About the �鶹Լ�� Feed

What does it mean to ‘broadcast British?’

2018-07-19T14:29:08+00:00

The production team for Make Yourself at �鶹Լ��, the first �鶹Լ�� programme for the Asian community.

In the wake of the recent Windrush scandal, many people have been discussing what it means to be British in the post-Imperial era.

When that famous ship dropped anchor at Tilbury Docks in 1948 it heralded a new era for both the UK and the �鶹Լ��, as the Corporation rose to the challenge of representing a new and unfamiliar audience.

Now, seven decades on, �鶹Լ�� History has launched the fourth release from its Oral History Collection, showing the way staff at the �鶹Լ�� created programmes for a diverse and multi-cultural audience following World War II. The results are interesting and often surprising.

Created in partnership with the University of Sussex, 100 Voices that Made the �鶹Լ��: People, Nation, Empire looks to shed new light on what is a complex and sometimes highly contentious subject.

John Escolme, �鶹Լ�� History Manager, explains: "What we're doing is bringing some of the �鶹Լ��'s hidden treasures into the public realm, including some of the 600 interviews with former members of staff, few of which have been available until recently."

Dual-identity

The records provide a fascinating insight into decision making at the �鶹Լ�� from that time, including minutes showing the initial reluctance of the Corporation to speed-up integration, and a recording of the first episode of Make Yourself at �鶹Լ�� from October 1965, the first �鶹Լ�� programme for the Asian community.

Speaking about the programme, guest reviewer and Newswatch presenter Samira Ahmed comments: "I have a special affection for Make Yourself at �鶹Լ��…That whole idea of spoken Hindustani being broadcast on the �鶹Լ�� was really significant, it was addressing a minority in their own language but it also made me aware for the first time that there was this dual-identity."

There are a number of fascinating case studies looking at this concept of dual-identity, including Una Marson. Una was the first black producer at the �鶹Լ��, way back in 1941. The prejudices she faced at that time are examined in a number of her documents and interviews, as well as comments showing the high esteem she was held in by some of her superiors.

Man Alive (1967) was one of the first TV programmes to speak to lesbians about their lives.

Reflecting the LGBTQ+ audience

As well as the subject of race, 100 Voices looks at the efforts made by the �鶹Լ�� to engage with people from the LGBTQ+ community: from the initial, church-dominated discussions on radio in the 1950s, to tentative efforts to document the lives of gay men on TV in the 1960s, right up to the bold lifestyle programming of the 1990s.

John explains: "The language used in many of these early programmes is often blunt and reflects the attitudes of the time. The seven �鶹Լ�� programmes covered really exemplify the change in the �鶹Լ��'s understanding of its LGBTQ+ audience from 1957 until the present day."

A letter from Sir David Attenborough advocating greater representation for minorities.

Confidential letters

Some of the recently released letters look at the �鶹Լ��'s first efforts to engage with minority communities. The letters reveal that many �鶹Լ�� journalists initially found it difficult to fully reflect and report on the lives of Britain's black communities and had to work hard to earn the trust of people in many UK cities.

Committee documents from the 1970s also show that the Corporation often struggled with the balance between increasing representation for minorities and a journalistic duty to report on prejudice and conflict.

While the debate around representation continues to be a challenging subject, one thing the documents make clear is the number of people at the Corporation who lobbied for change and pushed for greater equality in �鶹Լ�� content.

This cause is best summed up in a number of newly-released accounts detailing the behind-the-scenes decision to hand over editorial control to outside interest groups for a pioneering series called Open Door in 1973.

These include a memo from Sir David Attenborough, then Director of Programmes in TV, making the case for the series and advocating representation of minority voices on the �鶹Լ��.

You can find out more about 100 Voices on the History of the �鶹Լ�� website.

This article originally appeared in Ariel, the �鶹Լ��'s in-house digital platform.

Leafing through the history of Jackanory on World Book Day

2018-03-01T13:00:00+00:00

Today (Thursday 1 March) is World Book Day, to celebrate we have picked out a few of the books and their narrators who featured on the classic �鶹Լ�� Children's series, Jackanory.

Jackanory began in 1965, created by producer Joy Whitby, who had developed the children's show Play School. The first story, Cap o' Rushes was told by Lee Montague. Initially only meant to run for a six week trial, the show was a major part of �鶹Լ�� Children's television for 31 years, with around 3,500 episodes telling 650 stories, its final episode airing in 1996. The show made a short comeback in 2006 with stories read by Ben Kingsley and John Sessions, and again with Jackanory Junior in 2010 on CBeebies.

Below are just a few of the stories that were told over the three decades the original show was on air:

1965 production shot featuring the first Jackanory storyteller, Lee Montague (centre), with floor manager John Lane and producer Joy Whitby

Dame Judi Dench read 'The Jubilee Bear' written by Ursula Moray Williams in 1977

Michael Palin reading 'Charlie And The Chocolate Factory' by Roald Dahl in 1979

Bernard Cribbins (left) has made the most appearances on Jackanory, over 100. Here he is with Maurice Denham, Jan Francis and David Wood in a 10 part adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's novel, 'The Hobbit', in 1979.

Victoria Wood made her Jackanory debut in 1984 reading 'Little Mabel Wins' by Jilly Cooper

HRH Prince Charles took to the outdoors to tell us his story, 'The Old Man of Lochnagar', in 1984

In 1977, way before his role as Jean-Luc Picard, Patrick Stewart read us 'Annerton Pit' by Peter Dickinson

Jane Asher brought E Nesbit's celebrated children's novel 'The Railway Children' to life in 1981

Rik Mayall in 1993, reading us 'The Fwog Prince: The Twuth' by Kaye Umansky. Mayall also gave us an unforgettable reading of Roald Dahl's 'George's Marvellous Medicine' in 1986

Spike Milligan, reading 'Help! I am a Prisoner in a Toothpaste Factory' by John Antrobus in 1980

Charlotte Coleman read 'Night Birds on Nantucket' by Joan Aiken in 1992

Willie Rushton read us A.A Milne's 'Winnie The Pooh' in 1983

Alan Bennett reads from 'The House of Pooh Corner' by A.A. Milne, in the last series of the original run of Jackanory in 1996

If you are feeling nostalgic for Jackanory why not check out CBeebies Bedtime Stories which features a host celebrities reading stories.

Read the press release 'Brian Blessed narrates new CBeebies Storytime app tale for World Book Day'
Find out more about World Book Day 2018

�鶹Լ�� celebrities we said goodbye to in 2017

2017-12-23T07:00:00+00:00

As 2017 draws to a close we remember some of the actors, presenters, writers and comedians who have graced the �鶹Լ�� with their talents, but sadly died during the year.

Gordon Kaye, 7 April 1941 - 23 January 2017

Actor Gordon Kaye was best known for playing Rene in �鶹Լ�� wartime-set sitcom 'Allo 'Allo. Here he is pictured on set in 1991.

John Hurt, 22 January 1940 - 25 January 2017

Award-winning actor John Hurt was probably best known for playing the title role in The Elephant Man. Here he is pictured in a production still from The Alan Clark Diaries which aired on �鶹Լ�� Four, and later �鶹Լ�� Two, in 2004.

Desmond Carrington, May 23 1926 - February 1 2017

Veteran broadcaster Desmond Carrington's career spanned 70 years. His �鶹Լ�� Radio 2 programme aired from 1981 until he retired in 2016. Above is a clip from his The Music Goes Round show as he bade farewell to �鶹Լ�� Radio 2 in 2016.

Alan Simpson, 27 November 1929 - 8 February 2017

Alan Simpson, along with writing partner Ray Galton, created some of the �鶹Լ��'s most memorable sitcoms including Steptoe and Son and Hancock's Half Hour. Here he is outside Television Centre in 1970.

