I love looking at old photos of familiar places or people. There is something mystical about seeing one of the main streets of my home city as it appeared in the 1800s. I see buildings I recognise next to others I don’t. There is enough to anchor me in place and yet it seems so alien.
I’ve been looking at a lot of old family photos recently – my grandparents as children and young adults. I see the essence of the person I know, and yet is another sense this is a person that I never knew. What would it be like to travel backward and meet them in their youth?
This fascination is one of the many reasons that I loved Back to the Future, and time-travel stories in general. Check out the two photos below, from the main street of Swansea on the east coast of Tasmania.
Notice the Morris General Store in both photos. This historic building is our anchor. The first photo was taken in 1948 by my grandparents on their honeymoon. The second was taken by me on our Christmas holiday last month. (I kinda want to go back and take a photo from the same angle as the first now).
The impressive historic building was already 110 years old when my grandparents photographed it. Today it serves as part of the local IGA Supermarkert as well as a museum. There is a sign out the front listing the store owners all the way back to the 1800s. It has been a family-run business for over a century.
I wonder what ordinary landmarks of today will serve as historical treasures over the next couple of centuries?
If you like this, share the love
by 
