When an amateur restorer discovered slides showing street scenes from early 20th century Middleton – located near Manchester in the UK- he was keen to find out where exactly they were taken.

With the help of local historians, he was able to track down the location of some of the photos. But is there another way to identify where these historical photos were taken?

Using historical Ordnance Survey (OS) maps we were able to independently locate a number of the images. Here’s a quick guide to how we did it.