James Gray: Seven Dials crossing, January 1908. Hard to realise that a policeman was needed to control traffic in those days. jgc_26_157
2019: On the far left No 1 Goldsmid Road, no longer a private house, has lost its balcony and garden with surrounding wall [also seen and mentioned by James Gray in jgc_26_165 on the Dyke Road (2) page] while the garden of Selbourne House (right of centre) has been built over with shop premises. Otherwise all the visible buildings are remarkably unchanged. Trams, carts and policemen directing traffic have gone; there is now a roundabout with the welcome presence of newly planted trees. (Photographer: Mathia Davies)
James Gray: A view of Dyke Road and Prestonville Road in the 1870s. This area started to develop about 1850. The houses on the left had all been built by 1855, and were then known as 1/7 Peel Terrace. Most of these buildings still stand, though in a different form, as they were long ago converted to shops on the ground floor, with Barclays Bank at the triangular corner.
James Gray: This picture taken in 1955 needs no comment. It is very similar to the larger photograph on another page [jgc_26_152]. jgc_26_156
2019: At the time of the 1955 photograph, the corner building on the left was still a bank; it now houses a Small Batch Coffee Roasters café. The shop premises built in front of Selbourne House (central in both pictures, between Prestonville Road and Chatham Place) is a launderette. The beautiful clock crowning the building has been lost. Gone too are the overhead electric wires. (Photographer: Mathia Davies)
James Gray: Three photographs of this junction [jgc_26_152, 153 and 156], though not so busy in those days. In this view in 1907, when the traffic was hardly enough to keep the policeman occupied. jgc_26_152
2019: Selbourne House, in the centre of both images, at the corner of Prestonville Road and Chatham Place, still had a garden in 1907. The property gives the impression of being a private house, but it had been for many years a private school. Today the ground floor extension houses a launderette. (Photographer: Mathia Davies)
James Gray: View of the Dials in 1955, replete with lamp and trolley bus standards and guard rails. The gas board showroom was built over the garden of Selbourne House in 1933, whilst the Lloyds Bank building on the opposite corner dates from 1922. jgc_26_150
2019: As it is no longer advisable to stand in the road here, the 2019 image is taken from the pavement and therefore gives a full view of the elm (see jgc_26_148 below), seen behind the Belisha beacon. This tree was condemned for removal during the refurbishment of the Seven Dials roundabout but was saved by a 2013 campaign which involved protesters spending all night in its branches.
James Gray: Contrasting photographs with 50 years between them. (See following.) Here a tram turns from Dyke Road into Chatham Place, thought to have been about 1905. Note the overhead electric wires at the right, leading from the main wires in use. These were intended for use with a short double track spur in Goldsmid Road as far as the then Hove boundary. This was never used though the rails remained until the 1920s. jgc_26_155
James Gray: A view of Seven Dials in 1906, looking from Vernon Terrace across to Chatham Place. A tram can be seen ascending the hill. Contrast this scene with that in the previous photograph [jgc_26_150]. jgc_26_148
2019: Despite the changes of more than a hundred years, this vista is instantly recognisable today.