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Anthony Scerri was born on the 29th June 1923 to Lawrence Scerri and Guiseppina Gaglione. He was the eldest of 11 siblings, 9 of whom survived childhood.
As a young man, he started his tertiary education which was however curtailed by the outbreak of the Second World War. He was called up for military duty and spent the war years in the army as a 1st or 2nd lieutenant in charge of an antiaircraft battery. He was stationed in Malta.
Just before the war, his father opened a small stationery shop (the “Hamrun Library”) right in front of the parish church of the town of Hamrun. Anthony took up employment in the family business when the war finished. He kept this job until his retirement at the age of 60 in 1983.
A confirmed bachelor, Anthony took up photography as his main hobby. His enthusiasm for experimentation knew no bounds. He experimented with the usual B & W photography, B & W reversal processes, stereo-photography as well as colour reversal photography. Naturally, in the tradition of all amateur photographers of the time, he mixed the formulas for his solutions himself too. His closest friends were Rev. Frans Camilleri another amateur photographer and poet, and Joseph Cassar, a professional photographer. Both were from Hamrun. Joseph Cassar who had a photography shop and studio about 100 metres down the road from where Anthony lived, died last year in 2002.
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