History Features

Following a similar project about Bedfordshire, Memories of Hertfordshire Part 1 and Part 2 capture an age when steam trains rumbled through the countryside and people made their living from the land.

Hertfordshire memories

They include rarely seen footage of towns and villages all across the county including evacuees arriving at Welwyn Garden City in 1939 and a 1950s home movie which chronicles life in Hatfield. The earliest piece of film shown is now over 90 years old and this, like the other footage, would have been lost without careful preservation from film archivists.

Andrew Gray, Managing Director of Independent Studios said, "These DVDs are a first for Hertfordshire. Until now, people have only been able to see the county's past in photographs. Now we can all watch, on film, previous generations before us going about their daily lives in the places we know.

"The DVDs are the nearest we will get to time travel - a chance to look back at a chapter of life that has gone forever."

"Over time, film will deteriorate, unless it is kept under very carefully controlled conditions" added the Director of the East Anglian Film Archive, Richard Taylor. "Our archive has the equipment and expertise to preserve this film for generations to come.

"The public don't often get to see the gems from decades past stored here, so we are delighted to be able to share our local history on film with the wider community. These DVDs mean everyone has the chance to see what life was like through the years, by watching film shot by professionals and amateurs from all over the East of England."

Andrew Gray, who oversaw the script and the research for the project and Ashley Bond, who edited the DVDs told BBC Three Counties Radio more about them:

Hertfordshire memories

Where has the old film come from?

Andrew: It’s from the East Anglian Film Archive which basically covers the television area of Anglia television which includes Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire. A lot of the film there has been preserved, the earliest film from Hertfordshire is from 1916, but the earliest film they have goes back to 1896, so there’s just over 100 years worth of film there.

There are lots of cans and lots of big fridges to keep them cool at the optimum temperature but they’re now transferred to hard drives in order to preserve the quality, so hopefully they won’t have to keep getting the films out too often. The original films will obviously always be preserved but what we now work with are digital prints of them.

What was film like 80 or 90 years ago?

Andrew: It’s not too bad actually. In terms of being jerky it depends on the speed at which the camera was cranked, but it’s all black and white, you don’t really get colour film until the 1930s. Nevertheless, interestingly the very first colour film we’ve got of Hertfordshire is of the 1935 Jubilee celebrations at Elstree. It’s some wonderful colour film, it’s absolutely staggering, it looks like it was shot yesterday. It really is good quality.

If you go back to the earlier stuff, in this case the funeral of a Zeppelin air crew who were shot down and buried at Cuffley near Potters Bar, it’s good quality sepia. Like most film it really depends on the way it’s been stored. We always think that old film is scratchy and horrible but actually it isn’t, if it’s been looked after well, then the quality is pretty good!

What are your favourite parts?

Andrew: I mentioned the Jubilee celebrations at Elstree, the colour is wonderful, but there are a couple of others. We’ve got a slightly unusual film with George Bernard Shaw at his home in Ayot St Lawrence, it’s a nice film about him and his life. But what I like about the whole production is it shows how Hertfordshire has gone from being quite a rural place at the beginning of the century to actually being quite an urban place.

Hertfordshire memories

One of my favourite films is about Welwyn Garden City in the 1940s, about how Londoners were moving out there and what their hopes and expectations were, because in the post-war years Hertfordshire saw a lot of people move in and a lot of building work go up.

What will be most appealing to people do you think?

Ashley: I think the memories of how Hertfordshire was. From the point of view of the Londoner, they were amazed that there was this amount of space. They were crammed into two-up two-down terraces with the whole family and there was all this space out in Hertfordshire. Obviously I know that things have changed considerably, and I’m sure the 50s and 60s changed Hertfordshire in exactly the same way as every other place changed, but it’s remembering that there were rural areas and an idyllic sort of life in the very early days.

There’s a fantastic film from St Albans in the 1920s, where they’re travelling down a street and you can see the old vehicles. There are very few vehicles around except things like horse and carts and that’s quite incredible to see. It’s on your doorstep and it wasn’t really all that long ago. It’s only JUST outside living memory.

Have you got enough film to do more parts?

Andrew: Yes. We very much hope that these two are just the beginning. Watch this space – we hope to be making more!