Background
The first BBC Home Service broadcasting site in Nottingham was from the third floor of the Bentinck Buildings in Wheelergate from 18 August 1950. [1] [2] [3] The broadcasts went via the Nottingham telephone exchange to the BBC site in Birmingham on telephone trunk lines. The first live broadcast was on 2 December 1950 by George Liddell, of Nottingham Forest against Exeter. [4] Both Nottingham and Leicester had around 8,000 television sets. [5] Also earlier in 1950 Nottingham's Ken Adam had become Controller of the Light Programme (BBC Radio 2 from 1967).
One of the first live TV broadcasts from the area came on 7 June 1951 with cricket matches being sent to Sutton Coldfield, via a TV relay station on Bardon Hill in Leicestershire. [6] A BBC national broadcasting site at nearby Lincoln opened on Thursday 8 March 1951. [7]
The Director General of the BBC, Sir Ian Jacob first visited the new Nottingham site on Friday 12 June 1953, having lunch with the Senate of University of Nottingham. [8]
The controller of the BBC Midland region was John Dunkerley CBE (10 October 1902 - 21 March 1985), who had been there since 1932, working with composer Victor Hely-Hutchinson; Dunkerley was replaced in August 1964 by Patrick Beech CBE, of Malvern, the assistant head of the BBC West region. [9] [10] [11] Beech was the grandson of Mrs Patrick Campbell, whose second husband had been, previously, the second husband (from 1900) of Winston Churchill's mother. [12] In 1969 Beech became the Controller of English Regions. [13] In 1970 the structure of BBC TV regions changed.
Earlier sites
The £17,000 Derby Road site was opened by the Lord Mayor of Nottingham on Tuesday 1 October 1963. It had two sound studios. The studio on Derby Road was next to the catholic St Barnabas Cathedral. The site was directed by Gerald Nethercot, of Somerset. Mr Nethercot had worked for Leicester City Council from 1938. [14] He was Emergency Information Officer for Leicester during the war, and a 2nd Lt in the Home Guard. [15] He joined the RAF in 1943 as a Flt Lt, working in reconnaissance of V-weapon sites in the Pas de Calais, joining the BBC Midland region in January 1947. [16] He was the first official BBC East Midlands staff, being appointed in November 1950. [17] He never let his own children watch any evening television, and his children could watch children's television only twice a week. [18] The local BBC news programme was called 'Midlands Six-Ten'. [19] [20]
The building was designed by Bartlett & Gray, and built by Sweeney & Palmer Ltd of Beechdale Road; structural steelwork was done by Siddons of Redhill. The building was named after Robert Willson (bishop) who was responsible for the cathedral being there, and built by the Catholic diocese, costing £50,000. The BBC were on the second floor. There were plans for a new larger broadcasting centre in Birmingham, which opened in 1971. New colour television transmitters for Nottinghamshire and Northamptonshire were planned for 1966. By the end of 1966 it was hoped that two-thirds of the UK could receive BBC2. [21]
On Monday 13 December 1976 colour news first came from the Derby Road studio on Holden Street. It had been black and white since 1963. The East Midlands correspondent was Bruce Myles, of Ravenshead. [22] The transmitter was on the top of Nottingham Technical College. Philip Tibenham and Chris Drake had worked at the early Derby Road site. [23]
From Monday 7 to Friday 11 September 1981, Midlands Today was broadcast entirely from the Nottingham studio on Derby Road, next to the catholic Cathedral. [24]
The first East Midlands short TV news bulletins began on Monday 3 October 1983, with Graham Henshaw. Central News East began its news programmes around the same time, after a 21-month industrial dispute had finished. Later in 1987, Graham Henshaw became the editor of Look East , in Norwich. [25]
From Monday 3 October 1983, the East Midlands had half-hourly bulletins on Breakfast News. On Monday 15 July 1985 the main East Midlands opt out of Midlands Today started, with presenters 26-year-old Julie Hall from Marple, who joined in October 1983 from Channel 4, and 38-year-old Brian Conway, of Radio Leicester, from Hathern. In October 1988 Conway married BBC Birmingham presenter Kay Alexander. [26] Julie, with a degree in Industrial Relations, soon returned to Channel 4 to present the 'Union World' documentary series' [27] [28]
Tom Beesley, educated at Wyggeston Grammar School for Boys, the station manager from 1973-79 of Radio Nottingham had been the Midland regional television manager since August 1982, and lived in Kinoulton, and knew the Nottingham area, being born in Leicester. It was 6 minutes, to become 10 minutes in six months, once technology allowed this. Introducing the new opt out had cost £75,000. New editing facilities were built at a site on Derby Road, where staff increased from 2 to 18. 75% of the news for the opt out came from local radio. Tom Beesley, with another former BBC Midlands regional manager David Waine (regional head at Birmingham from June 1983 to September 1994, being replaced by Nigel Chapman), would also start the new regional Radio 106 in September 1997. [29] [30]
In 1992 Janet Mayo voiced the announcements on the London Underground Central Line; the 85 trains were built by BREL in Derby. [31]
Establishment
There had been plans for a separate region from 1969, in the BBC report 'Broadcasting in the 70s'.
To prepare for the new region, a new studio was built on Mansfield Road, opened by 53-year-old Michael Checkland on 27 June 1989. [32] The building was later demolished, around 2017.
BBC East Midlands Today was established as an independent programme on 7 January 1991, having previously been a part of Midlands Today , which now solely covers the West Midlands region.
The split arose from criticisms of Midlands Today as being too centric on West Midlands coverage, although a service of separate opt-out bulletins for the region had been provided during the 1980s.
On 5 February 1996, the show introduced a double-anchored presentation with Quentin Rayner and Kathy Rochford. The programme's newer (generic) 'look', in line with most other BBC regional TV news programmes, was introduced on 16 September 2002, with an update on 6 September 2004. The current titles and graphics were introduced in July 2019.
