London’s Screen Archives enables Londoners see their past come alive on film. Managed by Film London, we are a unique network of historic film collections that cares for, collects and screens heritage film across the city. Together we preserve London’s rich film heritage from feature films to home movies, public information films, newsreels, and records of the capital’s many different industries.
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100,000 Pound Damage 1,500 out of Work
40 fire engines unsuccessfully battle a raging fire that destroyed a wallpaper factory in Chiswick.
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Overview
Sanderson wallpaper factory had been based in Chiswick since 1879. It was destroyed in October 1928 in the largest fire Londoners had seen for years. This film shows 100s of fire fighters and 40 engines tackling the huge inferno in front of watching crowds, and also the aftermath - interior gutted, walls and roof collapsed, windows twisted out of shape. It’s said that for a week afterwards, mountains of smouldering wallpaper “glowed like a volcano”.
Sanderson moved to Perivale in 1930.
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