Published 16/07/2015
Bridgeman Footage selected important and quirky 2017's anniversaries for which we can provide archive footage. Click through to discover history in motion...
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Exact Date Unknown Construction of the R100 airship - 90 years His Majesty's Airship R100, known simply as the R100, was a privately designed and built rigid British airship made to develop a commercial airship service for use on British Empire routes as part of the Imperial Airship Scheme together with the R101. The R100 was built by the Airship Guarantee Company, a specially-created subsidiary of the armaments firm, Vickers-Armstrongs, in 1927. |
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January President Richard Nixon and NASA Administrator James C. Fletcher announced the start of Space Shuttle program - 45 years The Space Shuttle program, officially called the Space Transportation System (STS), was the United States government's manned launch vehicle program from 1981 to 2011, administered by NASA and officially beginning on the 5 January 1972 |
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William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody, US frontiersman, died in Denver, Colorado - 100 years Theater Actor, Military Leader, Folk Hero: Hunting and killing over 4,000 buffalo earned Buffalo Bill Cody his nickname, and his status as an Old West legend was cemented with his traveling Wild West show. Born near LeClaire in Scott County, Iowa, in 1846, Buffalo Bill Cody rode on the Pony Express at the age of 14, fought in the American Civil War, served as a scout for the Army, and was already an Old West legend before mounting his famous Wild West show, which traveled the United States and Europe. He died on the 10 January 1917. |
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Nazi officials hold the Wannsee Conference, calling for the Final Solution - 75 years. This clip shows footage of Wannsee Villa exteriors and interiors. As the camera films the empty building, the voice-over recalls the Wannsee conference between Senior Nazi officials that took place there on 20 January 1942 - the day that the fate of the Jewish prisoners was finalised. |
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Construction of the Eiffel Tower begins - 130 years. The construction of an iron lattice tower located on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France starts on the 28 January 1887. It was named after the engineer Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the Eiffel Tower. |
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The Georges Pompidou National Center for Art and Culture in Paris, called “Beaubourg” opens - 40 years Explore the planning, construction, scope and controversial reception of the newest ( 31 January 1977) and most modern art center in the world, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, called “Beaubourg” from the name of the land it occupies in the old Marais district. Filmed on location, the camera explores the building and the public that uses it; arts writer and lecturer Rosamond Bernier examines the forces that shaped the enterprise, and interviews some of the key players. |
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February "The Bird man" Franz Reichelt attempts to fly off the Eiffel Tower - 105 years Franz Reichelt, also known as The Bird man, was an Austrian-born French tailor, inventor and parachuting pioneer, sometimes referred to as the Flying Tailor. On the 4th February 1912 he jumped to his death from the Eiffel Tower while testing a wearable parachute of his own design. |
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Death of Mary, Queen of Scots - 430 years Also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland, was Queen of Scotland from 14 December 1542 to 24 July 1567 and Queen consort of France from 10 July 1559 to 5 December 1560. She died on the 8th February 1587, Fotheringhay Castle, by decapitation. Bridgeman Footage holds an early Edison film (1895), which shows the historical reenactment of her execution. |
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Thomas Edison, American inventor and businessman, is born - 170 years Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. He was born in Milan, Ohio, on the 11 February 1847. Bridgeman Footage holds a selection of over 90 early Edison films in the archive, a few of which date as far back as 1894. One of the clips in our collection features the very first kiss ever filmed: the actors, May Irwin and John Rice, staged their kiss for the camera at the request of the New York world newspaper and, although causing an uproar, the resulting film was the most popular Edison Vitascope film in 1896. |
