BBC NI's Rewind archive launches with 13,000 clips

Rewind hosts a collection of more than 13,000 clips with people able to search for clips by location, by date or by subject

Thousands of clips reflecting BBC Northern Ireland's extensive broadcasting archive are now available via a new online portal.

Rewind hosts a collection of more than 13,000 clips including news reports, documentaries and lifestyle programmes from the 1950 to the 1970s.

The portal makes a large cross-section of the BBC's archive publicly accessible for the first time.

Rewind users can search for clips by location, by date or by subject.

It is intended to be used as an academic and research tool and provides a glimpse of what life was like in Northern Ireland, as captured by BBC NI, down through the decades.

Renowned Northern Ireland figures such as George Best, Seamus Heaney and Mary Peters feature in the archive, which also reflects many of the significant events of the Troubles.

Former Manchester United and Northern Ireland footballer George Best is featured in the archive

Head of Rewind, Andy Martin, said work is under way to open up more of the archive from the 1980s and 1990s.

"We reckon by the time we are finished there could be 20,000 pieces of news footage," he told BBC News NI's Good Morning Ulster.

"What we are releasing this morning (Monday) is the 1950s, the 1960s and the 1970s and we have had a small editorial team watching every single piece.

"We have had a team of developers who have built this portal through which you can search in a way that you have never ever been able to search archive before.

"We do think that it is potentially the most advanced archive search platform available in the world, as it allows you to search for every single word spoken in the archive because of auto-transcription technology."

He added: "You can see everything from Ulster Mirror to all of the news archives and some of the weird and wonderful things that happened in Northern Ireland and it really is a repository of our social and political history."

The renowned poet, Seamus Heaney, captured on Ulster In Focus in 1970

The portal is available here and a special programme, Rewind The Scenes is being broadcast at 23:45 BST on Monday taking a look at the archive with the help of audience members.

The programme will be available afterwards on BBC iPlayer.

It features a visit by The Queen to the Belfast shipyard in 1954 to launch a new passenger liner and a competition for the best beard at Methodist College in the city a decade later.

As a taster, the programme has archive packages on Northern Ireland food favourites such as the soda farl and potato bread, as well as "the demise of the pint of porter".

There is also reaction to the forgotten tradition of straw weddings in County Fermanagh, vintage footage of football star George Best and a series of news reports documenting the Troubles.

Wendy Austin reporting on Scene Around Six in 1978

Peter Johnston, director of BBC Northern Ireland, highlighted the importance of the Rewind portal.

"This evolving archive resource has relevance for many people, providing fresh insights, forgotten stories and the documentation of Northern Ireland's past," he said.

"The teams involved have created an important academic resource that combines the power of new technology and the richness of the BBC's archive for all those interested in finding out more about Northern Ireland throughout the decades."

Content on the archive from the 1950s and 1960s was initially rolled out in libraries across Northern Ireland through BBC NI's partnership with Libraries NI and the portal remains available as a resource in many libraries.

You can access the BBC Rewind archive here and watch Rewind the Scenes on BBC One Northern Ireland at 23:45 and also afterwards on BBC iPlayer.