This is one of many films made by keen amateur filmmaker Charles Cotton Thomas.   The number of films he made on his own is uncertain; many were travelogues made in the 1960s and 70s, of which there are at least eighteen, and which have yet to be fully catalogued.  His collection also includes films of natural history, and his interest in wildlife is illustrated in his caravanning films as well.  Many of his film were made with other members of the Halifax Cine Club, of which he was a keen...

 

This is one of many films made by keen amateur filmmaker Charles Cotton Thomas.   The number of films he made on his own is uncertain; many were travelogues made in the 1960s and 70s, of which there are at least eighteen, and which have yet to be fully catalogued.  His collection also includes films of natural history, and his interest in wildlife is illustrated in his caravanning films as well.  Many of his film were made with other members of the Halifax Cine Club, of which he was a keen member.  In fact he claimed that he wasn’t a founding member of the Club when it was inaugurated in 1939 simply because he happened to miss the first meeting.  He did go on to become President of the Club, on two occasions, when it was at its height.

By 1939 Charlie had moved from 8 mm film to the much better quality, though much more expensive, 16 mm.  As well as a concern for the aesthetics of his filming, Charlie was also keen to improve on the technical side.  Just after the war he developed one of the first reel-to-reel tape recorders.  He later also made a projector with a much brighter light, producing  pictures which were up to ten times greater size on a screen.  In both of these projects it helped that he had access to precision machine tools through his company.

Charles was born in the village of Ovenden, just outside of Halifax, and lived and worked in Yorkshire for all his life.  After leaving school he went on to become managing director of his father’s machine tool company, Stanley Machine Tool – now Broadbent Stanley Ltd., still based in Halifax.  He was also President of the local rotary club and involved in other local affairs.  His dedication to filmmaking is evident in the quality of his films, and he once remarked to his friend and fellow club member Peter Holroyd (who donated the Collection) that the Club were “Hollywood rolled into one”; alluding to how amateur cinematographers take on the roles of cameraman, director, scriptwriter, runner, and sometimes ‘stars’.  This enthusiasm led him to build his own cinema in the loft space of the house he had built in 1956.  Charlie died in 1999 aged ninety.

In an interview with Peter and Kate Holroyd conducted by Mark Fountain – which has provided the source for much of this Context – the filmmaking couple, both members of the Halifax Cine Club (Kate’s father was Secretary), note that the films were made for a wider viewing at film shows put on by the club.  Showing to an audience had the effect of making the filmmakers put extra effort into the quality of their film making – apart from the fact that they also entered them in local, regional and national competitions.

This film has a companion one made, possibly a year or three earlier, just called Caravan.  This delightful film also features the same caravan in the same field, and with at least some of the same people.  And it too has a children’s birthday feast, only in this case with nine candles instead of twelve.   Charles and Margaret didn’t have any children, and it isn’t known for sure who Glenys is: Peter Holroyd believes that she is either a niece or goddaughter.

Caravanning became popular among those who could afford it in the 1920s and ‘30s.  In 1921 a Caravan Group was formed as a section of the Camping Club, later becoming the British Caravanners Club in 1937.  But it really took off in the 1940s and 50s when more people could afford it – as testified in the BBC 4 programme Caravans: A British Love Affair, first broadcast in 2009. Yet as can be seen in this film, it was still possible to have a field all to oneself, and get water from a mountain stream – although it isn’t clear what the toilet arrangements were!  It looks as if this caravan was permanently moored in this field, saving their lovely car the effort of having to pull it through the Dales.  For more on caravanning see the Contexts for Caravanning in Ulroam Sands (1948) and Yorkshire Camping and Caravanning Club (1937-1938)

It is interesting, both in this film and more especially in the earlier one, just how well fed our band of happy caravanners are.  Here they have a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs.  If this birthday is the same one that is celebrated in his earlier film, Caravan, then the film of the bird’s eggs and nesting in this film suggests that it is late spring.  If this is the case then it would have been just before the end of meat rationing, and indeed all wartime rationing, on 4 July 1954. In the Caravan also, they visit Skipton and show a plentiful supply of fruit and vegetables.  The fact that they were in the countryside may have meant that more fresh foodstuffs were available; and of course being “well heeled”, as Peter Holroyd puts it, would also have helped.

Charles and his wife Margaret were later to take their holidays abroad, which they also lavishly filmed. These films were the subject of a well-documented dissertation by Mark Fountain, who provides an interesting discussion of the films in the context of cine clubs and the conventions of the time.  This move from holidaying in Britain to holidaying abroad was in line with a major trend from the late 1950s onwards, continuing of course to today.  During the 1960s this was still very much the preserve of the well-off, who could also afford the expensive 16 mm cine cameras to film their adventures.   The YFA has a number of good examples of this, most notably the collection of holiday films abroad made by Charles Chislett.

Back in September 2007 a group of over a hundred academics, teachers, authors and charity leaders wrote to The Daily Telegraph expressing their concern about children’s wellbeing and mental health, which they argue is being undermined by the pressures of modern life.  A week later Rowan Williams helped to launch the Children's Society's ‘Good Childhood Inquiry’.  Rather surprisingly perhaps, the recently published Report (2012), The Good Childhood, has little to say about the importance of children playing outdoors in natural surroundings.  Yet a report by the National Trust which came out in the same year, Natural Childhood, authored by the naturalist Stephen Moss, highlights the trend of children staying indoors, and the consequent new phenomenon of what he calls "nature-deficit disorder", putting forward the strong case for the fundamental importance of re-connecting children to nature.  A theme that had also been taken up in the 2003 report from English Nature, Nature and Psychological Well-Being. 

Charles and Margaret seem to have taken their holidays abroad after these children, who were able to enjoy the delights of the British outdoors, had grown up.  This film is yet another reminder of the difference between a typical childhood of today and that of over 40 years ago.  Children climbing over fences in the countryside, playing down by a river, and just wandering around, was once much more common.  Films like this may well have a part to play in aiding the campaign by Stephen Moss, and many others, in encouraging children to spend more time out in the wild.

References

Mark Fountain, ‘Home Movies beyond the Home: The Amateur Holiday Film of C.C. Thomas and The Halifax Cine Club, 1957-1973’, dissertation submitted for BA in History for the University of York, 2008.

Interview by Mark Fountain with Peter and Kate Holroyd at the Yorkshire Film Archives, on 22 November 2007.

Hazel Constance, First in the field: a century of the Camping and Caravanning Club, Camping and Caravanning Club, 2001.

English Nature, Nature and Psychological Well-Being, Report No. 533, 2003.

Children's Society Report, the Good Childhood, 2012

The Good Childhood, Report, 2012