1950s Transport in the United Kingdom - British Transport In The 1950's - CharlieDeanArchives
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- Опубліковано 8 лют 2025
- A collection of short films showing various means of transport in Britain, including trains, trucks (lorries), cars, ferries and buses. .
CharlieDeanArchives - Archive footage from the 20th century making history come alive!
Notice how clean the road side verges, streets and train tracks are ; no crisp packets or drinks bottles, no empty beer cans and especially no half eaten McDonald's thoughtlessly thrown from a car window. Also noticed how well packaged that load was, on the lorry @ 9:20 , all nicely tied in hessian and stowed in wooden barrels. I hate modern waste with a vengeance.
Anyroad, moan over, what a grand film, thanks for uploading.....DA.
We wus poor in those days
@@kingsleyharris6343 Europe was mostly worn out and/or destroyed.
While rebuilding all sorts of materials were scarse.
Everything was reused or used for other purposes.
After the hardships from the last 2 decades they didn't complain and people worked more togheter.
You could argue that we Europeans have become rich on goods and materials but poor on the empathic and social level.
@@kingsleyharris6343 uwer luuky!
ua-cam.com/video/swWh45knSms/v-deo.html ; Railway Museum you can still take a ride in steam engines an interesting visit to get on the Train
@@cameronaustin4997cardboard box?
Brings a tear to your eye., just look how clean, well maintained everything is....... disciplined and in perfect order.
@DriftZ TwoSeven bullshit
@DriftZ TwoSeven Apparently its wound up racist twats.
Back then people who had very little were still proud to be British. It stood for pulling together and being industrious. Today people have the world at their fingertips, but are compelled to regard western nations as eternally evil. That’s what people mean by “Progressive”.
....and paid for by the taxpayer.
Before the muslim invasion
The period music is so expressive for this era.Thoroughly enjoyed the film. Thank you for posting.
What an absolute gem of a film. Loved every minute of it.
A very moving film which, as others have already said, demonstrates just how much we have lost. I don't know how long BRS lasted but it wasn't long. Woodhead tunnel opened in 1954 and Thatcher's shameful lot closed it in 1981. When I grew up the motto of my city was Labor Omnia Vincit- work conquers all. Needless to say, the motto, like work itself for many. is long gone.
Thanks very much for posting.
Lol, work for the state, like a serf, like a slave.
My father worked for BRS from 1946 until his retirement in 1986. It did eventually become the National Freight Corporation. It was nice to see the BRS lorries in the film. Brings back memories - he would have been 103 yesterday!
A time when a man could rely on work, transport, and law and order. I was just a child in the early fifties and was lucky to have been born then as comparing then and now 2023 I know which I prefer. Our transport system was ruined by the evil Thatcher along with many others . Don’t listen to those who praised her, they probably are the few that made a fortune due to her privatisation nonsense. Thanks for showing this film, it was great reliving those orderly times.
I used to go to school on my bike in the 50s, down quite a steep hill. On the way home I would look for a lorry going up the hill and I would hold on to the back of it, as they all went very slowly in those days. Amusing to see the 20 mph limit signs on the back of the lorries in this video! I agree with many of the comments that remember this era fondly.
Me 2 miss those days.
My father passed his test in 1951 during national service, he was a HGV driver until 1978 then Hackney taxis until he retired 1998 there were no pallets and tautliners then he had to handball the load and unload , sheet and roping he was as fit as a butchers dog RIP daddy xxxx
My old man was a ducker and diver when it came to working for a living. Spent 35 years in retirement.
Outstanding image quality. This was a time when working people's skills were celebrated, when working people had genuine opportunity for education and jobs. Their skills were seen as heroic, and services were owned by those who should own them; the public. Are you old enough to remember when there was a public? Loved this film, thanks for posting it.
Pencil
Pencil windmil
Pencil train
Black soul
Bridge
Did anyone else shed a tear watching this or am I just a silly sentimental old bugger?
yes and you are a silly sentimental old bugger lol
A golden era for Britain...now look at the state of the country 😟
Who won the war, the Commies.
Pl let me join the club. 😂.