Sara Coward, 30 January 1948 - 12 February 2017

Actress Sara Coward played Caroline Sterling in Radio 4's The Archers for almost 40 years. Here she is recording the worlds longest-running radio soap with the Duke Of Westminster and Arnold Peters as Jack Woolley in 1984 (The Duke Of Westminster appeared in an episode of The Archers that year as himself when the Duke visited Ambridge to open a Fashion Gala at Grey Gables in aid of the NSPCC of which he was National Centenary Appeal Chairman).

Steve Hewlett, 8 August 1958 - 20 February 2017

Seasoned �鶹Լ�� presenter Steve Hewlett started out on Nationwide in the early 1980s. He went on to present the Media Show on Radio 4 from 2008 when the programme launched.

Tim Pigott-Smith, 13 May 1946 - 7 April 2017

Veteran actor of stage and screen Tim Pigott-Smith recently made waves in Mike Bartlett's King Charles III in the West End and on the �鶹Լ��. Here he is pictured, behind-the-scenes as Count Dietrichstein in Eroica in 2003.

Brian Matthew, 17 September 1928 - 8 April 2017

�鶹Լ�� Radio 2's Sounds Of The Sixties presenter Brian Matthew. Brian presented the show between 1990 and 2016, but worked for the �鶹Լ�� for 63 years from 1954 until 2017.

John Noakes, 6 March 1934 - 28 May 2017

National treasure John Noakes was the longest-serving host of Blue Peter, and a household name in the 1960s, 70s and 80s. Here he is with his dog Shep on the set of Blue Peter.

Peter Sallis, 1 February 1921 - 2 June 2017

English actor Peter Sallis was known as the voice of Wallace in Wallace and Gromit and as Cleggy in Last Of The Summer Wine - here he is pictured with his co-stars from the �鶹Լ�� sitcom in 1999.

Andy Cunningham, 13 May 1950 - 5 June 2017

English actor, puppeteer, ventriloquist and writer was the creator and star of Bodger and Badger, here he is on the show in 1991.

Brian Cant, 12 July 1933 - 19 June 2017

Brian Cant was an actor best known for his work on �鶹Լ�� children's programmes, he lent his voice to characters in Camberwick Green, Chigley and Trumpton. He also presented Play School. Here he is presenting Play Away in 1971.

Barry Norman, 21 August 1933 - 30 June 2017

Film critic Barry Norman was a well known fixture on the �鶹Լ��'s Film... series from 1972 to 1998. Above is a shot of him presenting Film '79.

Deborah Watling, 2 January 1948 - 21 July 2017

Actress Deborah Watling was known for playing Victoria Waterfield, companion to the second doctor, Patrick Troughton. Here she is in character in Doctor Who: Fury From The Deep in 1968.

Hywel Bennett, April 8 1944 - July 25 2017

Welsh actor of stage and screen Hywel Bennett was known for playing the title role in ITV sitcom Shelley. He also appeared in appeared in three Dennis Potter serials – Pennies from Heaven (on �鶹Լ�� One in 1978, pictured above) and also in Karaoke and Cold Lazarus (1996).

Robert Hardy, October 29, 1925 - 3 August 2017

Actor Robert Hardy had a career that encompassed seven decades and crossed film, television and theatre. Here he is as Siegfried Farnon in �鶹Լ�� One's series based on the books by James Herriot, All Creatures Great And Small, in 1988.

Bruce Forsyth, 22 February 1928 - 18 August 2017

Veteran TV presenter and national treasure Bruce Forsyth's career spanned 75 years. In this clip Strictly Come Dancing pay tribute to Brucey who presented 11 series of the show from its first episode in 2004.

Sean Hughes, 10 November 1965 – 16 October 2017

Award-winning Irish comedian Sean Hughes was known for his stand up, but also wrote and acted. He was also a regular team captain on �鶹Լ�� Two's Never mind the Buzzcocks, where he is pictured with his teammates Liz McClarnon and Lloyd Cole in 2000.

Rosemary Leach, 18 December 1935 - 21 October 2017

Award-winning actress Rosemary Leach's career spanned seven decades, and encomapssed roles on stage and screen. Most recently she played a returning role in sitcom My Family on �鶹Լ�� One. Here she is pictured with Edward Fox in Thirty-Minute Theatre: Bermondsey broadcast on �鶹Լ�� Two in 1972.

Antonio Carluccio, 19 April 1937 - 8 November 2017

Italian chef and restaurateur Antonio Carluccio wrote 22 books and presented TV programmes including Antonio Carluccio's Italian Feast (pictured in 1996) and Two Greedy Italians with Gennaro Contaldo.

Keith Barron, 8 August 1934 - 15 November 2017

Actor Keith Barron was known for TV roles in Upstairs Downstairs and Minder. Here he is as Nigel with Valerie Gearon as his wife Ann in Vote, Vote, Vote, For Nigel Barton in 1965.

Rodney Bewes, 27 November 1937 – 21 November 2017

Actor Rodney Bewes was a familiar face thanks to his role in �鶹Լ�� television sitcom The Likely Lads (1964–66). He also played Mr Rodney on The Basil Brush Show 1968–69 (pictured).

Keith Chegwin, 17 January 1957- 11 December 2017

Much-loved presenter Keith Chegwin worked as a DJ on Radio 1 and presented many Children's shows. Here he is pictured (centre), with fellow Cheggers Plays Pop presenters Debby Cumming and Gordon Astley, in 1979.

Read the 1930s Radio Times magazines online

2017-12-05T08:30:00+00:00

Today, the �鶹Լ�� releases another decade of Radio Times magazines as part of the �鶹Լ�� Genome Project, �鶹Լ�� Genome Producer Andrew Martin introduces the collection.

Programme information from Radio Times listings between 1923 – 2009 is already available on the Genome website, but this new release allows readers to see the actual magazines from the 1930s. The 1920s magazines were made available earlier in 2017.

You can now see regular columns giving news about programmes, articles about various aspects of �鶹Լ�� output and policy, and the events that influenced and informed broadcasting in this important decade in world history, all complemented by illustrations, photographs, listeners’ letters and cartoons.

The 1930s was a turbulent decade, as the country tried to cope with the worldwide depression and mass unemployment that followed the 1929 Wall Street Crash. In 1936, King George V died, but his successor Edward VIII abdicated at the end of the year and was replaced by his brother, George VI. Internationally, the decade was marked by the rise of the Nazis in Germany, culminating in the outbreak of war in September 1939.

It was a time of change in broadcasting too. In 1932, the �鶹Լ�� moved from its old headquarters at Savoy Hill to the purpose-built Broadcasting House, still its headquarters today. The old individual stations identified by their call signs – such as 2LO, 5IT and 6LV – changed to more centralised National and Regional Programmes, and the Empire Service (now the World Service) was launched, relaying the first Royal Christmas broadcast, in which King George V’s voice was heard around the world at the end of an international link-up.

Radio Times shines a light on the programmes that became popular during the decade. Variety programmes were revitalised by a new generation of performers who were attuned to broadcasting. Radio drama was also developing fast, and technical advances allowed far greater flexibility in play production. Radio Times was full of articles about the growth of broadcasting techniques in all fields, including documentaries and music.

During the 1930s, Radio Times’ visual style broke free from the more restrained look of the 1920s, with increased use of artwork and photographs both on the cover and internally. Prestigious artists such as John Gilroy, Heath Robinson and Eric Fraser were regular contributors, and the magazines are full of visual treasures: from the smallest listings illustrations to full front cover art that helped bring the pages of Radio Times to life.

