No Redemption

[Born to Boogie]

I recently came across this photographic account of the miners' strike at Easington Colliery:

http://www.keithpattison.com/p742337115

It depicts many of the real life situations at the time which inspired several of the scenes in the musical. As someone interested in both social history and photography I found the book which is available to buy via the link below extremely interesting:

http://www.inpressbooks.co.uk/no_redemp ... 22033.aspx

It is sometimes difficult to separate accounts of the strike into what happened in different areas of the country. As it focuses on Easington Colliery alone I found this record particularly interesting.

Just posting here as I thought others might also be interested to take a look.

Here is some text from the site to give more of an idea about the book's background.

"THE 1984-85 MINERS' STRIKE IN THE DURHAM COALFIELD.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY KEITH PATTISON. WORDS BY DAVID PEACE

The Strike of 1984–85 shook the foundations of British society, tearing apart traditional mining communities and leaving them in tatters. Twenty-five years on and after thirteen years of a Labour government, there are many communities,not only former industrial ones, that languish outside the mainstream. And as David Cameron, castigating against ‘broken Britain’, takes power, No Redemption looks back at one particular broken community, Easington Colliery. In August 1984, Keith Pattison was commissioned by Sunderland’s Artists’ Agency to photograph the strike in Easington Colliery for a month. He remained there on and off until it ended in March1985, photographing from behind the lines a community rallying together against implacable opposition. Making, as the documentary film- maker John Grierson said ‘creative use of actuality’, Pattison frames a narrative sequence of images from the optimism of August, through the deepening pessimism of winter, to the final vote to return to work.

Twenty-five years later, on 6 May 2010, Election Day, Pattison took David Peace to Easington to interview three of the people caught up in the strike –Alan Cummings, Marilyn Johnson, and her husband Jimmy. Their memories, still freshly felt, make explicit the anger, pain, resilience and warmth captured in the photographs."

[ERinVA]

Thanks for that! Some of those scenes look really familiar. One that particularly struck me was the soup kitchen scene.

[Born to Boogie]

Yes, I find something else every time I look through the book. There is small boy playing on page 36 and then 'Wilkinson Scab' painted on the wall on page 37. In the story the Wilkinson family aren't miners but the fact the name is there I find fascinating. The photos also give one the sense of how intense the situation must have been, with the housing so tightly packed on narrow streets and the pit itself just yards from where the miners lived. Visiting the place now obviously doesn't tell this part of the story as a number of streets of houses have been demolished and the pit location is now open parkland.

The map at the location below shows the street names in Easington Colliery at the time of the strike. The pit was located in the open space at the top right of the map. You can see Billy's street listed (alnwick street). It is interesting to note that the streets were grouped by the first letter of their name. If you have half an hour to spare it is an interesting exercise to compare the street names on this map with those which exist today on google maps or in an up to date street map.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_KmeU879465A/S ... an0027.jpg

[kport]

No Redemption documents the 1984-85 Miners' Strike as experienced at Easington Colliery in County Durham.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-16963468

In August 1984, Keith Pattison received a month-long commission to photograph the strike at Easington Colliery. He stayed there for eight months, until the strike ended in March 1985, photographing events from the miners' point of view. Pattison's photographs document a mining community rallying together to defend its way of life

The village was the scene of numerous flashpoint between police and the community during the year-long dispute. The pit survived the strike but Easington Colliery closed in the 1990s and the village was later used as one of the locations for the filming of Billy Elliot. Loss of a year's wages caused hardship for many families in the village but regular community events were held for the children.

The pictures are at the National Coal Mining Museum for England, at Caphouse Colliery near Wakefield, in the Yorkshire coalfield where mining has also been carried out for centuries. By 1985 the coal at Caphouse was exhausted and its conversion to a museum started. The No Redemption exhibition at the museum runs until May

[Todd]

Very interesting. It would certainly appear that the "Billy Elliot" set and style designers got the look right when they made the movie and the stage musical. Thanks for sharing.

[Born to Boogie]

Good that there is another exhibition of these photos. As I mentioned in an earlier thread the book of images which is available to accompany the exhibition is extremely interesting and an excellent investment for anyone interested in BE. There is so much to be taken from those shots of locations used in the musical and the film. Link to earlier thread below for reference.

http://www.billyelliottheforum.me.uk/fo ... redemption

[ERinVA]

I am going to merge these two threads, as they are both on the same topic.

[BILLYFAN]

A very intresting set of photo's' born to boogie, it must have been a very difficult time for everyone
Their are about 26 photo's of Easington in the 80's by Bruce Rae and Paul rutishauser on the following site;_

http://www.amber-online.com/exhibitions ... n-a-mining village