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Stella, Tiny, St. Trinnean’s & World War II

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This week has been a great fact finding week for the Stella and Tiny documentary.

I received another letter from Scotland. A gentleman had read my letter in the paper and knew Stella and Tiny quite well, particularly during the late sixties and early seventies and, amazingly enough, he is actually in one of the films entitled “You in Your Small Corner”. He was also able to pass on the number of a lady called Morag who I spoke to on Thursday evening. Morag is a local resident of Muirhead and had known Stella and Tiny all of her life. She recalls them with great affection. Morag is collating a local history of the area and told me that local residents had wondered where the film “You in Your Small Corner” had gone.

“You in Your Small Corner” is a film following the seasons of Muirhead and Birkhill and shows the area in the late 50’s early 60’s. Talking to Morag and thinking over the coincidences that are unfolding I truly feel this is a good thing to be doing. I’ve also become quite keen that once the story of Stella & Tiny has been told I would like to return the footage to Scotland. What happens between now and then should make a good documentary.

Morag told me some great titbits about Stella and Tiny.

  1. Stella was an actual St. Trinnean’s pupil. The School was in Edinburgh, founded in 1922 by Miss C Fraser Lee. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Trinian’s_School.
  2. Stella had been in the ARP Police (Air Raid Precautions) during WWII and Tiny was a Police Officer.
  3. On April 29th 1942 when returning from London, I’m not sure if they were returning from Honeymoon or moving back to Scotland but they were caught in the Baedecker raids on York. Losing all of their possessions during the bombing raid on York train Station. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baedeker.
  4. Later that year Tiny was sent to Canada as a RAF Navigator/Bomber and returned in 1946. Maybe this is where their love of travel came from.
  5. Morag also told me that Stella & Tiny to Africa and made a film about that as well (unfortunately I haven’t got that one, so If anyone out there has it please let me know).
  6. Stella was a great musician and left her Steinway grand piano to a local school when she passed away in 2003, she also did lots of work with the Dundee Rep Theatre. I have included 4 photo’s Morag sent me in an email of Stella on her Steinway.

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As you can see this week has been an exciting week, and I’m getting some good information and storys about Stella & Tiny. I am planning on going to Scotland next month to meet up with Morag and  the local people to find out more and begin filming. I can’t wait. I was talking today with my friend Marc about  how amazing this project is turning out to be. The seed for it all was a box of cine footage purchased off ebay 5 years ago, and now the footage will be returned to it’s home (via my documentary of course).

Stella and Tiny RIP

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Today I arrived at the office and there was a letter waiting for me. Nothing unusual there you may think, but this was an actual letter; written by hand, by a real person. It’s been quite a while since I have received a handwritten letter. The stamp on the envelope was Scottish, which immediately made me think about my letter to the editor of the Arbroath Herald I’d written last week.

The letter is from a lady called Anita Walker who knew Tiny or Thomas Young and his wife Stella. In the letter she details her fondness for them both and informs me that sadly they have both past away. The letter doesn’t give any indication of children. It also gave me an address they lived at which I looked up on Google Maps street view and got a image of the house.

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The letter also contained some new leads for me to follow and today I have tracked down a gentleman called George Dall – a good friend and work colleague of Tiny, I have a contact number and will be phoning him later today.

All the evidence (such as it was) indicated that the couple had passed away, but to have it confirmed is nonetheless quite sad and I will be sure to visit their last resting place when I finally head to Arbroath to find more about them.

Stella and Tiny – Conversations with the Arbroath Herald

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Over the last few days I have been in touch with the Arbroath Herald. Initially I was going to run an ad in the paper asking if anyone had any information on Stella and Tiny; but  after a conversation with the paper they advised me instead to write a letter to the editor.

So I did.

Today I had a further conversation with Brian Forsyth from the Herald who said if they get a good response from the letter they will run a follow up story. He also asked me to pop in when I’m in the area for a catchup and he would also  like to see some of the footage.

It’s becoming clear that I will have to go to Scotland fairly soon- the documentary is gathering pace and I really need to start filming. It has taken a while to internalise concepts before moving forward on the right path but I feel the road ahead is clear. Not necessarily the in’s and out’s of the documentary as this will unfold as I go along – more of a loose and malleable structure to get me to the end. I also need to decide whether or not I take crew with me or I do what I normally do and go solo. As this is a personal journey I feel maybe I should take at least one crew with me as a second camera unit.

I have almost gone through all of the footage now. The latest reels are of a film called “You In Your Small Corner”. There are 5 x 400ft reels which make up this film, so around 2.5hrs of footage. The film is made in the Muirhead And Birkhill area and looks great. This is the only film on Super 8mm this means there is a soundtrack n the film itself. All of the other films have a 1/4″ audio reel to accompany the footage. Unfortunately I don’t have a projector with sound outputs yet – So the soundtrack is still a mystery to me.

Stella and Tiny new leads

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Today has been an interesting day, I found two little bits of evidence tucked away amongst some papers that should help shine some light on who these filmmakers are.

The two bit’s of paper have one thing in common – they are both from The Dundee Linoleum Company Limited. The business card also has a name A.J. Ferrie. I looked up the name Ferrie in the online phonebook for the areas of Arbroath and Dundee. There are 5 matches; 4 in Dundee and 1 in Arbroath under the name A Ferrie. I plan to call over the weekend and have a chat with A Ferrie.

I also heard back from the Angus District council Archive department today, who were very helpful. They invited me to visit and research the minutes of all meetings held by the Council which will contain the names of the Director of Housing Management. The minutes available would be from 1975 – 1996 and if I required to go back further from 64-75 then they could look for me as a commissioned piece of research. They Also suggested I put an advert in the Arbroath Herald seeking information.

