Friday 26 August 2011

London, 1940s

After spending last week looking at the Festival of Britain, I enjoyed watching these film clips which show London in the same period as it left the 1940s. The first is a tourist film, which covers the usual attractions but also mentions bomb sites near St Paul's and has transport and dress now long-gone.



The second shows daily life away from the tourist sights. It was filmed in St John's Wood in the late 1940s.



3 comments:

Graham said...

Actually, the section I was most impressed by was the view of the Pool of London and the huge numbers of ships loding and unloading
Graham

CarolineLD said...

I wouldn't disagree - the sight of ships right in the centre of the city never ceases to amaze me on older photos and film.

Mike said...

It's so easy to associate the loss of all that concentrated action with thinking that commerce is now a dead duck for London - when in fact pretty much the same tonnage is still handled today - it's just that it's in containers and further down the Thames (not least because the Pool and the old docks couldn't handle ships of that size).

Also amused by the shot of Tower Bridge whilst the commentary told us all about London Bridge. No wonder we all thought the USAians bought the wrong bridge !!