Metadata
WORK ID: NEFA 21912 (Master Record)
| Title | Year | Date |
| YORK RUN: FELLING FLATS | 1987 | 1987-01-01 |
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Details
Original Format: Super 8 Colour: Colour Sound: Silent Duration: 2 mins 47 secs Credits: Stephen Gray Genre: Amateur Subject: Working Life Urban Life Sport Architecture |
| Summary This amateur footage by Stephen Gray records two events in the 1980s: the first is a York Run that starts from the Knavesmire, and the second is the demolition in 1987 of tower blocks on the Nursery Farm Estate in Gateshead. The towers were commissioned by Felling UDC and completed in 1968. The consulting architect and engineer for this development ... |
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Description
This amateur footage by Stephen Gray records two events in the 1980s: the first is a York Run that starts from the Knavesmire, and the second is the demolition in 1987 of tower blocks on the Nursery Farm Estate in Gateshead. The towers were commissioned by Felling UDC and completed in 1968. The consulting architect and engineer for this development was John Poulson. The compilation also includes brief footage of the film-maker's colleagues in the Environmental Health Department of...
This amateur footage by Stephen Gray records two events in the 1980s: the first is a York Run that starts from the Knavesmire, and the second is the demolition in 1987 of tower blocks on the Nursery Farm Estate in Gateshead. The towers were commissioned by Felling UDC and completed in 1968. The consulting architect and engineer for this development was John Poulson. The compilation also includes brief footage of the film-maker's colleagues in the Environmental Health Department of Gateshead Council and on site at slum housing due for demolition.
In the first brief sequences, runners jog past a crowd of spectators at the Knavesmire, York. People mill around near a giant bouncy dragon inflatable for children set up on the grass, Terry's chocolate factory in the background. General view of the path leading to the Terry's factory.
Crowds line the road beside the Knavesmire, clapping the runners as they pass. A promotional red double decker bus advertising 'The Yorkshire Evening Press' stands next to the bouncy inflatable on The Knavesmire. More runners pass by, heading up Racecourse Road.
An overhead shot records the runners queuing up between barriers after completing the race.
The next sequences record the demolition of tower blocks on the Nursery Farm Estate, Balmoral Drive, Felling, in Gateshead as a media event. A man and a woman dressed in 70s culottes and high heels head towards the high rise tower blocks, probably walking up Split Crow Road. In nearby low rise council housing blocks, tenants are standing on their balconies, some taking pictures of the tower blocks.
More people start to gather for the demolition of the tower blocks, banners of demolition firm Ogden displayed at the top. Policemen in shirt sleeves are amongst the expectant crowd.
The first explosions occur and demolition begins, the blocks collapsing into huge clouds of dust and rubble.
The crowds begin to disperse. A sign denoting 'Ogden Danger Zone. Do not enter' hangs from a pole bent over from the blast. Tyne Tees TV presenters and film crew with their cameras stand in a cordoned-off area. One woman is dressed in a very 80s striped top and has Farrah Fawcett style hair.
The huge piles of rubble from the demolished tower blocks look like a hill range.
[fade out]
A few brief shots follow of a man with middle age spread, busting out of his shirt, is seated in an office, probably Gateshead council offices where the film-maker Stephen Gray worked in the Environmental health department.
A young man puts on goggles. He is standing in a yard outside No. 19 of a condemned terrace of houses, wearing only a pair of skimpy boxer shorts (or running shorts). He then pulls on a sun hat, and puts on a pair of safety ear muffs.
Context
By looking at past records that coincide with this date and the area, the first of this compilation of films is most likely the Brass Monkey Half Marathon, which is organised by the Knavesmire Harriers club and has been running since the 1980s. The second part documents the demolition of high rise blocks on the Nursery Farm Estate in Gateshead that were only 20 years old.
The Nursery Farm estate consisted of four seventeen-storey tower blocks built as public housing by Felling Urban...
By looking at past records that coincide with this date and the area, the first of this compilation of films is most likely the Brass Monkey Half Marathon, which is organised by the Knavesmire Harriers club and has been running since the 1980s. The second part documents the demolition of high rise blocks on the Nursery Farm Estate in Gateshead that were only 20 years old.
