John Topham

Who is John Topham?

John Topham was an English social documentary photographer.

He worked steadily from 1927 to 1973, documenting the "ordinary way of life of ordinary people...the little things of life - the way it really was." He is particularly noted for his photographs taken during the World War II era - with some appearing in Life magazine and one currently on display in the Imperial War Museum He amassed 121,228 negatives including 20,000 glass negatives of his earliest work.

The TopFoto collection in Edenbridge holds about 122,000 of his pictures, including 20,000 glass negatives. Topham worked closely with a Kentish Times photographer, Tom Fassam. Many of his prints of agricultural and rural interest are also on permanent loan to the Museum of Rural Life in Reading, courtesy of the TopFoto Archive.