Metadata
WORK ID: NEFA 19030 (Master Record)
| Title | Year | Date |
| ESLINGTON PARK 1953 | 1953 | 1953-01-01 |
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Details
Original Format: 16mm Colour: Black & White Sound: Silent Duration: 22 mins 16 secs Credits: Wright Anderson & Company Limited, Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company Limited and Redheugh Iron & Steel Company Clarke Chapman Genre: Amateur Subject: Sport |
| Summary Amateur record of a sports day at Eslington Park, Gateshead, in 1953 for employees of WACAR (Wright Anderson & Company Limited, Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company Limited and Redheugh Iron & Steel Company). The second part of the film features the Gateshead engineering firm Clarke Chapman and Company’s sports day also taking place in summer 1953. |
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Description
Amateur record of a sports day at Eslington Park, Gateshead, in 1953 for employees of WACAR (Wright Anderson & Company Limited, Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company Limited and Redheugh Iron & Steel Company). The second part of the film features the Gateshead engineering firm Clarke Chapman and Company’s sports day also taking place in summer 1953.
Title: Eslington Park 1953
Title: WACAR Sports
A crowd queues for tickets for the sports day on a misty day. A band plays. Races...
Amateur record of a sports day at Eslington Park, Gateshead, in 1953 for employees of WACAR (Wright Anderson & Company Limited, Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company Limited and Redheugh Iron & Steel Company). The second part of the film features the Gateshead engineering firm Clarke Chapman and Company’s sports day also taking place in summer 1953.
Title: Eslington Park 1953
Title: WACAR Sports
A crowd queues for tickets for the sports day on a misty day. A band plays. Races are run: girls' sprint with a father congratulating his daughter at the end, and boys' races. Prizes are presented to the boys as a steam train passes in the background, the railway line bordering Eslington Park.
The following races take place: egg and spoon relay race, a men’s sack and obstacle race, men’s long jump watched by a good crowd, women’s walking race, women's sprints, men's sprint and medium distance races, sprinting. In the medium distance race, the winners stride towards the finish line, applauded by the crowd. A women’s relay race closes this film section.
[The next short film is underexposed at times.]
Title: C. C. & Co. Sports
Various races are documented: boys' sprint races, including a minor casualty when a boy runs across the lanes, a toddler’s race, heats in the girls' sprint and separate boys' races, and men and women also race. A young boy’s race takes place again, followed by the girls’ sprint (perhaps finals). Men and women’s sprints take place. There’s a cycling race for the men, with a competitor taking a tumble. The men’s shotput is underway. The starter gun is fired for various heats of the men’s sprint. There’s a men and women's beanbag and skipping relay, and another heat of men’s cycling.
Footage of a bowls match is intercut with a group portrait of some women outside a marquee. Crowd shots are alternated with race heats for older men, the final dash of the long distance race, and the tug of war contests.
A group of men in suits pose for the camera.
More sports follow that include the long jump, men’s hurdles, women’s bean bag race, a slow cycle race, and a men’s relay race. A father and his daughter and son lark around with play races. The men’s relay continues, some competitors collapsing exhausted when they make it to the finishing line.
Prizes are presented by a woman in a fancy hat, including a set of cutlery. She is then presented with flowers.
Context
This film is one of several films shot by amateurs (usually more than one) recording the British engineering firm Clarke Chapman and Company’s works sports day in 1953, along with the annual inter-company sports between Wright Anderson & Company Limited, Clarke Chapman, Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company Limited and Redheugh Iron & Steel Company. It was held at Eslington Park, Gateshead, in sight of the Newcastle to Carlisle railway line. Steam engines are still chugging coal...
This film is one of several films shot by amateurs (usually more than one) recording the British engineering firm Clarke Chapman and Company’s works sports day in 1953, along with the annual inter-company sports between Wright Anderson & Company Limited, Clarke Chapman, Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Company Limited and Redheugh Iron & Steel Company. It was held at Eslington Park, Gateshead, in sight of the Newcastle to Carlisle railway line. Steam engines are still chugging coal trucks along the track at the end of the field.There was a high concentration of heavy engineering firms on Tyneside providing specialised equipment to railway, maritime, military, aircraft and nuclear industries in the 19th and 20th centuries and beyond.
In those days, companies of a particular size hosted family and competitive sports events as part of good industrial and community relations. Today you are more likely to have team building exercises or motivational days, linked to leadership skills and performance. This kind of ’industrial paternalism’ or philanthropic welfare started in Britain in the 19th century. Many manufacturing entrepreneurs and companies offered benefits to their workers, from sponsored sports teams, social clubs and other cultural activities to housing. Of course, fit and healthy workers would also be a productive workforce. Some examples include Cadbury, Rowntree, Lever Brothers and ICI. The old egg spoon race is probably now described as retro or nostalgic, but as we can see in the film, it is great fun and still a tricky balancing act to master. Here the sports day was designed to be an inclusive family day out and so we see children of all ages competing in their everyday summer clothes and also some serious track racing by people who would probably now take part in fun runs or marathons. Also part of the fun, the sport’s day is not complete without the men's tug o' war, a sport that was once part of the Olympic Games from 1900 until 1920, and apparently there are tug of war clubs in many countries, where both men and women participate. There are obvious tactics; raw muscle power, a strong grip, digging in of feet to create static friction and a team rhythm all of which play an equally important role in gaining victory. The Clarke Chapman Group was founded in a small factory at South Shore, Gateshead, in 1864 by the Victorian Sunderland-born entrepreneur William Clarke (1831-1890), joined by partner Able Chapman in 1965. The Tyne in those days was still a relatively clean river. Clarke Chapman was for many years one of the largest employers on Tyneside, and is still based in Gateshead at Saltmeadows Road, having moved in 1994 from the Victoria Works, which is now a housing estate. In 1989, Northern Engineering Industries (NEI) and Rolls Royce plc merged, with Clarke Chapman becoming a part of the Rolls Royce Industrial Power Group. Today it has a number of divisions and product groups that include well-established names. Cowans Sheldon, a pioneer of modern railways, designing and producing state of the art multi-tasking cranes and related rail equipment. Stothert & Pitt, provides dockside and offshore crane technology services and support. Wellman Booth, is a leader in overhead travelling cranes used in power stations, ports, fuel reprocessing plants, aluminium plants, steelworks and nuclear facilities and Protran, is a specialist in liquefied compressed gases and other specialised liquids bulk transportation. Lastly, Mackley Pumps, design and manufacture positive displacement pumps for de-watering collieries. In 2000 Clarke Chapman was acquired from Rolls Royce by Langley Holdings plc, a privately owned engineering group based in the UK with principal operating divisions in Germany, France and the UK and more than 70 subsidiaries worldwide employing over 4000 people worldwide. Related NEFA films: Sports Day WACAR Annual Sports Day 1950 WACAR Sports (1954) References: http://www.clarkechapman.co.uk/en-GB/news/1259/langley-interim-trading-sthttps://www.tradgames.org.uk/games/Quoits.htmatement Tyne & Wear Archives, Clarke Chapman Marine Rolls Royce Industrial Power Group Admin History |
