THE importance of clocks in Winchester.

The Guildhall clock was lit up in tribute to NHS last Thursday evening at 8pm as hundreds of people, if not thousands, went to their windows, doors, balconies and back gardens to clap their thanks to the medical and other emergency services working through the crisis.

The main photo was sent in by David Arthur and shows city council workmen maintaining the clock at the Old Guildhall. It is held at the Hampshire Archives.

It was taken in the early 1950s and at the top shows Mr Arthur’s father Ted, working at a time when health and safety was not as strictly enforced as it is today.

In many places the striking clock towering over the High Street would have become an important meeting place. But that role was taken by the Buttercross where one can comfortably rest on the steps as one waits for one’s rendezvous.

The sign for The Dolphin Inn marked the pub on the corner of St Thomas Street, now occupied by Joules ladies clothes shop. The pub closed in the early 1980s.