10th August 2025
John Wyver writes: In the line-up for the Baird 30-line transmission on the morning of 10 August 1931, along with jazz drummer L. Ash-Lyons and monologist Janet Barrow was Avril Coleridge-Taylor giving for the third time on television a
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9th August 2025
John Wyver writes: Monday 9 August 1938 was the first day of the BBC's mobile control unit being at the Empire Pool, Wembley (now Wembley Arena) for the European Swimming Championships. Two afternoon visits continued each day throughout
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8th August 2025
John Wyver writes: Intimate Interlude on the evening of Tuesday 8 August 1939 offered a bill featuring Mexican magician Kantu and Polish dancers Halima and Konarski, along with the mime artist Sherkot. As a vaudevillian whose act was almost entirely
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7th August 2025
John Wyver writes: You can sense from Alexandra Palace's schedules that August was the cruellest month for those running the service in 1938 and 1939 (and remember that Television shut down for three weeks in 1937). Producers and crews
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6th August 2025
John Wyver writes: The evening of the next day was to be devoted to the Russian ballet, and so the week's headline drama was played on Saturday 6 August 1938, rather than the traditional Sabbath. The play was J.B. Priestley's
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5th August 2025
John Wyver writes: Nearly three years on from the first 405-line broadcasts from Alexandra Palace to Radiolympia, the levels of creative ambition and achievement were exceptionally high. The producers were creating innovative drama, mounting complex OBs and, as yesterday's
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4th August 2025
John Wyver writes: On the evening of Thursday 4 August 1938 Alexandra Palace offered a feature programme with the somewhat unweildy title Exhibition: A Panorama Paris 1797-Glasgow 1938. Devised by Reginald Beckwith and Andrew Cruikshank, and produced by
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3rd August 2025
John Wyver writes: Sandwiched between a newsreel and a cartoon on the evening of Thursday 3 August was a quintessential example of television as a public service - and arguably further evidence of the BBC preparing the audience for the
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2nd August 2025
John Wyver writes: Nearly a year on from the BBC having taken over 30-line television, producer Eustace Robb was keen to produce increasingly ambitious broadcasts. One example was Looking at London by Television, a 35-minute original revue screened in the
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1st August 2025
John Wyver writes: In the weeks just after The Man with the Flower in his Mouth (see earlier post), John Logie Baird’s campaign to extend awareness of the potential of television next took to the stage of the more