Cinema Memory and the Digital Archive

Early in 1995, Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain Research Fellow Valentina Bold contacted Glenwood Lodge, a Residential Care Home in Castlemilk, Glasgow which boasted a reminiscence group, with a view to interviewing residents for the project. Five residents volunteered, and Tommy Adams was among them. Mr Adams was born in 1920 in Govan, Glasgow; on leaving school at fourteen, he went to work at a shipyard in Govan, and later in life worked as a lorry driver. On 24 January and 13 February 1995 he took part in five-way interviews at Glenwood Lodge, the other four participants being Nancy Keyte, Sarah Louise Gale, Tommy Dunn, and Patrick McCambridge.

In their first interview, group members share their early cinemagoing memories, citing the names and locations of the many Glasgow cinemas --particularly in Partick, Govan, Burnside, and Rutherglen--that they remember. The conversation moves on to silent films, ticket prices, and queueing. They debate preferences in films and stars, and agree that American films were better than British ones. They chose which films to go to by looking in the newspapers, they say, or by noting the length of cinema queues. One group member recalls chopping up fruiterers' boxes for firewood and selling bundles at tuppence a time to get 'picture money'. It is generally agreed that Donald O’Connor and Gene Kelly were the greatest ever dancers--“They could make their feet talk." There are recollections of children's behaviour in cinemas and of the strict discipline enforced by cinema staff. As a child, says one interviewee, you got fully immersed in what was happening on screen: “you used to imagine you were, you were the star of it.”

The second Glenwood Lodge interview opens with group members talking about the various jobs they had done throughout their working lives. Perusal of film annuals and photos of film personalities then prompts discussion of stars (over fifty are named in the course of the interview) and films, as well as other youthful pastimes, dancing in particular. There are further details of the various neighbourhood cinemas they frequented; anecdotes about selling logs and recovering deposits on bottles and jars to amass money for admission; recollection of prices of cinema tickets (dearer for balcony seats); and mention of Green's being the first to show silent movies in the showgrounds of Gallowgate.

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