Moving Pictures

Film is so evocative that researching old home movies can be emotional, as well as raise a whole array of questions, as Fae Godstchalk-Hart found on placement at the Yorkshire Film Archive. They share their thoughts here.

During my placement I worked in the Yorkshire Film Archives and I must say that though the work was not much different from what I was usually doing at university anyway, the experience was very enjoyable! They started of us newbies with a simple introductory course, which gave us a brief overview of what the archive was and also a little bit of the history of film. The experience was amazing on that day. On the day we learned how the first ever moving picture was made by a Frenchman in non other than Leeds! Unfortunately he went missing before he could patent his invention but the idea that films originated so close to home was more than fascinating. That was followed by examining the development of film through the years and I was very surprised to find that colour film had been around since the early 20^th century but was of course incredibly expensive. We then looked at some old film video cameras that would have likely been used for home videos. The objects that we handled there are a long way from what you would be used to today! The thought of carrying one around for more than a couple minutes alone made my arm ache. They were incredibly heavy.

The fun with the physical media didn’t stop there. We then went on to working and editing some pieces of real film reel, which really gave another meaning to the term ‘cut’. The process consisted of physically taking the film and slicing it apart with a special device and then re-taping it together with special tape. The old movie makers, and any poor editor working under Tarantino (who still uses reels of film and old cameras), must have been agonisingly time consuming which really makes you think about how far we have come as a society now. Now you can do all the film editing you want even from your phone, with just a few simple button presses.

The rest of the placement, and the actual work, consisted taking various films from the archives that had not yet been given a historic context and giving them an historic context. Most of these were of various home videos but some of the underlying topics of the videos were not only heart-warming but fascinating. My favourite two of the five I wrote contexts for were one about a man using gardening as a form of therapy after being disabled and another about fox hunting. The one about disability, labelled disability and the garden, led me down some thought-provoking research into the effects that disability can have on someone’s life, not just in physical difficulty but in mental difficulty as well. I naturally dived deeper and deeper into the topic and found that gardening is a proven form of therapy that has psychological research proving that it works in alleviating mental troubles. It has been commonly used to treat many forms of mental illness, such as depression and anxiety, and there are even charities that will help the disabled remodel their gardens so they can more easily participate. The second about fox hunting was more interesting than it was heart-warming. Foxes used to have a much lower population and the hunt for them was considered a working class form of sport. However, after the hunt was picked up by members of the upper class due to the chase being so long and thrilling, active breeding programs were put in place in order to up the fox population. In addition to this the very landscape was changed to better accommodate them just so they could be hunted. This raises a few questions about the ethics around fox hunting in the modern day most certainly, as their population problem is a direct cause of hunting! Yet hunting is often seen as the solution to the problem in many rural areas. It also raises questions about how class activities change from the rich to the poor depending on the circumstances and the timing. What else could have been affected by this sort of shift?

Films, Fact-finding and Future Paths

Researching films at the Yorkshire Film Archive has been an enriching experience for second year student, Freya Rickards, both in terms of using historical skills and thinking about future careers. Here, she highlights her approach to writing context pieces for this special film collection.

For my History, Community and Culture module, I completed a placement at the Yorkshire and North East Film Archive to assist with their Nature Matters project, which looks at changes in the environment and local landscape throughout the 20th century. In my work I researched various films that were being used within the project and created a summary of the context and history behind each film, allowing for a better understanding of the films themselves as well as how they relate to the project. I was extremely happy to get a place on this placement, as being a History and American Studies student, I spend a lot of time studying film, and have therefore gained a great appreciation for all types of film, especially those that can reflect changes throughout history. The placement has also been a great help in my future career decision, as I had previously never thought of working in an archive, but now I am strongly considering it as a career path once I graduate.

I have completed six contextual pieces for my placement, with each focusing on a different film within the Nature Matters project. Choosing which film to research was quite simple, I read through the list of available films and chose six that appealed to me the most, whether it be due to the film’s content, the history behind the film, or simply the way the film visually looked. Once my films were chosen, I rewatched them and researched the history of the main theme of the film, for example a city, a social movement, or a place of interest. Once I had written a few paragraphs on the historical context of the chosen film, I submitted them to the archive for feedback, and then I made the appropriate revisions to the contextual piece if needed to endure that the contextual piece is of a good enough quality for the archive.

