A BOOK has been published highlighting the legacy of a Radcliffe photographer.

Joseph Hardman: Lakeland Photographer 1893-1972 by Anne Bonney tells of the life and career of a man whose name and work has only come to the fore in the last few years.

Born on January 21, 1893 in Ainsworth Road and the son of a yeast dealer, Joseph Hardman grew up in a working class mill family.

After his father died in 1895, he and his four siblings helped through part-time jobs at the local shuttle works.

The Britannia Shuttle Works (Francis Hill & Co Ltd) in Ebury Street employed between 80 to 100 men and boys and supplied 300,000 shuttles annually by steam power.

Growing up in the area he began to take a keen interest in drawing and the world around him and although he and his brother Walter moved to Kendal in 1911 in search of work, Joseph kept close ties with his home town.

After the war Hardman rekindled his love of photography and acquaintance Clarence Webb provided advice and guidance to the amateur who sold a few of his photographs to local newspapers.

His career began to flourish. Together he and his wife Edith would travel up to 200 miles a week by taxi to different parts of the Lake District, Westmorland, Cumberland and beyond.

Edith kept accurate records of the many thousands of glass plate negatives he took on his large heavy reflex camera recording the great changes and developments in agriculture and the rural way of life.

He followed the agricultural year — ploughing, sowing, hay-time and harvesting and travelled up hill and down dale capturing life and places in the many hamlets and villages trying to record as much as possible.

The Museum of Lakeland Life and Industry in Kendal holds over 4,500 glass plate negatives, with some of them digitised so that they can be seen online.

His pictures featured in newspapers and magazines both in the UK and America.

He took between 50,000 and 60,000 glass plate negatives on his large heavy reflex camera with many of them featuring in publications such as the Daily Mail.

He used to send them down on the evening train to Manchester and his brother-in-law Charles used to collect them off the train and hot foot it round to the various dailies in time for deadline.

Author Anne Bonney first learned about Hardman nearly 20 years ago after discovering his work when looking for photographs to illustrate a book.

She said: “I knew then I wanted to learn more about this photographer. The Hardman photographs stood out from the rest as they had that extra something and a few of them were used in the first book that I published“I came across Joseph’s work in countless times and learned that he died in 1972. Very little had actually been written about him and had received little recognition for the vast legacy of black and white photographs he had left us and decided to rectify this. I started researching the book four years ago.”

The book includes several of his black and white photographs with memories of the people who knew him and his wife.

The book costs £13.50. Contact Anne on 01539 561321 or anne.bonney1@btinternet.com