The �鶹Լ�� Television Service also first emerged in this decade. In 1930, the �鶹Լ�� had only recently allowed John Logie Baird to use its transmitters for experimental television, and with only one transmitter available, his first broadcasts had to alternate sound and vision. The launch of the Regional Programme early in 1930 allowed these to be broadcast simultaneously, but the low-definition (30 lines) service was still very basic. In 1932, the �鶹Լ�� assumed responsibility for making television programmes: "Television makes its bow from Broadcasting House," announced Radio Times in August 1932.

High definition television began in 1936, from Alexandra Palace. At first there were two competing systems, Baird and Marconi-EMI, but after a few months the latter proved to be better, and was the basis of television in Britain thereafter. Radio Times included a glossy Television Supplement from January to July 1937, to publicise the new service.

In May 1937 the first proper television outside broadcast was mounted, with scenes of the coronation procession of King George VI televised from Hyde Park Corner. Previous outside broadcasts had involved taking studio cameras into the grounds of Alexandra Palace, but now state occasions, public entertainments and sporting events could be covered – like Wimbledon and the FA Cup final. Though the television service was only on air for a few hours each day, plans were afoot to expand to the Midlands and the rest of the country.

All that came to an end on 1 September 1939, when Germany invaded Poland. Although it was another two days until Britain declared war, the �鶹Լ�� put its emergency plans into operation: television closed down, and domestic radio services were conflated into a single �鶹Լ�� Service. The issue of Radio Times for 3-9 September 1939 had been printed, but was now entirely redundant, and an emergency edition was published in its place on 4 September 1939. Now under wartime restrictions, the �鶹Լ��, and Radio Times, battled on.

We hope visitors to �鶹Լ�� Genome will enjoy exploring this fascinating record of broadcasting and social history from one of the most important decades of the 20th Century.

Andrew Martin is �鶹Լ�� Genome producer

Find out more about �鶹Լ�� Genome
Read the �鶹Լ�� Genome blog

Friendly Radio: Five lesser known facts about �鶹Լ�� Local Radio

2017-11-08T10:00:00+00:00

Ahead of �鶹Լ�� Local Radio's 50th anniversary on November the 8th, I've spent quite a bit of time recently contacting editors, presenters and colleagues at all of our 39 stations to find out more about the local radio story. We’ve collected some incredible tales and also compiled a list of the very familiar radio and TV names who began their careers at local radio stations across the country from Carlisle to the Channel Islands. To spread the word we’ll be producing a couple of short films and we also commissioned a one hour radio documentary Friendly Radio which aired on �鶹Լ�� Local Radio stations Sunday 5th November.

But as a taster - here are five things I’ve learnt about �鶹Լ�� local radio recently.

Local radio is the place so where so many household names started.

For the 50th Anniversary we wanted to compile a list of household names who had started out on �鶹Լ�� Local Radio. We set out thinking we had to get at least 20 to make it worthwhile but in fact very quickly we had over 80 names. The 'stars' include Jeremy Paxman, Kate Adie, Richard Bacon, Jo Whiley and Clive Myrie.

The list also highlights a really broad range of talent, from comedians Chris Morris and Victor Lewis Smith to leading journalists Laura Kuenssberg and Liz Mckean, all of them had their first on air moments at a local radio station. I am sure there are many more than 80, but we’ve got the list down to 50 for a special anniversary film 50 at 50.

'50 at 50' 50 stars who began their careers on �鶹Լ�� Local Radio

Local radio quickly found its place in a local emergency.

These days our listeners expect our stations to be there when there’s a local crisis - when the snow falls or the roads shut, people know local radio will have the info they need. Back in the 60s this was all new. Our first station on air was Radio Leicester and early on in its history it covered the great flood of 1968 when over 500 houses in the city were left underwater, the service was a new local lifeline from the �鶹Լ��. Similarly a severe snowstorm in December 1967 forced the manager at Radio Brighton to put the station on air two months earlier than planned.

Local radio pioneered the open plan radio office

Coming from commercial radio where programming, sales and news all tended to work in different offices I was struck by how �鶹Լ�� Local Radio stations are usually situated in one large office with everyone from news to programmes and often (though not always) the editor all sat together. Of course open plan offices are standard these days across the industry but I discovered local radio was an early adopter. John Musgrave who opened Radio Blackburn in 1970 housed the station in a used car showroom. This meant the production area was a vast open plan space, so all the production teams had to talk to one another, and thus the idea of sharing content was born, moving towards sequence programmes.

Local radio has always had to innovate

Our stations led the way in the use of radio cars across the �鶹Լ��, although they were available to network and nations it was local stations that really discovered their value in getting us out of the studio and into the communities we serve.

�鶹Լ�� Radio Sheffield's car in 1998

The use of completely 'self-op' radio studios in the �鶹Լ�� was also largely driven through local radio and presenters have been battling with levels ever since.

Even the early local radio jingles were ground breaking. Delia Derbyshire from the �鶹Լ�� Radiophonic workshop, probably best known for creating the Doctor Who theme, was commissioned to create distinctively local sonic logos for our earliest stations. Steel knives and forks were used for Radio Sheffield’s music, pots and dishes for Radio Stoke and in an interesting digital reference to Robin Hood, an electronic bow and arrow featured on the station sound for Radio Nottingham. It certainly sounded different.

Local radio has always had to improvise

Local radio marketing budgets have always been tight, so editors have often found creative ways to get noticed. My favourite example is from Phil Sidey, the first station manager at Radio Leeds, he had a feud with the Yorkshire Post, who refused to write about the station. So he bought a greyhound, called it Radio Leeds, and when it won at races, the papers had to print the name.

Gareth Roberts is Editor �鶹Լ�� Coventry and Warwickshire and Head of Local Radio Development.

Find your local station.
Listen to 'Friendly Radio', a one hour documentary about the history of �鶹Լ�� Local Radio.
Find out more about the history of �鶹Լ�� Local Radio.

Orwell statue unveiled

2017-11-07T15:00:00+00:00

A statue of George Orwell, commissioned and paid for by the George Orwell Memorial Fund, has been unveiled in the piazza of New Broadcasting House. Sculptor Martin Jennings talks about the process of bringing his work to fruition.

George Orwell

There could not be a more appropriate time to erect a statue of George Orwell in central London. An ethical and intellectual hero, he anatomised totalitarianism and the misuse of language for political ends with unequalled precision. In our own febrile times he illuminates the path for those who seek clarity, decency and honesty in public discourse.

By nature he was ill-disposed towards received wisdom and could almost be described as the patron saint of independent thought, particularly in the realm of political journalism. So there could be no better site for his statue than �鶹Լ�� New Broadcasting House. He worked for the �鶹Լ�� himself for two years during World War Two before resigning – he was never a man moulded for employment.

Scale model of the statue

The statue needed to express both his mental and physical angularity. Orwell was forever a member of the awkward squad and his tall bony frame was almost purpose-built to express this. Several inches over six feet tall, with cabbage-patch hair and a lamentable moustache, consumptive, built like a scarecrow and with a potting-shed wardrobe to match, his physical appearance stands as a joyful counterpoint to a monumental intellectual acuity.

He was disparaging about statues in his writing: “That seems to be a fixed rule in London: whenever you do by some chance have a decent vista, block it up with the ugliest statue you can find”. He would never have been one to occupy a plinth with ease. I’ve represented him leaning perilously forward from his own as if from an orator’s soap-box.

Watch how Jennings' creation went from steel frame to the finished statue

Orwell was so dedicated a smoker that he even continued the practice when TB presaged an early death. Smoking was so much a part of his identity that it would have been unthinkable not to represent him with a roll-up between his fingers. Nowadays smokers are ‘outsiders’ both figuratively and literally. I like to think that had Orwell still been working for the �鶹Լ�� today, he would have cemented this outsider status with repeated retreats for a quick gasper at the windy corner of the building where his statue will now be found.

