We have been doing some preliminary work of the changing demographics of the antique trade in the 20th century, looking, initially, at the shifting locations in British cities, towns and villages occupied by antique dealers – this will be something that is much easier to do once the Antique Dealer Project Interactive Website has greater concentrations of data (we are working on that!).
We thought however, as it’s the summer and many of us are winding down, having a holiday or generally relaxing (supposed to be anyway), we would have a little SUMMER COMPETITION – based on hard academic research of course!
So we have devised a Competition, and everyone can join in –
THE COMPETITION: You must correctly LIST the TOP THREE town/cities in Britain in 1976 that had the MOST NUMBER of ANTIQUE DEALERS. Please exclude CAPITAL CITIES of the COUNTRIES making up the UNITED KINGDOM. So do not include LONDON (which had 1,233 dealers in 1976); or EDINBURGH (which had 105 dealers in 1976); or CARDIFF (which had 21 dealers in 1976); or BELFAST (which had 8 dealers in 1976).
We even have a PRIZE for the WINNER. A copy of ‘A Biographical Dictionary of 19th Century Antique & Curiosity Dealers’ (written by our own Project Lead, Mark – published by the Regional Furniture Society (2009; republished 2011) – this copy is unsigned, and they are the rare ones!
The COMPETITION is open all – anyone, anywhere in the WORLD – it is OPEN NOW (1st August 2015) and closes on 6.00pm on FRIDAY on 21st August 2015.
RULES of COMPETITION
You need to email your entries to antiquedealers@leeds.ac.uk -please include your name and address in the email.
Only ONE prize is available, so it will be on the FIRST CORRECT ENTRY LISTING THE TOP THREE LOCATIONS FOR DEALERS IN 1976 drawn at random from all correct entries received by the closing date. If there are no correct entries the submitted entry that is nearest to the correct answer will be given the PRIZE. We will post the Dictionary to the WINNER on MONDAY 24th AUGUST.
We will reveal the TOP TEN towns/cities with concentrations of dealers in Britain in 1976 on FRIDAY 21st AUGUST 2015.
GOOD LUCK!
HAVE FUN!
Mark
antiquedealersblog 
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