New YouTube Welcome Video

Check out our new YouTube welcome video! We’ve gone for Dramatic with a capital D. What do you think?

We’ve appreciated your feedback since uploading our entire archive onto YouTube just a few months ago, and you’ll notice we’ve started making a few changes to our channel. We hope to take it forward while keeping the best of what’s been done before.

Do let us know in the comments section below of the sorts of things you want to see on our channel.

Subscribe now to the largest archive of history on YouTube. Follow us through the 20th Century and dive into the good and the bad times of the past. Feel free to explore more than 80,000 videos of filmed history and maybe you’ll even find stuff no one else has ever seen.

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WWW.BRITISHPATHE.COM

WWW.YOUTUBE.COM/BRITISHPATHE

The Pathé World Cup Archives

The 2014 FIFA World Cup is underway in Brazil. At Pathé, some of us are football crazy – others less so! But whether you like your footie or not, there are some stories in the Pathé archive of interest to all. So, if you love football or just don’t want to feel left out of the conversation, here are some essential videos from Pathé’s vintage World Cup coverage.

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 MIGHTY ENGLAND – 1966

British Pathé has excellent coverage of the 1966 World Cup in fabulous Technicolor. The match, between England and West Germany, took place at Wembley. Note how the English and German fans are intermingled.

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PICKLES THE DOG FINDS THE WORLD CUP – 1966

Incredibly, there almost wasn’t a trophy to give England that year. The Cup was stolen, only to be discovered wrapped in newspaper on a London street by a dog called Pickles. This Pathé film shows Pickles getting his reward. Sadly, Pickles died the following year.

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HOW FOOTBALLS ARE MADE

This 1966 film shows footballs being made in Yorkshire for the World Cup. A surprisingly interesting look at something most of us never really give much thought to.
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1966 – IN-DEPTH

Here’s our gallery of fun 1966 World Cup facts for those who want a more in-depth look at that fantastic year for English football: http://www.britishpathe.com/gallery/world-cup

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THE COMPLETE BRITISH PATHE WORLD CUP COLLECTION

For those of you less enamoured with the great game (like your author – sorry, football fans!), if friends or colleagues mention a game from pre-1966 (unlikely) or from the post-Pathé era (quite likely), don’t panic! Just nod and say, “That was a very memorable match” – this can be used for both good and bad games. You’ll blend right in.

For those who want to delve more deeply into the Pathé archive than 1966, the company’s coverage of other World Cup years was more limited, but there are some good films, especially of qualifying matches. You can find every Pathé World Cup film in this collection on our website.

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To everyone everywhere, enjoy the World Cup!

http://www.britishpathe.com

The British Pathé D-Day Archives

On 6 June 1944, the invasion of Normandy began. British Pathé newsreels documented every stage of the liberation of Europe. Three videos are especially worth bringing to your attention.

INVASION – PICTORIAL REPORTS FROM FRANCE

This contemporary Pathé newsreel documents D-Day for cinema audiences watching back home. It’s interesting to magine what they must have thought watching these pictures. Many would have had sons, brothers or husbands on the battlefield.

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D-DAY – THE GREATEST COMBINED OPERATION IN WORLD’S HISTORY

Another contemporary newsreel, longer than the first, really shows the scale of the Normandy landings, looking not just at the beaches but the operations at sea and in the air.

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A DAY THAT SHOOK THE WORLD: 6TH JUNE 1944

John Humphrys narrates this brief overview of D-Day in an episode of the series A Day That Shook the World, which British Pathé co-produced with the BBC.

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COLLECTIONS & GALLERIES

For a more in-depth look at the D-Day landings and subsequent battles, you can explore a collection British Pathé has compiled of  footage from the archive and organised by topic. You can see a screenshot of the collection below, very similar to the one we recently produced for the First World War. You can find the collection on our website via this link.