With one pugilistic fist on his hip and the other hand jabbing his cigarette at us as we pass by, he demands that we direct our thoughts to the quotation inscribed in the wall next to him: “If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear”. These words from his proposed preface to Animal Farm are a rallying cry for the idea of free speech in an open society.

I’ve wanted to express Orwell as candid and forthright, a pointed and interrogative figure forcefully enquiring of each of us whether we too will take his stand on behalf of intellectual liberty and truth.

Martin Jennings is a sculptor and creator of the George Orwell statue.

�鶹Լ�� Radio at 50 – and as relevant as ever

2017-09-29T14:10:00+00:00

Fifty years ago this weekend there was a radio revolution: the Light Programme, the Third programme and the �鶹Լ�� Service were re-invented as Radios 2, 3 and 4, and Radio 1 was born. This bold, necessary and imaginative reorganisation of the radio portfolio was driven by the �鶹Լ��’s duty to respond to the changing interests of its audiences and the crisis it faced as people who loved pop music turned to the pirate radio stations. So on that Saturday morning in 1967 when Tony Blackburn started out with The Move’s Flowers in the Rain, we embarked on a musical adventure with our listeners. And today it’s a journey that’s as exciting and rewarding as ever, taking in the world’s biggest music acts as well as seeking out the stars of the future.

As the radio landscape shifts around us, Radio 1 continues to be a crucial pathfinder to young, diverse audiences. And that mission will only become more important: by 2025 a quarter of the population will be from an ethnic minority background, the majority under 45. Together with Radio 1Xtra and The Asian Network, Radio 1 is key to engaging with these listeners and nurturing the music and ideas they love.

We know that listening habits are changing, and we’re changing with them. We’re commissioning podcasts to reach the 2.5 million people who love listening but just not to the radio. We’re streaming our content globally, and making brilliant shortform videos: Radio 1’s YouTube channel has 5 million subscribers. And our ambition extends to live and linear listening as our phenomenal presenters curate an astonishing wealth of content. They shape our tastes, we trust them to do so. They are the �鶹Լ��.

Across the networks, as we continue on our mission to re-invent and grow, this birthday weekend is a great moment to reflect on all our exceptional programmes, and to remember that radio still reaches 90% of the population. It is a vital service and will continue to be so, well past the next 50 years.

On Saturday morning, the three-day Radio 1 Vintage Pop Up station will kick off. At 7am, there’s a live-recreation of Tony Blackburn’s first ever Radio 1 show broadcast as a triplecast on Radio 1 Vintage, Radio 1 and Radio 2, and at 8.30am Grimmy and Tony Blackburn will host a special Breakfast Show full of previous Radio 1 DJs and surprise guests.

As part of the anniversary celebrations, we’ve also seen an amazing array of stars doing Live Lounge sets, all of which are available on the website, YouTube and Radio 1’s iPlayer Channel.

Radio 1 is a remarkable station and I’d like to wish it – and its extraordinary sister stations - a very happy birthday.

Bob Shennan is Director of Radio & Music

Visit the History of the �鶹Լ�� Website and discover 100 Voices that made the �鶹Լ�� – Radio Reinvented
See the timelines for Radio 1, Radio 2, Radio 3 and Radio 4

With good Grace: Katy Searle on Grace W Goldie, the woman who invented election broadcasting

2017-06-08T08:00:36+00:00

On the night of 23rd February 1950, �鶹Լ�� producer Grace Wyndham Goldie realised her dream and ushered in a new era of political broadcasting – the first ever election results programme. Years before Goldie had been warned off television, being told it would be of no importance in her lifetime. Well how times have changed…the �鶹Լ�� election results programmes are watched by millions eager to find out who will form the next government.

Goldie is a woman who pioneered her vision of election broadcasting at the �鶹Լ��. I like the sound of her. Described as 'a small, birdlike woman with a striking finely chiselled face and a sharp questing mind' but also someone who could be 'difficult and capricious'. She was a woman it was said of 'iron whim'. You certainly need that if you work in political news.

When I first joined the �鶹Լ�� aged 19, I think it’s fair to say there were a lot more men in senior positions than women. Despite being told to go and get a good degree I decided hard work and perseverance would win the day. 27 years on, I now run the �鶹Լ��’s Political Newsgathering and it’s a very different world to the one Grace Wyndham Goldie experienced. Not only am I surrounded by brilliant women AND men, we work in a news cycle that’s so fast, no-one sits down.

Katy Searle and Grace Wyndham Goldie (archive) talk about election coverage

In Goldie’s election night programme, she relied on maps stuck to walls and lists of which politician was up or down. Of course what Goldie did then was cutting edge however old fashioned it seems now when we have touchscreens and virtual reality graphics. Where there are comparisons to my world 67 years on are the judgements made about what news lines to run, the accuracy over policy details, the overwhelming importance of impartiality throughout all of the �鶹Լ��’s coverage. The difference now is the speed of the news. The advent of Twitter, Facebook and Instagram for example mean the story can change in a second. The parties’ spinners are ever present, ready to push a line, pull a story. The leaders may seem calm but behind the scenes they are learning their words, anticipating the questions. And if a story breaks while they’re on stage – well they just have to roll with it – but the press knows it and they know that too.

Despite the second female Prime Minister taking office last year, politics remains an area dominated by men. Although there’s been a big growth in recent years, still only 30% of MPs in the last parliament were women. Political broadcasting is changing too. Laura Kuenssberg is the �鶹Լ��’s first female Political Editor, and I’m proud to work alongside her as well as the other women who now report on politics for the �鶹Լ��. Though as we always say, and perhaps Goldie would too, it’s not about being a woman, it’s about getting it right.

Katy Searle is the �鶹Լ��’s Editor of Political Newsgathering.

Election 2017 will air on �鶹Լ�� One and the �鶹Լ�� News Channel from 9.55pm on Thursday 8 June and will be available to watch on �鶹Լ�� iPlayer for 30 days after broadcast.

Mary Adams and other �鶹Լ�� female pioneers who inspired my love for Natural History

2017-03-08T12:59:21+00:00

If you ask someone to describe what a wildlife filmmaker looks like, I suspect they’d paint a portrait of a man with a beard and a big camera wearing camouflage gear. But I’m a wildlife filmmaker - I’m a petite, 38-year old woman, and there are plenty of others like me.

I’ve worked as a wildlife filmmaker for the �鶹Լ�� Natural History Unit for the last 13 years, most recently producing and directing a film about Islands that opened the recent David Attenborough series Planet Earth II. In the three and a half years of making the episode, I camped in the world’s largest penguin colony, watched racer snakes hunting down baby marine iguanas on a remote beach in Galapagos and got eaten alive by mosquitos in the Seychelles (it was not an island paradise experience).

Inhabitants of Zavodovksi Island, the world's largest penguin colony

When it broadcast in November last year, Planet Earth II - Islands became the most-watched wildlife show for more than 15 years, attracting more than 12 million viewers, and was the most requested programme on iPlayer for the whole of 2016. Something many people commented on, was how “nice” it was that it was produced/directed by a woman.

I guess it’s easy to assume that natural history filmmaking is a very male-dominated world. Sir David Attenborough is the face of natural history broadcasting in Britain, and we get very used to seeing male cameramen struggling in filming hides as part of ‘making-of’ segments. But the story behind the scenes is a very different one, for wildlife filmmaking – and indeed documentary filmmaking in general – is an environment that is rich in women and has been for many years.

