Back Cover of the First Jean Petrie Photograph Album

Category

Museums & Galleries Item

Item no

52324

Title

Back cover of the first Jean Petrie photograph album

Description

Back cover of the first of two photograph albums of Jean Petrie as a young girl, containing various photographs of Jean at home in Edinburgh and on family trips.

Accession number

MC883.81

Copyright

The City of Edinburgh Council Museums & Galleries

Jean Petrie was born in 1920 in Lossiemouth, the home of her maternal grandmother. Her parents, James and Ethel, both worked in communications, James as a surveyor and Ethel as a telephone supervisor for the Post Office.

James worked in Africa on the Gold Coast for much of Jean's childhood and the photograph albums were made so that he could see the progress of her childhood. The family home was 2 Boswall Loan, Granton and then 3 Columba Road, Blackhall, Edinburgh.

Because the albums were compiled to show Jean's childhood, they tell the story of every day life in a way many albums, which usually focus on holidays and special occasions, do not. The albums are a unique record of a child's life and have an ability to show the world through Jean's eyes. When the albums were donated to the Museum of Childhood, Jean told the curators "I was perpetually photographed to keep him [her father] in touch with the progress of his only child".

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