Overall, I have very much enjoyed my time at the archive. Learning about the history of film has been fascinating, and being able to handle old film cameras from the beginning of the 20th century has been amazing. Another highlight has been the opportunity for us on the placement to use a Steenbeck machine to show how film tapes are viewed. The placement has truly been a great opportunity and I am glad I have had the privilege to contribute towards the Nature Matters project.

Independence and interest: Improving skills and learning with the Yorkshire Film Archive

Second-year student Kama Clifford reflects here on their placement with the Yorkshire Film Archive, and what it’s brought to their skills as a researcher and historian.

My placement at the Yorkshire Film Archives has taught me a lot about myself, my work and, of course, the archives themselves. I’ve found it to be a brilliant opportunity that’s given me insight into my future. But I have three favourite things about my placement.

Firstly, the independence of it all. I’m a very independent person so being able to choose what film I contextualised, and just the general lack of pressure from the archive has been brilliant. The archive leaves you to it and that’s the best part; you feel like it’s all yours and like you aren’t being babysat. Of course, they’re always there if you have a question or need some direction, but the overall independence of the placement has been amazing.

Secondly, I’ve learnt so much from the archives. As a part of their People and Nature collection I watched some films on the relationships between people and nature, I then realised how much humanity views nature as a commodity; from animal testing to zoos and even to agricultural shows. Humanity views nature as something to monetise and this can be seen through the films and the entire collection the archives hold.

Lastly, the placement has helped me refine my research skills. At the beginning of placement my notes on the films were very long and I was finding it difficult to decide what information was important and relevant. However, throughout the course of the placement I began to find my way and realised how to find the most important and relevant information on what I was researching. This is going to be a big blessing when it comes to assignments in the future as I will be able to take what I’ve learnt and reuse it again and again. I also particularly enjoyed bringing the information up to date, for example, if I was writing about the first National Food Kitchen in York, I would discuss the context behind why it was set up and at the end of the context I brought it up to date by discussing the increase in food banks over the last ten years. 

This placement has also helped me learn lots about the archival and film industry, for example our introductory session taught us how film began and how the technology developed over the years, by showing us old films and the technology used. Another part of our introduction was a tour and explanation of the archives, we were shown the vaults in which the films are stored, and we were given an explanation of the formation of the archives. 

Developing confidence and knowledge: a placement at the Yorkshire Film Archive

At York St John University, we are very fortunate to have the Yorkshire Film Archive on campus, and to have placements with them offered as part of the History, Community and Culture employability and public history module. Here, second-year Elizabeth Allen reflects on her research experience.

During this past semester, I have undertaken a placement with the Yorkshire Film Archive as part of the module: History, Community and Culture. This placement for me was an opportunity to gain insight into archival work and to develop my research and written skills. Prior to this placement project, I had very little understanding of the potential careers that my history degree could take me to, however, since the start of this module, my insight and knowledge into future employment has grown significantly. Not only have my research and writing skills developed over this placement with the Yorkshire Film Archive but my confidence has grown, and this is something I can carry with me through the rest of my time at the university but also through to future employment. 

Film footage

Throughout the placement, we had to write contexts that would be published onto the Yorkshire Film Archive website. One piece that interested me was “Women in Sport” which was created in 1990. This film was a promotional documentary created by the Northern Region Sports Council with the purpose of creating more equality for women of all ages and ability and encouraging them to participate in sport. The film is significant in challenging the traditional views of women only being housewives and mothers and shows the increasing liberating attitudes of women finding their own identity away from their children and husbands. Throughout the promotional film, there are several interviews with women who share their positive experience of their involvement in sports and the benefits of making new friends and trying sports that they had either never done or had not done since school. 

To be able to write this written piece, I had gained a lot of knowledge on how to effectively research and analyse the film from the other films that I had researched beforehand and by taking onboard any feedback that I had received. Alongside this guidance from the team at the Yorkshire Film Archive, I had learnt how to communicate the necessary information into a piece of writing that would be published onto their website for their audience to read. At times I did find the research aspect of the placement difficult, especially when the films were quite long as there was a lot of information to process. However, through learning how I work most effectively, I found that once I had taken a step back and focused on one section at a time, I was able to have a clearer understanding of the research which then significantly improved the flow of my final written contexts. 

