Sun-Ray Photo Co.

The Sun Ray Photo company was a created pre-WWII walking picture firm operating in Scarborough.  They had two shops, at 7 Valley Bridge Parade and 28 Newborough, which runs through the town and down to the seafront. The photographers would walk along popular tourist routes, taking pictures of people, which could then be purchased from one of their physical sites. Numbers are often ‘scribbled’ on the images, these numbers would have to be quoted when the portraits were collected. During the winter the photographers, if not laid off, would work from the studios, or travel around the area taking pictures of scenes for postcards.

In 1930/1 Sun Ray employed John Frederick Staniforth who had experience in wireless construction, which Sun Ray also did at the time. He worked as outside photographer for a single season before being laid off with six other operators. His son describes his work, “…walking the sands and tempting holidaymakers to have their picture taken. These could be viewed later, on display boards set up at the exit slopes from the beaches. The technique called for taking the pictures during the early part of the day, then rushing back to the darkroom to develop the negatives and print them into proof form, then getting them back to the sands. There the photos were displayed, in good time to catch people as they left the beach for their boarding houses.” Later he opened his own photographic companies in Scarborough, Castle Snaps and in 1935 Stan’s Snaps.