Archive film footage stirs memories of Wirral's famous days

May 26 2009 by Liam Murphy, Liverpool Daily Post

THE celebrations at the Arrowe Park Scout Jamboree, of 1929, and the newly-opened bathing pool at New Brighton, in 1934, are just some of the historic events in Wirral to be captured on film at an event next month.

The North West Film Archive, based at Manchester Metropolitan University, will be presenting “Wirral on Film 2”.

The showing is part of its programme to make this fascinating collection available to the public.

The Archive’s service manager Marion Hewitt said: “This is a great opportunity for the people of the Wirral to enjoy an evening with a difference, and take a look back at life in their area in the past century.”

The films to be shown will feature life in and around the Birkenhead and Wirral areas in the last 95 years.

There will be a chance to see “wartime hero Monty” as he toured the Unilever works at Port Sunlight in 1950, and watch the famous Ark Royal as she is launched into the Mersey in the same year.

The film, The New Horizon, takes a tour of the Cammell Laird yard to see how the great ships were put together ready for the sea, before celebrating with the locals of Wallasey as the new Kingsway Tunnel is opened, in 1971.

There will also be a showing of the classic BBC documentary, Nairn's North, with an episode which looked at the decline of the New Brighton tourist trade in 1967, and another documentary about the last shrimp fisherman at Parkgate, 10 years later.