Wartime Broadcasting
By Mike Brown
()
About this ebook
Mike Brown
MIKE BROWN and Carol Harris are experts on the Second World War Home Front and co-authors of The Wartime House.
Read more from Mike Brown
Mastering VMware vSphere 6.7 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlitz Diary: Life Under Fire in the Second World War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wartime House: Home Life in Wartime Britain 1939-45 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Billy Beene and the Crusaders: The Crusade Begins! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEvacuees: Evacuation in Wartime Britain 1939-1945 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Child's War: Growing Up on the Home Front Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsChristmas on the Home Front Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAdventures with Czech George: The Story of a Very Special Friendship Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDay Peace Broke Out: The VE-Day Experience Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWeekday warriors Part 3: Same Old Song & Dance Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWeekday warriors Part 4: One more time... Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Thrilling, Sweet and Rotten Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWeekday warriors Part 2: Strangers in a strange land... Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The REAL Perspective: Secret Investments Your Financial Advisor Won't Tell You About Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWeekday Warriors: part 1 - First Daze Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Wartime Broadcasting
Titles in the series (100)
Buttons Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Perambulators Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPoole Pottery Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsScalextric Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClarice Cliff Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVW Camper and Microbus Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Church Misericords and Bench Ends Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The English Seaside in Victorian and Edwardian Times Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBritish Campaign Medals 1815-1914 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBritish Campaign Medals 1914-2005 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Victorians and Edwardians at Play Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fashion in the Time of Jane Austen Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Britain's Working Coast in Victorian and Edwardian Times Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Victorians and Edwardians at Work Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Chocolate: The British Chocolate Industry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBuckles Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Lorries: 1890s to 1970s Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5British Postcards of the First World War Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Flying Scotsman: The Train, The Locomotive, The Legend Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAirfix Kits Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5British Gallantry Awards 1855-2000 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Peat and Peat Cutting Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Orchards Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTractors: 1880s to 1980s Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe 1950s Kitchen Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5London’s Statues and Monuments Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Mail Trains Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe 1960s Home Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Farming in the 1920s and 30s Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5British Campaign Medals of the First World War Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related ebooks
Christmas 1914: The First World War at Home and Abroad Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCity of London at War 1939–45 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Home Front 1914-1918: How Britain Survived the Great War Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Blitz, A Very Peculiar History Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Home Front Pocket Manual, 1939–1945 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Wander Through Wartime London: Five Walks Revisiting the Blitz Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Blackout 1939-45 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsChristmas on the Home Front Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDover and Folkestone During the Great War Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsManchester at War, 1939–45 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Birmingham at War, 1939–45 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Home Front: 1939–1945 in 100 Objects Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNymphs of the Pavement: Sin, Scandal and Vice in Victorian Lincolnshire Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlockheads, Beagles, and Sweet Babboos: New Perspectives on Charles M. Schulz's Peanuts Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Lady Lord Mayors of Norwich, 1923–2017 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBritish Railway Tickets Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTo Prove I'm Not Forgot: Living and Dying in a Victorian City Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWe Are As The Times Are - The Story of Caf Le Hibou Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMuch to Be Done: Private Life in Ontario From Victorian Diaries Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Britain's Working Coast in Victorian and Edwardian Times Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsYoung Henry Ford: A Picture History of the First Forty Years Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Under Fire: The Blitz Diaries of a Volunteer Ambulance Driver Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRiding Into War: The Memoir of a Horse Transport Driver, 1916-1919 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Looking for Garbo: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBlitz Families: The Children who Stayed Behind Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTracing Villains & Their Victims: A Guide to Criminal Ancestors for Family Historians Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsReady for War: Letters Sep 1914 to Feb 1915 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLiving Pictures, Missing Persons: Mannequins, Museums, and Modernity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThose Great Old-Time Radio Years Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBloody British History: East End Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Performing Arts For You
As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Macbeth (new classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Stories I Only Tell My Friends: An Autobiography Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Importance of Being Earnest: A Play Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Coreyography: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Becoming Free Indeed: My Story of Disentangling Faith from Fear Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Sisters Brothers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Science of Storytelling: Why Stories Make Us Human and How to Tell Them Better Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Robin Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Our Town: A Play in Three Acts Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Strange Loop Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes: Revised and Complete Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Unsheltered: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Diamond Eye: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Quite Nice and Fairly Accurate Good Omens Script Book: The Script Book Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Storyworthy: Engage, Teach, Persuade, and Change Your Life through the Power of Storytelling Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wuthering Heights Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A Midsummer Night's Dream, with line numbers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hamlet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Trial Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Woman Is No Man: A Read with Jenna Pick Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Romeo and Juliet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Count Of Monte Cristo (Unabridged) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hollywood's Dark History: Silver Screen Scandals Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Into the Woods: A Five-Act Journey Into Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Tempest Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Dolls House Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mash: A Novel About Three Army Doctors Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Wartime Broadcasting
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Wartime Broadcasting - Mike Brown
EARLY DAYS
It seems strange to think that in 1939 the BBC was relatively new, having been formed as a private company in 1922, and only becoming the national corporation in 1927. It had grown quickly: in 1938 nearly nine million wireless licences were issued.