It is very sad that those post war dream days are long gone.
best video i have seen on youtube, thanks for posting, loved it
I just cannot express how grateful I am for being able to see this, the quest for money 💰 changed everything unfortunately. Thankyou.
I've seen another documentary about the marshalling yards. Those guys were well fit. If such a job still existed the workers would mess it up checking their mobile phones every 10 seconds.
No mobile phones. i still do this.camara's watch your every move!,
Ironically I watch this on my phone.
Wonder how many people of today even know what a "marshaling yard " is !
My dad worked in the marshaling yards at Whitemoor in March. He go into the empty Geest wagons to pick up any bananas that was left there. One time he climbed in to a wagon and just happen to shone his torch onto the ceiling and hanging there was a big tarantula spider he soon got out of there we didn’t get any fruit that night. Now there a category A prison on the marshaling yard. Wish l was back there again happy days
Thank you so much for adding this! It helped me tremendously.
+Emily Bohn
Put it all on rail they said, look at the state of the railways now, how much freight do you see going by rail, they can't even move passengers about the country properly any more.
The piece where the bus service was responding to customer complaints was pure fiction. I grew up using London Transport and often had to run to catch the bus. Those mean drivers and conductors would wait until I was about 5 yards from the bus and then drive away.
I notice how slim and muscular all these hard working manual workers were you just cant imagine anyone these day's with the burger eating pampered society,
The men in the Bus office were probably only in their 50s but looked a lot older
Thanks for posting this film.
Gosh, that’s a piece of rare footage of 18000, the first gas-turbine loco at 1:11; one of three and I think the first one of Swiss design. What a pity
the scene is not longer and with the sound and also some commentary...Ah well, beggars can’t be....
That said, and humour aside, this is a most superb documentary and a supreme credit to the makers for its serious dedication, good taste and
honest and respectful balance. For there is pride but no boasting, and gentle humility so creditworthy. The narrator couldn’t be better for his gentle but firm and serious vocal tones are excellent...Goodness, what we have lost as a nation! We may know a lot more, be far better off, but
in character manner I warrant we’re not half the people that were in those gentler but harder days, not far out of the War....See the earnest expressions on the faces of those young lads, and I’ll bet they’d set themselves behind any other in place or rank: and not because of any sense
of inferiority but because of a decent sense of respect for others and their neighbours and their equals.... Without hesitation, I say how proud I am of all those in this film and give thanks to those who have made this doc. available for viewing.
When we solved our own problems, manufactured our own goods, grew our own food, provided our own energy. Small things are telling: how neat and well dressed everyone was. There's something in these films from a vanished age, a sense of pride, optimism, unquestioning patriotism. Things weren't perfect, not by a long shot, but imagine taking people from this age and confronting them with Tik-Tok...
I think I prefer living with TikTok to living with polio, TB, and cancer being an automatic death sentence.
One of the best films I saw . I remembered from my childhood in the 60th`.
I remember shunters and goods guards I worked with on B R , I started as a junior porter in 1966 , worked in the sheds and when the opportunity came along trained as a Signalman worked my way through the grades , actually trained and worked 23 Signal boxs , as a regular Signalman and as a relief Signalman did 29 years on the railway , some happy memories, I finished in 1995 in a computerised box , it was the most modern type of Signal box at the time , the one before that was also a P S B push button on the underground at James Street Merseyrail . Any old friends from yesterday year ?
Thanks for showing 👍
At 12:46, the chap with the high tech wooden stick in the brake was called a "shunter", H&S would have afit.
Plus the lad on the lathe at 25.00 with no safety specs. No doubt there are many more points not cool in 2020.
And not a hi viz vest in sight.
And I bet he went to pub at dinner great days
@@mickwright3805 And dinner it would have been, "What's lunch?"; in the 1970s my employer had a sports and social club which they moved from five miles away to right outside the main office, fully licensed too, 2/3 at lunch and necked a few with the Chairman's son, great days indeed.
Millions managed to walk , without a cardboard mug of coffee in their hands.
john bunyan they use to have a billy can which had a tin cup on top it acted as a lid as well , my Grandad had one for work , he also had a split tin which was in two halfs one half was for tea and the other half was for sugar to make a brew , they mixed the tea with condensed milk in grease proof paper and then put it in the billy can and pour boiling water on top to make a brew , it was the best brew you could have .
