The Horsleys of Hollywood (NZ197524)

We don’t like to crow about it here in the North-East, but not a lot of people know that it was two brothers from West Stanley, Co.Durham, who founded the Hollywood movie business on America’s west coast. That’s not to say it wouldn’t have happened without them, but David & William Horsley were most certainly the very first businessmen to set up a film studio in the famous suburb of Los Angeles.

History seems to place David, the younger of the siblings, as the driving force behind the extraordinary venture. Born in 1873 at West Stanley, then a bustling little pit village in the heart of Durham, he seemed destined to follow his family members into the lifestyle to which they had become accustomed – until two significant events changed the course of his young life. Firstly, aged nine, his hand was crushed under the wheel of a train, necessitating the amputation of his lower arm; then, in 1884, the family emigrated to New Jersey in search of a better life.

As he entered adulthood, the disabled David set up a bicycle business and ran a pool hall. In time, he fell in with a former Biograph Studios employee, Charles Gorman, and the two of them – together with brother William – decided to set up the Centaur Film Company in 1907. By 1910, they were turning out a handful of films per week, including the famous Mutt & Jeff comedies.

In order to really make an impression in the industry, though, they needed reliable sunlight – and the west coast was the place they targeted. So, in the summer of 1911, their set-up was moved to California, and the name changed to the Nestor Motion Picture Company. Though a handful of film companies were already operating in the area, the Horsleys’ studio was the first to be established in the LA suburb of Hollywood. The very first movie set was erected in the backyard of the Blondeau Tavern Building on Sunset Boulevard – and in late October 1911 the first short Hollywood film was shot.

LA operations were, in the main, entrusted to the Horsleys’ general manager, Al Christie, whilst the brothers ran the film processing and distribution side of the business from their New Jersey base. However, things moved fast, and as other companies arrived in Hollywood in their droves, the Horsleys decided to merge with several other concerns and form the famous Universal Studios in April 1912 – with David listed as among the new company’s founders.

Within a year or so, however, he had sold his share in the new organisation and embarked on a life of travel. He returned to the film industry a few years later, but his venture failed, and he eventually died – and was buried – in LA in 1933. William Horsley also left Universal (in 1916) to concentrate on the processing and developing side of the business.

Interestingly, David’s son, David Stanley Horsley, became a movie special effects expert.

Clarence of Prudhoe (NZ096630)

The scene illustrated above will be instantly recognisable to most of a certain age – especially those with so much as a passing interest in movies. It is, of course, a still from the film It’s A Wonderful Life, featuring James Stewart (right) and his guardian angel, Clarence Odbody, played by Henry Travers. And what hardly anyone knows about the latter is that Mr Travers was born on the banks of the Tyne at Prudhoe in 1874.

There is much confusion over the origins of our Henry, though, with biographies having him born in various places. He spent many years in Berwick, so most claim he was born there; others say Ireland. But his birth was certainly registered in Hexham registration district (which, in 1874, included Prudhoe), so that would seem to clinch it for the good folk of our Tynedale town.

He was born ‘Travers John Heagerty’, but would barely have known the place of his birth. At a very early age (around 2) his family moved to the aforementioned Border town (Tweedmouth, actually), and he spent his childhood there, before training as an architect. He enjoyed amateur musical/dramatical roles from the 1890s onwards, briefly visiting Broadway in 1901. He returned to England thereafter to enjoy many successful years on the stage.

In 1917, he returned to the States, where he trod the boards prolifically for the next two decades on Broadway. In 1933, he appeared in his first movie, Reunion in Vienna; and in the years that followed cornered the market in roles very similar to that for which, ultimately, he would be best remembered: bumbling but loveable old men. His career seemed to peak in 1942 when he was nominated for an Oscar in Mrs Miniver.

However, he will be remembered and loved by most as the kindly, confused and ultimately life-saving guardian angel to Jimmy Stewart’s character, George Bailey, in that 1946 classic. So when it comes around again next Christmas, see if you can spot a hint of a North-East accent…

You see, George, you've really had a wonderful life. Don't you see what a mistake it would be to throw it away?

He retired in 1949 and died in 1965, aged 91.

'Get Carter' Car Park (NZ256632)

© Copyright philld and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

Gateshead’s Trinity Square Car Park (to give it its proper name) was constructed during 1964-69 and demolished as recently as 2010. It was always controversial: from its troubled construction, through its fitful existence, until, finally, the furore surrounding its planned and actual destruction. Yet it remains lodged in the minds of all North-Easterners of a certain age as the scene of the region’s most famous moment in the history of film.

