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Go Back to 1969 with news show ATV Today

Go Back to 1969 with news show ATV Today

MACE – The Media Archive for Central England is releasing ATV Today material from the sixties on DVD. Travel back to 1969 and life in the Midlands.

 

The centrepiece of the DVD is a documentary made by ATV Network’s news division which is described as a poignant and atmospheric profile of the people and character of the Black Country, the ‘birthplace and the cradle of the industrial revolution’.

 

90 year old Hannah Baker lives in a recently condemned 19th Century end-terrace in Tipton with its original open grate and no electricity. Mrs Baker remembers when she was a child the evenings would be lighter, the sky lit up beautifully by the furnaces. Herbert Davies and Gerald Billingham forge chains by hand at Cradley Heath and Quarry Bank from 4am ‘til 10.30am each working day. Herbert ‘scorns weaker men’. While having a pint, chain making legend and prize dog owner Joe Mallen uses beer glasses to simulate the process of dog fighting and later author and presenter Phil Drabble describes the brutal sport of cock fighting.

 

A Bradley pub is packed with regulars singing Somebody Stole My Gal to piano while the landlady serves up free pie and peas at Grey Peas Pudding Night; Dr John Fletcher of the Black Country Society talks of how locals possess a strong sense that they belong to a small group, whether it be a street, a town or area; and Black Country poet Harry Harrison talks of the region’s particular sense of humour.

 

The Black Country is narrated by Gwyn Richard’s. This half-hour documentary isn’t alone. Bonus material includes another hour of features from the ATV television vaults.

 

ATV Today news team in 1970Jaywalking: On The Road To Nowhere is a 25 minute documentary fronted by ATV Today presenter Sue Jay as she visits a faggot and pea supper evening at a local football club. This 1974 production features regional entertainers of the day.

 

The DVD also contains eight ATV Today news reports on the ‘Black Country’ area covering the years 1972 to 1978. [Right, the ATV news team in 1970]

 

‘The Black Country 1969’ is the first of what is planned to be many MACE DVD releases. For more details visit the MACE website, here.

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