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Palgrave Studies in the History of the Media
Radio Fun and the BBC

Variety Department, 1922–67
Comedy and Popular Music on Air
Martin Dibbs
Series Editors
Professor Bill Bell
Cardiff University
UK
Dr Chandrika Kaul
University of St Andrews
UK
Professor Alexander S. Wilkinson

University College Dublin
Ireland
Palgrave Studies in the History of the Media publishes original, high qual-
ity research into the cultures of communication from the middle ages to
the present day. The series explores the variety of subjects and disciplinary
approaches that characterize this vibrant field of enquiry. The series will
help shape current interpretations not only of the media, in all its forms,
but also of the powerful relationship between the media and politics, soci-
ety, and the economy.
Advisory Board: Professor Carlos Barrera (University of Navarra,
Spain), Professor Peter Burke (Emmanuel College, Cambridge), Professor
Nicholas Cull (Center on Public Diplomacy, University of Southern
California), Professor Bridget Griffen-Foley (Macquarie University,
Australia), Professor Tom O’Malley (Centre for Media History, University
of Wales, Aberystwyth), Professor Chester Pach (Ohio University).
More information about this series at

http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14578
Martin Dibbs
Radio Fun and the

BBC Variety
Department, 1922–67
Comedy and Popular Music on Air
Martin Dibbs
Kingsbarns, St Andrews, UK

ISBN 978-3-319-95608-4 ISBN 978-3-319-95609-1 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95609-1
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018951786
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of
translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now
known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information
in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the pub-
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publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institu-
tional affiliations.
The popular radio entertainer Tommy Handley at the microphone with Clarence Wright
during a war-time BBC variety show in Bangor. Photo by © Hulton-Deutsch Collection/
CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images
This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature
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The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
For Kate, with love
Acknowledgements
Radio Fun has been written with the help of many people.
Firstly, my thanks to Emily Russell and Carmel Kennedy at Palgrave
Macmillan who made the publishing process as smooth as possible despite
my constant emails.
The book has been written largely from primary source material at the
BBC Written Archive Centre and I would like to thank the staff there for
their assistance and in particular Jeff Walden for his cheerful and unstint-
ing help and advice during my many visits to Caversham Park.
I would like to record my thanks to Immediate Media, especially Ralph
Montagu, Head of Heritage, for generously permitting me to quote from
Radio Times.
Acknowledgement is also due to the staff of the National Library of
Scotland; the British Newspaper Library in Colindale, London; the
Bodleian Library, Oxford; and the University of St Andrews Library.
I would like to offer my thanks to the University of St Andrews Modern
History Department for partially funding both my master’s and doctoral
research from which this book is derived. Thanks are due to my supervisor
James Nott for his enthusiasm for my subject.
Thanks are also due to Anna Spackman who was there at the beginning
at Dundee University back in 1998.
I owe a great debt to my oral history respondents and their families
who at the time of interview were in their 80s and 90s. I was invited into
their homes where I was received most cordially and hospitably. I would
like to thank them for their time in recalling their experiences in the Variety
Department from the 1930s to the 1980s. They are Bob Colston,
vii
viii Acknowledgements
Elizabeth Terry, Brian Willey, Donald Maclean, Geoff Purrier, Pat and
Geoff Lawrence, Peter Pilbeam (who discovered The Beatles for the BBC)
and Charles Chilton, a pioneer of broadcast jazz at the BBC, who regaled
me with, among many other stories, his meetings with Sir John Reith. I
would also like to thank John Fawcett Wilson, producer of Radio 4’s King
Street Junior, who answered my questions by phone and Marion Holledge
who corresponded with me about her memories of the BBC during the
1940s. It was a privilege to meet them all—sadly, many are no longer with
us.
Finally, my love and thanks to Kate, my wife, who, throughout the writ-
ing and editing process, kept me focused at all times, made sense of the
manuscript and so much more. Without her support, this book could not
and would not have been written. To her it is dedicated.
A Note on Primary Source Material
All BBC files cited in this book are preceded by the abbreviation BBC
WAC. Individual files are referred to by the subject of the individual docu-
ment, but where they are untitled they are referred to by sender to recipi-
ent either by name, for example, Watt to Nicolls, or by job title, DV to
C(P).
BBC copyright content is reproduced courtesy of the British
Broadcasting Corporation. All rights reserved.
ix
A Note on Terminology Used
Throughout the book, I have used the term ‘network’ rather than ‘pro-
gramme’ when referring to particular divisions of the BBC’s radio output.
‘Programme’ rather than ‘show’ is used to indicate a particular radio pro-
duction or series although there are a few exceptions. I have also fre-
quently abbreviated the BBC Light Programme, Home Service and Third
Programme to the Light, Home and Third, respectively. I have used the
terms ‘the Department’ and ‘Variety’ as shorthand ways of referring to the
Variety Department. As far back as the 1930s, Variety was occasionally
referred to as Light Entertainment, but I have tried to restrict this term to
the post-1957 period following the renaming of the Department to Light
Entertainment (Sound). Variety, Talks, Features, Drama, Children’s Hour
and so on, where capitalised, refer to BBC programme-making depart-
ments. I have also tended to use the term ‘radio’ instead of ‘wireless’
which today, in the world of electronic communication, has another mean-
ing. Inevitably exceptions will have crept in; any errors are my
responsibility.
xi
Contents
1 Introduction 1
2 1922–1933: Variety Before Variety 13

