This building on the left was known as Dronfield Castle, but was in fact a Victorian folly circa 1840 which had battlements and Gothic windows and straddled the River Drone at the bottom of Soaper Lane. It was lived in until after the Second World War and was eventually demolished in the early 1970's.
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A black and white photograph taken circa 1970 showing the view from Soaper Lane Railway Bridge looking at the cottages fronting Sheffield Road. The nearest cottage, 21 Sheffield Road, was the home of Mr. and Mrs Sanderson Bennett. Sanderson Bennett was a keen gardener with an allotment in Eldon Croft and he had been a mobile travelling haberdasher. Sanderson Bennett died in 1956, aged 80. At the top of the picture can be see a house on Scratters Lane, off Snape Hill. The dwelling in the centre of the photograph is Holborn House.
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The photograph shows shops and houses on the left. In the distance are the Bridge Inn and William Rhodes' Shops, now the Priory Flats. On the right is the junction with Soaper Lane coming down from the High Street. The buildings on the near left were demolished when Snape Hill was widened. Clothes indicate that the photo was taken in the late nineteenth or early twentieth century.
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A photograph showing the 'bottom yard' of the Lucas Foundry. Founded in 1790, the foundry manufactured spindles and flyers for the textile industry. In 1890, the firm split into two with a new 'top yard' forge manufacturing hundreds of different designs of spades and shovels. Bottom yard was on the site of a former dye works with a dam and workshops and was on the site of the present railway station. Samuel Lucas originally leased the site in 1811, buying it in 1822, and set up a foundry making malleable iron for castings for the engineering industry. He was joined by his brother Edward. There was a foundry on this site for 160 years.
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A photograph showing the shopping area on Sheffield Road, opposite the Lucas Foundry Bottom Yard. William Rhodes was an early tenant of numbers 4 - 10 and his shop, a drapers and gents outfitter, proudly announced that it had the first telephone in Dronfield. The shop later became A. E. Harrison's. The shop on the right is Lawson's ironmongers. The building dates from the early 19th century, and in the 20th century it was used as the gas offices. The building on this site today houses the Priory residential flats, a rebuild but in keeping with the original. The date of the image is unknown. Nelson's Confectioners, later Valerie's Clothes, was in this group of shops.
Sepia photograph of the Feast Procession opposite Church Crossing over the railway line on Sheffield Road, outside the Chemist Shop belonging to Twelves, the Bridge Inn and the Rhodes Shopping Emporium. The procession paused at intervals for hymn singing and a sermon. The clothes suggest a date of circa 1918. The gentleman in the centre of the photograph, in conversation with the man in the bowler hat, is believed to be Edward Carpenter.
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A black and white photograph taken from a commercial postcard by the Sheffield photographer and publisher Robert Sneath. Taken in the 1920's, it shows Sheffield Road and is looking south towards the railway station. The photograph shows the wooden ramp leading to a bridge over the railway to Lea Road (known locally as Station Road) which was necessary when the Midland Railway Line was built through Dronfield in 1870. The buildings on the left hand side are the William Rhodes shopping emporium, the Bridge Inn and the Rock Tavern. The vehicles are horse drawn carts or handcarts. The man in uniform on the left hand side is a railway worker. A prominent feature is the telegraph poles along the railway line. The wall on the right of the picture is the Lucas Foundry bottom yard.
A photograph showing the present wooden footbridge at Dronfield Railway Station. The footbridge carries pedestrians from Chesterfield Road over the railway line and onto Lea Road. Originally pedestrians had to cross the line at Church Crossing. In the background can be seen houses on Vale Close.
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