Wessex - Somerset - Avon - Wiltshire - Dorset

Wessex: Somerset, Avon, Wiltshire, Dorset (c.1980) – West Country Tourist Board
West Country Tourist Board | ISBN: None
Condition: Good | Sold by Crappy Old Books

The West Country. That glorious corner of England where rolling hills, ancient villages, magnificent coastlines and reassuringly substantial cream teas combine to create the impression that civilisation reached its peak sometime around 1935 and has been gradually deteriorating ever since. Here, the roads are narrow, the pubs are picturesque, the scenery is magnificent and the locals have traditionally regarded visitors from London with a mixture of commercial enthusiasm and profound suspicion.

Welcome to Wessex: Somerset, Avon, Wiltshire, Dorset, a delightful vintage tourist publication produced by the West Country Tourist Board around 1980, when holidays were planned with paper maps, accommodation brochures and an optimistic belief that the weather would improve by Wednesday.

The title evokes the ancient kingdom of Wessex, that historically distinguished region of southern England whose name still conjures images of Saxon kings, medieval churches, rural landscapes and the fictional world of Thomas Hardy, where everybody seemed to spend an extraordinary amount of time falling in love with unsuitable people and suffering the consequences.

Somerset offers its rolling countryside, historic towns, dramatic gorges and the magnificent city of Wells, while Wiltshire contributes ancient monuments, mysterious prehistoric landscapes and Stonehenge, where generations of visitors have stood contemplating how prehistoric people managed to move enormous stones without the assistance of a decent crane.

Dorset provides spectacular coastal scenery, attractive villages and enough Hardy associations to make even a perfectly cheerful afternoon feel faintly tragic. Avon, meanwhile, represents a particularly interesting historical curiosity, being the short-lived county created in 1974 and abolished in 1996. Its appearance in the title immediately identifies this publication as belonging to a distinctive chapter in British local government history.

There is something wonderfully appealing about tourist literature from this period. Long before online reviews, smartphone navigation and accommodation websites displaying seventeen photographs of the same bathroom, prospective holidaymakers relied upon printed guides to discover where they might go, what they might see and whether the local attractions justified spending six hours in a car with three increasingly argumentative children.

Such publications also offer a fascinating snapshot of how regions presented themselves to visitors. Historic houses, scenic drives, market towns, seaside resorts and rural tranquillity were promoted with enthusiasm, while traffic jams, disappointing weather and the possibility of finding the entire village closed on a Sunday generally received rather less attention.

Dating from approximately 1980, this West Country Tourist Board publication is an appealing piece of regional tourism history, reflecting an era when the British holiday industry operated at a considerably more leisurely pace.

This Good-condition copy, offered by Crappy Old Books, will interest collectors of vintage travel literature, local historians, enthusiasts of Somerset, Avon, Wiltshire and Dorset, and anyone nostalgic for the days when planning a holiday involved unfolding a map across the kitchen table.

A charming journey into the West Country as it was promoted nearly half a century ago, when a pleasant country inn, a scenic view and a reasonably priced bed and breakfast were sufficient ingredients for a successful holiday.

And if the weather turned dreadful, there was always a stately home to visit.

Or, more importantly, a pub.

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