Jericho Sketchbook
Preface
by Norman Pollock
Canal Street
There are a variety of reports and publications on Jericho but no sketchbook containing drawings of houses, street scapes, pubs, schools, churches, shops and businesses with accompanying text that seeks to explain the early setting and later nineteenth and twentieth century growth of Jericho. I was partly encouraged to produce a sketchbook with the help of my co-author because I had come across a number of sketchbooks illustrating in an interesting way the development of small towns in South Australia and other states in Australia.
Jericho has survived as an inner-city suburb with a distinct personality despite the many changes and challenges it has faced in the 170 years of its existence, such as the Oxford Movement of the nineteenth century and Inspector Morse of the late twentieth century. It almost ceased to exist as a residential area when determined attempts were made to turn it into an extension of Oxford's commercial core and into a wilderness of car parks and offices. Although it survived that battle, it still has to face the inexorable pressure of increasing traffic, road congestion, parking, noise and other nuisances.
Jericho has none of the architectural grandeur, and venerable age of collegiate Oxford. Beaumont Palace, Gloucester College and other monastic institutions, now exist only in name. It has a workaday appeal that is noticeable on walking around the area observing the many different architectural styles and variations in the patterns of brickwork, doors, windows, fanlights, chimneys and roofs. Superficially houses may appear the same, but on closer inspection, especially when sketching a building, interesting differences appear. It is, however, not only the streets and houses that vary considerably; the composition of Jericho's population has also changed. Most of the old families have gone, and a much wider range of people now lives here - academics, artists, writers, professional people and so on.
Jericho has survived as an inner city suburb with a distinct personality despite the many changes and challenges it has faced in the 170 years of its existence, such as the Oxford Movement of the nineteenth century and Inspector Morse of the late twentieth century. It almost ceased to exist as a residential area when determined attempts were made to turn it into an extension of Oxford's commercial core and into a wilderness of car parks and offices. Although it survived that battle, it still has to face the inexorable pressure of increasing traffic, road congestion, parking, noise and other nuisances.
