Teesside Inauguration Procession

Geishas, cowboys and the Invisible Man: hundreds of children turn out in fancy dress for the christening of a new County Borough of Teesside.

On 2 April 1968 kids in costume entertain the crowds on the Victorian streets of Middlesbrough after the new County Borough of Teesside is introduced in a ceremony at the Town Hall. The Lone Ranger, Thunderbirds fans, and a devil garbed in black march down Linthorpe Road following the traditional parade of trade floats. The British Steam Specialists and Ringtons tea merchants take part, and economic patriotism makes a show with a Union Jack festooned “Buy British” bus.

This film was shot by amateur filmmaker Betty Cook, President of the Cleveland Cine Society and the North East Cine Society. Six towns lost their civic identity with the controversial re-drawing of boundaries to create the new Teesside - Middlesbrough, Stockton, Redcar, Thornaby, Eston and Billingham. The historic occasion was celebrated in a poem called ‘Hail Teesside!’ by the British Poet Laureate of the time, Cecil Day Lewis. In 1974 the boundaries were once more on the move when the non-metropolitan county of Cleveland was created. The ‘Buy British’ movement sprang from the ‘I’m Backing Britain’ campaign, which also bloomed briefly as Britain’s economy withered in 1967.