BBC Radio was 100 years old yesterday, and celebrated with special programmes, podcasts, reconstructions, playlists, news reports, tweets, documentaries and all sorts of things that aren't recognisably wireless.
Day 1 on 14th November 1922 featured two news broadcasts, one at 6pm and one at 9pm, read first at normal speed and then at half speed to see which the audience preferred. The first bulletin on 2LO included reports on the opening of the Old Bailey sessions, a speech by Conservative leader Bonar Law, the aftermath of a "rowdy meeting" with Winston Churchill, a train robbery, the sale of a Shakespearean first folio, London's foggy weather and the latest billiards scores. The newsreader was Arthur Burrows, director of programmes. And it was broadcast from Marconi House on the Strand, pictured below, from a room on the seventh floor.
On Day 2, i.e. 100 years ago today, the two news broadcasts were followed at 9.15pm by a results programme for the General Election which had been held that day. This was also the day that broadcasts began in Birmingham (5IT) and Manchester (2ZY) under separate editorial control. The first ever children's programme was broadcast at 7pm on 2ZY and featured a selection of gramophone records plus the story of The Happy Prince read by Miss A Bennie, The Lady of the Magic Carpet. These were simpler times.
Jump ahead half a century and I wondered what was on the radio at 6pm on 14th November 1972.
Radio 1: Radio 1 Club with Noel Edmonds from the YWCA, Edinburgh Radio 2: Teddy Johnson (including at 6.15 Dick Barton - Special Agent) Radio 3: Stock Market Report Radio 4: News (followed by The Ken Dodd Show)
(plus 20 local radio stations)
As for 14th November 2022, the BBC now has 5 national stations, 4 digital stations, 3 streamed stations, 8 services for the home nations, the World Service and 41 local radio stations. At 6pm Radio 4 celebrated with a special 2LO-led news broadcast in which the BBC itself was the focus of several stories. I like that the first non-news programme of the BBC's second century was I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue (first broadcast 1972) followed by The Archers (first broadcast 1951). Other properly old programmes still broadcasting on the 100th anniversary included the Shipping Forecast (1924), Woman's Hour (1946), Today in Parliament (1947), Book at Bedtime (1949), Brain of Britain (1953), Today (1957), Farming Today (1960), The World at One (1965), Start The Week (1970), PM (1970), You and Yours (1970) and The Food Programme (1979).
I spent 10 hours yesterday watching or listening to BBC content, which is fairly standard, including four different radio stations and two different TV channels. Hurrah for entertaining radio, for engrossing television, for intelligent producers, for talented production, for news that attempts to be balanced and for all this without repeated breaks for commercials. My life would be significantly diminished without the BBC, an organisation which unexpectedly sprang from a consortium of wireless manufacturers a century ago. Long may it inform, educate and entertain.