Finally, we’ve also put together a new gallery of 10 Amazing D-Day Facts. Do take a look.

http://www.britishpathe.com

 

 

A message from British Pathé

We’re absolutely thrilled to have gained so many new subscribers across our various social media channels over the last few weeks. Thank you all for supporting our upload of 85,000 films to YouTube – that’s more than most people can sift through in a lifetime!

Now that’s done, we’re dedicated to giving these videos a framework so that you can find exactly what you’re looking for. So keep your eyes peeled for our playlists and highlight videos – there’ll be a new one every week.

We’re sure there’s something for everyone in our archive and we can’t wait to share it with you.

Best wishes,
British Pathé
https://www.youtube.com/britishpathe

British Pathé releases 85,000 films on YouTube

Newsreel archive British Pathé has uploaded its entire collection of 85,000 historic films, in high resolution, to its YouTube channel. This unprecedented release of vintage news reports and cinemagazines is part of a drive to make the archive more accessible to viewers all over the world.

“Our hope is that everyone, everywhere who has a computer will see these films and enjoy them,” says Alastair White, General Manager of British Pathé. “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.”

British Pathé was once a dominant feature of the British cinema experience, renowned for first-class reporting and an informative yet uniquely entertaining style. It is now considered to be the finest newsreel archive in existence. Spanning the years from 1896 to 1976, the collection includes footage – not only from Britain, but from around the globe – ofmajor events, famous faces, fashion trends, travel, sport and culture. The archive is particularly strong in its coverage of the First and Second World Wars.

Alastair White continues: “Whether you’re looking for coverage of the Royal Family, the Titanic, the destruction of the Hindenburg, or quirky stories about British pastimes, it’ll be there on our channel. You can lose yourself for hours.”

This project is being managed by German company Mediakraft, which has been responsible for numerous past YouTube successes. The company will be creating new content using British Pathé material, in English and in foreign languages.

You can view and share films from this invaluable resource here.

British Pathé presents: WW1 – The Definitive Collection

August 2014 marks one hundred years since the start of World War One. To commemorate this landmark occasion, British Pathé has launched a definitive collection of WW1 films.

British Pathé holds one of the finest and most comprehensive First World War film archives in the world. There’s footage of trench warfare, zeppelin raids, battleships at sea, U-boats, protests, wartime propaganda, and countless other interesting subjects.

The collection has been organised by topic, event and protagonist, and for the first time presented on a single navigable page.

You can explore the collection here.

A sample image of the newly-created collection, organised by topic.

www.britishpathe.com

Lest We Forget

Remembrance Sunday will shortly be upon us. The British Pathé archive is rich in footage from twentieth century conflicts. We share some select films in the collections listed below.

The First World War

British Pathé holds one of the finest and most comprehensive First World War archives in the world. You will find chilling shots of young troops huddled in their trenches, wearing gas masks, and going “over the top”, as well as battleships at sea, and aerial warfare. There is also footage of shell shock victims at Seal Hayne military hospital in Devon.

The above link is just a selection and you can find more than 2,000 relevant films by searching on our site.

The Second World War

The archives of World War Two material filmed by British Pathé are wide-ranging. Pathé cameramen went with the troops all around the world as well as documenting the destruction at home. Footage details warfare on land, at sea, and in the air.

A general Second World War Collection can be found here – just a selection of the 4,000 films available.

Korean War

The Korean War is often referred to as “The Forgotten War”. Two and a half million people lost their lives in this conflict, including many British soldiers. Our Korean War Collection (just a selection) can be found here, or you can search our website for what you need.

Remembrance

As well as contemporary coverage of various remembrance events and religious services. A catalogue of our Remembrance Day footage can be found here, or you can search our website for more specific films. A particularly interesting one details the work of the Royal British Legion, and visits the factory in Richmond in which war veterans make poppies.

Remembrance Sunday is on 10th November. Remembrance Day is on 11th November.

www.britishpathe.com

Images From The Archive

NEW BLOG!

One of our archivists has set up a new blog site dedicated to the best images from the British Pathé collection. There’s only a few up there so far, but with a new one added each day, it’ll be sure to quickly become quite a gallery.

