Children paddling on the beach

In 1903 little children timidly enjoy the waves, the girls careful not to get their summer dresses wet. I wonder what happened to them as they grew up. They could have lived through two world wars.

A real gem!

We went to a auction in Bordeaux last Friday. It was a really good day. We managed to get some good lots and amongst the postcards was this one. There were two postcards made of the artist, Alfred Renaudin, at work on the banks of the river Moselle in the Lorraine region of France.

This is the rarer of the two. Alfred Renaudin (1866 – 1944) was a French landscape painter who was most active between the wars although this postcard was sent in 1905.

I looked on the internet to see if I could find the final painting, nowhere to be seen. Perhaps it’s in a private collection.

A stroll by the beach

Around 115 years ago Royan would have looked like this. Most of it was destroyed by the allies in WWII. I can’t help wondering if the ladies talking their walk would have been affected by the train passing so close just above them. It would have been very noisy, to say the least.