The Dawn of Radio Entertainment 13
John Reith: Architect of the BBC 16
Early Programme-Making and Criticism 18
First-Generation Radio Artists 24
Early Organisation of Light Entertainment 26
Cleaning Up Its Act 29
The Trans-Atlantic Octopus 31
Music for the Many 34
The Devil’s Music on Air 37
Ukulele Players and Comedians 40
Conclusion 42
3 1933–1939: The Show Begins 47

Variety Takes Shape 47
Looking for Ideas 51
Bureaucracy and the BBC 55
Keeping It Clean … and British 60
America: Opposition and Influences 64
Variety’s Home-Grown Programmes 68
Dance Music and Crooning 71
xiii
xiv Contents
Some Like It Hot 74

A Hierarchy of Dance Music 78
The Demon Drink 79
Sunday Policy and Continental Competition 80
Lightening the Schedule 85
Who’s Listening? 90
Variety: A Guinea Pig 93
Change at the Top 97
Conclusion 99
4 1939–1945: We Will Be Working Under Difficulties 107

Variety Goes to War 107
Variety on the Move 111
Assessing Audience Opinion 114
The Forces Programme 117
On the Move Again 122
Keeping Cheerful 126
The Dance Music Policy Committee 134
Jazz and Popular Music 136
Crooning and Slush 138
The Offensive on Drink, Dirt and Foreigners 142
Transatlantic Assistance and Co-operation 148
An In-House Assessment 152
Post-War Plans 157
Departures and Arrivals 162
Conclusion 163
5 1945–1955: A Golden Age for Radio Comedy 171

Normal Service Resumed 171
The Pyramid of Culture 173
Variety Demobbed 175
Chambermaids and Fig Leaves 184
Anti-Americanism Returns 190
Radio Comedy Perfected 194
Another Evaluation 205
That Old Familiar Tune 206
All that Jazz 209
Contents
xv
Not to Be Broadcast 211
The Inevitability of Change 215
The Light Goes ‘Heavy’ 217
Variety Holds Its Own 221
Conclusion 222
6 1956–1967: Sound into Vision; Popular into Pop 229

The Shock of the New 229
The Future of Sound Broadcasting 231
Managing Decline 238
Keeping It Clean and Wholesome 244
Getting With-It 247
Beat and the BBC: Into the Swinging 60s 249
Jazz: Too Little, or Quite Enough? 253
The Decline of the DMPC 256
New Directions 261
Piracy, Needletime and a Major Reorganisation 265
The End of an Era 269
Conclusion 270
7 Coda 275
Sources and Further Reading 283
Index 291
Abbreviations
AEFP Allied Expeditionary Forces Programme

