About Us

In 1949 two brothers,George and Douglas Weaver started a photographic business in Ashford, Kent. They mainly took photographs of people,places and events, such as Christmas parties, dog shows, village fetes, schools, churches, weddings, and major news events that would regularly appear in the national and local newspapers.  The area they covered was from Ashford, Kent (their base) out to Sussex and on occasions London. The indexes written at the time were not always that comprehensive, especially in the earlier years.  They usually gave the reference number, name or place and the date although at the beginning just the month was shown.

George and Douglas Weaver with Ian Gambrill 1972

In 1963 when Ian Gambrill was 16 years old he went to work as an apprentice to the Weaver Brothers.  After he completed his apprenticeship he continued working alongside the other photographers, Dave Downey, Tom Bader and Brenda Sacre the receptionist.  Just after Ian started working for the Weavers he met Sue Draper, courted and eventually married her in 1969.Three years later the Weaver Brothers decided to retire and suggested that Sue and Ian might like to buy the business, which they did.  Included in the sale were all their old negatives, together with the copyright, going back to 1949.

Sue Gambrill 2006

Over the years Sue and Ian moved their business premises four times and each time they moved the negative library, which continued to grow and grow.  They have just sold their main business (Industrial and Aerial Photography) and have decided that now would be the time to try and put all the old images onto a website.  Sue started investigating her family history in 2004 and has realised how important these old photographs could be to so many people.  Apart from people carrying out family history there are also authors, publishers, advertising agencies and television and film companies to name but a few.

There are over 200,000 negatives from the old library and it will take a long time to put the pictures onto the website.  Initially they hope to have a couple of thousand images with additional images added regularly.  At the same time they intend to create another side to the website with current images of people and places, also aviation (Ian's passion), not only in Kent but around Great Britain.

Circus in Ashford 1953	Hop Picking Tenterden 1954	North Modern Boys Football Team Ashford 1949

There will be no charge for searching the images, but good quality prints can be obtained either by using the online ordering service or by contacting Sue and Ian by telephone.

The early indexes have few details so if anyone has any information regarding any of our images we would be grateful to receive it.  Please send us an email using our HELP US page.

Queen Mother at Ferry Field, Lydd Airport 1958	Millennium Dome, Greenwich 2001	Wedding 1950

If anybody objects to any of the images being on this website would they please send an email to info@reflections-images.co.uk