Sports I Tell You!

It was sports! Sports, I tell you. That's the glue wot bonded the Blazer Boys together back in the old days. It certainly wasn't any shared interest in gardening or yard work. And it wasn't video games or blogs either, because neither of those space-age distractions existed in the mid 60s. The word 'blog' probably would have stumped us into total silence.

Nope, it was football, hockey, baseball and tennis for this group of wayward youth. Mostly football and hockey - mostly played right on the street - and mostly without the participation of Dougie. Doug was a bit of a misfit in this regard - the only Blazer unwilling to join in with all the sports stuff. He just didn't fancy all the running around I guess. But a few years later in the 70s, he would join us for midnight roller hockey games at Stardust, so that kinda made up for it.

I never owned a decent football myself. We always had to rely on Don to supply the best looking, best handling footballs for all the tossin' and bootin' we did each season at Blazer Stadium. (Blog report coming up soon on Blazer Stadium.) I seem to recall that I once owned a hard plastic football that was originally a container for some liquid; maybe laundry detergent; complete with a nasty spout opening at one of the pointy ends. There was no way you could punt something like that. Forget it.

The clips supplied in the short video below capture a few sporting moments with the Blazers. All Blazers (except Rob) can be found at some point in here. And to replace Rob in the lineup, we've uncovered more exciting footage of 'Big Al' and his brother Randy which we've tastefully added for a more comprehensive viewing experience.

Interesting Characters In Close Quarters

Back in its heyday (the late 60s) our corner of the world (Blazerville) was never short of interesting characters stuck in close quarters. We had the weird middle aged guy across the street from Rob's (with the high-pitched chipmunk voice) that tried to cut our Wham-o© frisbee in half with a saw. We had the cranky Mr. McCloud that lived between Danny's house and mine who would rake his yard with one arm because the other arm had been torn off in a train mishap. We had Mr. Hildebrant - the first person I ever saw that would blow out the contents of his nose by plugging one nostril at a time. These were a few the oddball residents of our street that we were forced to either interact with, or do our best to avoid, on a daily basis.

Unfortunately, my movie making days didn't extend that far back. My cameras didn't start rolling until 1973, which was far too late to catch the circus show going on outside our doors. By the time I decided to make it my life's work to record the living, breathing neighborhood of my youth, we were well into the next generation of Quebec Street. Out went the old 19th century holdovers with their Ed Sullivan shows and Benny Goodman tunes - and in came the energetic new baby boomers with their Love American Style and Moody Blues.

But this film (below) has none of that. All I can offer up here is another taste of 'the usual' as we knew it back in our day. My 'like-minded' cohort Bartholomew Woods can be seen at one point standing on the roof of his house making his own visual record of Blazerville by snapping pix in all four directions. (Where are those pix today, Bart?) And the youth movement is clearly on display with Selena (pictured top) and her sister Emma and my niece Tracy. Plus we discover that I obviously used the single frame 'time lapse' feature (gimmick) a few more times than I actually remember. Because it's here again plenty.

Visual Documentation

It was just a short clip of footage; maybe 6 seconds running time. But when it comes to historical moments on film, I dun purdie good for myself when I captured both Don and Evert; the elder statesmen of the Block Blazers; sitting side by side in one of the most important recordings in local super 8 movie history.

As role models for the rest of the 'Blazer kids' back in the golden 1960s and 70s, it was crucial that some form of visual documentation of these two titans - in their prime - survive to the present day. Thankfully, in the short film we're about to see, we can rest assured in the knowledge that that documentation has been secured.

As far as we know, there is no other film footage of them together, posing before the camera like this. Even a still photograph from that era is hard to find. They may have spent a lot of time in each other's company 40 years ago, but there's precious little evidence to prove it. So the call goes out to all former Blazers across the planet: we need more Evert/Don pix! If any can be found, they should be forwarded to this internet address pronto.

Also on display today... Bartholomew Woods brings out his Sesame Street Bert puppet once again and supplies us all with one of the funniest moments on screen. That of the dummy's hand (manipulated by Bart) being used to smack an inquisitive neighborhood child's cheek (Daygai?) and then the child responding with a punch of his own - not to Bartholomew at the controls, but to the poor helpless puppet!

'Big Al' makes a rare wintertime appearance, Doug and I go sailing, Danny plays basketball, and there's a few scenes off the cutting room floor from 'the epics' to round out this latest mini collection.

