News on Screen

Series

Series Name

Mining Review 6th Year

Issue

Issue No.

1

Date Released

Sep 1952

Stories in this Issue:

• 1. FIRST CUT
• 2. FREE WEEK
• 3. CLUB MEETING
• 4. ON SET

Story

Story No. within this Issue

1 / 4

Summary

NoS Summary - Cutting the first sod at Bevercotes colliery.
BFI synopsis: The opening ceremony with Sir Hubert Houldsworth (national Chairman), Rex Ringham (East Midlands Chairman) and Geoffrey Lloyd (Minister of Fuel and Power). At the camp skating, horse riding, and boating lake.
NCB Commentary - Under this desolate Nottinghamshire lanscape is coal - more than 113 million tons of it. This is Bevercotes, a mile or so off the Great North Road. Next door to these marquees, being decked out for the formal opening ceremony, two 24-foot shafts will be sunk, 3000 feet deep.
There was a big turn out for the cutting of the first sod. National Chairman Sir Hubert Houldsworth was there; so was the East Midlands Chairman, Rex Ringham. Geoffrey Lloyd, Minister of Fuel and Power, takes charge of the spade - down it goes, and a new colliery is born.
Nine years from now all this will be a £5 1/2 million all-electric colliery, emplying 2,000 men and winding 5,000 tons a day.
The opening lunch seems to have gone down all right. Let’s hope they’ll do as well with the grub in the new Bevercotes canteen.

Researcher Comments

BFI sources suggest that this story was filmed around the 6th June 1952. Commentary recorded 1 August 1952.

Keywords

Food and cooking; Mining; Ceremonies

Locations

England; Nottinghamshire; Bevercotes

Written sources

British Film Institute Databases   Used for Synopsis
National Film Archive Catalogue
Film User   Vol.8 No.87 January 1954, p32.
The National Archives COAL 32   /3 Scripts for Mining Review, 1949-1956

Credits:

Production Co.

Documentary Technicians Alliance

Director

John H. Shaw-Jones

Sponsor

National Coal Board