Coal on Film

Young Socialists take the lead in the struggle against the "Tory dictatorship" led by Margaret Thatcher.

"Coalmining is now the greatest adventure of all time" according to this recruitment film.

Deep underground, Yorkshire miners hew their living out of the coalface.

This directorial debut from Lindsay Anderson is an unexpectedly lyrical portrait of conveyor belts.

Valleys boy escapes as architect to London, where he dresses in black, but returns to Clydach Vale - “a heaven and a hell all rolled into one word, spelled C O A L" – dressed in white.

Fire eating, sword dancing, beautiful banners and a whole lot of brass - Durham's 'Big Meeting' gets under way.

Striking imagery powers this campaigning film on behalf of striking miners and their families.

This compendium of colliery tales includes miners enjoying a Butlins holiday, a round of golf at Gleneagles and a visit to a film set.

This short profile of mining life from silent film studio Kineto was a key film in the development of British documentary.

An exuberant animated short celebrates writer Sid Chaplins short story about the defiant spirit of an old miner who finds his beloved pigeon loft is under threat.

Meet Windsor the pit pony, pulling his weight (and more) for the war effort.

The deadly downside of Britain's industrial might: smog.

Monster plant machinery is used in the preparation of land and for the extraction of coal in open-cast mining.

Ace edition of the series with wintry-but-warm vignettes of coal community life in South Hetton, Woolley Colliery and Caldey Island.

A look at Thorncliffe's extensive industrial heritage - from the 18th century to the 1930s.

Welcome aboard 'Futuro', a spherical 'space house' for the 1970s.

Wokingham gets new houses warmed with the cutting-edge technology of the 60s.

The aftermath of a devastating explosion at Haig pit in the Whitehaven coal field.

A Barnsley miner dreams of shooting a film about life down the pits in this audaciously ambitious amateur feature.

Dark shadows in miners' lungs and lives, as the threat of pneumoconiosis is made worse by changes to the benefits that compensate for its effects.

Not a waving flag or curtsey in sight as a solemn Prince of Wales tours deprived north east mining villages.

Smithfield Market is barricaded and Hyde Park turned into a milk depot, as London tries to cope with the 1926 General Strike.

Spalding in Lincolnshire boasts eight million tulips in glorious array, while Eton boys go down a pit in Ayrshire.

Coal touched all our lives, as this issue of the cinemagazine demonstrates with items on a miner's wife turned mayor, a Coal Board chess team and more.

Infectiously lively film of a Yorkshire mining community's grand day out.

This Week report capturing the immediacy of life on the picket line in South Yorkshire.

Is coal king or is it in crisis? This Modern Age offers its vision for the future.

Described as the 'coal industry's last bastion of free enterprise', the Forest of Dean's free miners operate outside the National Coal Board and make a living from local coal.

A ‘living museum’ at Beamish rides the waves of interest in industrial heritage in the 1970s. [78]

The most advanced deep coal mine in the world opens while those who work it stand by their fellow miners, as the future of both the miners and coal mining is decided on the picket line.

The clear waters of the River Wye and the rural areas it flows through offer a stark contrast to the industrialised Rhondda where the River Taff runs black with coal dust.

A mechanical monster of the 70s takes its place in Northumberland’s coal mining history.

Labour Party leader Harold Wilson speaks to the nation on the coal dispute in response to PM Edward Heath.

As the Cannock Chase office of the NUM fills up with the walking wounded from the pit face what future can there be for such a high risk industry?

The power behind industrial Scotland is beautifully photographed in these scenes of coalminers and iron ore smelting.

A Lancashire farmer's fields yield an unusual crop

A bleak Christmas for the men of Snibston Colliery as mining in Coalville comes to an end in the last days of 1983.

With flying pickets at the colliery entrance the moderate miners of South Derbyshire face the painful decision of whether to cross the picket line.

What do you get when you cross a lifeboat and a coffin? This rescue device helps bring injured miners back to the surface.

Potent, precious images of mining communities living through the bitter Depression years.

A walk through any Co-op store reveals some of the delightful gifts that could be yours if you advocate solid fuel heating for the home.

A black miner makes an intriguing addition to an already captivating film of coal workers up from their pit.

A makeover in Batley, a super-dock in Immingham - and 70s kitsch abounds.

Grimy miners head home at the end of their shift in the days before pithead baths.

Three Handsworth households get paid to breathe more easily in this jaunty promo about Sheffield's switch to smokeless fuels.

Miners' lives and labours in Lanarkshire, Leicestershire and South Wales.

The majestic rebirth of Manchester's Bradford Colliery and other stories.

The only two surviving scenes from an amazing Edwardian film about the work of Britain's coalminers.

Miners from Glamorganshire and Stafford let down their hair with festivals, galas and lashings of beer.

Rotherham United talent scout Joe McGuire is on the look out for miners with footballing flair.

Pits, quoits and 'Cosie' the hungry baby bear - this cinemagazine offers some wonderful vignettes of life beyond the 'face'.

In the cold winter of 1972 Usworth Colliery miners refuse to keep the home fires burning during a national miners strike.

A mass street football game in Workington, and fascinating debates in Glamorgan.