AFN American Forces Network
AI Appreciation Index (later RI—see below)
BBC British Broadcasting Company (1922–26), British Broadcasting
Corporation (1927 onwards)
BBC WAC BBC Written Archive Centre
BEF British Expeditionary Force
C(P) Controller of Programmes
DMPC Dance Music Policy Committee
DV Director of Variety
HLE (S) Head of Light Entertainment (Sound)
HV Head of Variety
ITMA It’s That Man Again (radio programme)
MoI Ministry of Information
MWYW Music While You Work (radio programme)
PAMS Production, Advertising, Merchandising Service
RCA Radio Corporation of America
RI Reaction Index
RP Radio Pictorial
RT Radio Times
TIFH Take It From Here (radio programme)
WVS Women’s Voluntary Services
xvii
List of Tables
Table 3.1 The growth of the BBC Variety Department: staff statistics
1933–3951
Table 3.2 BBC National Programme: schedule for Sunday, 21 March
193781
Table 3.3 Radio Luxembourg: schedule for Sunday, 21 March 1937 82
Table 3.4 BBC National Programme: schedule for Sunday, 4 August
193988
Table 3.5 Popularity of Variety programmes with light entertainment
listeners: October–December 1937 95
Table 3.6 Variety listeners’ preferences for light entertainment
programmes: the first Listening Barometer, October–
December 1937 96
Table 4.1 BBC Home Service: schedule for Friday, 8 September 1939 109
Table 4.2 BBC Home Service: schedule for Monday, 18 December
1939113
Table 4.3 ‘For the Forces’: schedule for Tuesday, 20 February 1940 118
Table 5.1 Variety Department staff numbers 1946–55 175
Table 5.2 BBC Light Programme: schedule for Sunday, 10 December
1950177
Table 5.3 BBC Light Programme: schedule for Tuesday, 11 October
1949218
Table 5.4 Average listening audience in Britain Feb. 1952–Feb. 1954 220
Table 6.1 Variety Department staff numbers 1956–67 232
Table 6.2 Comparison of BBC radio audience numbers, 1948 and 1956 233
Table 6.3 Light Programme: annual programme content in percentages,
1956–67237
xix
xx List of Tables
Table 6.4 London Home Service: annual programme content in

percentages, 1956–67 238
Table 6.5 BBC Light Programme: schedule for Friday, 21 October 1960 239
Table 6.6 Radio 1 and Radio 2 the broadcasting day: Tuesday, 14
November 1967 268
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
There was no television in our house until 1966. Consequently I grew up

during the 1950s listening to the radio. Our radios were frequently my
grandparents’ cast-offs, apart from the wartime austerity model we owned
for a short while. They often had an intricate design around the speaker,
and the waveband display included strange and exotic place names such as
Athlone, Hilversum, Riga and Zagreb. With their glowing valves, these
radios always seemed to take an irritatingly long time to warm up before
any sound came out and even then would crackle alarmingly as the volume
or waveband was adjusted. The radio came to be my window on the world
as well as a supplement to my early education. I listened avidly to the Light
Programme with its comedy and wide range of music and while I might
not have always completely understood the humour, my imagination
painted a picture in my mind of how particular radio artists looked. Every
week I eagerly anticipated Hancock’s Half Hour with Bill Kerr addressing
Tony Hancock as ‘Tub’ and The Navy Lark’s Jon Pertwee shouting
‘Everybody Down!’ prior to HMS Troutbridge suffering some navigational
calamity. While home from school for lunch, I looked forward to the
comedian Ken Platt opening his act for Workers’ Playtime in his flat
Northern accent with his catchphrase—when it was still de rigueur for
comedians to have a catchphrase—‘I won’t take my coat off I’m not stop-
ping!’ I must also have been among the relatively few youngsters who
remained devoted to Children’s Hour on the radio as it gradually yielded
© The Author(s) 2019 1