No men with pink hair
Can someone please transport me back to these times...
Don't be silly
When anyone asks me since returning to the UK after a lifetime of travel; "Where do you live?".. I respond.. "The 1950s".. I was determined to turn back the clock to an age where England was the England that I grew up in.. I moved to a wonderfully sleepy part of England, the edge of a village.. I park outside of the shops I have in my nearest shopping town. I live in the land of Margaret Rutherford and Agatha Christie. You can still do it. :>)
Yes, thanks for the reply, seriously thinking of a move somewhere, anywhere....
@@kayjohnson4294 Well you could do worse than moving to the 1950s. I would recommend a village somewhere in Exmoor National Park. Not too far from a beautiful coastline, wonderful landscapes.. All stalled in the 1950s.
You would soon want to return to today's world life was very tough then
Beautiful film, but why do I feel so sad?
I think its because we lost our innocence along the way ..
The music penetrates one's soul . . .
Despite advances in technology, Britain was a better place to live in the 1950's than it is today. I would gladly get time-traveled back to then if it was possible.
@Mole catcher. For may of us socially yes (and we see the lack of smartness that belies the financial security of such an individual) but is it nevertheless sensible to 'spite' advances in (specifically health) technology?
You would be shocked, and wouldn't fit in at all. All considered, I'm confident you would see it as the worst decision of your life.
Thinking that 'everything was better in the past' is just a sentimental lie.
Selective memory. That's if you are actually remembering it at all.
Yup. So You’d gladly enjoy the Smog. Outside toilets. Slums. Backstreet abortions. Poor quality of food. Appalling roads. 6-7 hours to get from London to Devon by car (if you had one). Mining is presented here as some efficient, clean, patriotic thing. What isn’t shown is the poor air quality, the men dying. The bosses rich men treated appallingly.
Wake up mate. As someone else says, I think you’d be crying like a “snowflake” for your 21st century life back.
@@OlafProt My comment, compared to all of the comments on it, wins the thumbs-up count by a mile, so suck it up.
My great grandfather was a truck driver. My grand mother still remembers her childhood times.
Just brilliant thank you
This is what's needed today get youngsters interested in learning hands on methods
I grew up in the 1950s and the people banging on about the "Good old days" on here make me laugh. In winter time we used to walk to school through black smog, you could hardly see your hand in front of your face, a working man was lucky to have a bicycle let alone a car. Retirement age for men was 65 .Guess what the life expectancy was for men in the 50s-65 years.Full employment but you were basically worked to death.
The good parts that we have lost were the transport of goods by rail and BRS plus bus services run by local authorities.try making a complaint today.
Lived on a post war council estate, with no shops, pub or bus service, But they did provide us with a C of E and RC church at opposite ends of the estate LOL.. One telephone box, so if you had a phone in your house you were very popular with your neighbours.
I certainly understand your points, however You’ve missed the point, friend. I’ll leave it at that. If you are a person of faith ( Jesus Christ), you’ll figure it out.
Nice quality!
7:25 shows the old Aquitania tied up at the ship breakers yard at Faslane, Scotland. It was shot early in her demolition, probably around May, 1950, as only the outside bulkheads of the A-Deck promenade, and all of the upper sports deck aft, have been removed.
i so want to go back to those times
Respect to the guys excavating that tunnel. That was hard graft
I crossed the north sea in 1970 by cargo ship Hull to Antwerp as a passenger .i was 20.
Bloody scary in fog for part of the trip ship blowing its horn regularly .
Britain went wrong somewhere not long after .
I live in 🇦🇺now.i do love the old UK though of my child hood.best years of my life .
And look at the Police State of Victoria, who's running it Erich Honecker?
Amazing to see the old uniforms and Routemasters in Bristol. I can remember them from when I caught the bus to school every day.
Look like RT’s rather than Routemasters, RT’s have the narrower arched radiator grill where as Routemasters have a wider squarer grill.
@@eddherring4972 Thanks for the correction!