NOT: "Baby's First Steps"

Da fella wots bin doing all the tranfering of these mid-1970s super 8 films of mine onto mid-2000 DVDs, told me that he thinks they are some of the best he's worked on. I dunno what he means by that, but I assume he just doesn't want to lose me as a customer. It also doesn't say much for any of the other people's films he's had to transfer. They must REALLY stink.

Maybe his opinion is based on the fact that I've never submitted the kind of film he's come to expect from the casual DIY home movie enthusiast. The same style of movie he dreads having to watch over and over. Family BBQs; family xmas reunions; or family road trips with shaky footage of babies and dogs.

Well yes, I would have to agree with him in that respect - I never attended the 'school of cliche film making'. So a title like: "Baby's First Steps" will not be coming soon to this blog at any point. I guess the recent wedding footage of our childhood friend (Doug; May 10th) was the most 'stereotypical' thing I've uploaded here (dull and predictable) but that doesn't really count. And the transfer guy never had to sit and watch it. That was merely the recording of a day more than 30 years forward from what I've been trying to memorialize on this internet stage.

Today's movie reel is no better or worse than the previous 25 reels, but it does have a few surprises. I'm always pleased to find stuff I'd shot decades ago come springing back to life to make me say... "Oh yeah... the Don and Brenda spinning dance! I'd almost forgotten about that."

Last but not least, watch for the ultra cool 'time traveling' cross dissolve that ends the film. 35 years in the making.

Bird Watching With Bartholomew

I never really know what memories are going to be pulled out of the pile when I dig around for more of these old super 8 films to upload onto this weirdo blog setup. It all falls into place by chance really. Very much like calling out the bingo ball numbers to the old folks at the PNE.

Today, under the letter 'B'... we have Bartholomew. A handful of scenes featuring THEE Bartholomew Woods. Yes, there's a tiny bit of Dan and Paul in here (and Don too, if you know exactly where to look) but it's Bart that hogs the spotlight this time round for sure.

Our visual journey today takes us from Vancouver to Seattle, from Point Grey to Oakridge, and from Little Mountain to Seymour Mountain. We learn in this video that Dan needed a sit-down break during the shooting of the City Hall portion of his most memorable movie role (as Farmer Dan in: 'Farm News') and, perhaps even more surprising, we learn that Bartholomew was, and probably still is, quite the devoted bird watcher/nature lover.

The Kilted Groom

I was forced to take a break from the editing of my super 8 films today so that I might attend the early morning wedding of a childhood friend from the old days down on the block. Yup; one of the Blazer kids was g'wan do the 'marriage thang' yet again and it wasn't pretty. You've heard of the 'jilted bride?' Well, Doug was the 'kilted groom' for this time round and there just weren't nobody gonna talk him out of it, there weren't.

Well sir. As is my custom when it comes to leaving the house, whether it be a short stroll to the grocery store, or a long drive out to Richmond for a church wedding, I took one of my cameras along. This time it was the Sony Digital 8 Camcorder that made the trip - both there and back - and the resulting moving pictures are on display (in living colour) here.

Blog Theatre

I could'a sworn that each and every one of these short film clips on today's video (below) had already made their appearance within this blog theatre at some earlier point in the proceedings. But when I took a quick look back thru the postings leading up to this present one, I found their previous appearances NOT!

Being the 'completist collector' that I am (is that even a real term?) I couldn't allow the possibility of these old filmed memories living an unscreened life, so I've slapped them all together here under one umbrella just to be done with them.

There's at least one 'pause and reflect' moment in this video that I'd like you to take notice of. It occurs when two separate scenes (both featuring Bartholomew Woods) combine that are probably, in reality, separated by a good 10 years but when connected here, they condense down into the space of seconds. In the first scene, Bart looks over his shoulder (at what... his fleeting youth?) and in the next, his head is turning back to face us - but he's a full 10 years younger.

Such is the magic of motion pictures and splicing tape. Meanwhile, 'Big Al' fans will be disappointed to learn that the little ragamuffin is not included in today's presentation. However his brother Randy and sister Iris are both on board to take his place, and that should be good enough for most.

Also, in the short bit with Doug, Laine and Iris, I KNOW there was more footage shot that day with these people, but somehow it has gone missing over the years. It saddens me muchly to think that a chunk of block history may be lost forever. We certainly can't reshoot it now. I can only hope that another Woodward's bag full of discarded super 8 film will be found in the storage room when I next make a search down there.