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Title: ROCKET RANGE, BENBECULA

Reference number: 1342

Date: 1961c

Production company: [ BBC Television (?)]

Sound: sound

Original format: 16mm

Colour: bw

Fiction: non-fiction

Running time: 10.50 mins

Description: A documentary about the local people's reaction to the establishment of a Royal Artillery Guided Weapons Range in the Hebrides and how the presence of the base affects traditional life.

Held by local school until exchanged for video copy in 1982. This print the only surviving footage.

Credits: comm. Ludovic Kennedy

Shotlist: No credits. Shots of shoreline, sea and blackhouses, South Uist (.37) Religious shrine, Iochdar (.48) gvs South Uist landscape, road and houses. Cattle (1.06) woman weaving at loom inside cottage [Lily MacLellan, Lochcarnan] (1.24) man repairing a dinghy (1.39) workers from the alginate factory including Duncan MacKay and Iain MacIsaac collect seaweed from the shore, pile it onto cart and drive off, Donald MacNeil driving tractor (2.25) shots of convoy of army vehicles on South Uist (2.39) Shot of Royal Artillery Guided Weapons Range, Hebrides. Voice-over islander. Shots of base at Carinish (3.10) Interview by Ludovic Kennedy? with Colonel Cooper on relations between the army and the islanders (4.05) gvs soldiers on base (4.14) interview with John MacInnes, Clerk of the District Council, on the arrival of the army base (5.05) interview with islanders - Donald MacDonald, Locheynort (5.27) - and Ronald and Mrs. MacPhee in their cottage (6.37) interview with Sir Walter Pollen, laird of Ormacleit Castle (7.01) gvs of terrain, new causeway from South Uist over to Benbecula, shrine (7.16) village (7.21) islanders cutting and loading peat, electricity pylons (7.31) new houses at Daliburgh (7.42) gvs landscape (7.57) montage of previous interviews on proposed German use of the range (10.03) shore at Lochboisdale. Interview with singer Murdina MacInnes, maid at local hotel, on the German presence (10.27) gvs Lochboisdale, shore and harbour (10.50)