The Owen Luder Partnership was responsible for its design, dreamt up, as it was, as a rival for Newcastle’s planned Eldon Square Shopping Centre. For the car park itself was only a part of a greater whole, sitting, as it did, atop the Trinity Square shopping precinct. The latter opened in 1967, the car park suffering construction problems which delayed its opening until 1969.

For four decades thereafter it dominated Gateshead’s skyline, to the delight of few and the distain of many. It found international fame as the starring venue of the 1971 gangster flick Get Carter, from which Michael Caine famously hurled Bryan Mosley’s character to his death.

Atop the car park stood the shell of a restaurant which was never actually used due to its inaccessibility. The shopping centre was utilised reasonably well throughout its lifetime, but the car park – unused for long periods – was never well liked and soon became unsightly.

Once hailed by experts as a Brutalist classic, it slowly fell into a state of dangerous dilapidation. Its film fame helped it stave off demolition for years, until it was finally dismantled during 2010 during phase 1 of the town centre’s long-term redevelopment.

Fancy some cheap family/local history books? 

Check out my other blog for details.

Will Hay of Stockton (c.NZ446193)

[from Wikipedia]

The great William Thomson “Will” Hay was a famed comic screen actor of 1930s and 40s Britain. As a child, he lived in several locations throughout England as his father sought work, but was actually born in Stockton-on-Tees to parents William and Elizabeth in December 1888.

Will began his adult life as an engineer in Salford, but decided to become an actor in his early 20s, spending many years as a music hall performer – including some time in Fred Karno’s famous comedy troupe. After a long and successful stage career, he broke into film in his mid-40s and spent a short but highly successful few years in the business (1934-1943), before moving (very briefly) into radio. His film portrayals saw him play bumbling authority-figure characters – among them lead roles in  Boys Will be Boys, Oh, Mr Porter!, The Ghost of St.Michael’s (above), and My Learned Friend.

He wrote much of his own material, and was also, interestingly, a highly-respected amateur astronomer (and a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, no less). Furthermore, he was one of Britain’s first private pilots (he gave lessons to Amy Johnson) and spoke several languages proficiently. He was married – and fathered three children – before separating from his wife, Gladys. Sadly, he spent the last two years of his life disabled following a stroke in 1947.

Will Hay died in 1949, aged just 60, and was buried in London.

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Get Carter Finale (NZ465400)

© Copyright Andrew Curtis and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

Blackhall Beach.  The wasted shore, the aerial flight.  And Jack Carter finally gets his revenge in the climactic scene of the classic 1971 gangster flick, Get Carter.  Today, faint traces of former days of industry can be made out as per the above image, with the line of the aerial flight still discernible by way of the concrete channel running across the foreground.  The overhead conveyor once carried coal waste from nearby Blackhall Colliery over and out to sea – and provided Michael Caine with a handy means of disposing of the body of his final on-screen kill forty years ago. 

The black beach and its coaly waves are beginning to disappear, too, thankfully – though one can’t quite yet call it pretty.

More excellent ‘then and now’ shots here (and use the ‘back’ and ‘next’ button for more).

Turning The Tide

What does a historian make of a project designed to wipe all traces of industrial activity from a stretch of coastline in an attempt to revert it to its former, natural beauty?  In the case of the Durham Heritage Coast, as it is now called, surely no one can complain.  For as recently as the early 1990s, the East Durham seaboard was an industrial wasteland, made famous by distinctly unglamorous appearances in such films as Get Carter and Alien 3.

A century of coal mining activity had scarred the coast beyond recognition, waste-dumping from the scattering of collieries betwix the Tyne and the Tees placing the beaches in some areas beneath ten metres of black slag and poisoning the water and its natural habitat for several miles out to sea.  Flora and fauna were devastated.  Come the closure of the pits in the years leading up to the early 1990s, locals had long since turned their backs on the disgusting mess and cared little for nature’s woes in the face of their own collective economic plight.

The mid-‘90s saw a sea-change, though.  With the availability of Lottery Fund cash, the local authorities rallied, and, with the help of a host of other organisations and vested interests, launched the ‘Turning The Tide’ (TTT) project in 1997 – and the clearance work began.  Astonishingly, within its five-year remit, TTT had utterly transformed the landscape: by 2002 the coastline was well on its way to an incredible recovery – a process now being continued by local groups, the Durham Heritage Coast Partnership and nature itself.

