Rare footage of the Great Yorkshire Show's past to be given special screening

While it is used throughout the year for more than a hundred rural showcase events, it is the event in July in the shape of the Great Yorkshire Show that gives it a national and indeed international spotlight.

This heritage is being celebrated in a special screening of archive footage at the Great Yorkshire Showground, something organisers say will reveal a fascinating portrait of Yorkshire farming and rural life in the 20th Century.

Rural Life on Film will be screened at the Pavilions of Harrogate on Wednesday, April 6, from 1.30pm to 4pm.

Held by the Yorkshire Rural Support Network in association with the Yorkshire Film Archive, around an hour of specially curated footage will be shared, with a break part way through the film for tea and cake.

The event is being held to bring together farming families, particularly more senior family members, following a long period of enforced social isolation during the coronavirus pandemic.

Kate Dale, co-ordinator of the Yorkshire Rural Support Network at the Yorkshire Agricultural Society, said: “We are offering this special screening as a small thank you to all those who have given so much to our farming industry over the years.

“It is very much about bringing together members of the farming community again, especially some of our more senior members, to celebrate the shared history that binds us as a community.

“The film that Yorkshire Film Archive has kindly put together will be a lovely trip down memory lane, so if you have any family members or friends who you think would enjoy a warming afternoon of nostalgia, we’d love to welcome you along.”

In what is the year of Her Majesty The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, the film includes a nod to Royal celebrations past, with footage from the 1977 Silver Jubilee celebrations in the rural community of Fearby near Masham.

Archive material from the Great Yorkshire Show also features an event that The Queen has attended herself on four separate occasions.

Another highlight will be a poignant story about the men from farming communities in the Wagoners’ Special Reserve from East Yorkshire, who were some of the first men to go abroad in the First World War.

Graham Relton, archive manager at Yorkshire Film Archive, said: “We have delved into our vaults to curate a special film show, featuring everything from sheep washing, working the land by hand and machine, land girls and farmers’ wives to traditional rural pursuits, village celebrations and, of course, the annual Great Yorkshire Show.

“The presented screening will reveal a fascinating portrait of Yorkshire farming and rural life in the 20th Century showcasing footage from regional television collections and amateur productions.”

Meanwhile, the Great Yorkshire show will once again be a four-day event next year and tickets are on sale now.

The 163rd show will take place from Tuesday, July 12 to Friday, July 12 15.

Last year, the show was stretched across four days for the first time to allow more people to attend in the wake of social distancing rules. Organisers said the event would continue to run across four days following “overwhlemingly positive feedback” from visitors.