Stop, Look, Listen... And Take Heed!

The excellent nostalgia TV channel Talking Pictures TV, about which I blogged previously on the occasion of its 5th birthday, very often as mentioned shows short archive documentary films and amateur cinefilm - usually between 10 and 30 minutes' duration - in association with the likes of the Imperial War Museum and the British Film Institute.  Recently it has started broadcasting some quaint motoring-related shorts from the 1940s and '50s, some linked to the forthcoming 100th anniversary of the original Austin 7 motor car which was first introduced in 1922 (and which I can hardly believe will shortly be celebrating its centenary, having also blogged about it on the occasion of its 90th birthday).  One that particularly caught my fancy and which has [partly, along with Mim's recent review of a TPTV-aired feature 80,000 Suspects over on Crinoline Robot] inspired this post is the captivating and entertaining (in more ways than one) road safety film from 1947 entitled It Happened Today.

While in places it hasn't dated well (especially Patrick Holt's narration, which has suffered somewhat from 70 years of change and the many pastiches from the likes of comedians such as Harry Enfield) this just adds to its overall charm in my book and it remains a fascinating early example of its type.  One particularly interesting area it focuses on is the then still-new concept of the unsignalised pedestrian crossing, complete with Belisha beacons but yet to feature the now-familiar black-and-white stripes that gave rise to its more common alternative name - the zebra crossing.  

A Belisha Beacon crossing at the corner of Whitehall  and Horse Guards Avenue, 
London, December 1938.
source - Flickr / Leonard Bentley

First introduced in 1935, Belishas were the brainchild of - and were named after - Leslie Hore-Belisha, the Minister for Transport from 1934 to 1937 who was a staunch advocate of improved road safety especially after he was nearly run over on Camden High Street shortly after his appointment.  Part of his Road Traffic Act 1934, which also included the creation of the 30mph urban speed limit, the first official driving test and a comprehensive updating of the Highway Code, the beacons were added to existing "uncontrolled crossings" that had until that point only been demarked by reflective metal studs set into the road.  The distinctive flashing orange globes set atop a black-and-white painted pole, along with the new speed limit and driving test, went a long way to lowering the number of fatalities on Britain's roads from 1934's high of nearly 7,500 (along with 231,000 injuries).  It was not until 1949, however, two years after It Happened Today was made, that the matching stripes were first added to the road surface giving rise to the zebra crossing name that they still bear today (and which was allegedly coined by a young James Callaghan - then a junior transport minister - when he viewed an early prototype at the Transport Research Laboratory in Berkshire).  Now the next big advance looks to be intelligent light-up crossings with warnings built into the kerb to try to catch the attention of the smartphone-addled.   

source - The World of Playing Cards

source - The World of
 Playing Cards

So well-received were the beacons that, in addition to quickly receiving Belisha's name, such was their novelty value they started something of a craze for related ephemera - including an eponymous card game based along the lines of Rummy.  Made by the well-known playing card manufacturer Pepys, the cards feature delightful images of various British landmarks and towns from London to Oban as well as pictures depicting the safe (and not so safe!) use of the road, along with examples of the road signs in use at the time (and which are fully deserving of their own blog post) and different coloured numbers - the idea being to collect sets of either of the latter.  As something of a Pepys collector myself, Belisha (my example's on the left) was one of the first of their games I picked up (from eBay a couple of years ago) and it has proved to be a thoroughly enjoyable and popular diversion (see what I did there?).  The game was updated in 1955 with the addition of an extra level of cards, updated images and new road signs.  Released as Round Britain it nevertheless retains much of the charm of Belisha, although the revised rules and new cards do make it slightly less fun to play (needless to say an example still graces my collection!).

source - The World of Playing Cards

Various road safety films similar to It Happened Today would continue to be made throughout the 1940s and '50s.  Then in 1953 came the character of Tufty Fluffytail, an anthropomorphic red squirrel created by one Elsie Mills as a way of imparting road safety advice to young children in an accessible and understandable way.  This led to the creation of the Tufty Club in 1961, designed to promulgate road and pedestrian safety among the under-5s through simple books and, later, public information films (narrated by the great Bernard Cribbins).  Such was its success that at its peak there were almost 25,000 Tufty Clubs throughout Britain with over 2 million members and the scheme lasted well into the 1980s, outliving several other programmes.