The first female television producer at the �鶹Լ�� was Mary Adams who joined the corporation in 1936. She was a 30-year old former research scientist, married (at a time when most professions barred married women from work) and she had a rich and successful career as a documentary producer and commissioner in the field of science. It was Mary Adams who spotted a young David Attenborough in 1952, and later commissioned Zoo Quest, a series he proposed in conjunction with London Zoo, which first brought Attenborough to the television screens.

Mary Adams

In my 13 years at the �鶹Լ��, there have been many highly talented female wildlife film producers to draw inspiration from, including Martha Holmes (The Blue Planet) and Vanessa Berlowitz (Frozen Planet, Planet Earth). Many among the commissioning team and controllers for science and natural history have been female – indeed the current head of �鶹Լ�� content is a woman, Charlotte Moore.

Granted, the presence of women on-screen in science and natural history seems somewhat less common than seeing male presenters but when they do appear, they can be hugely inspirational. Watching Martha Holmes don a bubble helmet for the series Sea Trek in the early 1990s was a major factor in me wanting to learn to scuba dive and ultimately do a PhD in fish biology.

On Planet Earth II, more than half the production team were female, including all the production co-ordinators and many of the researchers and directors on location. For our penguin filming on Zavodovksi Island (the most remote and ‘committed’ shoot of the series) it was a woman who advised on field/camp safety, and one of the three boat captains that sailed us 8 days through the volatile Southern Ocean, was a female. This is something that would have been incomprehensible 40 years ago, as women were actively discouraged from working in Antarctica - women didn’t over-winter on British science bases until the 1990s.

There are still areas where women are very under-represented in documentary filmmaking. For example, you see relatively few female wildlife camera operators in broadcasting, and there is no doubt in my mind women often have to work harder to ‘prove themselves’ in the field, compared with men. But women can be excellent team leaders, and highly creative storytellers. I’m hopeful that, one day, the stereotype of ‘producer/director’ may just as easily be female.

Elizabeth White is producer/director of 'Planet Earth II: Islands'.

End of term shows and Christmas extravaganzas

2016-12-17T12:13:23+00:00

Jon Jacob looks back at some children's TV Christmas extravaganza's and considers how they, like the Strictly Come Dancing, are the perfect start to the festive celebrations.

End of term parties are better than Christmas Day.

I haven’t conducted exhaustive research to back this up. On the contrary, my evidence is largely anecdotal, highly subjective and suspiciously partisan. But seeing as it’s very nearly the Festive season and we’re meant to be filling up on Christmas spirit, I figure forgiveness for a wild assertion should be fairly straightforward to secure.

The excitement I experience about the end of term has its roots, inevitably, in childhood. To be specific, there was only really one end of term which mixed the excitement of impending escape and the anticipation of a big celebratory event – that was the end of the autumn term.

As we skidded to the end of lessons and the big carol service, contemporaries I’d long struggled to get on with at school suddenly took on an entirely different guise. Everyone’s mood had changed. The territories established by each school year were abandoned: everyone appeared to be everyone else’s friend. One year at school, I sent fifty Christmas cards and got sixty back. Unprecedented. Never beaten.

That end of term warmth was reflected on TV too. Roy Castle’s All Star Record Breakers, and before that, Play School and Play Away’s Christmas Pantomimes are the broadcast equivalents for the school Christmas phenomenon.

Roy Castle leading a group of dancers in a 1978 edition of 'All Star Record Breakers' - TV's equivalent of the end of term school show.

All Star Record Breakers was an annual Christmas ‘extravaganza’ borne out of the weekly programme Record Breakers. It ran from 1974 to 1982.

I was never a big fan of Record Breakers. From an early age (soon after the thrill of seeing the tallest man in the world on TV wore off) I saw the programme for what it really was: a televised trot through the Guinness Book of Records, fronted by a trumpet-playing presenter whose cheeky smile, twinkling eyes made me, and breath-taking exuberance made him the equivalent of the kid at school everyone wanted to be a bit like. Let’s just call that jealousy on my part and be done with it.

All Stars was ‘event TV’. I remember that much. My memory of its content is scant, but its effect was striking. Children’s TV personalities from across the �鶹Լ�� join together in a glittering fun-filled extended edition – the TV equivalent of Whizzer and Chips Summer Special.

Festooned with big musical numbers, loads of energy and very wide smiles, All Star Record Breakers was the moment when the artificial boundaries between TV programmes were temporarily dismantled. All of the �鶹Լ��’s TV presenters now appeared themselves as friends of one another, creating a whole other imaginary world in my head. They probably gave each other cards and presents in the canteen. And like Bucks Fizz, they probably all lived in the same house together somewhere in the country, assuming they didn’t have an apartment they shared in Television Centre with Noel Edmonds, Keith Chegwin, John Craven and Maggie Philbin.

I’m also not entirely sure whether All Stars was my first TV Christmas extravaganza, or whether it was Blue Peter’s Christmas edition. After weeks of struggling to make and then subsequent light each candle on the Blue Peter Advent Crown, Blue Peter cast similar magic: presenters gathered around a Christmas tree, joined by a procession of local school children kitted out in scarves and thick bobble hats to sing Hark the Herald Angels Sing under hot studio lights. Presenters exchanged gifts on TV, seemingly allowed to open them before the big day. And they got real gifts too. Simon Groom once gave Lesley Judd a puppy. I seem to recall Peter Duncan getting a tool kit.

Blue Peter's Christmas edition from 1981 - an evocative wintry setting under the glare of hot studio lights.

If All Stars was the TV version of an end of term Christmas show, then Blue Peter’s Christmas edition (still running today) was the TV carol service. These were the magical moments of television, when viewers marvelled at how the implicit barriers constructed by the grammar of television were broken down. Excitement and anticipation mixed with the tantalising sight of familiar faces participating in a show-home illustration of our own Christmas celebrations. Heady visual cues.

Strictly Come Dancing has a similar effect on the senses. After weeks of regular feel-good doses, we skid towards the end of term with a vast dance floor ahead of us, numerous lights bouncing off every available shiny surface, and the chance to do our own ‘sofa salsa’ along to the signature tune for one last time. There’s an unshakeable sense of camaraderie – we’re not just observing that but participating in it as viewers too.

There is a sense of occasion about the whole affair. Not just because it’s the final and we want to know who the winner is. Like All Stars, Blue Peter and school Christmas parties, us viewers get to treat ourselves with a lavish event none of us have had the inconvenience of having to stage, and from which we don’t need to get our parents to pick us up at the end.

My perception of Strictly behind the scenes triggers memories of the school Christmas show. Weeks of rehearsals culminating in the thrill of afternoons taken over by vaguely glamorous-sounding occasions like ‘dress rehearsals’ or ‘run-throughs’. School-children normally marooned by the protocols imposed by tyrannical contemporaries throughout the rest of the year, now bonded with kids they never dreamed they’d be ‘cool enough’ to get on with. An eclectic mix of young performers convened in a way they knew all too well they wouldn’t once term started up again in a few weeks’ time. This unusual billing and the feelings which emerged from it was something to savour.

The Strictly series has at its heart a similar eclectic billing. The Final is the prize for our series-long commitment. It’s the first of the big Christmas ‘parties’ – self-contained on our screens and not needing us to tidy up afterwards - which eases us towards a more personal festive celebration. As much as I adore Christmas Eve and the big day itself, it is the end-of-term party which stokes the greatest excitement in me. And from someone who is renowned amongst his colleagues for not especially liking parties, that’s saying something.

Jon Jacob is Editor, About the �鶹Լ�� Blog

Strictly Come Dancing: The Final is on Saturday 17 December at 6.40pm on �鶹Լ�� One
Read Hannah Khalil's blog featuring her favourite Len Goodman quotes from this year's competition
Sports Personality of the Year 2016 is on Sunday 18 December at 6.40pm on �鶹Լ�� One
Read Jon Jacob's blog about Choral Evensong: A Service with carols for Advent

Hely-Hutchinson: The �鶹Լ�� man who created the ultimate Christmas music

2016-12-13T13:58:14+00:00

Jon Jacob praises the unsung hero of Christmas music who started his �鶹Լ�� career in 1926 as a piano accompanist and finished as �鶹Լ�� Director of Music.

