Metadata
WORK ID: YFA 3136 (Master Record)
| Title | Year | Date |
| LAST OF THE LAWNSWOOD TRAMS | 1956 | 1956-01-01 |
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Details
Original Format: 16mm Colour: Black & White / Colour Sound: Silent Duration: 8 mins 24 secs Credits: Cyril and Betty Ramsden Subject: Urban Life Transport |
| Summary Made by Betty and Cyril Ramsden, this film is dedicated to the last Lawnswood tram in Leeds which made its final journey in 1956. The film thanks the Leeds City Transport Department and the Leeds Reference Library for their co-operation in making the film. The Ramsdens were semi-professional filmmakers filming both for pleasure and taking on commissions from companies such as the Yorkshire Evening Post. |
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Description
Made by Betty and Cyril Ramsden, this film is dedicated to the last Lawnswood tram in Leeds which made its final journey in 1956. The film thanks the Leeds City Transport Department and the Leeds Reference Library for their co-operation in making the film. The Ramsdens were semi-professional filmmakers filming both for pleasure and taking on commissions from companies such as the Yorkshire Evening Post.
Title-A Ramsden Film
Title-Last of the `Lawnswoods'.
Title-To the Leeds City...
Made by Betty and Cyril Ramsden, this film is dedicated to the last Lawnswood tram in Leeds which made its final journey in 1956. The film thanks the Leeds City Transport Department and the Leeds Reference Library for their co-operation in making the film. The Ramsdens were semi-professional filmmakers filming both for pleasure and taking on commissions from companies such as the Yorkshire Evening Post.
Title-A Ramsden Film
Title-Last of the `Lawnswoods'.
Title-To the Leeds City Transport Department and the Leeds Reference Library. Thanks are given for their help and cooperation.
The film opens with stills images of different part of Leeds city centre from the late 1800s, early 1900s. They are many stils images of various different styles of trams including horse drawn, double decker and rail trams.
The next shot is of a map with `Leeds Corporation meeting of Town Council August 3rd 1887', written on the top. A pointer shows a route on the map. Again, different styles of trams are represented.
Title-For better or worse Leeds will soon be tramless.
Title-This is a record of the last of the Lawnswood in March 1956.
A red tram, number 194, drives through town. The tram has an ad for `Hemmingway Noted Ales' on the front.
The tram drives through town and footage is taken of the front cabin from the point of view of the tram driver. The tram moves along the tramlines, around the city centre, and past famous landmarks such as the Civic Hall. Interior scenes then show the driver operating the tram as he takes it out to the residential area of Headingley.
The tram briefly pulls up to a stop, and some ticket inspectors disembark from the rear of the tram. The tram continues off down a road in a residential area and past the Ramsden's house.
A tram driver stands in front of the tram and pulls a rope attached to a part of the roof. It folds down and the tram drives off again back into the city.
Title-The End.
Context
A trip across Leeds in March 1956 on board the 194 tram, advertising Hemmingway Ales, passing the local traffic, the Civic Hall and other notable landmarks.
With trams making something of a comeback, Leeds, in that portentous year of 1956, provides some tips on just how it can be done. Local filmmakers extraordinaire, Betty and Cyril Ramsden, were on hand to capture the last tram to Lawnswood, providing an opportunity to look back at this clean, economical and efficient mode of transport...
A trip across Leeds in March 1956 on board the 194 tram, advertising Hemmingway Ales, passing the local traffic, the Civic Hall and other notable landmarks.
With trams making something of a comeback, Leeds, in that portentous year of 1956, provides some tips on just how it can be done. Local filmmakers extraordinaire, Betty and Cyril Ramsden, were on hand to capture the last tram to Lawnswood, providing an opportunity to look back at this clean, economical and efficient mode of transport that, of course, had to go. Betty and Cyril Ramsden, prominent members of Leeds Cine Club, began making their large collection of films in 1945 and continued into the mid-1960s. Their film collection was made the subject of a BBC/Open University television programme, Nation on Film (2006). Cyril had a dental practice on the Otley Road in Headingley, with Betty as secretary, from where they most probably took some of this film. This may have been the last tram to Lawnswood, but it wasn’t the last tram to run in Leeds, which took its final journey on 7th November 1959. The last city in Britain to run trams was Glasgow, finishing in 1962, though Blackpool held onto a commercial route. |