The outcome of my placement project with the Yorkshire Film Archive was hugely positive. Being able to work for an archive was a useful experience. Through developing my research, communication, and written skills, I have a significantly gained confidence and knowledge on the opportunities that could be available to me after my degree. Regardless of whether my degree takes me into archival work, I know that these skills are going to be transferable and have prepared me for my future. 

Battle cries of women on film

A placement Yorkshire Film Archives and a look into the history of local women on film was a fascinating experience for Bethany Emmerson, a student on a History, Community and Culture placement. 

During my second year studying History at York St John University I took the module ‘History, Community and Culture’. The module encourages students to pursue a 75 hour placement at a institution that the individual is interested in. Through one of the university’s partnerships, I was able to apply and carry out my placement on the ‘Born a Rebel’ project situated at the Yorkshire Film Archive. The ‘Born a Rebel’ film is part of the Vote 100 campaign which took place throughout 2018. The aim of the campaign was to celebrate 100 years since the 1918 Representation of the People Act, which allowed most women to vote, as well as the progress women have made in that time.

While working on the project I was encouraged to find a personal connection with an aspect of the ‘Born a Rebel’ film. I was instantly fascinated with the northern aspect of the film and decided to focus on it. From there, I combed through each individual film from the edit, going through collections at the Yorkshire Film Archive, North East Film Archive and North West Archive until I had a collection of my own that focused on the Durham Miners Rallies of the 1980s.

Being from Durham myself, I found it very interesting to research the role women played in these strikes, as well as asking the women in my family about how they were affected by them. Two of the main ones I focused on were ‘Durham Miners Rally 1984 No. 1: Banners and Arrival At Racecourse (1984)’ and ‘1984 Miners Strike: Easington Colliery (1984)’. Both films feature women’s groups protesting against the closure of mines in the north of England, often singing the famous song ‘We shall not be moved’ like a battle cry as they carry tapestries through the cobbled streets and country roads.

Throughout working on the project I made notes on each film I watched in order to help me with writing my final essay. The essay I wrote was personal, as what was asked of me, in order to showcase how I interpreted ‘Born a Rebel’ and how I connected with it on an emotional level. I was able to write my final piece with the help of my project manager, who was able to steer me in the right direction as my first draft read more like a university essay than a personal piece. All the people who work at the Yorkshire Film Archive were very approachable, friendly and helpful when presented with any queries I had and I would like to thank them for making my time working on the ‘Born a Rebel’ project so enjoyable. I would also like to thank York St John University for providing me with the opportunity to be able to have this placement that allowed me to work with two things I am very passionate about: film and history. It is a fantastic project and I had a great time working on it.

Ordinary Lives and Extraordinary Stories on Film

The Yorkshire Film Archives and the North East Film Archives were a treasure trove for Lolita Smurthwaite, a student on a History, Community and Culture placement. 

My Placement was at Yorkshire Film Archives, placed in the Fountains Library on campus, but I produced work for North East Film Archives, a partner of YFA. This hidden gem unfolds into a maze full of a range of films, ranging from home movies, adverts, news shows, documentaries and independent films in various forms including VHS. They not only hold thousands of donated films, but also hold films for ITV and BBC news, and are working towards digitalising as many of the films as they can.

The Archives rely on funding from companies and the public and therefore, funding decides what is prioritised in their work. The archives work towards promoting awareness of films and themselves and they often create a collection of films for certain purposes, such as the current one they are working on at the moment for Hull with their celebration of being titled City of Culture.

What I found quite interesting was seeing first-hand the process and work behind these archives. However, the researching of North East films has a special place in me due to me being from the North East itself. Not only was I able to use the knowledge I already had, I gained new knowledge about the places I grew up in and visited. For instance, I researched context for a amateur film about Beamish Museum and found out about the origins and process of how Beamish expanded to what it is today.

In other examples, I saw the important social topics my area was concerned with through multiple Tyne Tees Television films ranging fro the years 1950s-1990s. The North East holds a rich history of uniqueness which is shown through these films and by providing context, it hopes to promote not only the archives, but the extraordinary aspects of the North East. With the donations from families to the archives, we are able to see the unknown history of certain areas which makes the archives even more important for our history. The films show the drastic changes or even the familiar scenes of towns and cities.

