Help preserve some rare Toc H history

This is a crowdfunder to digitise rare Toc H film footage.

I recently obtained a 16mm copy of a report on Toc H’s Dor Knap Centre that was filmed in the summer of 1961 and shown as an insert in the 26 Nov 1961 edition of ABC Weekend TV’s The Sunday Break, a religious magazine show. I paid for this myself (with some financial support from John Burgess who was around when it was filmed) as it is the only known surviving copy of this important clip. It is in an ABC TV film can and is thought to be the original. No copies exist in the Toc H archive nor at any television archives such as the BFI.

The next step is to get the 16mm cine film digitized so more people can see it. I will then pass the original film to the Toc H Archive at Birmingham. To get the film professionally scanned (along with the audio) is to cost about £320 and since I have already paid £110 to purchase the film, I am appealing for some help towards the cost of digitization.

This cost is with a professional video company who will clean the film first and scan it carefully at high resolution. It is possible to get it done much cheaper but the results would be very much poorer. The company I have selected was recommended to me by the East Anglian Film Archive.

If you are in a position to make a small donation towards this process I would be extremely grateful and you can do so through this GoFundMe page (or contact me directly if you prefer). Once it is digitized, I will make it available free of charge to interested parties (I am trying to trace the copyright holders and that will make a difference as to whether I can publish it freely on the internet or just make it available to those who request it). I will write more about the programme when it is available for viewing.

Steve Smith March 2023