Every Friday I send out an email that features photos from the Rupert Leach Collection, snaps taken from the personal View-Master reels of View-Master’s Director of Photography in the 1940s and 50s. These never-before-published images show alternative shots of some commercial View-Master reels and personal photos of Leach, his wife Poppy, and others.
I try to get to the bottom of the people and places pictured within. Let’s dig in!
This week’s reel takes us to the magical realm of King Arthur in Glastonbury, England. We will be poking around this area for the next three Leach Collection emails, so feel free to get up to date on this place with my favorite tour guide, Rick Steves:
I care about history, but I love lore. And Glastonbury is chock-full of both!
Let’s dig into this reel:
For View-Master nerds: There’s no specific Glastonbury reel that I could find, but single reel #1035 “Somerset Scenes” includes a couple of stunning 3D shots of the ruins!
The ruins of Glastonbury Abbey are a key tourist attraction and the center of a lot of history and legend:
The abbey was founded in the 8th century and enlarged in the 10th. It was destroyed by a major fire in 1184 but subsequently rebuilt and by the 14th century was one of the richest and most powerful monasteries in England….
From at least the 12th century, the Glastonbury area has been associated with the legend of King Arthur, a connection promoted by medieval monks who asserted that Glastonbury was Avalon. Christian legends have claimed that the abbey was founded by Joseph of Arimathea in the 1st century.
I think what I really learned this week is that the monks in charge at Glastonbury Abbey waaaaay back in the day were truly incredible at marketing, because most of the legends surrounding the abbey and the area can be traced to them with nothing much but faith to back them up. They had a real knack for building legends, and I respect that.
There must be some significance to this spot and what they are looking up at, but I’m unclear what it is. Was this simply a thing tourists did/do among the ruins? Maybe, but you know I like to make up stories so, in my mind, all of their travels for View-Master was just a cover for their real quest — the quest for the Holy Grail! Which means they are standing there staring up at something to figure out part of the mystery, like in that delightfully silly movie National Treasure?
The Glastonbury thorn is a form of common hawthorn [tree] … found in and around Glastonbury, Somerset, England. Unlike ordinary hawthorn trees, it flowers twice a year… the first time in winter and the second in spring. The tree is also widely called the holy thorn, though this term strictly speaking refers to the original (legendary) tree.
So, why is the tree legendary?
According to legend, Joseph of Arimathea visited Glastonbury with the Holy Grail and thrust his staff into Wearyall Hill, which then grew into the original thorn tree…. The historicity of Joseph's presence in Glastonbury remains controversial, but the thorn is first mentioned in a pamphlet published by Richard Pynson in 1520 called Lyfe of Joseph of Armathie, which was almost certainly commissioned by Glastonbury Abbey. In this account, the miraculous winter-flowering Thorn is paired with an equally remarkable walnut tree that grew in the Abbey grounds and was said to flower on Midsummer's Day. Both were seen as marks of divine favour, proof that Glastonbury was 'the holyest erth of Englande'.
It’s said that the original was chopped down in the 1600s. And terrible people destroyed grafted versions again and again. Why are people like this? I will never know.
The present "sacred thorn tree" at the Church of St John was grown from a local cutting, like many others in the neighbourhood of Glastonbury. …Trees survive from earlier grafts to perpetuate the Glastonbury legend, among them two other holy thorns in the grounds of St John's.
Unusually, this photo was blurry in the reel! From what I could gather, this is the tomb of the last abbot of Glastonbury, Richard Whiting, who met a rather bleak fate:
Whiting presided over Glastonbury Abbey at the time of the Dissolution of the Monasteries (1536–1541) under King Henry VIII of England. The king had him hanged, drawn and quartered after his conviction for treason for remaining loyal to Rome. He is considered a martyr by the Catholic Church, which beatified him on 13 May 1895.
Whiting’s head was fastened over the west gate of the newly deserted abbey! Given his manner or death, odds are his actual remains are not in the tomb.
Today the Chalice Well is, of course, a tourist spot with a trust running the whole thing. That started in 1959. This photo predates that, which is neat. Also neat: Evidence suggests that the well has been in almost constant use for at least two thousand years.
Wells often feature in Welsh and Irish mythology as gateways to the spirit world. The overlapping of the inner and outer worlds is represented by the well cover, designed by the church architect and archaeologist Frederick Bligh Bond and presented as a gift after the Great War in 1919. The two interlocking circles constitute the symbol known as the Vesica Piscis. In the well lid design, a spear or a sword bisects these two circles, a possible reference to Excalibur, the sword of the legendary King Arthur, believed by some to be buried at the nearby Glastonbury Abbey.
Christian mythology suggests that Chalice Well marks the site where Joseph of Arimathea placed the chalice that had caught the drops of Christ's blood at the Crucifixion, linking the Well to the wealth of speculation surrounding the existence of the Holy Grail. [I TOLD YOU THAT IS WHAT THIS IS ALL ABOUT!—RK] … "It is said that beneath its waters Joseph of Arimathea hid the Chalice of the Last Supper and immediately the waters flowed red….
According to local lore, the waters from this well have three attributes in common with human blood: the waters are warm, red and coagulate! The water in the well is often warmer than the surface ground temperature and roses bloom near it even in winter.
And it’s the Glastonbury Thorn that blooms in the Chalice Well garden each Christmas!
If you made it this far you should smash that ❤️ button so I know you’re out there and following along. Thanks for reading, friends!
So much lore! No doubt there are additional secrets hidden in the stones of those walls.
Have you ever visited the general area yourself? (You may now.)