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First flight of Zeppelin LZ-11 Viktoria Luise with Ferdinand von Zeppelin present - 105 years LZ-11 first flew on February 14, 1912, and was named after Princess Viktoria Luise of Prussia, the only daughter of Kaiser Wilhem II. The ship made local sightseeing flights, mostly from Frankfurt, but also from Postdam, Oos (Baden-Baden), and a few other cities. Having made almost 500 flights, carrying almost 10,000 passengers, the Viktoria Luise was transferred to the German Army at the beginning of World War I and used as a training ship for the military. |
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March Son of aviator Charles A. Lindbergh is kidnapped - 85 years The Lindbergh trial, following the kidnapping of Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr., the eldest son of aviator Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh on 1 March 1932, was one of the most famous newsreel events of the 20th century. This clip features footage of the trial, and interviews with the news cameraman who filmed it. From a series of unique and rare interviews with the top newsreel cameramen who captured some of the greatest events of the 20th century on film. |
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Release of Nosferatu - 95 years Nosferatu is a German Expressionist horror film, directed by F. W. Murnau, starring Max Schreck as the vampire Count Orlok. The film, shot in 1921 and released in Germany on the 4 March 1922, was an unauthorised adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula, and is now one of the most iconic horror films ever made. The clip shows scenes from the silent film including the iconic scene of Count Orlok's shadow climbing the staircase. |
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Russian Revolution - 100 years The Russian Revolution is the collective term for a pair of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which dismantled the Tsarist autocracy and led to the eventual rise of the Soviet Union. The Russian Empire collapsed with the abdication of Emperor Nicholas II, and the old regime was replaced by a provisional government during the first revolution of February 1917 (8 March in the Gregorian calendar; the older Julian calendar was in use in Russia at the time). In the second revolution that October (8 November), the Provisional Government was removed and replaced with a Bolshevik (Communist) government. |
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April US enters WWI - 100 years On the 6th April 1917, two days after the U.S. Senate voted 82 to 6 to declare war against Germany, the U.S. House of Representatives endorses the declaration by a vote of 373 to 50, and America formally enters World War I. Our clip shows American soldiers leaving to fight the Great War, troop ships departing from a harbour, Franklin Roosevelt sent to France by President Woodrow Wilson and more... |
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Launch of the first human cannonball - 140 years A 14 year-old girl named Rossa Matilda Ritcher and known as Zazel, is launched at the Royal Aquarium in London on the 10 April 1877. She was launched by a spring-style cannon invented by Canadian William Leonard Hunt ("The Great Farini"). She later toured with the P.T. Barnum Circus. To celebrate Zazel’s career we feature an American thrilling stunt show from the fifties with human cannonball, human catapult, burning man dives into burning tank. |
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Titanic sets sail – 105 years It began its maiden voyage on 10 April 1912. Before it had left Southampton harbour, it narrowly missed another ship, the SS New York. After stopping at Cherbourg in France and Queenstown in Ireland it sailed out into the Atlantic to begin the main leg of its journey to New York. But on the night of 14 April, after ignoring repeated warnings, the Titanic hit an iceberg. The impact ripped a hole in the hull (partly due to poor-quality rivets), letting in water. It took less than three hours for the boat to sink. |
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Leonardo da Vinci, Italian painter and inventor, is born - 565 years To celebrate the great master’s birthday on the 15 April 1452, Bridgeman Footage brings you an animated profile of Leonardo da Vinci's life and work, created by the legendary Halas & Batchelor. To discover his work in more detail browse a selection of clips and documentaries on some of his masterpieces.
