Canals and Canal Boats

Canals and Canal BoatsJust over two hundred years ago the growth of Britain's waterways paved the way for the Industrial Revolution. Now they offer thousands a break from everyday life as a much loved leisure activity. This video explores the fascinating and tradition steeped history of canals from Roman beginnings, through the golden pre railway age when Birmingham alone had more canals than Venice to the modern renaissance. Around half of the visual content is archive

Sentinel Centenary (1973)

120 minutes

archive film and re-enactments to bring the past to life

It shows all the action at Foxfield on typical running days we see lots of locomotive activity and both passenger and goods trains

Fifty years ago it underwent great changes when the majority of housing and buildings around the village green were brutally demolished – at a time just before conservation and reclamation became such important issues to the City

Festival of Britain 1951

magnificent performance as the greatest aircraft designer of all

The Van Buren show has become the largest Illusion act in the UK

70 minutes of a wide variety of music and song charting

The programme engages the ear with Bennett’s astute observations and wonderful writing and it is illustrated throughout with relevant photographs

After fairground scenes at the Potteries Wakes in 1927

November 1914