@@eddherring4972 or Leyland Titans. Bristol also built their own buses. The K looked a bit like an RT
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Commercial_Vehicles
All of the double deckers I spotted were Bristol K series. The chassis were built in Bristol but the bodies were built separately, usually by Eastern Coachworks in Lowestoft on the other side of the country. Completed chassis were driven, without bodies, all the way across England, fitted with bodies and then driven back to Bristol. That must have made sense to somebody. I noticed a Bedford single decker too.
There was a signal box in the middle of the Woodhead tunnel, not a popular spot in the steam era.
Reminds me of a show i watched with my grandad, On The Buses!
What a great and wonderful film thanks for your sharing this with the people who worked in the 40s through the 90s ronrdzl
Todays health and safety culture has just had a heart attack watching this film! Especially the guys running beside and in front of the rail wagons in the shunting yard.
Thought the same thing myself
There must have been a few accidents
Yes. A world without HR dickheads.
Well it was dangerous.
I was a Shunter for 14 years Jerry, I think the most dangerous time was in the Winter, the sleepers would have frost or ice on them, especially on late turn or nights.
@@mjames4709 HR or H&S?
To my surprise, the lorry in the Argyll segment drove through my village on its way to Campbeltown.
Some of the older working men in this film, made in 1951, must have been veterans of WW1.
I remember being on the Manchester - Sheffield train going through that tunnel in the late 1950s
I think the 4 funnel liner is the `Aquitania` broken up in Faslane in 1950.
As a 3 year old, I was onboard her last Atlantic crossing in 1949,departing from Halifax, Nova Scotia.
I'm sure you're right. It was reckoned she'd steamed three million miles and carried a million passengers in her career.
I love thes old films! Just shows what we are lacking today right at the end, young people being taught skills that would serve them well in their future, Apprenticships something you never hear of these days were the lifeblood of industries and all other jobs back then! What a shame we seem to have lost all sense of direction in this country nowadays??
Apprentices are back with a vengeance but they are nothing like the apprenticeships of old.
When we knew who was amongst us.
What?
I just admire the incredible confidence of people who knew what they were doing!!! I swear we are going backwards ...
Absolutely, getting dumber fast.
When Britain really was great, everyone giving 100% to their jobs. Not asking what your country can do for you, but asking what you can do for your country.
had unions and well paid and secure, unlike today
Worse pay and conditions back then
you stole that from Kennedy , it was B S when he said it an it's still B S today , aye !
@@thomasw.glasgow7449 You need Pride in what you do, and your Country.
@@exb.r.buckeyeman845 aye but that's not what it means , roughly translated it means don't ask us for anything but we will take whatever we want , aye !
That's first time I've ever seen 18000 moving it looked fantastic
Most of those vehicles were made in Britain, then.
People leaving work and queuing for buses. Not many lines of traffic, then.
I used to think that a queue of 6 cars was very heavy traffic.
On the other hand, the upper deck of trams and buses, in the winter, was full of smoke, and condensation poured down the windows. I hated this when I travelled 7 miles to school for 7 years, in South London.
Ironic that they start the story with the digging of the new Woodhead Tunnel, only to see it closed just 10 or so years later. What a waste!
It was built as the trans-Pennine Coal route between Wath Yard and Guide Bridge. That it also provided the first ever intercity overhead electric express service (between Sheffield and Manchester), was almost an afterthought. Unsurprisingly, as it duplicated the Midland route, it only lasted 16 years till 1970 (Dr Beeching recommended Woodhead over the Hope Valley line) and the coal trade basically ended in 1980. What a waste!
Back when Britain was Great. Now its falling apart at the seams.
Nice
Scenes are lovely and not irritating to the eyes
Not many drivers today could rope and sheet these days from an old lorry driver retired now 71 makes me fill sad.
This is true, from a driver only 15 years your junior. But the lorries of today are a very different machine to those of sixty and seventy years ago, and even of thirty or forty years ago, as indeed are the roads. The weights and speeds are very different, the forces exerted are orders of magnitude in excess of those that ropes and sheets could withstand. I mourn the passing of the old skills, but progress has demanded ever more secure and robust methods of securing our loads.