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Second Battle of Gaza - 100 years The Second Battle of Gaza was fought between 17 to 19 April 1917, following the defeat of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force (EEF) at the First Battle of Gaza in March, during the Sinai and Palestine Campaign of the First World War. Gaza was defended by the strongly entrenched Ottoman Army garrison, which had been reinforced after the first battle by substantial forces. This clip includes panoramic shot of Gaza from front line trench and The Norfolk Regiment of the British Army in trenches during the battle. |
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May The Hindenburg disaster – 80 years The Hindenburg disaster took place on Thursday, May 6, 1937, as the German passenger airship LZ 129 Hindenburg caught fire and was destroyed during its attempt to dock with its mooring mast at Naval Air Station Lakehurst, which is located adjacent to the borough of Lakehurst, New Jersey, United States. Of the 97 people on board (36 passengers and 61 crewmen), there were 35 fatalities (13 passengers and 22 crewmen). One worker on the ground was also killed, making a total of 36 dead. The disaster was the subject of spectacular newsreel coverage and it shattered public confidence in the giant, passenger-carrying rigid airship and marked the end of the airship era. Our clip shows an interview with James Seely, cameraman on the news report of the Hindenburg Disaster, including footage of the event. |
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King George VI's coronation - 80 years The coronation of George VI and Queen Elizabeth as King and Queen of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth and as Emperor and Empress of India took place at Westminster Abbey, London, on 12 May 1937. King George ascended the throne upon the abdication of his brother, King Edward VIII, on 11 December 1936, three days before his 41st birthday. Edward's coronation had been planned for 12 May 1937 and it was decided to continue with his brother and sister-in-law's coronation on the same date. |
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Charles Lindbergh's solo flight across the Atlantic - 90 years On the 21 May 1927, the famous aviator Charles A. Lindbergh landed his Spirit of St. Louis near Paris, completing the first solo airplane flight across the Atlantic Ocean. Lindbergh was just 25 years old when he completed the trip from New York to Paris. |
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15,000,000th Ford Model T comes off the assembly line - 90 years The first production Model T Ford was assembled at the Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit on October 1, 1908. Bridgeman Footage holds a clip of Henry Ford and his Ford Model-T in 1908. Over the next 19 years, Henry Ford's assembly line would build 15,000,000 automobiles with the Model "T" engine, the longest run of any single model apart from the Volkswagen Beetle. From 1908-1927, the Model T would endure with little change in its design. Henry Ford had succeeded in his quest to build a car for the masses. You can paint it any colour, so long as it's black
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John F. Kennedy, 35th US president, is born - 100 years John Fitzgerald Kennedy was the American politician who served as the 35th President of the United States from January 1961 until his assassination in November 1963. He was born on the 29 May 1917 in Brookline, Massachusetts. Bridgeman Footage holds a series of clips and home movies that covers the beginning of his career till his assassination in 1963. Celebrate his birthday by watching him and his family during the Camelot years. |
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June Battle of Messines - 100 years The Battle of Messines (7–14 June 1917) was an offensive conducted by the British Second Army, under the command of General Sir Herbert Plumer, on the Western Front in Belgian West Flanders during the First World War. The preliminary bombardment of Messines happened on the afternoon of 5 June 1917. |
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The Marshall Plan is drafted - 70 years In the immediate post-World War II period, Europe was ravaged by war and susceptible to exploitation by the Communist threat. On the 5 June 1947, during a speech to the graduating class at Harvard University, Secretary of State George C. Marshall issued a call for a program to rebuild Europe. Worried by the fear of Communist expansion and the rapid deterioration of European economies in the winter of 1946–1947, Congress passed the Economic Cooperation Act in March 1948 and approved funding that would raise over $12 billion (approximately $120 billion in current dollar value) for the rebuilding of Western Europe economies: the Marshall Plan officially called the European Recovery Program, ERP was born. |
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The Soviet Union blocks the Western Allies' railway, road, and canal access to the sectors of Berlin under allied control, known as the Berlin Blockade - 70 years In 1945, the Allies divided Germany and Berlin into four zones of occupation. In June 1948, Britain, France and America united their zones into a new country, West Germany. On 23 June 1948, they introduced a new currency, which they said would help trade. The next day, the 24 June, Stalin cut off all rail and road links to west Berlin. The west saw this as an attempt to starve Berlin into surrender, so they decided to send supplies by air. The Blockade lasted 318 days. During this time, 275,000 planes transported 1.5 million tons of supplies and a plane landed every three minutes at Berlin's Templehof airport. On 12 May 1949, Stalin abandoned the blockade. |
