Back to “Civie Street”
Saturday, August 18th, 2007
RAF Newsreel / Information film – The Gen, The Voice Of The Service, Number 14
The Gen an internal film magazine was started in 1943, of which eighteen editions were eventually produced, the title adopting the popular RAF slang term referring to the latest information. It offers a particular insight into how the Service presented itself to its own people and to the notion of an established RAF culture. This was circulated throughout the Service for inclusion in the entertainments programme and, in addition to showing the effective work the Service was doing in all theatres of the war, included jovial views of RAF life such as ‘Letter to Bert’, a common serviceman’s observations on his experiences in exotic locations.
Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, June, 1997 by Kenneth Buckman
Someone has put several of these up on Google Video. This one (#14) is apparently from very near the end of WWII. It shows newly developed helicopters and Squirt jets, and a bizarre “foolproof and safe” method of grabbing a sheep, and then a man into an aircraft from the ground, that you will have to see to believe. It goes on to show centrifuge experiments and the early use of water pressurized suits to counteract blood pooling in the lower half of the body at high g. All of this is narrated in a light jovial manner. We also hear about young Jimmy Natu a Ghurka orphan adopted as RAF base mascot in Burma who becomes “one of the boys.” He’s a regular earner and gets two bob a week.
The second half is about Education and Vocational Training. Letting everyone know that they soon will be out of a job, and that you, yes you, better start figuring out what you are going to do when you hit Civie Street. As Air Commander Allan Lancelot Addison Perry-Keane growls: “The RAF cannot guarantee you a job.”
