1973: The Death of the Local Pub? | Man Alive | Voice of the People | BBC

You used to be lucky to get bread and cheese or a pie with your pint in the pub. Today, along with booze, they serve up go-go girls, topless dancers, strippers, female impersonators and music, music, music. Right now the traditional local is in danger. Big cities are being swamped with disco bars, ideal for those who don't want to talk to each other; popular 'mine hosts' are being replaced by managers; old pubs frequented by old men in old villages are being closed down.

Some people are making a lot of money out of the changes, like Bob Wheatley, one of the pioneers of the hip new pub, and clearly, there is an appetite for these establishments - particularly among the young. But a lot more are sad - and angry. Samuel Johnson once said: 'There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern or inn.' Man contrived it. Is man now destroying it?

Man Alive investigates.

Clip taken from Man Alive: Pop Into Your Local - Before it Disappears, originally broadcast on BBC Two, 7 March, 1973.

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