English Heritage is encouraging visitors to share their holiday snaps of trips to Stonehenge – the older the better – to help celebrate the 100th anniversary of the monument belonging to the nation.

The charity is aiming to create a digital album of pictures ranging from black and white photos from the era when visitors could wander right up to the great stones, and even sit on them, to more modern ones taken with digital cameras and phones.

To drum up interest the charity has released a series of touching “then and now” pictures in which visitors returned to the Wiltshire site and re-created treasured family images dating back to the 1970s, 80s and 90s.

• Pull yellow button left to right to see paired pictures

American Taney Roniger with her father and now her husband American Taney Roniger’s mother photographed her, aged two with her father in 1971. Almost 50 years later, Taney once again posed in the same spot, only with her husband this time, who wore the same woolly jumper as her father did in the original photo.

Among those who returned was Taney Roniger, an American, who was only three when she visited Stonehenge in 1971 with her parents.

Roniger was photographed by her mother, appearing with her father, a US army doctor stationed in Belgium, leaning against one of the stones. Almost 50 years later she was once again posed in the same spot, but with her husband this time, who wore the same woolly jumper as her father had done in the first photo.

Roniger said: “I remember a feeling of vastness at the stones. The original is one of my favourite photographs, I really treasure it. Returning to Stonehenge after all those years was really special. The stones were overwhelming, I had the sense that they were bigger even than my first visit, and it felt like my parents were with me.”

The images are not exact copies. Even at the times when they are allowed within the stone circle visitors were not encouraged to lean agains the stones, as Roniger and her father did.

Another visitor, Bob Heyhoe, said: “My father worked six days a week and every Sunday would take the family for a day out somewhere interesting, and that day he decided we would go to Stonehenge. Our family were close and my mother recorded the moment with one photo taken on our Brownie box camera. The photo was found a few weeks after my mother died, and returning to Stonehenge today stirs up memories of a really special family day out.”

Jane Vellender was five years old when she visited Stonehenge for the day with her family in the 60s and sat on one of the stones for her picture. “Standing in the same spot now as I did nearly 50 years ago, I’m just aware of how fast time passes, and yet how the memory of being here then is still so fresh,” she said.

Sue Lane Sue Lane was four years old when she visited Stonehenge with her mother and grandparents in 1966.

Sue Lane was four when an image of her was taken in 1966. “It was a blowy day, I had just recovered from measles and in the photo my mother is shielding me from the wind,” she said. “The slide was treasured and kept in a box, and would be projected on my nan’s lounge wall every Christmas, along with other favourite family snaps.”

Kate Davies, English Heritage’s director of Stonehenge, said: “People have been visiting Stonehenge for centuries and since the 19th century people have felt compelled to take photos of themselves and their loved ones in front of the stones.

Jane Vellender Jane Vellender was five when she visited Stonehenge for the day with her family in the 60s.

“But rather than lying forgotten in a dusty old photo album or on a memory card, we want people to share with us their photos of Stonehenge and help us to create a photo album with a difference. It could be your photo, it could be your parents’ photo, it could be your grandparents’ photo – we’d love to see it and bring as many of them together as possible. This archive is a way of making us all part of the ongoing history of this incredible place.”

The call comes in a year marking an important anniversary for Stonehenge. In 1918, Cecil Chubb, a barrister, and his wife, Mary, gifted the monument to the nation. The Chubb formally donated Stonehenge to the nation on 26 October 1918. English Heritage is inviting people to a few days of “celebration and surprises” from that date this year, orchestrated by the Turner prize-winning artist Jeremy Deller.

The original photo was taken in 1955. Rowland Allen is third from left in both photographs. The original photo was taken in 1955 – shortly before the great trilithon, seen behind the family group in the newest photo, was re-erected in 1958. Rowland Allen is third from left in both photographs.

To share photographs of the monument – and to see other people’s pictures, visit www.stonehenge100.co.uk/entries