@@RichardLordRix I retired I was nearly 68 I had my own lorry a Daf supper space Cab was one of the first euro 6 before that I had Euro 3 4 5 as well,one of the first lorry’s I drove was a 5 ton Bedford with a crash box also a Foden with a 12 speed range change behind a 180 Gardner and when you went up to the smallest hill you had to go down to crawler that was 1971 I believe.They would give you any old crap to drive then and if you had a heavy load you could get brake faid and I that many times and you would fill your pants nearly .On heavy loads you would use chains the loads were gust as heavy google it was a different time and things have got better for you young drivers thank god but the road side stops have got worse believe me I don’t envy you I went back to work driving a van a year later still working know I will stop working when I drop started work at 13 old habits die hard.Good luck to you and god bless.
a lost art,you don’t see a roped and sheeted lorry today
The good old days
19:30 that's not fog, that's pipe smoke blown down from the Bristol bus depot.
...Brilliant video
"Fickled as a woman any day" at 23:18, boy can't say that anymore with the PC police hiding at every corner. LOL
great line though , aye !
@@thomasw.glasgow7449 Yes it made me chuckle! But he's right though :-)
What beautiful islands in which we live
It appears to be quite hard to find the narrators cast for this production but I'm sure the main one is that fine character actor Raymond Huntley, familiar from countless post-war film comedies and what are the chances the Scottish BRS segment is spoken by John Laurie ? The cross-channel ferry narrator is familiar but I can't quite place him.
I was ashunter at Bescot and wednesbury yards i loved the job running after the wagons jumping on and off on the move coupling up moving wagons even getting between the wagons and loco on the move no snow flakes then oh the memories
@david woods sorry its taken so long to reply but I've just seen it yer I was fit out shunting in all weather sleepers very slippy running leaping over rails jumping on the wet frosty wagons very dangerous job I was young could not see any danger work would not have been done with the snowflakes and health and safety today stay safe dave
Today's pathetic wimps would have a fit.
Nice vid - thanks.
Just look back at this and think of what Enoch Powell warned us about,
Do tell us? I’m intrigued.
@@seanoreilly7692 - Powell warned us that by the early 21st century nasty little racists would be reduced to venting their impotent rage in the comments section of UA-cam videos. He was quite the visionary.
@@L0stJ0hnny It is also biblical, Toer of Babel.
@16:45 good to see so many people with a job, bring back this era.
I'm pretty sure the Argyll section is narrated by John Laurie, the classical actor famous in later life for playing Private Frazer in "Dad's Army".
... we're all doomed, dooomed I tell ye!
The good old days. 😳
Good Stuff .enjoyable , everyone knew their job !!
Lots of glum sentimentalism in these comments “oh I wish we went back to that”). The UK is a country that is the way it is because of mass-manufacturing, consumerism, profit-chasing, businesses and politics - changes to which, I might add, were all welcomed by the general public then. More choice for less cost in shops, no more drudge work, more opportunities for people previously excluded (incl. by class), jobs for women, lower taxes, SMALLER STATE etc - there’s no single point of blame.
Same Brits melancholy in here wanting “the good old days” back will be the same as those who want the NHS to be better or the railways to be nationalised and fixed but who at the same they don’t want their taxes to rise. These are contradictory wants. Maybe stop voting for parties who prioritise ‘wot business wants’ and not us, maybe start asking why our rich-poor divide is so massive and why the average personal wealth of people is rapidly dropping below their equivalents across Europe. Maybe stop being manipulated or whipped-up by disingenuous politicians and their allies in the media (ALL media, yes even those “non-MSM blogs” who often are much worse because they can hide who pays and owns them and who still have biases). In this country, we’re just worker ants left to fight over crumbs while most of the money gets squirrelled away or stuffed away tax-free overseas and your country changing infront of your eyes because you didn’t read between the lines on the manifesto. Wake up, we’re too cowed and dozy.
My great grandfather was an Engine driver and my grandad a shunter at bricklayers arms Bermondsey saw his mate crushed dead, turned his hair white over night
Awesome ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
None can match the sincerity,hardworking,quality and reliability of the British worker 🤗😘❤️🔥
Leave aside the scums but The British Worker is just awesome 🤗😘❤️ for all
The world of my childhood. To quote SpikeMilligan: "Nostalgia, leave me alone!"
