John Wyver writes: The first half-hour of the afternoon transmission on Tuesday 25 April 1939 was graced with the second performance of a production J.M. Barrie's one act, and according to the author 'unfinished', Shall We Join the more
John Wyver writes: Monday 24 April 1939 saw one of the BBC's pair of mobile control rooms parked outside Burlington House for an afternoon outside broadcast from Varnishing Day for the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition. Above is the image Radio more
John Wyver writes: On St George’s Day 1938, Saturday 23 April, and on the following evening, a ‘local OB’ from the lake close by the AP studios transmitted a reconstruction of the First World War naval attack exactly twenty more
John Wyver writes: The afternoon of Saturday 22 April 1939 saw the first performance of Dallas Bower's production of Katharine and Petruchio, a radically shortened 'acting version' of William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew that had originally been more
John Wyver writes: From 11.12pm on Friday 21 April 1933 viewers fortunate enough to own a 30-line television receiver could watch the half-hour Looking In, billed as ‘the first television revue’. Written by John Watt with music composed by more
John Wyver writes: On what from production photographs looks like a rainy Tuesday afternoon on 20 April 1937, the fledgling Television service at Alexandra Palace, ever in search of noteworthy elements to broadcast, elected to screen as a local OB more
John Wyver writes: On Monday 19 April 1937 Alexandra Palace hosted a troupe billed as the Margaret Morris Dancers, who performed in both the afternoon and evening. Their first 13-minute slot featured seven short works, performed to Beethoven and Chopin more
John Wyver writes: Television's treat on the evening of Tuesday 18 April 1939 was the third Coliseum Night presenting the first half of the variety bill at Sir Oswald Stoll's flagship theatre in London's St Martin's Lane. Featured artists more
John Wyver writes: Just after 3pm on Saturday 17 April 1937 BBC Television began an 'outside broadcast' from the railway terminus adjacent to Alexandra Palace. Billed as Demonstration of Railway Locomotives, and organised with London North Eastern Railway, the transmission more
John Wyver writes: Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin was born 136 years ago today. To mark his 50th birthday on Sunday 16 April 1939, when Charlie was working on the script for The Great Dictator (1940), Alexandra Palace screened an more