M. Dibbs, Radio Fun and the BBC Variety Department, 1922–67,
Palgrave Studies in the History of the Media,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95609-1_1
2 M. DIBBS
to both television and the BBC’s cuts and changes of the early 1960s.
When alone, I would experiment with tuning the radio and discovered the
delights of the Home Service where I listened to the repeats of the week’s
comedy programmes I had missed on the Light Programme. The Third
Programme too nurtured my interest in serious music and the theatre. On
Sundays my parents cooked lunch against a background of the Light
Programme’s Two-Way Family Favourites. Later we ate to the accompani-
ment of the boisterous sounds of a British institution of the 1950s, the
Billy Cotton Band Show—Sunday was unthinkable without it—followed by
Educating Archie, Ray’s A Laugh or some other Variety Department com-
edy production. For me these programmes were highly amusing and I
never gave a moment’s thought to the organisation behind them or the
producers such as Jacques Brown, Charles Maxwell and Roy Speer who
were simply names mentioned at the end of each programme. Fifty years
later this concerned me much more.
While at the BBC’s Written Archive Centre researching BBC radio
comedy in the post-war period, as well as exploring other primary and
secondary source material, I became aware that there had been no specific
enquiry into the history of the BBC’s Variety Department. Gradually, the
Centre’s pink folders revealed long-forgotten personalities and brought to
life scenes and situations dating from the earliest years of the BBC. The
same names appeared in documents repeatedly as did their sometimes
intriguing job title abbreviations. HV and HLE (S) were straightforward;
HAR and AHLMP (S) needed a little more thought but HCat, ASESBOB
and MOLE(S)—the latter I subsequently interviewed—required consid-
erably more decoding.1 People such as the Misses Absalom and Lipscomb,
Gale Pedrick, M.M. Dewar, Pat Dixon, C.F. (‘Mike’) Meehan and Patrick
Newman to name but a few, soon began to feel like old friends as they all
went about their daily business whether it was informing, requesting, cre-
ating, discussing, resolving, placating, complaining, proposing, respond-
ing or submitting.
The title of this book is taken partly from the popular but long defunct
children’s comic Radio Fun which featured the fictitious adventures of the
day’s radio stars in strip cartoon form. The book focuses largely on the
history and work of the BBC’s Variety Department from the formation of
the BBC in 1922 until 1967. The Department devised, developed and put
together radio light entertainment programmes, generally weekly, many of
which went on to become firmly embedded in the nation’s cultural psyche.
It was a hive of continual human creative interaction which, despite its
INTRODUCTION 3
myriad problems, simply got on with the business of entertaining the

