Thread by @YourWullie

John Claridge was born in Plaistow, London in 1944 and began taking photos of the East End as a teenager in the 1960s. 
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Here are some of those images.
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Self-Portrait with Keith, E7, 1961.
Claridge was 17 in this photo.

H Goldstein butchers, 1966.

‘These two brothers owned the butcher’s shop. After I had taken the photograph I mentioned that they must have done well today as there was only one chicken left. One of the brothers replied “No! We only have one chicken!”’

Photograph: John Claridge

Corsetiere, 1961.

‘As I was photographing this shop window, a man passing by asked what I was doing. I replied that it was a beautiful window of corsets. He looked me up and down and said “No son, there’s something wrong with you!” and marched off.

Housing, East End London, 1963
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‘Everything was quiet in this building, almost like wandering into an unknown world. It was dark and damp with the stairs worn hollow. For me, it was both surreal and mundane at the same time’

Shoe repairers, Spitalfields, 1969.
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“Everyone worked in the docks, did a bit of boxing or they were villains. My dad went to sea when he was 13, he did bare-knuckle boxing, he knew how to rig a ship from top to bottom, and he sold booze in the states during prohibition"

A lady at her window, 1963.
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"I used to get up at five in the morning to talk to him (Dad) before he went to work and he told me stories, that was my education. People say life was hard in the East End"

Ross Bakeries, 1966.
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‘During the 60s one saw the demise of many corner shops. A chipping away of local communities and the encroachment of tower blocks, the East End was in transformation’

Jim Scanlan, 1966
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‘This was our next door neighbour. I remember my Mum getting his shopping for him whenever he was a bit unwell. He always had a twinkle in his eye and a smile. He was one of the most gentle and charming people I’ve ever met, but with a wicked sense of humour’

Newsagent, Spitalfieds, 1966

Fishmongers unloading fish from Grimsby, East End, 1966,

West Ham's groundsman, 1964
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"He was the groundsman at the Memorial Ground where I played football aged ten in 1954,"

‘At the Salvation Army’s Booth House, I asked this gentleman if I could take his portrait to which he replied, “Of course, old chap.” What surprised me was his posh accent. He then started quoting from Freud and Shakespeare telling me who said what. But I never knew his story’

The window on the top right of this photograph was John Claridge’s former bedroom when he took this portrait of his neighbours in Plaistow – Mr & Mrs Jones – in 1968, on a visit home in his early twenties.

Woman holding a joint of meat in the doorway of a butchers in Spitalfields in 1966

‘I have always been drawn towards signs, typography and abstract graffiti. I think this photograph has all of the above. It also tells a story of the fragmentation of the East End during the 1960s’

Photograph: John Claridge

Claridge had taken a picture of the outside of this woman's shop and she then asked him in for a slice of apple strudel, E2, 1962.

Woman with gumball machine, Spitalfields, 1967

Clocking in at the Truman Brewery, Brick Lane, 1964

Kosher Butcher, E2, 1962

Saveloy stall, Spitalfieds, 1967

Tubby Isaac's, Spitalfieds, 1982

Goldstein Butchers, Spitalfields, 1966.

“This is a group portrait of friends outside of their shop. The two brothers who ran the shop, the lady who worked round the corner and the guy who worked in the back,”

The Street Lamp, 1968
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‘Something about this location always reminded me of a De Chirico painting, although not in colour. Something about the architecture and this solitary man’s journey’

Anglo Pak Muslim Butcher, E2, 1962

Spillers, 1987
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‘The buildings look like tombstones complete with their inscriptions, rather appropriate given they have now died a death in an area of East London called Silvertown! Although this photograph was taken in 1987, I think it related more to George Orwell’s 1984’