A young woman working at the Viewdata offices in Alva Street Edinburgh, September 1980. Prestel, a British Telecoms online service and precursor of teletext and the internet, used Viewdata to transmit its content.placeholder image
A young woman working at the Viewdata offices in Alva Street Edinburgh, September 1980. Prestel, a British Telecoms online service and precursor of teletext and the internet, used Viewdata to transmit its content. | TSPL

Edinburgh retro: 21 amazing photos of people at work in the early 1980s - from chimney sweep to shipyard worker

By Ian Swanson
Published 28th Mar 2026, 11:04 GMT
Updated 29th Mar 2026, 04:45 GMT

From chimney sweep to chocolate checker and shipyard worker to mole catcher, some of the jobs that kept people busy in Edinburgh in the early 1980s just don’t exist any more.

Here is a selection of fascinating photos chosen from the Evening News archive, showing people at work in factories, shops, foundry, fields, offices and elsewhere in the early 1980s.

Scroll through the pictures and get a feel for what working life in and around the Capital was like four decades ago.

A fruit wholesalers' display at Gorgie fruit market in Chesser Avenue Edinburgh, August 1983.

21. Fruit wholesaler

A fruit wholesalers' display at Gorgie fruit market in Chesser Avenue Edinburgh, August 1983. | TSPL Photo: Jack Crombie

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