nation on a daily basis despite, for example, frequent studio chaos, finan-
cial stringency, eccentric characters—often both the producers and the
artists—and repeatedly berating memoranda from senior management. It
always worked to a very tight schedule.
This book is neither a history of radio artists nor of light entertainment
programmes although both feature strongly as they were an integral part
of the make-up of the Department. Instead it is a narrative history explor-
ing along chronological lines the workings of, tensions within and the
impact of BBC policies on the programme-making department which
generated the organisation’s largest audiences. It provides an insight into
inter alia key events, personalities, programmes, internal politics and
trends in popular entertainment, censorship and anti-American policy as
they individually or collectively affected the Department. It examines how
the Department’s programmes became markers in the daily and weekly
lives of millions of listeners and helped shape the nation’s listening habits
when radio was the dominant source of domestic entertainment. The
book includes and explores events and topics which, while not directly
forming part of the Variety Department’s history, nevertheless intersected
with or had an impact on it. Such topics include the BBC’s attitude to jazz
and rock and roll, the arrival of television with its impact on radio, the
pirate radio stations and the Popular Music and Gramophone Departments,
both of whom worked closely with the Variety Department. The book also
demonstrates that it was possible for creativity to consistently thrive and
develop within the highly bureaucratised environment of the BBC, despite
pressures from above to conform to the organisation’s often conservative
norms. The Variety Department was a prime example of this phenome-
non. On many occasions senior management intervened to ‘rein in’ the
Department whether it was in terms of, for example, programme presenta-
tion, choice of artist, producer or content. Frequently, after much har-
rumphing from above, programmes which caused some displeasure to
senior management went ahead with only minor changes to appease them,
or even none at all.
The BBC as a company and later public corporation always provided
entertainment in its schedules. Variety was one of the main sources of
early programme content. Variety, or vaudeville in America, was a form
of public entertainment in a theatre setting comprising a series of sepa-
rate acts or ‘turns’. It evolved from its predecessor, the music hall, which
dated from mid-Victorian Britain and provided entertainment, largely
4 M. DIBBS
comic and chorus songs, to an audience seated at tables and chairs with
food and drink being served throughout the performance. From the late
nineteenth century, purpose-built variety theatres began to appear in cit-
ies and towns of any size. They were highly decorative both inside and
out, had a proscenium arch, plush interiors and fixed seating, but with-
out meals being served in the auditorium. Their arrival, together with
changes in the law, marked the decline of the music hall from 1914
onwards. A variety show would include a selection of performers such as
acrobats, animal acts, comedians, dancers, instrumentalists, jugglers,
magicians, mime artists, singers and ‘speciality’ acts such as mind readers
or whistlers. The programme would typically be played twice nightly and
often run for a week, after which the acts would disperse to other venues
across the country. Variety entertainment reached its zenith during the
inter-war years, but its demise began with the arrival of its most serious
rival, the talking cinema. With the expansion of the television audience,
the variety theatre, as a type of public entertainment, was practically
extinct by 1960.2
In the BBC’s early years, this established cultural form provided a
source of material for popular entertainment programmes with their typi-
cal spread of talent. While there were practical reasons why the mime artist
and juggler, which relied on visual impact, were excluded, there were
examples of tap dancers being accommodated. Indeed, Music Hall and
Palace of Varieties, which aimed to capture variety’s atmosphere, were
among the Department’s most popular programmes for many years. When
the BBC’s Variety Department was created in June 1933, its title reflected
the diverse range of public entertainment genres then currently popular
including revue, concert party and light opera, none of which would have
been out of place in variety theatres. The Department came about through
opposition, competition, criticism and need. Opposition came from the
entertainment industry which regarded radio with deep suspicion as a
means of depleting its audiences rather than as an opportunity to popula-
rise its artists. Competition emanated from European continental radio
stations who threatened the BBC’s monopoly and audience. Press criti-
cism highlighted the BBC’s shortcomings in providing popular entertain-
ment, while the need to increase variety programme output resulted from
the formation of the BBC Empire Service in 1932. The BBC assumed that
the majority of listeners would choose a diet of mainly popular enter
tainment. However, John Reith, the BBC’s first General Manager and
later Managing Director, felt that if the radio audience were continually
INTRODUCTION 5
fed entertainment, they would soon grow tired of it. He considered that
the medium should be used for the greater good by bringing into every
home, irrespective of class or means, the best that had ever been thought
or said in the world. He therefore set out to give the radio audience what
he considered they needed rather than what they thought they wanted and
to provide listeners with the full range of output on one radio network in
order to surprise them with topics they never knew they would find
engaging.
The establishment of the Variety Department not only marked the
beginning of the process to professionalise the BBC’s approach to the
production of light entertainment programmes, but also gave clear evi-
dence of the Corporation’s commitment to the provision of popular
entertainment for the nation. The BBC now began to create something
distinct—its own form of popular culture. One of the first steps was to
initiate the process of reducing its dependence on the entertainment
industry by developing its own ‘radiogenic’ stars—artists who had the
unique ability to entertain and communicate with an unseen audience.
Once the Department was operating, producers began to think more criti-
cally about how light entertainment on radio could be original, effective
and better suited to the medium as they set about creating the first genera-
tion of programmes for the listener. These early attempts brought about
innovative programmes such as Café Colette which, although broadcast
from a London radio studio, transported listeners to Paris for a programme
of live continental dance music. They also included In Town Tonight, the
earliest chat show; Monday Night at Seven, which comprised four separate
items; and Band Waggon, an early part-comedy programme in magazine
format. It was during this period that the Variety Department established
itself within the BBC and in the mind of the listeners and helped to make
radio the leading provider of domestic entertainment in inter-war Britain.
It was one of the first programme-making departments to embrace
Listener Research as a valuable tool in determining audience size and pref-
erences to inform programme-making. Successive Directors of Variety
drew all this activity together. Each was a powerful and influential high-
profile figure who, behind the scenes, grappled with the problems of hav-
ing to find new artists, develop new programme ideas, source scripted
material, answer the radio critics, work to tight schedules and justify the
Department’s actions to senior management.
The war severely tested the Variety Department and it was arguably its
finest hour. It successfully carried the crucial dual responsibilities of
6 M. DIBBS
morale-boosting by entertaining the nation at home and forces overseas