During my time at the archives, I witnessed first-hand the importance of the films. A man visited to see himself as a young man star in a film for an advertisement. This was the only place that had stored this particular film and it allowed him to relive his youth by seeing it once more. The smile upon his face after seeing it was said to be one of the main reasons why the managers enjoy working in the archives. Working in this environment with my own desk and being assigned tasks but with so much freedom allowed me to explore my own personal approach to my writing and research and even finding out the most efficient way through trial and error.

Untold Stories of Talented Women on Film

Zoe Jenkinson, during her time on the History, Community and Culture second-year module, brought her passion for gender history to her placement with the Yorkshire Film Archives. 

I was lucky enough to obtain one of the competitive placements working with the Yorkshire Film Archive on their ‘Born a Rebel’ project focussing on women on film. As a gender historian this placement couldn’t have been better for me as working with women in history is my area of expertise and I jumped at the opportunity to do more research into the subject.

The brief of the placement was to write a piece to be published on the Yorkshire Film Archive website about the collection of films within ‘Born a Rebel’ and to research further into the background and context of the films. We were told to approach the placement with our individual viewpoint; as mine is one of gender history I started with intention to researched more into perceived femininity, and more specifically, the women in adverts during the 1950s.

When researching, I discovered that it was the many films of women in industry and women in sport which sparked my interest. These films portrayed women who were unrecognised for their ability in their time but have come to be of great importance in present day. For example, I did research into Beryl Burton, a female cyclist who won more than 90 domestic championships and 7 world titles, even beating the men’s record in a 12-hour time trial.

I also did research into the ‘Preston Ladies Football Club’ and into notable members of their organisation. I stumbled across a footballer named Lily Parr who has been inaugurated into the ‘Football Hall of Fame’ for her feats in the field. I even managed to spot her in the film used in ‘Born a Rebel’ (the black-haired woman in the back of the photo).

I learnt a great deal from my placement, including a lot about the history of Yorkshire and women’s role in the development of said history. At the end of my placement I produced a piece for the website and was invited to participate in a recorded interview about feminism. We also discussed the difference between how women are perceived in the present day and how they were perceived in the past. This interview will be transcribed and published alongside more work on ‘women on film’.

The placement overall was very successful with much information and knowledge gained from the experience. The archive even asked me to come and volunteer for them next year which I will be more than happy to take them up on. A very successful placement.

Preserving heritage and nostalgia: Cataloguing at the Yorkshire Film Archive

History, Community and Culture module student Rebekah Bradshaw writes about her experience at the Yorkshire Film Archive, preserving local history from old-fashioned film equipment. 

I was lucky enough to secure and complete my placement at the Yorkshire Film Archive, a position offered through the university. During my time I was responsible for watching, describing and cataloguing films which the archive had the intention of cataloguing but, due to budgetary restrictions, had not. It is great that my writing could be published on their site and used in the future to help access the films I worked on. The abundance of films stored at the Archive are focused on Yorkshire and further Northern regions (due to the partnership with the North East Film Archive).

The vaults, where these films are stored, was one of my favourite parts of the place. The storage of these films is an impressive sight, especially when considering the deceptive size of the location (I didn’t even know the archive existed until my interview, despite walking past it multiple times). It also requires a lot of precision to make sure these films stay in pristine condition; humidity and temperature all have to be accounted for.

I found it interesting to learn about the local history of York through these films. Due to the myriad of films at the Archive I was tasked with cataloguing certain collections so most of the films I studied were from the late twentieth-century period. Considering the topics of the films I got to find out what issues were prominent enough during that period to create a film with the purpose of documenting it. One of my favourite parts of the placement, mainly because of the nostalgia of it, was using the equipment such as the VHS player and tapes that I viewed a lot of the films on. It is also interesting to see how developed the modern-day counterpart is.

The equipment used to shoot these films is also evidently different, visible in the poorer pixilation quality and granulation, as well as the different editing and animation styles compared with today. I did encounter some difficulties with using older technological sources, some tapes had sustained damage which had led to some drop out making it impractical to view. This provides perfect evidence as to why archives such as the this one are necessary in preserving history, and the need for haste as tapes which are only a few decades old are susceptible to irreparable damage. I thoroughly enjoyed helping contribute to the legacy these films will leave for future viewers.

