We would love to see any more that exist. As far as we know these are the only surviving photographs of any of the police boxes in Bristol. The railings around the box make us confident that this is the Sea Mills box. The second photograph (below) comes from a collection held by Baruch College Archives in New York, amongst a fascinating collection of photographs they have of British police boxes. Thanks to Richard Welch for providing that evidence. This was the first image we found and shows it’s position on the Square, opposite the red K6 public phone box. The one above is taken from the window above what was Welch’s drapers shop (now Collistear Beauty) on the Square. We are lucky to have a couple of photographs featuring the Sea Mills box. The file contains only one, quite poor image which may be one of the Bristol boxes and we don’t know which one. It shows that keeping them in good repair soon became an issue. Bristol Archives holds a file of original material relating to their installation and maintenance. It’s intriguing that so little evidence of them remains. Later that year two more boxes were installed bringing the total in Bristol to 13. The Western Daily Press reported on 22nd March 1932 that an informal ceremony was held, that day at the police box in St Edyth’s Road. We now know that it was certainly there, and that it lasted for sometime after 1944 with an alternate use – the local lollypop lady used it to store her lollypop. We first became interested in this at Sea Mills 100 because some local residents remembered there being a ‘TARDIS style’ police box on Sea Mills Square, others were equally adamant that it had never existed. Thirteen were installed in 1932 but by 1944 the decision had been made to replace them with much smaller police pillars. Do you remember there being TARDIS style police boxes in Bristol? Their time here was short lived, so not many people do.
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