and helping to ensure industrial output and productivity were consistently
high. This was achieved under extremely difficult conditions while having
to contend with the effects of two evacuations—with their accompanying
transport and communication problems—shortages of talented staff
brought about by war service and the need to consistently devise pro-
grammes to keep people cheerful. The BBC’s strict pre-war broadcasting
standards were maintained. This involved the imposition of tough policies
on programme censorship and an uneasy co-existence with American light
entertainment with its potential to affect British culture. Wartime brought
about important and irreversible changes to broadcasting. Significant
breaks with Reithian philosophy came with the establishment of an addi-
tional single radio network, the Forces Programme, designed for a specific
audience and purely for popular output. This led to the contraction of the
BBC’s restrictive Sunday broadcasting policy.
Variety emerged from the war in a state of low morale having burnt itself
out creatively over the previous six years. A new Director heralded a period
of renewal in which the Department discovered and established new artists
and writers. The process was in full flower by the early 1950s when the
radio comedy series proper—particularly the situation comedy format—
had become well established. However, just when radio was demonstrating
exactly what it could do, the scene was set for a decline in listening from
the mid-1950s due to the rapid emergence of television as the dominant
domestic entertainment medium. By 1967 the process was complete. All
radio programme-making departments were affected by falling audience
numbers with closures, mergers and movement of staff as the outcome.
The Home Service and Light Programme became increasingly differenti-
ated with the former being based more on the spoken word and the latter
becoming a natural home for much of Variety’s output. The Variety
Department was affected less by the changes than other departments.
Nevertheless, it declined in terms of staff numbers and programme output
and experienced budgetary constraint. It was not all bad news however, for
a number of radio’s best-loved comedy programmes emerged over this
period. Popular music policy changed too with the BBC having to accept
that there was indeed an audience for rock and roll and later pop—a deci-
sion made easier by the emergence of a new generation of producers and
managers and the retirement of the old guard. The BBC set about provid-
ing an alternative to Radio Luxembourg and later, through government
direction, to offshore pirate radio stations. This culminated in the creation
INTRODUCTION 7
of a popular music network (Radio 1) and the rebranding of the Light,

