Isle of Man winter photos bring Manx history to life

A collection of 1,000 old photographs featuring winter scenes from the Isle of Man has been made available online.

The black and white images were taken between the 1950s and 1980s by the Manx Press Pictures agency.

They depict winter activities and landscapes including a snow-laden Douglas promenade, political protests and a visiting Santa Claus.

Manx National Heritage said the collection, dubbed This Is Winter, would "preserve memories".

The organisation's Jude Dicken said the photos could "engage people with their own living history".

She added: "These images aren't just of interest to the people who lived through those times, they're also very, very useful to social historians.

"People have hugely fond memories of the scenes shown in the photographs. This is our national memory."

The photos also capture a civil defence exercise preparing for nuclear war, and a demonstration outside Tynwald calling for pensioners to be paid a £10 winter fuel allowance.

Ms Dicken said going through the negatives in the Manx Picture Press archive was like "opening Pandora's Box".

"When we digitised them we didn't fully know what we were going to get," she added.

As well as the selection posted online, about 60 images have been put on display in an exhibition at the House of Manannan in Peel.

Manx Picture Press provided photographs for two Isle of Man newspapers until the early 1980s.