Old Movies are a Genealogy Goldmine

The BBC has recently uncovered some amazing footage shot at a VE day party in Gateshead, and is appealing for people who think they can identify any of the people in the film to come forward. You can watch the nine and a half minute movie on the Yorkshire and NE Film Archive on their website.  

It’s a truly remarkable piece of film, mainly because it’s in colour. So few colour movies exist from this period, at then end of six years of war and at a time where supplies of any film, let alone colour film, were in very short supply. The images are crisp and clear, and show ordinary people celebrating, as well as parades of returning soldiers and local police officers. The images are so clear that there is a good chance people will recognise relatives, or perhaps even realise that one of the toddlers or babies featured is them.

Genealogy Research and the Moving Image

The discovery of this film brings home how important old films can be for your family history research. There are lots of moving image archives around the country, all of which have this sort of film although perhaps not as high quality. The National Library of Scotland moving image archive has over 46,000 items in its collection, and has put 3000 of them online.

Much has been made of the gimmicky “animate your ancestors” tools from some of the big genealogy websites but actually finding footage containing one of your ancestors, or even of an event you know they definitely took part in, is so much better than an AI-enhanced idea of what they may have been like.

Of course, in order to find any potential ancestors in moving images, you first have to know where in the country to look for them. This is where more traditional genealogy comes in; you have to look at civil records, censuses and other documents to locate your family and start looking for relevant images. I can help with this, and if I’m not able to research in the part of the world where your ancestors lived, I have many friends and connections in the genealogical community who can help. Get in touch – you never know what you might uncover.