Unlike the company’s Facebook or Pinterest pages, the images on the new blog, Archivist @ British Pathé,  are shown free of all description or context, allowing the images to speak for themselves. Some of them, out of context, seem really quite bizarre! Which is, of course, part of the fun. Take this one – “A Bath With A View” (1931). But each image has a link to the original newsreel which you can watch online and find out what it’s all about and see if you’ve guessed correctly.

We hope you enjoy the images. Take a look at the new blog here.

imagesfromthearchive.wordpress.com

British Pathé Picks: July 2013

Here are some things in the archive that may be of interest to you over the next few weeks. Click on the links to take a look.

2013 British Open   (18 July)

The 142^nd Open Championship takes place this month in Scotland. British Pathé’s coverage of past events can be seen on our website via this link.

Wiley Post Flies Solo   (22 July)

80 years: Wiley Post was the first to fly solo around the world. British Pathé has two newsreels covering the historic flight in this collection.

Bombing of Hamburg   (24 July)

It is the 70^th anniversary of the bombing of Hamburg in Operation Gomorrah. Shots of the RAF and USAF raids and the devastation wrought can be found here.

Korean War Truce  (27 July)

60 years: The signing of the truce in 1953 was covered by Pathé News and the original newsreel can be viewed here. The archive also has additional material from the Korean War, including combat footage. Here’s a selection.

www.britishpathe.com

TV Ads: British Pathé’s Forgotten Work

There’s an interesting film in the archive concerning the production of television commercials by Associated British-Pathé (as the company was known from 1933 to 1958). It is introduced by McDonald Hobley, better known for his work with the BBC, who takes the audience – in this case, prospective clients – on a tour of Pathé’s Wardour Street studio, the newsreel archive, and the history of the company. This presentation, entitled Introducing Ourselves, was intended to show advertisers the good work that Pathé could do on television commercials, a new media they had begun to exploit only eighteen months previously (circa 1954).

As Hobley’s presentation reveals, Pathé produced about two hundred commercials a year and some of them are included in the film as a showreel. Hobley tries to limit expectations of the selection, not terribly convincingly, by describing the choice as “random…Not necessarily the best that we have produced, but we have tried to limit our selection to those which offer the types of production which we feel will appeal to you – the advertisers – in this area.”

Some of the ads are really quite entertaining and worth a watch, if you can stomach twenty-five minutes of what we’re now used to just fast-forwarding through. The showreel begins with Dunlop Tubeless Tyres, then moves on to: Max Factor’s Top Secret hair spray, Dunkies doughnuts, Guards Trousers, Amami Wave Set, Hiltone, Mum antiperspirant, Brylcreem, Disprin, Twinings Teas, Maxwell House coffee, Black & Decker tools, another Maxwell House ad, Burtons trousers, Hi Fi Lipstick from Max Factor, Mac Fisheries, Blackstone Opticians, Electrolux vacuum, Fred Fearnley Ltd.  Scooters and Motorcycles,  Scentinel Quiff air freshener, D.D.D., Dinneford’s, Setlers, Fray Bentos, an ad for bread, Bristow’s Hair Tonic, Tide detergent, Wm Younger’s Beer, another Fray Bentos commercial, Heinz, Brylcreem again, Peter Robinson, another for Dunlop, Huntley and Palmers, M & B Bitter, Tide, and Esso Extra.

What’s somewhat odd is that there appears to be some additional later footage tacked onto the end of the presentation. This dates from the 1970s, and must have been added to the film when the archive was under EMI ownership. These are a trailer for Love Story, starring Ali MacGraw and Ryan O’Neal and a “rather fab” Chrysler Sunbeam ad from 1978.

Introducing Ourselves is valuable for its enticing glimpse behind the scenes of Pathé in the 1950s, the way in which the newsreel archive has by then already been deemed of historical significance worthy of preservation, and for including the only – at least in our collection – examples of Pathé’s commercial work, often forgotten due to the organisation’s usual focus on cinema news and theatrical films.

