History is best seen through primary media of the era. We learn a lot from photos, documents and film. The first public information films of WWII highlight the lives lead during the war. What was important to the people and the government of the time, how we lived and how we made it through to the end of the war are all shown on these films.

 

During the war, public information films covered some more general topics such as public health (most famously Massingham’s Coughs and Sneezes) but most were related to the war effort. When the war ended, public information films continued. These films/fillers shifted to everyday issues, shown on the television between programming. As Jae Prowse of Horrified Magazine put it, these films were ‘warnings to the curious’, designed to be quirky, trying to keep the audience’s attention.Films were regularly produced throughout the 20th Century, and into the 21st. Big global crises were also focused on providing vital and new information to those who needed it. This was especially important in developing, unprecedented issues such as the Aids epidemic.

 

In 2006 the Central Office for Information, (COI, the main government body that made the fillers) celebrated its 60th anniversary. Despite this celebration, it was only 4 years later in 2010, that the government announced that COI would be closing. It ceased operations in 2011. Despite the closure, public information films still exist in a smaller capacity. They still exist in school assemblies and on social media, but one of the biggest public information campaigns in recent years is the fillers which were released during the Covid lockdowns. In half a century, maybe young historians will be looking back on these lockdown fillers, and learning something about the way we lived during that big period of our lives.