 

One of those programmes was the "Kerb Drill", which ran concurrently with the likes of the Tufty Club and other road safety policies.  Even Batman got in on the act during one of his rare breaks from fighting crime in Gotham City, as this recently-discovered footage from 1966 proves.

 

The 1970s saw the introduction of arguably the most well-known and long-lived road safety initiative - the Green Cross Code.  Featuring noted Bristolian Dave Prowse (who would later go on to greater fame as the body of Darth Vader in Star Wars) as the Green Cross Man this series debuted in 1975 and ran for nearly 20 years until the early 1990s (with a brief revival, complete with a then 80 year old Prowse, in 2014) scaring the bejesus out of a generation of dungaree-wearing kids by suddenly appearing out of nowhere, sometimes accompanied by an unnamed robot sidekick, looking very stern and shouty.  While the Green Cross Code Man was eventually retired, the Code itself lives on, although various subsequent attempts to instil road sense in youngsters have, erm, perhaps not been quite so successful.   

 

So there we have it then - a brief history of road safety from the 1930s to the 1990s (a bit late period-wise for this blog perhaps, but then all things Nineties are considered "vintage" now apparently) inspired by a splendid piece of 1940s film work.  Looking back at these innumerable road safety initiatives and the many dangers still very much inherent on the roads - not helped by modern technology and with 15-19 year olds having among the highest death rates due to traffic accidents - some new safety programmes inspired by the past seem called for.  One could easily see another update of Belisha, with current signs and new pictures, being just the thing to teach the youth of today how to stay safe on the roads.  Hmmn, maybe another lock-down project... 

***It Happened Today is also available to view for free on the BFIplayer*** 

Back on the road with Bertie Wooster and Captain Hastings

By far and away the most popular post ever published on Eclectic Ephemera was my study of the cars driven by two of our favourite fictional (alas!) chaps - Bertie Wooster and Captain Hastings.  Originally composed in June 2014 it has to date racked up a frankly astonishing 19,516 views and continues to attract comments more than six years after publication.  Clearly it has proved popular with both Wodehouse and Hastings fans the world over and it has been some recent comments from a few of the former that has inspired me to revisit the topic once again.

In my original post I focussed on the shared automotive tastes of Messrs. Wooster and Hastings in the form of the two interconnected marques of Aston Martin (Bertie) and Lagonda (Hastings).  At the time I mentioned that neither character's motor was specified in the books and while that may be true in the case of Captain Hastings ("The Cases of Captain Hastings" - now there's an idea for some fanfic!) it was subsequently pointed out to me that Wodehouse did name-check two makes of car in a couple of his Jeeves books so it struck me as the perfect opportunity to make another post out of the fact and to set the record straight.  (I was also corrected in the matter of the car Plum was pictured in outside a friend's home in Norfolk in 1928, which I had initially [mis]identified as a Morris Oxford Bullnose but which in fact was an AC 12hp Tourer.)

Wodehouse in his AC 12hp Tourer (NOT a Morris Bullnose), outside Hunstanton
Hall, Norfolk in 1928.

Bertie Wooster's Sunbeam

I did say in my initial post that "to my certain knowledge" P. G. Wodehouse never referenced the car Bertie drives and only has him allude to "the old two-seater" or "sports model"; this was I admit based on a brief and slightly hazy recollection of all the Jeeves stories I had read over the years and even then there was a nagging doubt in the back of my mind that somewhere there was a reference to a specific model but short of going back through the whole collected works - a not unpleasant undertaking to be sure but rather a big job for a simple blog post! - I wasn't sure how I was going to go about identifying it.

