Doctor Who newsreels among thousands of films released by British Pathé
Monday, 21 April 2014 - Reported by John Bowman
Archival footage relating to Doctor Who is among thousands of films now available to view on the British Pathé YouTube channel, after the organisation decided to upload its entire catalogue in high resolution to the video-sharing website.
British Pathé newsreels were once a staple part of going to the cinema, providing people with visual reports and features in the days before television news and, indeed, before many people had TVs. Now its collection of 85,000 films, spanning the years 1896 to 1976, has been released as part of a bid to enable the archive to be seen globally.
Alastair White, the general manager of British Pathé, said of the unprecedented release:
More offbeat Doctor Who-related newsreels show a radio-controlled Dalek named Dodger selling university rag mags in Coventry in 1964, and another home-made Dalek plus robot and rocket in the back garden of the Sherlock family home in Horsham, which was filmed in 1967.
British Pathé newsreels were once a staple part of going to the cinema, providing people with visual reports and features in the days before television news and, indeed, before many people had TVs. Now its collection of 85,000 films, spanning the years 1896 to 1976, has been released as part of a bid to enable the archive to be seen globally.
Alastair White, the general manager of British Pathé, said of the unprecedented release:
Our hope is that everyone, everywhere who has a computer will see these films and enjoy them. This archive is a treasure trove unrivalled in historical and cultural significance that should never be forgotten. Uploading the films to YouTube seemed like the best way to make sure of that.
German online TV channel Mediakraft has managed the project and is to create new content with British Pathé material. It said:While the British Pathé archive is available online via their own website, www.britishpathe.com, going public on YouTube will create a new user experience. Viewers can comment, share and embed the historic videos and thereby add another dimension of context to the British Pathé archive.
In addition, it is very likely that the community will find hidden gems in the enormous video library that have not been discovered by the archivists yet. British Pathé, Mediakraft and YouTube are very excited to see the interaction of the online video community with the fantastic archive of history.
Of particular interest to Doctor Who fans will be the film clip of the 1967/68 Schoolboys' and Girls' Exhibition at Olympia, which at the start briefly shows a Cyberman and Yeti with onlookers, as well as the 1959 film Park Rangers, in which a police box on Wimbledon Common is put to use (1:51). Also in the archive is the 1955 newsreel Waistcoat Club Aka Waistcoats For Women, which includes footage of Jon Pertwee and Jean Marsh, who were married from 1955 to 1960 (0:49 and with Pertwee's brother Michael and Michael's wife Valerie at 1:24), as well as Peter Cushing (1:36). The film states that the Pertwees were founder members of the club in 1953. In addition, it is very likely that the community will find hidden gems in the enormous video library that have not been discovered by the archivists yet. British Pathé, Mediakraft and YouTube are very excited to see the interaction of the online video community with the fantastic archive of history.
More offbeat Doctor Who-related newsreels show a radio-controlled Dalek named Dodger selling university rag mags in Coventry in 1964, and another home-made Dalek plus robot and rocket in the back garden of the Sherlock family home in Horsham, which was filmed in 1967.
Schoolboys' and Girls' Exhibition (1967-1968) | Waistcoat Club Aka Waistcoats For Women | Park Rangers | The Student's Dalek Aka Robot Book Seller| Robot Boy