“The Vire was lowered once a year to clean the swimming school. It formed a hole in front of the house. My father cleaned it because, when we ate poultry or rabbit, we threw out the gouailles, the intestines, to attract the fish. And my father fished a lot! Three or four of us would go swimming in the Vire. I miss my house. Especially as it could have been repaired. The architect decided that we needed a street on the banks of the Vire...” Like 88-year-old Simone Vauttier, many Saint-Lô residents remember the old Saint-Lô. The one they knew before 1939. At that time, the town as it had been for generations had not yet been destroyed, but the lives of its inhabitants were already beginning to change.

This book is a written account of eighteen oral testimonies given by Saint-Lois men and women from all walks of life about their lives before the war. These interviews, conducted by Jessica Périsse and illustrated by photographic portraits by Jacques Marcel Blondel, provide an insight into the town's physiognomy before 1944, and the habits and mentalities of a bygone era.

Jessica Périsse is a journalist based in the west of France, working for the print media, in particular for the newspaper Ouest-France. She has also worked with La Dépêche du Midi, Le Télégramme, Téléobs, Itélé and TV Sud. Her favorite subjects are history, heritage, society, culture and defense.

Photographer Jacques Marcel Blondel works with the press and communications agencies. His work as an author is illustrated by photographic projects: in 2011, with an exhibition at the Conseil Régional de Basse-Normandie and the Conseil Général de la Manche on disabled people, and, in 2013, on the renovation of the Val-Saint-Jean district in Saint-Lô through a booklet and an exhibition.

LIVRE EDITION OREP (BAYEUX)