Thanks however to a comment on the original post from an anonymous Wodehousian a couple of months ago my information was updated and memory jogged so that I was reminded that in the short story "Bertie Changes His Mind" (from the book Carry On, Jeeves) the character of Peggy Mainwairing, a schoolgirl Bertie and Jeeves give a lift to, asks of our hero "What's your car? A Sunbeam, isn't it?".  While no further detail is given either in this or later stories Wodehouse scholars have alighted on the 1925 Sunbeam 20/60 Sports as being the most likely candidate and I can certainly understand why (1925 being the year of Carry On, Jeeves' publication for one thing).

source - ClassicCarsForSale

One could easily see Bertie and Jeeves pootling along in such a car as this - the 20/60 being marketed against the equivalent 20hp Rolls-Royce of the period; available in a number of different bodystyles built by either Sunbeam or various coachbuilders on a standard chassis (as was the practice of the time), the Sports model was offered as a two-seater (with a separate dickey seat in the back) and looks every inch the spiffy vehicle that would have appealed to a chap like Wooster.

source - V&P Classic Cars

The history of the Sunbeam cars is a rather convoluted one and would easily fill an entire blog post alone.  Suffice to say that, like so many early 20th century car companies, Sunbeams roots can be found in late 19th century bicycle manufacture - in this case the creation of Wolverhampton businessman and engineer John Marston.  A keen cyclist, in the 1870s he branched out from manufacturing tinplate into making his own bicycles with the name "Sunbeam" being suggested by his wife Ellen.  As with many Victorian entrepreneurs Marston wanted his machines to of the highest quality and Sunbeam Cycles were soon widely regarded as among the best available, a reputation it held on to until bicycle production ceased in 1936.  The company began making motorcars around 1901-1902 but then in 1905 the business was split up, with the newly-formed Sunbeam Motor Car Company Ltd taking over car production while Sunbeam Cycles continued in the ownership of Marston (with motorcycle production lasting until 1956).

Louis Coatalen in his Sunbeam Nautilus, Brooklands 1910
source - Wikimedia Commons

In the years prior to the Great War the Sunbeam Motor Company grew to become a serious contender in the luxury car market, rivalling the likes of Rolls-Royce, Bentley and Daimler.  Under the auspices of French automotive engineer Louis Coatalen, who joined the company in 1909 as chief designer, Sunbeam branched out into motor racing and Land Speed Record cars; during the First World War it also produced aero engines and commercial vehicles (the latter continuing until the mid-1960s and encompassing buses, trams, trolleybuses and even milk floats!).   Following the war's end Sunbeam merged with two competitors, Darracq and Talbot but each would continue as separate entities.  The 1920s were Sunbeam's heyday with its luxury limousines and sports models like the 20/60 proving popular with the well-heeled set of the time.  The 20/60 was produced from 1924 to 1932 in various bodystyles ranging from large 6-seater limousines, through 4-seater open tourers to rarer examples like this drophead coupe - only three of which still exist, including this one currently for sale (and you know what they say - if you have to ask the price...).

source - ClassicCarsForSale

Sunbeam struggled to survive the Depression of the Thirties; in 1934 after a string of financial losses the company was sold to the Rootes Group, one of the first massive automotive conglomerates which already counted Hillman, Humber and Singer among its brands.  Seeing the way the market was going Rootes repositioned Sunbeam as more of an everyman's car, combining it with the Talbot nameplate to create Sunbeam-Talbot, a situation that lasted until the mid-1950s when the Talbot name was dropped and Sunbeam began making sports cars such as the Alpine and Tiger.

source - V&P Classic Cars

Sadly the decline of Sunbeam began shortly thereafter in the 1960s; over the following 20 years the company was sold to Chrysler Europe (who reintroduced the Talbot sub-brand), before being passed on to Peugeot who eventually pulled the plug on both brands in 1981.  But it is Sunbeam's glory days of the 1920s that we are concerned with here and this 20/60 Super Sports DHC from the middle of that decade is fully deserving of Bertie's attention.

Bertie Wooster's "Widgeon"

The only other car to get a name check in the Jeeves books is in Thank You, Jeeves, where Bertie is noted as driving a "Widgeon Seven".  This is definitely a fictitious vehicle (and nothing to do with his friend and fellow Drones Club member Freddie Widgeon) but is most likely to be based on the Austin 7, that brand's ubiquitous small runabout.  I won't go into the history of the Austin brand here (I've already gone on long enough about Sunbeam) and it is unclear why Plum felt it necessary to change the name (if indeed that's what he did) unless he thought - as has been suggested by Wodehouse scholars - that an Austin was somewhat beneath the likes of the moneyed Bertie.  While this may be true of the standard saloon and convertible models, again - like many cars of its time - the Seven was available in a multitude of bodystyles and its cheap asking price and simple, lightweight mechanicals made it popular as an everyday racer with a number being produced in quite sporty designs.  It's entirely possible that one of these could have appealed to Bertie and this may be what Wodehouse was thinking of when he was writing Thank You, Jeeves.