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July Guglielmo Marconi, Italian inventor dies - 80 years Guglielmo Marconi was born in Bologna, Italy, on the 25 April 1874 to an Italian father and an Irish mother. In 1894 he began with experimenting the possibility of using radio waves to communicate without wires and within a year he had sent and received signals beyond the range of vision over a hill. He took out a patent in 1896. The Italian government was not interested in his work, but the British Admiralty was, and it installed Marconi's equipment on its ships and pushed radio transmission to greater lengths. By 1899 Marconi had sent a signal across the English Channel to France and in 1901 was able to transmit across the Atlantic ocean. In 1909 he won the Nobel Prize in physics, shared with Karl Ferdinand Braun whose modifications to Marconi's transmitters significantly increased their range and usefulness. He died in Rome on the 20 July 1937. |
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Famous Jack Dempsey vs Jack Sharkey, boxing match at Yankee Stadium - 90 years World famous heavyweight champions Jack Dempsey and Jack Sharkey fought at the Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, New York, July 21st 1927. Jack Dempsey 194½ lbs beat Jack Sharkey 196 lbs by KO at 0:45 in round 7 of 15. |
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August The Chinese Civil War - 90 years The Chinese Civil War was a civil war in China fought between forces loyal to the government of the Republic of China (KMT), and forces loyal to the Communist Party of China (CPC). The war began on the 1st August 1927 and it represented an ideological split between the Communist CPC and the KMT's brand of Nationalism. It continued intermittently until late 1937, when the two parties came together to form the Second United Front to counter a Japanese invasion and prevent the country from adding to an earlier invasion into Manchuria in 1931. Our 1927 clip shows battle scenes, fighting in streets of Canton, Europeans fleeing, Prisoners, European troops on patrol in Shanghai, crowd looting a bank. |
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King Edward VII’s coronation - 115 years The coronation of Edward VII and his wife Alexandra as King and Queen of the United Kingdom and the British Empire took place at Westminster Abbey, London, on 9 August 1902. Originally scheduled for 26 June of that year, the ceremony had been postponed at very short notice, because the King had been taken ill with an abdominal abscess that required immediate surgery. |
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The Second Moscow Conference between the major Allies of World War II - 75 years Taking place from August 12 to August 17, 1942, Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of Great Britain, W. Averell Harriman Special Representative of the United States, and Soviet premiere Joseph Stalin met to plan the North Africa Campaign and to discuss the later landing and opening of a front in northern France. Stalin and Churchill came to like each other. |
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Trial and execution of Sacco and Vanzetti - 90 years In 1921, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, both Italian-Americans, were convicted of robbery and murder. Although the arguments brought against them were mostly disproven in court, the fact that the two men were known radicals (and that their trial took place during the height of the Red Scare) prejudiced the judge and jury against them. On April 9, 1927, Sacco and Vanzetti's final appeal was rejected, and the two were sentenced to death. The executions took place at midnight on August 22, 1927. |
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The Battle of Stalingrad - 75 Years This major WWII battle in which Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad in Southern Russia took place between the 23 August 1942 and the 2 February 1943. It is considered by many historians to have been the turning point of World War II in the European theatre. Its decisive Soviet victory and consequent destruction of the German 6th Army caused the beginning of the decline of the Axis forces on the Eastern Front. |
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September Mussolini gives a speech in German, at the Berlin Olympic Stadium, 1937, Nazi parade at night - 80 years 28 September 1937 has been given as a national holiday. At 18:00 hours the Olympic Bell began to ring, signifying that Hitler and Mussolini were en route. Hitler was the first to speak to the German nation by wireless. Mussolini then stood up and climbed the podium to speak and delivered his carefully prepared speech in German, with an Italian accent. After the speeches a battalion of torchbearing Schultzstaffeln appeared. They flowed into the arena like a living flame, dividing and moving to each side in columns of four to create a huge swastika. |