Watch Hobley’s introduction and behind-the-scenes footage in Part One here.

Watch the various commercials in Part Two of the presentation here.

www.britishpathe.com

Imphal and Kohima

The British people have voted for their “greatest battle” in a poll conducted by the National Army Museum. The combined victories at Imphal and Kohima against the Japanese in the Second World War are now taken to be the “Greatest British Battle” in history, winning more than half of the votes cast. The runner up was D-Day, with 25 per cent of the vote. A full list of the contenders can be found here, in an article for The Daily Telegraph. For each of these engagements, the British Pathé archive has some relevant films that should be of interest.

“Invasion Scenes Far East” is a newsreel item showing British troops advancing towards Imphal in India. “Japs Trapped At Imphal” follows Indian infantry of 5th and 7th Indian divisions as they advance through the Hills of Manipur, past the bodies of dead Japanese soldiers, to trap the enemy.  Finally, “Driving Out The Japs” follows Lord Louis Mountbatten inspecting Indian soldiers and British men of the 14th Army at Imphal and Kohima. You can find all three films in this collection.

D-Day

There’s an extensive collection of films from the Normandy landings during WW2 in the British Pathé archive. Click here for a selection. A more general Second World War Collection can be found here.

www.britishpathe.com

The Oscars: We were up all night! But was it worth it?

It was the 85th Academy Awards last night! The winners were all worthy, Daniel Day Lewis was charming as usual, everyone was impeccably dressed, and the great William Shatner made an extended appearance. We stayed up all night as usual, and (as with every year) we regret it. It’s never quite as fun as we think it’ll be, especially when Steve Martin is absent. Martin was, for us anyway, the standout host of recent Oscar times. Seth Macfarlane was okay, but check out this Martin monologue from the official Oscars YouTube channel:

And with Alec Baldwin on Martin’s third appearance:

Disagree with us? Leave us a comment below!

But if, like us, you’re nostalgic for earlier times, you can see highlights from past ceremonies in the British Pathé archive via this link.

For our 1967 Oscar-nominated Documentary, “See You At The Pillar”, click here

The Pathé Animation Archive

As well as producing regular news stories, British Pathé often included additional forms of entertainment mixed in to add a bit of variety. These pieces could be more comedic or quirky in tone, such as the Pathé Pictorial series, or entirely fictional pieces such as Dave and Dusty. In the early days, they also produced some animated shorts. In the late 1910s, there was a series of John Bull cartoons, which sadly we cannot find in the archive. There was also, most notably Jerry The Troublesome Tyke and the somewhat similar Adventures of Pongo the Pup, both from the mid-1920s.

Jerry was a cartoon dog from the silent era who actually “worked” for Pathe News.

“The Adventures of Pongo the Pup!” Classic animation from the 1920s.

The archive also contains a great deal of other animated productions and series. But of immense interest are the war propaganda shorts, particularly the marvellous “Britain’s Effort“, made by Lancelot Speed, but also the Sinking of the Lusitania and the brief Star-gazer, a still of which is below.

A still from “Run Adolf Run” from 1940.

The Pathé Animation archive also contains plenty of educational and information cartoons, such as this Ministry of Information film “Peak Load Electricity“ from 1943. Plus, there’s a lot of fun John Noble shorts and film of cartoonists at work. Pathé had fun with its shorts by showing the animators interacting with their creations, sometimes (in the case of Jerry), arguing with them.

Still from Ministry of Information trailer “Export or Die”, 1944.

So there’s a wealth of different styles and genres within the archive to explore. We’ve presented just a taster of them here, in our efforts to promote aspects of the archive which have been somewhat neglected by the understandable focus on Twentieth Century politics, royalty, and the two world wars. For an introduction to “Alternative Pathé”, read our previous blog post, “That’s all very well, but what has the Pathé archive got for ME?”

To search our Animation Archive, click here.