Fantastic not a McDonald’s KFC of Costa coffee litter anywhere to be seen. Xxx
My childhood from 1945 onwards was spent in these hallowed times .. I'm leaning back now, to a quieter more civilized time, a less congested time ..Growing up in Highams Park in Essex, the freedom we had as children, the trolly buses and trains. walking to school, the shops the forests of trees and blackberries we found to take home to mum to work her magic on .. Would I go back for a day or two....?
What ship is it at 7:26? Is it a White Star liner awaiting scrapping?
What superb photography. Another comparabke film is OCEAN TERMINAL also on yt....
I’m glad they removed all those mountains from the centre of Bristol and Manchester, it was done in the early 1960s I believe.
Lots of very telling comments from you all, folks - so many different things were going on, back then - talk about "In House"! Now a lot of it is pulling down factories, closing ship-yards, closing down docks, closing down local shops of many different descriptions - from local produce to supplies for mechanical, electrical etc etc etc. Farms closing, hundreds of varieties of fruit being plowed into the ground because supermarkets don`t like the shape or size of the very tasty apples and pears that we used to enjoy. Just one little example to make one chortle:- I saw a program about bagpipes. They had some very convincing ones from some far-away country trying to cash in. They also had some really good ones from - you can guess where. The ones from abroad didn`t even play! Completely unusable! Now, where was I - Oh yes - Ship yards clos........................................................!!!!
Wonderful, 20 mph speed limit on those lorries
This was a beautifully presented reminiscence, although not entirely factually correct in its portrayal.
Interesting-what do you think is wrong with it?
In Melbourne we used H class locos to push the trucks over the Hum
This film is called "Work In Progress".
Exellent😊
7.25?….ish. Your looking at the metal industries breakers yard. You’re standing at just about the old north gate to Faslane submarine base which was yet to be expanded. I lived in bay cottage for few years which is opposite to where that ship was being broken.
"Oi, John!, where's your hard hat, hi vis uniform and steel toecap boots?!!"
Anybody.... What is that ship with the four funnels at 7:26??? It was great.
RMS Aquitania
@@johannesbols57 Thanks for info. What threw me off was seeing a four funnelled ship in a 1950's educational film. Just read the history of the RMS Aquitania and it was the last four funnelled ship scrapped and did it have a LONG "illustrious career." Learn something new everyday. Thanks.
While the film now feels like romanticised nostalgia, London Transport was actively recruiting staff in the Caribbean. In contrast the nationalised Bristol buses, featured in the film, with the connivance of the all-powerful TGWU transport union, operated a “colour bar” preventing any nonwhites from becoming bus crew, until broken after the Bristol bus boycott of 1963 and leading to the 1st Race Relations Act in 1965.
Actually they didn't the West Indies were in dire straits and were trying to get rid of their excess people.
Why is this video a gammon magnet?
You need to reflect on that.
This was over 70 years ago. The world is totally different place now, no point looking back those days are gone. Enjoy today and enjoy what you can control ❤❤
Back then we might not have been the largest, the wealthiest or the most powerful nation... but it WAS the best country in the world...
Alas.... long gone... :(
My grannies stone deaf and she said the best part of this video was the music!
1:05 Which transporter bridge is that? Its not Newport or Middlesbrough. I think it might be Runcorn.
is that John Laurie narrating at 7'30" ?
Lovely, lovely film, thank you!
And that Brylcreem! (24.44)
But, 'That's the channel all over - fickle as a woman any day'? How times change :-)
Does anyone know the music at 7:20? Vaughan Williams, perhaps?
14:50 Well, if Bristol hadn't closed its tram system, scenes like people left behind at bus stops wouldn't have happened. I know that the Luftwaffe got the blame for knocking out the tram power supply, but abandonment actually started in 1938.
15:22 "let's pretend this is how we deal with complaints"
7:27 Aquitania cameo ?
I particularly enjoyed seeing my original birth city of Bristol (although I left there I was 9 years old) 😎
I can't imagine any bus company putting on extra services at a moments notice if the timetabled ones were busy.Not in the 21st century anyway. 😮