The Nursery Farm estate consisted of four seventeen-storey tower blocks built as public housing by Felling Urban District Council. The blocks consisted of 381 dwellings in total. Construction was approved by committee in 1966; building was completed in 1968. The consulting architect and engineer for the development was John Poulson. All of the blocks were destroyed in 1987 as a result of their rapid deterioration and unpopularity. Problems with the blocks were cited as water ingress, cracked concrete, questionable structural stability, balcony deterioration and poor reputation. The controversial £1 million demolition by Ogden of Kenmir, Dene, Nursery and Greencroft Towers took place on 12th July 1987, and as can be seen by the TV cameras and crew in the film, the spectacle had a lot of media coverage and drew a large public crowd in the community, including keen amateur filmmaker Stephen Gray. Stephen Gray’s interest in amateur filmmaking was peaked as a teen at Boldon Comprehensive School in the 1960s, but he could not afford a cine camera until, aged 19, he started work as a Gateshead Council trainee environmental health officer. “With my first month’s pay I remember going to Bonser’s camera shop in Bigg Market, Newcastle. There I bought a second hand Sankyo Silent Super 8 camera for £25, quite a lot in 1977.” The Super 8mm film camera, advertised as ‘Fun’ and ‘Easy to use’, was first manufactured in 1965 by Kodak for their new small gauge film stock, which did make shooting home movies more affordable for the increasing number of amateurs. The recent film ‘Super 8’, directed by Steven Spielberg) influenced the revival of interest in the 1980s. Gray joined the South Shields Marine & Technical College Cine Club around 1978, where renowned animator Sheila Graber and award-winning amateurs like Michael Gough offered tips on film structure and editing. He later became a member of Newcastle & District Amateur Cinematographers Association. It was his role with Gateshead council responsible for inspecting slum housing and supervising clearance that personally connects this filmmaker to the Nursery Farm estate demolition and the final fragment of footage of fellow environmental health colleagues on site at a condemned Gateshead terrace in the 80s. He also recorded derelict local housing in the film Unfit for Human Habitation (1984). World War One marked a new type of Britain in 1919, where politics, society and the economy underwent dramatic changes. The housing situation was a key concern, especially for those soldiers returning home from war. Measures such as the Addison Act of 1919 were introduced, after which the government produced 500,000 homes over the span of 3 years for returning soldiers who otherwise would have lived in squalor. These houses were mainly semi-detached houses. World War II brought about the same issue. The Labour government at that time wasn’t providing housing quickly enough, which Churchill’s Conservative party realised was the key to winning the next general election. Their solution was to buy the small amounts of land available and build tower blocks on them. This was a quick and cheap way of providing more housing as well as affording them political gain within the government. Ultimately, Britain was transformed by the arrival of high-rise council estates. The 1950s mark the beginning of a more modern approach to housing, with the introduction of the prefabricated high rise flat, which continued to gain prominence into the 1960s. They were not at first seen as a sign of poverty but promised a new Britain. The collapse of the newly completed 22-storey Ronan Tower in East London, built using the Larsen-Nielsen method of pre-fabrication, was one of the turning-points in people’s attitudes and confidence in high-rise residential buildings. As the 1970s progressed, social housing in Britain started to garner even more controversy, especially concerning political scandals and the poor construction of the flat blocks. The Nursery Farm estate was built with the Skarne industrialised system. As this mass produced building expanded in the 50s and 60s, the Stockholm firm’s system gained international fame, particularly in England. This system was focused on the community space while also building housing in a more affordable and rapid way. However, as evidenced by the Nursery Farm estate as well as the Quarry Hill flats in Leeds, this post-war modernist dream failed because of a lack of maintenance, investment, and poor building materials. The Poulson scandal of the 1970s was a national story and highlighted the corrupt nature of the councils, government and local officials who were mostly involved with the modern architecture emerging in Britain. Politicians such as Andy Cunningham, chairman of Felling council, and T. Dan Smith (known as ‘Mr Newcastle’) were both jailed on corruption charges with the architect John Poulson. Poulson was an unqualified architect, who overextended his business to private contractors and made payments to local councillors and public authority figures in order to win contracts. The contract awarded to Poulson by Andy Cunningham (nicknamed ‘Mr Felling’) for the Nursery Farm flats was highly suspect as it did not go out to tender. Crudens were hired as contractors on Poulson's advice. Poulson was the consulting architect for Crudens for the Skarne indusrialised housing system that were used to build the blocks. Consequently, this negatively impacted on the quality of social housing, which accounts for the symbolism of poverty associated with them in the 1970s and 1980s. This political scandal affected society to such an extent that the demolition and continued decay of these high-rise blocks became commonplace in British society. Media and popular culture have played a fascinating part in the subject of council estate high rise blocks. J.G. Ballard’s High Rise and its ‘exploration of gated communities, physical and psychological’, is a particularly interesting take on the high-rise council estate. One of its inspirations was Erno Goldfinger’s Brutalist Balfron Tower in East London. Ballard himself was a child prisoner of war in a Japanese camp during World War II and has written a number of other bestsellers, including Empire of the Sun and Concrete Jungle. He focuses on the effects of the physical surrounding on the character and how there is a ‘retreat from the outside world’. This is an apt parallel when thinking about the whole Skarne systems intention for a community and how this becomes oppressive in the 1970s and 80s. Ballard’s novels do not present a set political agenda but High Rise and its dystopian nightmare seems to predict the dream of utopian social housing turned sour during the selfish Thatcherite era. It was of course Thatcher’s Conservative government that introduced the right-to-buy system as part of a new housing act; although this did improve the morale of the British public by giving them financial freedom as well as increasing finance within the treasury, it did have huge consequences, as evidenced by the housing crisis today. Remaining council estates that didn’t fall under the housing act raised rent prices even higher. Issues surrounding high rise towers are still very prominent in society today, especially with the recent tragedy of Grenfell. This event has brought back questions about the quality and regulation of materials and maintenance, as well as financial intervention from the government. References: Skarne System: http://www.skarne.se/frames/skarne_system.html Dan T. Smith: https://tom-draper.com/2016/09/29/four-visions-of-t-dan-smith/ Brass Half Monkey Race: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brass_Monkey_Half_Marathon Housing issues post WW2: http://www.screenonline.org.uk/history/id/1092543/index.html The History of Council Housing: https://fet.uwe.ac.uk/conweb/house_ages/council_housing/print.htm Historic England: https://www.pastscape.org.uk/hob.aspx?hob_id=1497981 Thatcher government right-to but system: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/aug/26/right-to-buy-margaret-thatcher-david-cameron-housing-crisis J. G. Ballard context - https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/03/jg-ballards-high-rise-takes-dystopian-science-fiction-to-a-new-level Addison Act - https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/photography/council-estates-design-style-history-addison-act-1919-a9024646.html https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/law-obituaries/8093747/Andrew-Cunningham.html |
