Newquay’s RNLI lifeboat
Admiral Sir George Back was captured on one of the first home movie cameras
in the mid 1920’s. Through modern technology and the advent of video sharing
and social networking this fantastic footage has now come to light and is in
the public domain.
Today’s technology means
that people can share photos and video footage at the click of a button.
Modern devices are cheap and abundant and websites like YouTube and Facebook
readily connect people. We take this for granted.
Go back ninety years and
things were entirely different. Photographs were an expensive luxury and
video footage a rarity. This footage has survived nearly 90 years until 2010
and has been converted to a digital format and shared on YouTube for
everyone to see. A little bleached in places, it is a truly spine tingling
experience.
The footage appears to
have been filmed over a period of time; scenes include deck chairs and ice
creams on the beach and snow ball fights in the streets.
The film from the mid
1920’s shows the lifeboat Admiral Sir George Back launching down the steep
slipway on Towan headland surrounded by many onlookers. The launching of the
lifeboat was a real community affair with crew and onlookers alike summoned
by the maroons.
Maroons are shown
being set off at the beginning of the film by
what would probably have been one of the coastguards. The footage then shows
the lifeboat being recovered on Towan beach before being towed by horses
back through the town, again surrounded by onlookers.
Other scenes in the
footage show children playing in the snow on the town’s streets, the gigs
rowing across the bay and an ice cream seller peddling his wares on Towan
beach.
The film is estimated to
be post 1923. Kodak Eastman started manufacturing cine film for home use and
the Newquay gigs took to the water in earnest.
If you can add any
historic information or identify any of the persons please email
web@newquay-lifeboat.org.uk
all information will be shared with the source publisher and added to our
website. Similarly if you have any old video or pictures please send them in
and we will construct a historical gallery.