Durham miners and their families mix fun with a dash of politics at their annual Gala.

Pipeline to Pimlico - Battersea Power Station helps change the face of Pimlico.

A visit to Peterlee, Co. Durham, plus news from Britain's coalfields.

Ashington, Northumberland, when it was still King of Coal. Plus folk star Ewan MacColl.

Bobby Charlton and his brothers Gordon and Jack meet their father Bert, a miner, as he clocks off from work.

With scant regard for Health & Safety, the women of Chiswick smoke, lounge and leapfrog to their heart’s content for the start of the mixed-bathing season.

Miners, villagers and a Tory Lord fight the Blackhill Colliery closure in this moving documentary inspired by the Free Cinema movement of the 1950s.

Beautifully-photographed scenes of industrial beauty, bleakness and jollity in Aberaman, in the Rhondda, South Wales.

A political giant takes a trip by electric buggy into the heart of an extraordinary chemical town at Billingham.

The styles, streets and music of 1970s Nottingham are engagingly evoked in this industrial process film.

Billowing banners and copious crowds throng Durham for the annual Miners' Gala.

Where do all the miners go on a Monday? With an average of forty percent of miners staying away from work at the start of the week, what are they all doing and can the industry cope?

An insight into the life of coal miner Charles Jones from the Rhondda valley, an area famous for it’s coal production.

Joan Collins gets to grips with the by-products of coal in her first screen appearance

Knockabout comedy that grabs attention through its setting of the Pwyllgwaun colliery near Pontypridd.

In a London factory money's going up the chimney, out the roof and down the pipes: an early documentary by Lindsay Anderson.

Wives and mothers call for the release of miners jailed during the Miners' Strike.

A neat coalition between the Keep Britain Tidy Group and the National Coal Board aims to inspire colliery cleanliness.

From Tenerife to Treorchy: Jack Bellamy’s tribute to the canary, the little yellow songster that saved so many miners’ lives.

A filmic speed date with the multifaceted rock celebrates its talents and virtues in the days before its shortcomings soured the relationship.

With a crowd of over 2,000 and a pop star like reception for Arthur Scargill, the NUM conference in Sheffield is a rallying cry from the striking miners.

An illuminating introduction to coalmining for young schoolchildren

A chorus of coal fires sing for their cut-price supper in this short animated ad for the National Coal Board.

Coalminers Beware! Short sharp safety messages that hit the spot.

Trainees are busy learning "a career rather than a job" at the world's first Mines Mechanisation Training Centre in Sheffield.

The future of postwar Britain lies in the hands of her miners, according to this film encouraging young lads to work in the coal industry

An intriguing blast from soccer's past: Wrexham meet Beighton Miners Welfare in FA Cup First Round.

The Ocean Coal Company plays its part in the “war against dirt” by providing pithead baths. Its new sports facilities and playgrounds offer healthy fun for all the community.

With a black Labrador by his side, “Fen Tiger” Harold Sennit, the self-proclaimed “last of the peat diggers”, sets to work at Wicken Fen, Cambs.

“If there’s music in yer, it has to come out”. But northern brass bands, as this film testifies, reveal so much more about working class life than its innate creativity.

Fascinatingly wrong 1970s predictions of how UK energy needs will be met in the future.

The struggling UK coal industry is under the spotlight, together with the US liquor trade and the rise in trailer living.

The coal industry needs you! Newly nationalised mining companies seek colliers, stokers, gaffers and lamp-keepers.

The curious by-products of crude coal - drugs, plastics, benzole and fertilizer among them - and their wartime uses.

Join the working men of a northern powerhouse: on the job in Gateshead workshops and at the long wall of a Northumberland pit.

From Westminster to Derbyshire: life at the coalface of one of Britain's defining political dramas.

Songs, stories, anger and resignation as Trimdon Grange colliery in County Durham faces closure in 1968

Excitable or restless? Learn how to control your impulses in this safety film from the National Coal Board

A highly revealing look at the high expectations for coal mining in Yorkshire shortly before the defeat of the miners and mass pit closures.

A rare example of social mobility as an ex-miner crosses the class divide, while still retaining some loyalty to his former community.

The whole spectrum of colliery workers and their families take a break from work, parade their horses and exhibit their natural cheerfulness.

As a coachload of miners drain a crate of beer each on a trip to Scarborough, several talk onions, another hustles at darts and one acts the clown.

Key figures behind the clash between the government and the National Union of Mineworkers speak

There’s a war on and coal is needed – lots, and fast. Dylan Thomas is on hand to script this fascinating documentary.

A holiday romance between a miner and a secretary blossoms in Ramsgate

The awe-inspiring industrial splendour of Beckton gasworks is on show in this beautifully photographed film

Insightful documentary charting the decline of industrial relations in mining culminating in the 1984-85 strike

Gender stereotypes alert! Bert insists he knows what he’s doing - with predictable results, as far as his wife is concerned

There’s no stopping Joe once he gets going on the topic of the nationalisation of the coal industry.

Back to the coal face: miners, mine owners and government agree to split the difference in a dispute over working hours.

From Llanduff to Castleford on an intriguingly odd tour of the UK's coal industry

Tales of the valley: women recall their lives in the mining communities of the Rhondda