Today there are 15 miles of new coastal footpaths and more than 30 miles of cycleways criss-crossing a unique magnesian limestone landscape which is home to all manner of rare and beautiful plants, insects and animals – all suitably protected by law and freed from farming use.  For once, the wiping of our historic past has been welcomed by one and all – though it lives in on a scattering of information panels the length of the coastline.

The video, here, says and shows it all.

Nose’s Point & the Blast Beach (NZ438478)

© Copyright Brian Abbott and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

This abandoned corner of the North-East has seen more than its fair share of industrial blight over the years.  The heights of Nose’s Point and thereabouts have seen ironworks, a bottle factory and a chemical works built, thrive and demolished over the years – as well as, of course, Dawdon Colliery, which closed in 1991.  Add to the mix random railways and a ballast dumping ground for merchant ships, and it is a wonder that it looks as scenic as it does today.  Blast Beach, seen in the foreground of the picture above probably got its name from the blast furnaces of the ironworks, or is perhaps a slight corruption of the word ballast.


Such was the state of the area prior to its recent clean-up that the headland used to protrude further out to sea thanks to the dumping of industrial waste – and a platform, or crust, of compacted slag and slurry covered the beach, again extending far out into the waves (you can still see the edge, or lip, of this artificial surface where the rocky beach abuts the land).  It looked so barren that it was used in the opening scenes of the film Alien 3 in 1992.

With the retreat of industry, nature – with a little help from man – has largely wiped the grime from the shores and the cliffs.  However, with the protective coating of waste now gone, coastal erosion is a major concern.

Dame Flora Robson (NZ371658)

 

Flora McKenzie Robson, one of the twentieth century’s greatest character actresses of stage, film and TV, was born at 11 Village Terrace, Westoe, on 28th March 1902. Her father, a shipping engineer, relocated the family to the south of England in 1907, where Flora spent most of the rest of her life. From the age of five she competed in recitation competitions, eventually attending RADA as a youth.

Lacking what may be described as ‘glamorous looks’, Robson took on character roles from an early age – a career decision which was to see her excel over the following decades, though her fame didn’t begin to surface until the 1930s. In fact, such was the uncertainty of her ‘trade’ that she spent several years employed as a factory welfare officer in east London in the 1920s. The early 1930s, however, began to bring real stage success – based largely at the Old Vic.

In time, film roles followed. Most notably, of course, were her two performances as Queen Elizabeth I in Fire Over England (1937, picture above) and The Sea Hawk (1940); but memorable roles followed in Saratoga Trunk (1945 – Oscar nomination), Caesar & Cleopatra (1945), Black Narcissus (1947), and the ‘Holiday Camp’ series of films. A host of stage, film and TV appearances followed throughout the ‘50s, ‘60s and 70s. Many will remember her for her role as the Queen of Hearts in the 1972 production of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and her final film appearance as a Stygian Witch in Clash of the Titans (1981).

Her largely unheralded charity work helped her to a CBE in 1952, then a DBE in 1960. She never married nor had children, and lived for many years before her death at her Brighton home with her two sisters. She died in 1984.

IMDb entry here.

North Blyth Staithes (c.NZ314823)

If, like me, you love seeing the North-East depicted in old movies, then you’ll know all about the classic British gangster flick, Get Carter. A marvellous 1971 effort – if for no other reason than to see so much of the region as it was forty years ago – the closing scenes are famously acted out on Blackhall Beach, just north of Hartlepool.

However, the scene immediately preceding the ‘beach chase’ between Michael Caine and Ian Hendry (where the two are seen scrambling over giant coal staithes, before progressing to the beach) was actually filmed thirty miles north, at what used to be North Blyth Staithes. Nowadays, there ain’t much to see on the seafront at the Blyth estuary – and it is really quite peaceful; but at one time it was a hive of activity. As recently as the early 1960s, it was Europe’s busiest port for shipping coal, with five sets of staithes and numerous other loading points. But the subsequent decline of the coal industry led to to the staithes being left as idle skeletons for many years, until the North Blyth set – originally built during 1910-23 – were severely truncated in the 1990s.

Nowadays, Blyth makes a decent living, ironically, from importing goods. This amounts mainly to material for the nearby Alcan works – namely, alumina and, believe it or not, coal.

For some absolutely splendid ‘then & now’ shots of the North Blyth Staithes (and dozens of other scenes from the famous film) see the Get Carter Tour website. Look for the ‘Locations Tour’, and then the ‘Staithes’ links. Super stuff.