our working lives, then and now

A short film showing how railway track was laid in the days before ‘elf and safety went mad.

An educational movie about jobs available within the railways of Great Britain during the mid/late 1940′s. Covers some of the less glamourous jobs withing the railways including cleaning locomotives, station work and other behind the scenes activities which were the starting point of your career in those days

Escape the smoggy city and join this colourful 1950s tour around England’s Peak District courtesy of British Transport Films. Robert Shaw provides the soothing narration.

a look at Plymouths hopes and fears just after the end of World War 2. looks at the plan to rebuild the city -like a Phoenix, “the PLAN FOR PLYMOUTH.” a local family, the Copperwheats are our stars supported by the City Engineer, Paton Watson and the progessive architect Lord Abercrombie. This is a very hard to get hold of film indeed and has only been shown a few times, thanks to Channel 4 and the BFI.

In this story from Mining Review 2nd Year No.12, we join Durham miner Tom McDonagh, his wife and their triplets on a family break to Butlin’s holiday camp in Filey, North Yorkshire. The very first Butlin’s opened 75 years ago in Skegness, with Filey following in 1945 after postponement during WWII. All the communal games and activities you would expect of this classic British holiday are here, introduced by a suitably jolly narrator, but as you may notice poor Mum hasn’t quite escaped the domestic drudgery…