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Gifts Place History Book

Place History Book

Mock-up of our Grantchester village edition sample as an A4 hardback, with the cover from its print file: a photograph of the parish churchOur Grantchester sample book
Mock-up of our village edition sample, Grantchester, as an A4 hardback, with the cover from its print fileOur village edition sample (Grantchester)Pages 8 and 9 of our Grantchester sample, from the hardback print file, shown open: Map detective, the village on the 1886 Ordnance Survey map, with things to spotPages 8–9: the old mapPages 12 and 13 of our Grantchester sample, from the hardback print file, shown open: Eels, malt and the millPages 12–13: the millPages 14 and 15 of our Grantchester sample, from the hardback print file, shown open: the church of St Andrew and St MaryPages 14–15: the churchPages 16 and 17 of our Grantchester sample, from the hardback print file, shown open: the Old Vicarage and its ownersPages 16–17: one house

The story of a house, street or village, researched from real records and bound as a keepsake.

Three editions. We write about a whole village, a single street, or one house or building. Our Grantchester sample is a village edition; a house edition follows the same pattern, centred on your house and widening out to its street and village where the records do.

A house drawing (illustration)

Illustration of Audley Cottage, Grantchester, in ink and watercolour style: a white cottage with a weathered tiled roof, two chimneys, a dormer and a porch, with a cedar and a bare tree behind
Illustration of Audley Cottage, No. 35 Broadway, Grantchester, a listed house in our sample village. Drawn by us on computer after a photograph by Ethan Doyle White (2022), source, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. This drawing is an adaptation of that photograph and is shared under the same licence.

A house drawing is not included in the book yet. This illustration shows the kind of drawing we are working on.

Giving it for Christmas? Buy a Place History Book Gift Certificate (£79), available to order until Thursday 24 December. You get a printable certificate straight away, with an optional printed card, and the book follows in January.

Pages from our Grantchester sample

Sample book cover: Grantchester, CambridgeshireSample page: the manors of GrantchesterSample page: houses to look for

Picture credits and licences are listed on page 15 of the sample. The map is reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland.

The digital edition

The digital edition of our Grantchester sample on a tablet, open at the chapter Eels, malt and the mill

The digital edition is the full book as a PDF, to read on screen or print at home.

What's inside

  • 24 to 32 pages about your house, street or village
  • Historic Ordnance Survey maps, with "map detective" notes
  • Story chapters from published histories and records
  • A timeline, a houses-to-look-for list and a full source list
  • A dedication page with your own message
  • Optional bonus chapter: a family surname in the place's records (before 1921, open sources only)
  • Uncertain points clearly flagged. Nothing is invented.
History, not surveillance. We write about the past only. We don't research or name living private individuals, including current owners or neighbours. A building's history after about 1921 may be brief.

Where every fact comes from · the sample’s sources page

  1. A. P. M. Wright et al., “Grantchester”, in A History of the County of Cambridge and the Isle of Ely, vol. 5 (Victoria County History, 1973), pp. 198–214.
  2. Historic England, National Heritage List for England: list entries 1309436, 1309385, 1127790 and others.
  3. Ordnance Survey six-inch map, Cambridgeshire sheet XLVII.SW, surveyed 1885, published 1886 (National Library of Scotland).

Read a 16-page excerpt of our Grantchester sample book

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