Rare and Stunning Color Photographs Offering a Glimpse of England in 1928 _ Ukhistorical

In the late 1920s and early 1930s National Geographic sent photographer Clifton R. Adams to England to record its farms, towns and cities, and its people at work and play.

According to Retronaut, Adams was 38 years old when he took these stunning color photographs by using the Autochrome process at that time. He photographed many other European countries, and working for National Geographic from 1920 until his death in 1934, aged just 44.

A policeman directs buses in the intersection of Trafalgar Square, London.

An informal portrait of a farmer and his cart, in Crowland, Lincolnshire. Decoy Farm is now the site of a recycling centre and a housing estate.

A police constable passes the day with farmers gathering hay, in Lancashire.

Two women rest for lunch in a Lancashire hayfield.

A young girl plays in the sand at Sandown, Isle of Wight.

Actors dress for a pageant as Britannia and her knights.

Two women buy ice cream from a vendor out of his converted car, in Cornwall.

A woman sticks her head out of her bridge house window, in Ambleside, Lake District, Cumbria, England.

A war veteran sells matches on the street, in Canterbury, Kent.

A young girl sells artificial flowers for charity on Alexandra Day, in Kent. The first Alexandra Rose Day was held in 1912; it commemorated the arrival in Britain of Princess Alexandra of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, from Denmark, in 1862.

Women selling Queen Alexandra roses for charity, in Seaford, East Sussex.

In Oxford, the corner of High street and Cornhill is bustling.

A view of the Cunard SS "Mauretania" at dock, in Southampton, Hampshire.

A view of a vine-covered house on a Stratford-upon-Avon street, in Warwickshire.

A young woman mails a letter at the pillar box, in Oxford.

Women have tea in front of the Clock House, originally a hospice, in Buckinghamshire.

A little boy mails a letter in the hedgerow, in Sussex.

A London double-decker bus stops to allow people aboard.

(Photos: Clifton R. Adams/National Geographic Creative/Corbis, via Mashable/ Retronaut)