What was Weatherfield like before "Corononation Street" started on television in 1960? Beginning in 1905, when the street was built, this book follows the characters' lives up to 1960, charting their tribulations and triumphs against the backdrop of those decades of change, which saw among things the Depression, the General Strike, two world wars, rationing, Queen Elizabeth's Coronation, the economic growth of the 1950s and the advent of television. Readers can observe the courtship of Stan and Hilda, glimpse Ken Barlow as a schoolboy, and hear the war memories of Albert Tatlock. This guide to the prehistory of Coronation Street includes photographs which capture those earlier times.