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October War bond rally with Douglas Fairbanks, Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford - 100 years The United States had entered WWI, on April 6, 1917, and began selling bonds to raise funds for the war effort. In 1917 there were 2 issues of Liberty Bonds: the first in April 24 and the second in October 1st. Although many Americans were caught up in a patriot fervor, war bond sales were initially quite weak. Most Americans in the late 1910s had never bought a bond of any kind. To promote sales, the government began enlisting celebrities from several fields of entertainment, most notably motion pictures. In this clip Marie Dressler, Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, and Douglas Fairbanks promote War bonds to the public. |
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Sputnik, world's first satellite, is launched by the Soviet Union - 60 years History changed on the 4 October 1957, when the Soviet Union successfully launched Sputnik I. The world's first artificial satellite was about the size of a beach ball (58 cm in diameter), weighed only 83.6 kg, and took about 98 minutes to orbit the earth on its elliptical path. That launch ushered in new political, military, technological, and scientific developments. While the Sputnik launch was a single event, it marked the start of the space age and the U.S. Vs U.S.S.R Space Race
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Ernesto "Che" Guevara dies - 50 years Che Guevara, byname of Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, theoretician and tactician of guerrilla warfare, prominent communist figure in the Cuban Revolution and guerrilla leader in South America was born in Rosario, Argentina on the 14 June 1928. After his execution by the Bolivian army in La Higuera, on 9 October 1967 he was regarded as a martyred hero by generations of leftists worldwide, and he became an icon of leftist radicalism and anti-imperialism. |
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Mata Hari, exotic dancer and courtesan found guilty of espionage, is executed in France -100 years Born on August 7, 1876, in Leeuwarden, Netherlands, Mata Hari was a professional dancer and mistress who accepted an assignment to spy for France in 1916. Hired by army captain Georges Ladoux, she agreed to pass military information gleaned from her conquests to the French government. Not long after, however, Mata Hari was accused of being a German spy. She was executed by firing squad on the 15 October 1917, after French authorities learned of her alleged double agency. |
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November Marie Curie is born - 150 years. Marie Sklodowska was born in Warsaw on 7 November 1867. In 1891, she went to Paris to study physics and mathematics at the Sorbonne where she met Pierre Curie, professor of the School of Physics. They were married in 1895. The Curies worked together investigating radioactivity and in July 1898, they announced the discovery of a new chemical element, polonium. At the end of the year, they announced the discovery of another, radium. The Curies were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903. Pierre was killed by a carriage in 1906 and Marie took over his teaching post, becoming the first woman to teach at the Sorbonne. She received a second Nobel Prize, for Chemistry, in 1911. In this clip on women scientists Marie Curie is feature working in her laboratory. |
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Georgia O'Keeffe, American artist, is born - 130 years To celebrate Georgia Totto O'Keeffe birthday on the 15th November 1887 we feature a clip from the film 'The American Scene: Indian Life in Mexico' and a short documentary on her Masterwork, The White Calico Flower, (1931, oil on canvas). The American Scene Film shows scenes of a small town in New Mexico, home to artist Georgia O'Keeffe seen driving in her car and working in her studio. |
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Auguste Rodin, French sculptor, dies -100 years To commemorate Auguste Rodin's death on the 17 November 1917 watch a discussion of the stature and influence of sculptor Auguste Rodin. With Edward Steichen, photographer; Jacques Lipschitz, sculptor; and Leo Steinberg, art critic, Themes: on meeting and photographing Rodin's work, early reactions and latter appreciation of Rodin, critical appraisal on Rodin's work, Rodin and modern art, critical reaction to his work in his own time, the "private" works of Rodin, studies (some of which are shown), Rodin's influence on Lipschitz as a sculptor. |
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December Funeral of General Jean Louis Xavier François Darlan – 75 years He was Admiral of the Fleet and commander in chief of the French Navy in 1939 at the beginning of World War II. After France capitulated to Nazi Germany in 1940, Darlan served in the pro-German Vichy regime, becoming its deputy leader for a time. When the Allies invaded French North Africa in 1942, Darlan ordered French forces to cease resisting and cooperate with the Allies. Less than two months later, on the 24 December 1942 he was assassinated. It was said "no tears were shed" by the British over his death. |
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Bridgeman has selected important and quirky historical anniversaries for which we can provide archive footage and images. Browse our 2015 and 2016 footage anniversaries.
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