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Lost archive rediscovered
by Simon at 21:13 16/06/13 (Blogs::Simon)
Today at the monument I met Richard Bailey, the son of T.A. Bailey, the Chief Architect of the Ministry of Works from the 1950s who supervised the restoration of fallen and leaning stones at Stonehenge in the 1950s.
He's the young boy in this photo which was recently reproduced in Heritage Today and prompted him to go through his father's archive of material relating to his 18 years at the Ministry of Works.

Amongst the many fascinating items he brought along to the site to show us (including the original plans for the existing visitor centre from the 1960s - now we've got a chance of discovering where the electricity and plumbing infrastructure is actually located!) was this ceremonial key, used to unlock the gate to the subway under the A344 upon its official opening on 9th July 1968.

An absolutely delight to meet him and hear his stories, including how he put a 1958 penny beneath Stone 58 as it was lowered back into its stonehole during the re-erection of the west trilithon in 1958.

Apparently the archive is extensive, and now he knows how excited we all were to see the few items he brought along he's going to go through it in detail to see what else is there.

I can't wait to see the rest!
--
simon

Attachments...
JPG image (43 K) Richard Bailey
JPG image (305 K) Key
JPG image (373 K) Key (reverse)
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