The Britain of the 1970s now feels like a country undergoing a dramatic transformation. Pulling ourselves away from mid-century austerity, we attempted to embrace new technology, new lifestyles, even a new form of currency – while also, perhaps, harbouring nagging doubts about the tidal wave of modernity rapidly racing inland to sweep away the last vestiges of post-war grimness.

It’s a transformation captured perfectly by the mid-1970s childhood snaps of Matt Sawyer, living in a London high-rise and holidaying in the haunted lanscapes of Kent.

Over to you, Matt…

“I was born in 1970. When steam’s fires had gone cold and the locomotives were lined up, waiting to be cut up. NASA still sent men to the moon. Shillings were still with us, but not for long. It was the cusp of an era, on the margins between ages, and that’s what this holiday photo reminds me of. The modern pram that converted to a pushchair – mum was very proud of that. The stack of wooden beer crates next to plastic milk crates. The pleasingly wooden shop front, advertising very modern frozen cod in batter.

“My childhood did seem rather like that. That mixture of old and new. I think, when this photo was taken, we were still living 15 floors up in one of the new post-war dreams. There were signs saying ‘New Pence’ everywhere, they confused me for years. My ex-London County Council school got fluorescent tubes, and our house was converted to North Sea gas during the hottest summer for centuries.

“Our holidays remained resolutely in the past, however. No package holidays in the sun for us. No holiday cottages. Just a very old tent (no plastic windows here) and a withdrawn GPO van to which my dad deftly added windows and bunks. And even though we could have gone to Cornwall, or Scotland, or the Lake District or even to France, our holidays remained resolutely in the southeast corner of Kent, along with, to be fair, a sizeable chunk of southeast London.

“I didn’t realise it then, but if there’s a Haunted Generation landscape then it’s Romney Marsh, with its reclaimed lands and its constant soundtrack of seabirds. Its old smuggling towns cashed in on the legend of Dr Syn – vicar by day and eerie scarecrow by night, leader of the smugglers. Best of all, there was Dungeness. A place, in every sense, on the margins. Seemingly both sea and land at once, and feeling a million miles away from London.

“Known to Doctor Who fans as the location for ‘The Claws of Axos’, Dungeness remains a unique place. Technically a desert, this vast inland shingle plain feels like the end of the world. You’ll find lighthouses, arty gardens (most famously Derek Jarman’s) and old railway carriages used as homes, topped off with local fish and chips, a nuclear power station and the world’s smallest public railway. It’s telling that the shingle disturbed by the Doctor Who team in 1971 remains exactly how they left it.

“Not of much interest to us kids, then. The small fairground at Dymchurch and the endless sandy beaches of St Mary’s Bay were far more interesting. But our final trip, when I was nearly 12, saw me develop a growing fascination for the bleak view of the power station, seen across the shingle from – finally – our holiday bungalow.

“These days, I like the odd trip down there just to soak up the weirdness of the place, and I’ve introduced a fair few people to its bizarre magnetism. That photo, featuring a long-gone Lyons Maid metal bin, may well be from the Haunted Generation era, but Dungeness has never really left it.”

Thanks, Matt. The Dark Room is a collaborative effort. If anyone would like to contribute their own childhood photos from the era, I would be utterly delighted – please drop me a line using the “Contact” link at the top of the page. Thanks so much.

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