1933 Austin 7 Nippy 2-Seater Sport
source - Wikimedia Commons 

The most sporting of the Sevens were the two-seater Sports models with such wonderful pre-war names like Nippy (Brum, anyone?), Speedy, Brooklands and Ulster - the latter two taken from those models' many successes at the Ards racing circuit in Northern Ireland and at Brooklands in Surrey - and once again one can readily imagine Bertie and Jeeves whizzing along the country roads of England or around the back roads of Mayfair in just such a car.

1925 Austin Seven Super Sports
source - Car and Classic

Surviving examples of Austin 7 Sports variants are also thin on the ground these days; although perhaps not quite so rare as the Sunbeam, with prices starting at around £25,000 for a decent rebuild replica (a modern-build body on an original chassis) rising to £40k for an original Brooklands.  Definitely the best way into owning a set of Wooster wheels considering the prices of Sunbeams and Aston Martins!

source - Pinterest

Captain Hastings' "Elisio Freccia"

Right, on to Captain Hastings and his "other" car now (don't worry, we're nearly at the end!).  Our hero had always been very faithful to his beloved Lagonda so it came as something of a surprise to learn that in The Adventure of the Italian Nobleman he was seriously considering exchanging it for an "Elisio Freccia"!  "Considering" is the right term, too, seeing as he seemed to spend the first half of the episode vacillating over writing the cheque ("I've got it marked in my diary.  It says 'decide about car.'").

Once again the "Elisio Freccia" is a made-up vehicle and not a real make or model, but the car it is based on is certainly one of the most beautiful and rarefied Italian sports cars of the interwar period - the 1935 Alfa Romeo 8C 2900.

1936 Alfa Romeo 8C 2900A Spider
source - Ultimatecarpage.com 

source - IMCDb / Auto Motor Klassiek

The 8C traces its lineage back to the 2300 model of 1931, which was a pure-bred racing car designed for the famous Italian road race the Mille Miglia.  A few two-seaters were produced for sale to the public, as well as single seater Grand Prix types (known as P3 Monopostos) which were entered in the 1932 Italian GP.  In the following years the model was refined as the 2600 in 1933 and subsequently the 2900 in 1935, which is precisely when Captain Hastings comes in as the 8C 2900A was first shown and advertised for sale at the 1935 London Motor Show.  I can just see the good Captain being in attendance and having his eye drawn by this racy Italian beauty, albeit as the fictional "Elisio Freccia".  I can understand his reluctance to part with the cheque, though, seeing as the asking price for an Alfa Romeo 2300 in 1931 was over £1,000 (£70k in today's money).  Having said that he'd be even less likely to spend out on one today - a 1937 8C 2900B selling for a breathtaking $4 million back in 1999, the result of only 33 such models ever having been produced.

In the event, though, our favourite chap ends up keeping his trusty Lagonda after stuffing "his" Elisio Freccia into the villain's Vauxhall (have no fear, though - no priceless classic cars were injured in the making of this film, a jerry-built mock-up being used for the final crash scene) following what has to be the greatest chase scene in the history of film.  Never mind Bullitt, Ronin and all the rest, Hastings' heroics has everything - a flock of geese, broken crockery, a charabanc full of old ladies, not to mention his fantastic finishing move!

"You SWINE!  That's for Miss Lemon!"
source - Pinterest

So there we have it, then - our two top chaps and three more of their favourite voitures.  I hope you've enjoyed reading this post as much as I have writing it (if you've made it this far); it's even given me an idea for a series of blog posts based around the cars of fictional detectives and literary characters (bearing in mind how well - or not! - I get on with series posts), continuing with Margery Allingham's Albert Campion and Dorothy L. Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey.  Until then we can carry on delighting in the supreme Thirties motoring that these two splendid coves continue to afford us.