Composer Victor Hely-Hutchinson (above) has a deep, dark, perhaps even cold stare in our archive pictures. Underneath a bristling trimmed moustache is a mixture of a business-like pout and mischievous grin. Or am I projecting?

Suave, handsome, and maybe even a bit of a dandy? Maybe. In 1926 when he began his career at the �鶹Լ�� as a pianist and accompanist, wax secured a strong parting. By 1933, it was securing a windswept fringe. By 1936, the hair had thinned slightly, so too the budget for hair product. But there was still the playfulness in his eyes evident in his earlier shots.

Born in Cape Town, he was educated in England, but returned to Cape Town as Lecturer in Music at the University from 1922 to 1925. He became a member of the �鶹Լ�� music staff the following year, went to Birmingham as Music Director of the Midland Region in 1933, and the next year resigned this position to succeed Sir Granville Bantock as Peyton Professor of Music at the University of Birmingham.

I know little about the man, other than the Christmas music – his Carol Symphony - which he composed in 1927.

The Carol Symphony – a series of four variations on Christmas carols – exudes playfulness. It takes familiar carol melodies – O Come All Ye Faithful, God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Here We Go A-Wassailing – and applies all sorts of musical, textural and harmonic treatments to the melodies. As he does so – like any other composer using the variation form – he extends the blissful expectation of Christmas beyond the length of the carol we recognise.

During the third movement of the work, Hely-Hutchinson’s mastery is on potent display where he buries each of the carols’ melodies deep in the musical material, and makes recognising them part of the listener’s entertainment. It’s not immediately obvious what we’re listening to at the beginning, but a potent example occurs around 2 minutes into the introduction of this movement: one steady note in the strings hangs in the air; a harp creates an eerie music-box effect. A counter-melody joins soon after. A vague sense of menace threatens to overpower the delicate beginning of life.

The unsettling feeling doesn’t last for long: it’s resolved with the quietest of bassoons playing one suspended note transforming the moment into a quiet triumph and, the introduction of a familiar carol – The First Noel. In that deft moment of musical transformation, Christmas is announced.

Everything else that follows is a joyous orchestral celebration of the musical resolution we heard close to the beginning of the movement culminating in one of the most gloriously indulgent of chords in all of Christmas (beaten only by the final chords of the final verse of O Come All Ye Faithful).

In the case of Hely-Hutchinson’s masterful creation (musically orthodox and conservative given that it was written 14 years after Stravinsky's iconoclastic Rite of Spring), the music creates intense musical depictions of the Christmas story the carols themselves sought to celebrate in the first place. The symphony as a whole is a musical melange that sounds as though it could well have been created for TV. The fact it pre-dates the format’s prevalence by about forty years makes Hely-Hutchinson’s creation makes the work all the more an achievement.

The third movement was used in a Children's Hour adaptation of John Masefield's Box of Delights broadcasting during the Second World War. When the series finally came to TV in the 1980s the music was used again for the opening and closing titles. That's where I first heard it. It still brings a tear to my eye now.

Hely-Hutchinson's other compositions – largely incidental music - are sprinkled throughout the Genome Radio Times Archive, popping up in various plays, including an adaptation of CS Lewis’ Through the Looking Glass, and Dumas’ The Man In The Iron Mask. He performed in chamber music concerts as a pianist, conducted various �鶹Լ�� orchestra, and presented programmes ‘designed to broaden music-lovers appreciation’.

Hely-Hutchinson left the �鶹Լ�� in 1934 after set up the Midland Studio Orchestra and worked as the �鶹Լ��’s Midland Regional Director of Music. He returned to the corporation in 1944 to become Director of Music, and continued to broadcast on the �鶹Լ�� Service right up until his death in 1947, at the age of 45.

Jon Jacob is Editor, About the �鶹Լ�� Blog

Mary Adams, first woman television producer at the �鶹Լ��

2016-11-02T10:00:00+00:00

As �鶹Լ�� History launches an archive to mark 80 years of Television, Dr Kate Murphy blogs about the �鶹Լ��'s first female producer, Mary Adams.

I don’t know whether you have seen the television screen or whether its problems interest you, but I should very much like you to come up to Alexandra Palace and discuss with us the possibilities of this new medium”, so wrote Mary Adams to John Betjamen in May 1937. The �鶹Լ�� television service was then six months old, and Adams had been a television producer since January that year. In every way this was unprecedented. Not only was she a woman, but she was nearing 40 and married with a young baby. She also earned far more than most of the thrusting young male producers she worked alongside. So how had this unlikely situation arisen?

Mary Adams had first come to the attention of the �鶹Լ�� 10 years earlier, in 1927, when she gave a radio talk on ‘Heredity’. The fledgling �鶹Լ�� was always on the lookout for potential speakers for its Talks programmes and Adams’ expertise and experience suggested she would be a good choice. She was a biologist by training who, after four years of post-graduate research at Cambridge, had become an adult education tutor. Her broadcast was deemed such a success that she was invited back to the �鶹Լ�� the following year; her six-part series ‘The Problems of Heredity’ provoking much correspondence and debate. Two years later, in 1930, the now 32-year-old Adams applied for a full-time post with the �鶹Լ�� as an Adult Education Officer for the �鶹Լ�� Counties.

Her appointment reflected the modernity of the Corporation. Not only was it unusual to recruit older women, 30 was then considered middle-aged, but she was married; her husband of five years was the maverick Conservative MP Vyvyan Adams. At a time when many professions, such as teaching, banking and the Civil Service, enforced marriage bars, the �鶹Լ�� openly employed married women. In fact, one of its most senior women, Mary Somerville, who headed the School Broadcasting department was not only married but, in 1930, had a year-old son. The �鶹Լ�� also ostensibly offered equal pay and Adams negotiated a generous salary. The usual starting pay for salaried staff at the �鶹Լ�� was £260 a year, accepted as the basic rate for a middle-class lifestyle. Adams agreed £650 (she had asked for £800), reflecting both her status and her verve. By 1939, she would earn £900 a year.

Back in 1930, it had quickly become apparent that Adams was not cut out to be an Adult Education Officer. The job was heavily dependent on organisational skills whereas Mary Adams’ strength was her creativity. She was an ideas person, with an impressive contacts book, so was far better suited to a production role. Her manager, Charles Siepmann, was quick to realise this, and Adams was soon making programmes, mostly science programmes, in the form of talks. This was in the days before recording, when all spoken-word output on the �鶹Լ�� was live talks, a format championed and perfected by the brilliant Hilda Matheson, the �鶹Լ��’s first Talks Director from January 1927 until early 1932. Much of Matheson’s success lay in her ability to entice the great and the good to broadcast. Adams was similarly adept, drawing on her a wide network of friends and acquaintances, from Beatrice Webb and John Hilton to Norman Angell and Margery Fry.