After the Munich crisis that September, when Britain and France were very nearly plunged into war with Germany, the BBC began preparing for what many saw as an inevitable war.
In 1938 Neville Chamberlain was celebrated for avoiding war at Munich. He could not repeat the act in September 1939, announcing, ‘this country is at war with Germany’.
There were those in government, Chamberlain among them, who believed that wireless broadcasting – or at least the entertainment side – should cease in the event of war, leaving it a vehicle for government advice, instructions, and news. These functions were vital to the conduct of war, meaning the BBC also would be vital. It was therefore crucial that bombing should not disrupt its output through knocked-out broadcasting studios or masts. This would not only break a vital link between the government and the people, but also create confusion and panic. Another challenge was to avoid enemy aircraft being able to use radio transmissions as a homing beam.
It was decided that the solution to both these problems was, in the event of war, to merge the BBC National and Regional Programmes into a single channel – the Home Service – broadcast throughout the country. Programmes would be produced at several locations, limiting the damage to the system that would occur if one were knocked out. In the event, Broadcasting House was hit twice, but the BBC was never forced off the air.
With that possibility in mind, however, in 1938 the BBC made plans in case London had to be evacuated. Wood Norton Hall, a Victorian stately home near Evesham, was secretly bought and equipped in the months before war broke out. Although never used in its emergency role, by 1940 Wood Norton was one of the largest broadcasting centres in Europe with an average output of 1,300 programmes a week. It also became the BBC’s monitoring service centre until early 1943, when monitoring moved to Reading, so that Wood Norton could become the main broadcasting centre if London had to be evacuated due to the V-weapon assault.
Comedian and singer Arthur Askey, along with ‘Dicky’ Murdoch, had been a great hit before the war with their show ‘Band Waggon’, returning to the airwaves in mid-September 1939.
Further provision was made at Bristol, where the BBC prepared an underground fortress beneath fifty feet of solid sandstone in a disused funicular railway tunnel driven through the Clifton gorge in the 1890s. The BBC took it over to convert it to an air raid shelter for Sir Adrian Boult’s BBC Symphony Orchestra, which had been evacuated nearby with the Music Department. However, in 1941 in the face of bombing raids, the Music Department moved to Bedford, and the tunnel became the nerve centre of the BBC in the West of England. The roof of the tunnel was waterproofed, and electric lighting installed. In three months four large chambers were built and outfitted, sending programmes in about forty different languages all over the world.
On 24 August 1939, during the last uneasy days of peace, the BBC demonstrated its value in a crisis, when it was used to summon teachers back from their summer holidays to prepare for evacuation.
Just before dawn on 1 September, German forces invaded Poland – an act that would propel Britain into war. The BBC was immediately placed on a war footing, the first act of