Edinburgh in the 1950s Ten Years the Changed a City

EDINBURGH in the 1950s was a very different place. After the ravages of war, the International Festival and Military Tattoo was introduced as an antidote to post-war austerity, the new Civic Survey and Plan put forward grandiose recommendations for change, and a new young Queen visited the city. This was a time when slum housing was a blight on many people's lives, but there was a real sense of community that was ultimately lost in the move to sparkling, modern homes in the new housing estates. People continued to use the trams to travel to work in the many factories or make trips to Portobello for a day of fun, but they were slowly usurped by the car. It was a glory period for the local football teams, and nights spent dancing or at the pictures were a weekly event. There was still the horse-drawn milk float and children played in streets that were lit by gas. Beautifully illustrated with many previously unpublished photographs, Edinburgh in the 1950s provides an exceptional insight into a time now acknowledged as the end of an era in Edinburgh - for good and for bad.

Jack Gillon is a long term resident of Edinburgh and has worked as a Town Planner involved in the conservation of the city’s heritage of historic buildings for around thirty years and has an extensive knowledge of the city's history and architecture. He writes extensively on the historical heritage of Scotland and has had several books published by Amberley.David McLean along with Fraser Parkinson run the hugely popular 'Lost Edinburgh' Facebook page which has over 80,000 followers.Fraser Parkinson is a local author who runs the hugely popular 'Spirit of Leithers' page on Facebook which traces the social and architectural history of Leith through old images.