1h

First transmitted in 1969, this documentary follows the construction of the world’s most advanced underground system. Macdonald Hastings narrates the story of one of the most complex tunnel engineering feats of its time. He reveals the isolation felt by the miners who spent six years burrowing deep beneath the streets of London, shows what they did beneath one of London's most famous department st... Read more

1h

This personal plea from Margaret Drabble is a lament for the death of the city, which questions whether 'civic redevelopment' is tearing the heart out of our cities. Are tower blocks, giant supermarkets and an ever expanding suburbia the way forward? Margaret Drabble thinks not and argues that a successful city combines areas where residents and office workers share a space and a multiplicity of s... Read more

1h

With Angels and Skins neck and neck in the contemporary Folk Devil stakes, presenter Harold Williamson decides to meet and talk with members of each group and, crucially, to speak to their parents, in order to find out what they’re really like.

1h

This film looks at a handful of the 280,000 railwaymen who work in Britain, especially the men who worked on the former Midland and Great Central routes, as they reflect on their changing industry. Inside Sheffield Railway Men's Club former steam locomotive crew discuss the transition from steam to electric and diesel engines, and heatedly debate their respective merits. Meanwhile, on the Manch... Read more

1h

In just four months, the world's first jumbo jet goes into regular service over the Atlantic. Already 200 have been ordered by the world's airlines. Each is designed to carry nearly 500 passengers. The jumbo has been called a 'pilot's dream.' But will it also be an airport's nightmare? By next year, half a dozen of the giants may be queuing at peak hours to disgorge their passengers at London A... Read more

1h

For the Safety of All. There are seventy-two manned lighthouses around the Scottish coast and it takes a vast and complex organisation to administer them. The isolated rock stations are serviced by four ships. These ships are crewed by seamen who know every rock in the gullies which are the hazardous landing places. This documentary is a story of storm and danger-and a story of lonely living. ... Read more

1h

Pop Go The 60s! was a one-off, 75-minute TV special originally broadcast in colour on 31 December 1969,to celebrate the major pop hits of the 1960s.[3] The show was a co-production between the United Kingdom's BBC and West Germany's ZDF broadcasters. It was shown on both stations on the same day, with other European stations broadcasting the programme either the same day or later. Although a co-pr... Read more

45m

James Cameron documentary relating to the cultural impact of the Apollo programme.

1h

Original footage of the Apollo 11 full moon walk and commentary transmitted by the BBC on 20th and 21st June 1969.

1h

Intimate portrait of the daily life of the British Royal Family drawn from 18 months of filming within Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle and Balmoral.

1h

The first duty of a state is to see that every child born therein shall be well housed, clothed, fed, and educated. (John Ruskin) How good a parent are you? Do you know the laws - old and new - governing you and your child? How far are you answerable, and how far is the State, for his health, safety, education, behaviour, hours of work? Cliff Michelmore and Magnus Magnusson give you the chance t... Read more

1h

Marty Feldman, for many years a successful comedy writer before turning to performing, explores humour through the people who create it, comparing their traditions, motivations and anxieties with his own. Among the people Marty talks to are Peter Sellers, Eric Morecambe, Peter Brough and Archie Andrews, Dudley Moore and Barry Took.

1h

First broadcast in 1969. In his 70th year, Alfred Hitchcock came to the National Film Theatre in London to talk to fellow director Bryan Forbes and to answer questions from an audience of film enthusiasts. With scenes from Blackmail (1929), The Lady Vanishes (1938), Psycho (1960), The Birds (1963) and Torn Curtain (1966).

1h

BBC documentary following life in one of the last of the Irish roadshows "Existence as portable as the props, Travelling light, living in transit, always thinking of that next town just ahead." The first BBC NI documentary in colour, entertainers portrayed in this film are a rapidly dying breed, and are possibly the last surviving family in Ireland to dispense a nightly three-hour brew of blood an... Read more

1h

Filmmaker Roger Mills authored this documentary in 1969 and managed to capture the spirit of rugby league in the north of England. Mills tells the story from his own perspective, as a middle-class rugby union-playing southerner who was taught nothing of the game at school and who never knew that far off in the 'cloth-capped' north men took money for a very different type of rugger. The film is ... Read more

1h

No star fell in love as often as Garbo did on the screen, but was she herself happy? 'I live in a corner. I am typically alone. I wish it could be otherwise, but it cannot.' This programme, narrated by Joan Crawford and first broadcast in 1969, looks at Garbo's art and life through her films. Extracts, courtesy of MGM, include Camille, Ninotchka, Queen Christina, Marie Walewska, Two-Faced Wo... Read more

1h

In a programme first broadcast in 1969, some of the four million people evacuated as children from British cities during the Second World War look back on their experiences.