From the start Mary Adams had made the �鶹Լ�� jittery. Her husband might be a Tory MP, but she was very left wing in her views. Her annual reports hint that she was also impulsive and difficult to control, with a tendency to act without reference to her seniors. As Siepmann noted in 1932, “her enthusiasm is apt to outrun her discretion”. At a time when the Corporation was coming under increasing scrutiny for being ‘Red’, this was not a good combination. Indeed, in March 1934 she took much of the blame for the notorious ‘Ferrie Incident’ when William Ferrie, a representative of the National Union of Vehicle Builders, claimed live on air that his script for the series ‘The National Character’ had been censored and abruptly walked out of the studio, to leave silence. It may be no coincidence that at this point in her �鶹Լ�� career Adams, who had produced the talk, agreed to a part-time post although it is also certain that her health was poor, she was due for an operation and was undoubtedly over-worked. But after almost two years of working virtually full-time for half-time pay, she became convinced that her continuing part-time status was because she was held to be “a wild, unruly, Bolshevik sort of person”. In April 1936, having finally persuaded her �鶹Լ�� bosses otherwise, and just at the point that it was agreed she could return full-time, there was another twist; she announced that she was pregnant.

There is a remarkable letter amongst Mary Adams’ papers, written to Sir John Reith, the Director General of the �鶹Լ��, on 28 September 1936. Thanking him for the flowers and lovely welcome they gave to her daughter Sally (born four weeks earlier), she enthused about motherhood and the new sense of ardour and responsibility it had given her. It was for this reason, she informed him, that she wished to apply for the position of Director of Talks that has just been advertised. Although, in his response, Reith raised the question about whether Adam’s was “wise or right” in her wish to lead the “double life”, he agreed to her application going forward. There was never any likelihood of Adams getting such a lofty promotion, her gender, the fact of her young child and her political views would have militated against her. But the appointment of the right-wing Sir Richard Maconachie was possibly the reason why, in January 1937, Mary Adams returned to work not in the Talks Department for Radio, but to a new position, overseeing Talks for Television.

On 2 November 1936, when the �鶹Լ�� began transmitting its television service from Alexandra Palace in North London, staff numbers would have been around 100, about half of whom were women. Most were employed in low-paid secretarial and clerical positions, but that didn’t necessarily mean that their work wasn’t highly calibre. Joan Gilbert, for instance, a clerk who worked on ‘Picture Page’, included amongst her duties researching guests, writing scripts, sub-editing, and working as a talent scout for the programme. The Television Make-up and Wardrobe team was headed by Mary Allan, one of whose key roles was to ensure that Jasmine Bligh and Elizabeth Cowell, the two female announcers, always looked their best under the harsh studio conditions. It’s not clear how often Mary Adams appeared on camera. Although Radio Times lists her as responsible for the ‘presentation’ of more than 50 programmes in the years before television closed down in September 1939 for the duration of the Second World War, it is likely that it was her voice, rather than her face, that introduced her various contributors.

The range of Mary Adams output is astonishing. As a producer of radio talks, Adams’ focus had predominantly been social affairs or science. In television, she learnt quickly that television talks worked best with a visual element. Her first programmes differed little from her radio work: the intellectual giant Professor Walter Gropius in discussion with Maxwell Fry about ‘Architecture Today’ or the MP Robert Hudson, from the Ministry of Health, in conversation with John Hilton about ‘Food and Health’. But soon fresh ideas were apparent. A talk on ‘Heraldry of Yesterday and Today’ included demonstrations.

‘London Galleries: Young Artists and their Work’ saw John Piper in the studio with young art students, showing their work. ‘The World of Women: Illustrating Verse’ paired the spoken-out-loud writings of Olga Katzin with the illustrations of the artist Pearl Binder. Adams also acquired some TV regulars producing, for instance, the zoologist David Seth-Smith’s ‘Friends from the Zoo’; the gardening expert CH Middleton’s ‘In Your Garden’ and the chef Marcel Boulestin’s ‘Cook’s Night Out’.

Her approach to John Betjeman in May 1937 is typical of her dynamism. Betjeman was becoming well-known as the creator of the Shell Guides to Britain. Once his interest in appearing on television was substantiated she suggested a talk that included maps and photographs as well as objects - physical props that would bring the programme to life. When ‘How to Write a Guide Book’, was transmitted ‘live’ on 21 September 1937, Betjeman arrived at the studio with a hotchpotch of items including a milking stool, a weathercock, wild flowers and a piece of Cotswold stone. The portrait painter Edward Halliday was similarly impressed by Adam’s production values. They worked together on the short series ‘Masterpieces on your Walls’, broadcast in September 1938. This was about the easy availability of good quality reproductions for the home and provided an excuse to interject popular works of art by the likes of Paul Nash, Laura Knight and Eric Ravilious as well as Picasso, Van Gogh and Cezanne, into Halliday’s lively commentary.

Pearl Binder would become an Adams regular. Following her appearance on ‘The World of Women’, the two friends worked together on a number of programmes, with Binder contributing the ‘live’ illustrations. The six-part series’ Clothes-Line’, broadcast from October 1937, as well as using Binder’s drawings, utilised the versed commentary of James Laver of the Victoria and Albert Museum, the historic costume collection of Cecil Willett Cunnington and live mannequins to tell the story of fashion through the ages. Binder was heavily pregnant during the series, her daughter Josephine born within weeks of the final show. ‘Looking for a House’, in May 1939, was Binder’s illustrated take on the trials and tribulations of house-hunting while ‘Rough Island Stories’ broadcast from June 1939, was a history of the British Isles told through maps, pictures (provided by Binder) and film, presented by Harold Nicolson and James Horrabin. Adams developed a raft of other extravaganzas including ‘Guest Night’, which brought together an array of well-known contributors for topical chat; ‘Columnists and their Victims’ a sort of news quiz and ‘Salute to America’, which profiled the contemporary US scene in speech and images.

These programmes would be Adams’ final pre-Second World War offerings. With television suspended for the duration of hostilities she was transferred, in December 1939, to the Ministry of Information as Director of �鶹Լ�� Intelligence, a post she would hold for two years. Returning to the �鶹Լ�� in 1941, she worked for the North American service, producing programmes such as ‘Answering You’ and ‘Transatlantic Quiz’. When the television service reopened in 1946, Adams returned in a Senior Producer role. One of the areas she pioneered was programming for children. In 1937, she had developed ‘For the Children’, the first such show. In 1946, it was reintroduced, this time fronted by Annette Wells with her accomplice, Muffin the Mule. Adams was also intrinsic to the development of television programmes for women. Following the success of Woman’s Hour, introduced onto the Light Service in October 1946, it was seen as judicious to do the same for the small screen. ‘Designed for Women’, first broadcast in October 1947, was intended to be a “magazine programme of special interest to women”. It would lead to a dedicated strand of women’s programming that endured until 1964.

Mary Adams versatility and creativity is evident in the vast array of output she continued to oversee. In 1952 she spotted the potential of a young David Attenborough and ‘Zoo Quest’; she introduced the science quiz ‘Animal Vegetable Mineral?’ and initiated the first highly controversial medical series ‘A Matter of Life and Death’ and ‘Your Life in their Hands’. She also nurtured the talents of another soon-to-be doyenne of television, Grace Wyndham Goldie. Mary Adams’ abilities did not go unrewarded. In 1948 she had been promoted to Head of Television Talks, and in 1952, gained autonomy from Mary Somerville, then Talks Controller, whose empire had encompassed both radio and TV. The following year, Adams was again promoted, this time to be Assistant to the Controller of TV, working to Cecil McGivern. On her retirement in 1958, the now 60-year-old Mary Adams was feted by McGivern, his valediction, published in the staff journal Ariel, neatly summarising her achievements.

Mary Adams, one of its pioneers, is very jealous of the reputation of the �鶹Լ�� Television Service and her standards are extraordinarily high. She flayed lapses of taste, refused to allow television to become simply escapist, and her ideas were vivid, bold and far-sighted. And while Mrs Adams could be brilliant she was at the same time completely determined to achieve her purpose. She has frequently left technical staff and programme staff exhausted, exasperated, but after the event, admiring. I regard Mrs Adams as one of the few real architects of the television service and it owes a great deal to her… Her breadth of mind, her vision, her ideas have been a constant education. Her range of friends, acquaintances and contacts in the intelligent world is also extraordinarily large and is itself a tribute to her great ability”.