A quick look on google maps tells me it’s a mere 17.5 miles from Dundee to Arbroath.

The puzzle is starting to build up and slowly I feel I’m getting closer to finding out more about these two filmmakers.

Looking for Stella and Tiny

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Today I started my search for a couple called Stella and Tiny.

It’s research for a Documentary I am making about them. They were/are a couple from Scotland who travelled the world from around 1964 – 1975. They documented their travels with a 8mm and Super 8mm cine camera and made some wonderful travel films from their rushes. My old company Widelode purchased a box of cine footage, 1/4″ audio reels and lecture notes in an ebay auction about five years ago.

The box had come from a house clearance with no information know about it origins. The box had sat in the office until I recently purchased the footage/audio and notes off Widelode and I am embarking on the journey to find out who they are and who were the people they made the lectures for.

My initial investigation is following up a clue left on an envelope in the box. It had the title of one of the films “The Hammer and the Sickle and the road to Samarkand” written on it but scribbled out in the address box is an old address to Angus District Council, Director of Housing Management, Hill Terrace, Arbroath. So I sent a e-mail to the Angus District Council and to the local Library to see if they know a couple called Stella and Tiny as I figure the envelope is addressed to one of them; so I guess I will have to see if they have anything for me.

Tomorrow I am sending one of the films off to be cleaned and scanned and digitised to HD resolution, I can then start putting together a whole film with audio and the lecture note. SO fingers crossed I should have something to show in a few weeks.

Manumission The Show

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A few months ago I finished cutting a promotional video for Manumission The Show. I have to say I’ve had worse jobs in my life. The show is a raunchy hedonistic night of clubbing fun and if you get the chance to see “The Show” then you should go. I hope you like the edit.

The Wales Green List 2009

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Back in May of this year I was commissioned by Cynnal Cymru to make a film about Sustainability in Wales. I was to accompany Photographer Daniel Green on a journey around Wales. Dan was going to photograph 20 people/groups who were on the Cynnal Cymru Green list. My task was to capture what they had to say about their contribution to a sustainable Wales.

The Wales Green List celebrates individuals making Wales a better and more sustainable place to live. It’s the first list of its kind in Wales, bringing together the different elements of sustainable development – environmental, economic and social – in one award.

We had very little time to accomplish this huge task ahead. A little over four weeks was our filming schedule! and we also had to navigate our way around other peoples plans. A logistical nightmare was unfolding. To top it all off the plan Widelode had for the film wasn’t as straight forward as collecting the piece to camera and covering it with B roll(footage that adds meaning to a sequence), we wanted to create a Audio Visual sound scape running through the film using only organic sounds recorded on my journey as well as having the bridging sections between people talking to be pure AV. Now that takes a little time.

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When Widelode started as a video production company in Cardiff about 7 years ago we started looking into AV remixing and were inspired by the likes of Cold Cut and Hexstatic. Over the years we created quite a few videos and performances along this vain our first ever being Convoy vs the Bandit http://www.widelode.com/convoy-vs-the-bandit. We learnt a lot from the early Av videos and developed our technique and started creating more complex pieces like Worldy Music http://www.widelode.com/worldy-music,  and Cardiff Characters http://www.widelode.com/cardiffcharacters, we had always wanted to look at a much larger project that was driven by the AV but hadn’t found the right one till now. There just seemed a natural synergy between a project that was championing Sustainability in Wales and creating a musical score from the organic sounds I picked up on the film.

The journey through Wales was fantastic and the true variety of people I met was inspiring, from the big players in the Sustainable world like CAT (Centre for Alternative Technology) to the lovely women of llanddewi brefi Women’s Institute who are making the changes that we all need with our everyday life’s. I don’t feel that the journey has turned me into a Eco Warrior but has shown me that there are many forms of sustainable living, well being and education that are key to a successful sustainable Wales.

For further information on Sustain Wales and the Wales Green List http://www.sustainwales.com/home/en/campaigns_greenlist.aspx

The Persians

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I felt quite privileged the day I was allowed to film at Cilieni Village, a replica North German Village at Sennybridge in the Brecon Beacons military range. I had very little idea of what to expect that morning, Mike Devaney who is the technical director for the National Theatre of Wales picked me up and we headed to Sennybridge.

On arrival we consulted our map and headed for the Military range, driving a few miles – looking for our rendezvous with our MoD Liaison(!!). We headed further into the range and on reaching the brow of a hill we were confronted with an amazing sight. Cilieni Village.

The Village feels very much out of place, like something you would have seen on the news during the Bosnian War. It is stark and empty. It’s essentially a giant theatre, a theatre of conflict, resolution and battle tactics. I find it incredibly exciting that this military theatre will be opening itself up to the National Theatre of Wales to perform the oldest surviving play in the history of theatre, The Persians.

This location was so satisfying to shoot. The half house (exactly what it sounds like) was something to behold, discarded smoke canisters and ammo shells lay on the floor of its four story stage. When we moved into the village I was like a kid in a sweet shop with beautiful compositions at every turn. I was only give 2 hours to shoot on location and easily got what I needed although I could have happily spent the whole day there.

Once again Marc [Heatley] came up trumps with the tune I needed for the Piece with a tune of his from the vaults. Called Spooky – it helps to create an intimate, secretive beginning before the tuba reveals the location.

For more information on this performance please goto http://nationaltheatrewales.org/whatson/performance/ntw06