Germany and Holland - Part one

This post features a slightly longer vintage home movie than many of the films on the site and was taken during a family holiday in Germany and Holland in 1961.

In order to upload the film onto YouTube I had to split it into two parts because it was slightly longer than 15 minutes, so this post will be followed soon by another with the second half of the film.

Because it's a longer film it was made up from several reels so I can't say for sure the film stock that was used to shoot all of the film, but the first few feet are marked Kodachrome so that's how I've categorized it. It's a standard 8 film (obviously I guess since the Super 8 format started in 1965).

I did a bit of research to try to find where the film had been shot, because the only information written on the film's canister was 'Germany & Holland 1960 - 62'. This gave me Germany and Holland as the countries and date but I wanted to see if there were clues in the film which would help narrow the location to specific towns or cities.

Although I can't be certain where the opening shots in the market place were filmed, towards the end of this first part there is a picture of the hotel the family were staying in which has the name clearly shown. When I did an image search for 'Golzhelmer Krug' I discovered the hotel is situated in Dusseldorf in Germany. Once I had that information I found that a street name which appears in an earlier sequence, 'Resser Str' also has a match in Germany, at a location close to Dusseldorf, so I'm fairly confident that I've found the general location the family were staying in.

The film seems to mostly focus around the youngest member of the party, a small boy of about 3 years((About the age I would have been in 1961 )) which I guess is entirely natural since he was the baby in the family.

The opening sequence is taken in a market place, with members of the party looking round and bartering for goods. In the background of one scene I can see a hotel called Hotel Prins Bernhard, but when I did a search for that name I couldn't find where this location might be.

After some time in the market, there a some scenes of the small boy enthralled by a street musicain / one man band, and then later by a tortoise he's found. This is followed by shots of a wide river or canal, which since it's followed by the street sign mentioned above, could be the Rhein-Herne-Kanal which is close to that location.

Towards the end of this half of the film, the family are shown in a large town or city in Germany - this could be Dusseldorf or another city close by.

If you recognise any of the areas shown in the film, please get in touch using the comments form below.