‘This Is Our World Too’: My Experience on the Born a Rebel Placement

Freya Walker found stories of ‘bravery, diligence and determination‘ on her History, Community and Culture module work placement with the Yorkshire Film Archive, on the ‘Born a Rebel’ women’s history project. 
For my ‘History, Community and Culture’ work placement, I applied for the Born a Rebel project at the Yorkshire Film Archive which is based at York St John University. The project used the Born a Rebel film as its inspiration, and it explores twentieth-century women’s history through a series of films featuring women.

The Born a Rebel film was created from archive footage of women from the Yorkshire Film Archive, the North East Film Archive and the North West Film Archive and was made to celebrate a hundred years since women were permitted to vote for the first time. The film sends a powerful message about female empowerment, from the Edwardian era when suffragettes first fought for their freedom to the 1990s when women had fought for decades to be listened to in a patriarchal society. I found the film incredibly inspiring. It showed women standing up for their rights, working hard during war time and speaking out against thing they felt passionately about. It was a film about bravery, diligence and determination. It was this that inspired me to apply for this placement and drove my work on the project.

On my first day at the Yorkshire Film Archive, the other people on the placement and I watched the film again and discussed our initial thoughts and feelings on what we had just seen. We talked about how the film had made us feel, how we reacted to the way women were treated throughout the different eras, what our favourite things about the video were, what our least favourite things were and our thoughts on feminism and female empowerment in todays society compared to how it was represented in the clips that made up the films. We were all interested in women’s history and we had all been inspired by the films but we all had different views and perspectives on what we had just seen which made the discussion we had enlightening and helpful in challenging our views. After our discussion we walked around York to try and find one of the locations featured in the video; the old Rowntree factory.

As the placement continued, I watched all of the videos featured in the Born a Rebel film using the Yorkshire Film Archive database. The videos provided a fascinating window into the past and some of them, especially one featuring a 1960s beauty pageant that objectified and degraded women, shocked me. We were given the opportunity to write about and give our opinions on the videos and the women featured in them. I picked two videos that I was especially interested by and wrote about how the women came across in those. The videos I picked were an amateur film of women on Kings Road, Chelsea in London in 1967 which showed a range of different women going about their daily life, and a student-made documentary about female Roxy Music fans in 1977. I wrote about how the women in those films had used fashion and their appearance as a way to express themselves in a unique way.

This placement allowed me access to the huge collection of videos the Yorkshire Film Archive has to offer. These videos gave me insight into how life was in the past for women. Some of them inspired me, some of them shocked and even disgusted me but all of them increased my knowledge of the experiences for women in the twentieth century. From the first suffragettes who decided they were going to fight for equality to the women who worked hard while the men were away during the war and the miners wives who supported their husbands, all of the women featured on the videos helped me to understand life for women in the past.

Preserving History on Film

Through our History, Community and Culture module, Jamie Hyam discusses his experiences of a cultural treasure-trove at the Yorkshire Film Archive. 

My work placement was carried out with the Yorkshire Film Archive. This is an organisation located within the University in the Fountains Library, whose aim is to both preserve heritage of the local area through the preservation of film and make these films more accessible through digitising them for their website. My job was to go through a collection of films and make them more accessible to audiences by writing contexts for the pieces which would allow them to be found more easily.

The first film I looked at was this one of Dr Ian Ramsey, the 90^th Bishop of Durham. I looked at Ramsey’s background and his role with the Church, and investigated the places he visited to see if they were still there today. After I had got some key topics to explore, I was left to work independently and focus on the information I found most interesting. One of my favourite parts of this placement was that I could pick and choose what would topics interested me most. For example, with this film I mainly looked at 1960s society because this is what engaged me. The placement wasn’t about covering the right or wrong topics, but rather getting the unique chance to use the film archive to explore and write about what you find interesting.

One of my favourite films held by the collection is this 1950s collection of clips from an amateur film-maker of the City of Durham, where I went to school and grew up. As it was over 60 years ago it is interesting seeing how some things changed, and how other things haven’t.

The facilities at the archive were also very interesting to examine. Because they deal with a variety of different formats such 16mm film, 35mm film, or even VHS, the Archive need to have equipment to test all these formats on. The images in this article show two different methods of viewing these images. One is a simple VHS player which were used in more recent history, and the other image showing methods of playing film, which were a lot less common and a lot harder to find now. Although the films they receive will be digitised, it is important for the archive to check them first, and ensure that they aren’t damaged and that the content is important enough to be digitised.