Read also The 80th Anniversary of �鶹Լ�� TV
Discover more clips documenting The Birth Of TV on the �鶹Լ�� History website

Marking 80 years since the birth of �鶹Լ�� Television

2016-11-02T09:00:00+00:00

The �鶹Լ��'s first British television service launched 80 years ago today, on 2 November 1936. To mark the occasion our colleages at �鶹Լ�� History have launched a new website celebrating the landmark anniversary combining archive material from the early days of television.

The site is packed full of video and audio footage telling the story of television including its invention, the opening night at Alexandra Palace in 1936, TV closure during the war and its resurrection in 1946, as well as TV’s milestone moments such the Olympics and the Coronations of 1937 and 1953. We've selected some choice clips below to whet your appetite.

Alexandra Palace gets ready for Radiolympia TV Demonstrations – a movie reel film showing the �鶹Լ�� studios being built at Alexandra Palace, with two different studios (one using the Baird system and one using the EMI electrical system), and the first night of broadcast to the Radiolympia exhibition.

�鶹Լ�� TV reopens after war – a �鶹Լ�� Television movie reel film showing presenter Jasmine Bligh announcing the resumption of the TV service from Alexandra Palace on 7 June 1946.

Adele Dixon sings ‘Magic Rays of Light’, a specially composed song celebrating the new medium of television on the opening night of broadcast – 2 November 1936 – also featuring behind-the-scenes footage.

Petula Clark singing 'Miser Miser' from the Alexandra Palace studios in 1947.

First �鶹Լ�� TV producer Cecil Madden describes being told that he had four months to set up the new TV service before receiving a phone call a few hours later explaining plans had changed and the service had to be on air in just nine days.

Programme sample of Margot Fonteyn dancing for the camera, and then the whole of the Sadler's Wells company dancing ‘Façade’.

The �鶹Լ��'s first TV Producer Cecil Madden explains the difficulties of using the clunky Baird system of TV which took 90 seconds to get the picture onto screen. He describes how Baird gave a demonstration for members of the press who were enthusiastic about running round the equipment to see themselves on screen and how this led to problems.

Discover more about The Birth Of TV on the �鶹Լ�� History website
Read more about �鶹Լ�� TV's 80th Birthday Anniversary on on the Media Centre

Seventy years of Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour

2016-10-07T09:00:00+00:00

Olive Shapley interviews Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt for Woman's Hour, 1951

Seventy years ago today a great British institution was established. At 2pm on 7 October 1946 the first edition of Woman’s Hour graced the airwaves on the �鶹Լ��’s Light Programme, 2pm being the hour it was deemed women would have finished the majority of their housework, and therefore have a moment for a cuppa before the kids got home.

The originally-billed programme "that offers a female perspective on the world” was originally presented by a man - Alan Ivimey - listed in the Radio Times as a specialist "in writing for and talking to women."

Early segments like "how to hang your husband’s suit" didn't go down well with listeners who found the programme at times patronising. But, the programme still addressed serious issues. When the word “vagina” was used in the programme's first year in a talk about women’s health there was an outcry from the public. Birth canal was the favoured term for a number of years afterwards.

The programme became part of the Radio 4 schedule in 1973. Following Ivimey’s tenure as presented, the programme has been fronted by women including Violet Carson, Olive Sharpley, Jean Metcalfe and Marjorie Anderson. In 1990 the time slot was changed to its current morning slot (10-11am on weekdays) and the drama serial feature was added.

Sue MacGregor interviews Margaret Thatcher for Woman's Hour, 1985

The 'magazine' format of Woman's Hour has, right from the outset, featured cooking segments. Currently titled “Cook the Perfect…” chefs including Gordon Ramsay, Angela Hartnett and Rick Stein have featured. Political guests have also been a staple part of the line-up including Eleanor Roosevelt, Nancy Astor, Vera Brittain, Margaret Thatcher, Hillary Clinton, Cherie Blair, Tony Blair, Michael Howard, Gordon Brown and David Cameron.

Martha Kearney interviews Hilary Clinton for Woman's Hour, 2003

The Woman’s Hour Power List which started in 2013 as a list of the 100 most powerful women in the UK - has since evolved into a list of Game Changers in 2014 and Influencers in 2015.

The show’s current presenters are Jenni Murray and Jane Garvey. Today the programme has six shows a week, Monday to Friday from 10-11am and Saturdays from 5-5pm, and attracts 3.7m listeners weekly. And it's not just men listening either. Many of the subjects featured on the programme have universal appeal. Currently, the gender split of listeners is 40/60 male/female. What’s more, 25% under the age of 35, which is higher than average for Radio 4.

The Woman's Hour podcast has 1m downloads per month making it the second most popular daily podcast across all �鶹Լ�� radio after The Archers.

We spoke to presenter Jenni Murray for a blog Radio, Power and Woman's Hour last year. In it she revealed what keeps her excited about the show – which she has been presenting for 29 years:

"I grew up with Woman’s Hour. My mother used to have very strict feeding routines for me, and they coincided with Woman’s Hour. So we would listen to it together. If there were any parts that included a health warning she’d send me into the kitchen – to put on the kettle or get something. So it’s always been a part of my life.

"My first time in the studio presenting it was incredible because I’d heard over the years 'Woman’s Hour presented by Sue MacGregor'. So the first time they said 'Woman’s Hour presented by Jenni Murray' I got very excited. And people will think I’m silly but I still get that same excited feeling every time I hear those words. It’s a wonderful job, I’ve always loved broadcasting, I’ve presented some TV programmes and written books, but I feel most at home in a radio studio so I feel very, very lucky.”

Find out more about Woman’s Hour
Read Jenni Murray’s blog Radio, Power and Womans Hour
Listen to an early Woman’s Hour broadcast

Remembering the �鶹Լ��’s first official historian Asa Briggs

2016-10-04T15:41:32+00:00

Lord Asa Briggs

A memorial service was held yesterday (Tuesday 4 October) at All Souls Church, Langham Place, London to celebrate the life of Lord Asa Briggs.

For 37 years Briggs was regarded as the �鶹Լ��’s first official historian, once referring to his endeavours by saying, 'to write the history of broadcasting in the 20th century is to write the history of everything else.'

Briggs first became involved in broadcasting in 1958 when he was asked by Sir Ian Jacob, then Director-General of the �鶹Լ��, to write a history of British broadcasting, focusing in particular the role of the �鶹Լ��. The first volume of Briggs’s five-volume history, Birth of Broadcasting was published in 1961; he completed the fifth volume in 1995. The books are seen by some as an extant source.

Historians and academics paid tribute to Briggs at his memorial today. Professor Jean Seaton from the University of Westminster, the �鶹Լ��'s current historian, spoke of Briggs' contribution to the organisation.

The memorial also celebrated Asa Briggs’ contribution to The Open University. The institution announced yesterday the creation of a new Professorial Chair in History – the Asa Briggs Chair. Its first incumbent will be Paul Lawrence from the OU's Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, who has made a significant scholarly contribution to British social history. Additionally there will be a funded PhD studentship in a related area of research.

"Asa Briggs was the first real historian to take the media seriously," said Tony Hall at the service, "His five-volume history of the �鶹Լ�� was a foundation, paving the way to media history as we know it today. He was also an inspirational guide to the Corporation, illuminating not only its past and present, but its future too.”

Briggs’ role as a public historian is to be celebrated in a special Radio 4 Archive Hour, scheduled for broadcast in 2017.

Read Asa Briggs obituary on the Guardian website
Read also Lord Asa Briggs on �鶹Լ�� Genome