The High Wycombe Society has recently received a donation consisting of a collection of Estate Agents’ brochures for High Wycombe property auctions during the latter half of the twentieth century.

Most of these contain schematic plans which show the exact location of the various shops in the town centre as they were in 1950s/60s/70s and 80s.

These are an absolute goldmine for those people interested in studying how the town centre developed in that period.

Bucks Free Press:

The plan accompanying the brochure for the sale of No.1 Crendon St is shown here. This shows the premises located around the junction of the High St, Easton St, Crendon St, and Queen Victoria Rd in 1967. No.1 Crendon St was advertised as a “Valuable Freehold Shop Investment” and was for sale by auction “By Order of the Executors of the Estate of Miss N. Dyson deceased”.

The auction was to take place at The Guildhall on Friday June 2, 1967 at 3.00pm.

Many readers might well have fond memories of quite a few of the premises shown in the location plan, such as:

The Imperial Stores on the corner of the High St with Corporation St. This is the substantial three storey building originally built for Davenport Vernon’s ironmongers stores and now occupied by Santander Bank.

Imperial Stores were primarily grocers, their first store in Wycombe being established around 1920 in Crendon St, before moving to the High St site some 10 years later. Initially the shop only occupied a part of the ground floor of that site before expanding to take over the whole of the ground floor, and included a Health Centre. The second floor was occupied by the Royal Liver Assurance Office and the third floor by the Bucks School of Music.

Vera Williams, a ladies dress shop, situated on the opposite corner to No. 1 Crendon St (the premises being auctioned).

The men outfitters Lemmings, then in Easton St, who were still located in the town until a few years ago.

Jackie Kay of the High Wycombe Society is to be congratulated for making these brochures available on the Society’s website at http://www.highwycombesociety.org.uk/going-going-gone/. The brochures are minimally introduced with links so that you can click right through to scanned versions of individual brochures.