The Box is a major cultural and heritage attraction and archive, which opened in Plymouth’s city centre in September 2020. Its collection, formally the South West Film and Television Archive (SWFTA), is the regional film archive for the South West of England, comprising the combined programme libraries of Westward Television and Television South West (TSW). It also includes a significant number of donated film collections dating back to the early 1890s.
This film is part of Free
Lynton and Lynmouth Holiday
Political uncertainty at home and abroad roots holidays at home.
In partnership with:
Overview
A family on summer holiday visit the cliff top village of Lynton and the port harbour of Lynmouth in Exmoor National Park in North Devon. The resort became popular in Georgian times and paddle steamers were soon bringing in visitors from Swansea and Bristol. A tramway known as the Cliff Valley Railway was completed by 1890. The villages are on the South West Coast Path and the Tarka Trail and the Two Moors Way taking in Exmoor and Dartmoor runs from Lynmouth to Ivybridge.
Holidays at the seaside were common during the Depression years of the 1930s because the Wall Street financial crash had pushed prices down making them affordable to more sections of society and in general families were also by now smaller units. These were traditional holidays and people stayed in hotels and Bed and Breakfast accommodation. Package holidays and holiday camps were about to be launched as the popularity of holidays by the seaside was growing. Billy Butlin opened his first holiday camp at Skegness in 1936 and there was to be a boom in holidays after the Second World War due in part to the right to statutory paid holidays becoming law in 1938.
Related
Watch for free
John Doyle in Lynton and Lynmouth John Doyle in Lynton and Lynmouth
News 1971 5 mins Location: Lynton
John Doyle is in this special report on the summer season and arrives in Lynton and Lynmouth.
Watch for free
The Lynton and Lynmouth Cliff Valley Railway The Lynton and Lynmouth Cliff Valley Railway
News 1966 5 mins Location: Lynton
Victorian lift offers water-powered ups and downs.
Watch for free
Lynton and Lynmouth Lynton and Lynmouth
1921 12 mins Silent Location: Lynton
Could these holidaymakers have imagined the violent potential of an idyllic Devon landscape?
Watch for free
The Lynton Light Railway The Lynton Light Railway
Non-Fiction 1935 5 mins Silent Location: Lynton
A trip from Exeter to see the Lynton Light Railway in the year of its closure
Watch for free
Lynmouth Floods' Anniversary Lynmouth Floods' Anniversary
News 1977 5 mins Location: Lynton
The 25th Anniversary of the Lynton and Lynmouth Flood
Watch for free
British Deaf Association Summer School, Exeter (1957) British Deaf Association Summer School, Exeter (1957)
Non-Governmental Organisations sponsored film 1957 25 mins Silent Location: Exeter
A trip up Lynton & Lynmouth’s stunning water-powered railway is one of the highlights the British Deaf Association’s trip to Exeter in the 1950s.
Watch for free
Getting it Back: The Story of Cymande - Q&A Getting it Back: The Story of Cymande - Q&A
Inside Film 2024 22 mins
The director of a documentary about British funk pioneers Cymande joins the band at BFI Southbank to talk about the film.
Watch for free
The West Case The West Case
Action and Adventure 1923 28 mins Silent Location: Tilbury
Plotting world domination, Devil Doctor Fu-Manchu steals plans for a new aero-torpedo in this earliest surviving thrill-a-minute serial instalment.
Watch for free
Enter the Scala!!! Enter the Scala!!!
Inside Film 2024 16 mins
Filmmakers Jane Giles and Ali Catterall discuss their documentary Scala!!!, revisiting the legendary and inspirational cinema venue and some of the most notorious films that screened there.
Watch for free
Smith Smith
Charity appeal 1939 10 mins
Long thought lost, this Powell-directed promotional short for a veteran’s charity was only rediscovered in 2003.
Watch for free
An Airman's Letter to His Mother An Airman's Letter to His Mother
Documentary 1941 6 mins
A poignant, stirring letter from a recently deceased pilot to his mother is read by John Gielgud.
Watch for free
The NHS75 Celebration The NHS75 Celebration
Short documentary 2023 3 mins
Former Bristol Poet Laureate, Miles Chambers reads a poem specially commissioned for the 75th anniversary of the NHS.