Third and Home as Radios 2, 3 and 4 respectively.
Two key, over-arching themes had a constant and disproportionate
impact on the Variety Department throughout the period, censorship and
anti-Americanism. These were not experienced to any great extent by
other programme-making departments. Standards of propriety were of
great importance to the BBC. Through censorship, the Corporation both
restricted and prevented public access to anything it considered unsuitable
in either comedy programme scripts or popular song lyrics. Until the late
1940s, there was little consolidated guidance to staff as to what consti-
tuted ‘unsuitable’. Policy was reactive, largely contained in a myriad of
memos, usually hastily devised in response to public or internal displea-
sure. In 1948 formal guidelines were drawn up to provide advice to pro-
gramme producers outlining what was acceptable for broadcasting. While
the BBC endeavoured to maintain a high degree of censorship, such a
position became increasingly difficult to sustain in the climate of social
change which took place during the 1950s and 1960s.
Early anti-Americanism within the BBC demonstrated a loathing for
much of American popular entertainment which, it believed, would even-
tually swamp Britain’s distinctive cultural character if left unchecked. The
Corporation therefore assumed the unofficial guardianship of British pop-
ular culture and devised strategies to mitigate the situation. It was the
Variety Department which bore the brunt of the BBC’s anti-American
outlook but, with a constant need for new radio stars and ideas, successful
American formats were adopted, but only after they had been suitably
adapted for British tastes. Nevertheless, the BBC considered Anglo-
American relations of great importance, and a tradition of co-operation in
broadcasting between the two nations grew steadily in order to promote a
greater understanding between them. This was to prove invaluable par-
ticularly during the war. However, the wartime welcome to American
programmes on the BBC was tempered with a post-war wish to preserve a
Britishness in light entertainment, and the use of American idiom and
faux American accents in scripts and popular songs was actively discour-
aged. This attitude only began to decline with the arrival of commercial
television in the mid-1950s with its plethora of popular imported American
programmes.
This book has been largely written from primary source material pre-
served at the BBC Written Archive Centre, Caversham Park, Berkshire.3
Much of this original source material has never been published before
8 M. DIBBS
and in using it, the voices of contemporary staff members tell the story of
the Variety Department as it felt at the time. Of particular relevance has
been the R (Radio) file group containing matters of policy, minutes of key
administrative and production committees, records dealing with specific
programmes and proceedings of the Programme Board and the Control
Board, programme scripts on microfilm and a comprehensive collection of
press cuttings dating from the 1920s. Many documents reveal, for exam-
ple, the stages in policymaking, the problems facing programme makers,
the tensions between the creative and administrative staff, edicts to output
departments from senior management and inter-departmental politics.
They also provide an insight into the relationship between artists, their
managements and the BBC. While the archive provides a wealth of infor-
mation for the historian, files are not always complete. Most frustrating for
the historian are the lacunae—memoranda for which the replies have not
survived, have gone astray or where the file simply ends. Tantalising are
those files vetted by the Archive’s staff and endorsed ‘confidential papers
removed from this file’. But it is the comments in pencil on documents
which often betray a sense of the recipient’s true feelings about the matter
in hand rather than the response eventually given in reply.
As a further source of first-hand information and a means of hearing
original voices from the Variety Department, I set up a small oral history
project. Between October 2008 and February 2009, I interviewed a
number of retired Department staff who had responded to an advertise-
ment I had placed in Prospero, the BBC’s retired staff magazine. Their
ages then ranged from their late 70s to early 90s, and they provided an
illuminating insight into the workings of the Variety Department
between 1933 and 1967. I was received into their homes with utmost
courtesy and hospitality, and without exception they all had an illuminat-
ing recall of events as well as fond memories of working for the BBC. It
proved to be a fascinating and rewarding experience and one of the most
memorable aspects of researching this book. The respondents are listed
in more detail in the Sources and Further Reading section at the end of
the book.
The BBC’s official publications have also been an important source of
information. The annual review of the BBC’s work for the immediate past
year was known at various times as the BBC Hand Book, BBC Year Book or
BBC Annual. The first edition was the BBC Hand Book 1928. These books
position themselves somewhere between a factual account and a public
relations document and provide an uncritical but nevertheless useful guide
INTRODUCTION 9
to the BBC. As with many official publications, often what has been omit-
ted is as important as that which is present. Over the years their format
followed a similar pattern which included insights into broadcasting pol-
icy, names of principal officers, details relating to individual radio net-
works, programme supply departments: generally, a summary of the
Variety Department’s work and key statistics relating to the organisation.
Radio Times, first published in 1923, provided information on Variety
programmes, artists and daily programme content generally. It also served
as a point of contact between the BBC and the radio audience as well as
providing and promoting the BBC’s view to its readers. However, Radio
Times should not be taken as an authentic guide to what had or would be
broadcast as it was printed some weeks in advance of publication and the
programme schedule could and often did change between the day the
magazine was printed and the day when programmes were broadcast. The
most accurate record of broadcasts is Programmes-as-Broadcast (P-as-B), a
daily register of every broadcast on each BBC service, a copy of which is
kept at the BBC Written Archive Centre. The BBC Quarterly (1946–54)
resembled an academic journal and reflected on the problems of broad-
casting. Throughout its relatively short life, it published a number of arti-
cles pertinent to the Variety Department and the Light Programme largely
outlining problems and challenges.
Although not a BBC publication, Radio Pictorial (1934–39) was a
weekly magazine aimed at the family but with an appeal specifically tar-
geted at women with its free gifts, pull-out pictures of the day’s stars,
special offers and advertising. Its focus was largely, but not exclusively, on
light entertainment and consequently on the radio celebrities of the time.
Although initially supportive of the BBC, the Corporation’s perceived
failings were sometimes featured in articles often in sensationalised form.
These grew more common as the magazine strengthened its connection
with European commercial radio for which it carried programme
listings.
Limitations of time and space have meant that inevitably there are areas
which deserved more attention. In this respect I am mindful of the role
played by women in the Department. Variety was male-dominated in
terms of producers although a small number of women such as Doris
Arnold (the pioneer), Audrey Cameron, Joan Clark and Joy Russell-Smith
worked their way up through the organisation to become producers, most
notably in wartime when many male producers were on war service,
although their employment continued subsequently. While women always
10 M. DIBBS
comprised over half the departmental staff, they were primarily employed
on clerical and secretarial roles—in the latter frequently covering for their
producers when absent. Their support was integral to the creative process
not only in ensuring that programmes were ready to broadcast but fre-
quently that they were broadcast at all. Prior to the war, three women did
reach director level within the Corporation: Hilda Matheson was the
BBC’s first Director of Talks, Mary Somerville the Director of School
Broadcasting and Isa Benzie, Foreign Director. There were also a number
of women who became producers, most notably Olive Shapley of the
Features Department in the North Region. With a marriage bar in opera-
tion at the BBC from 1932, women might only be permitted to stay on if
they were considered to be of great importance to the Corporation. Isa
Benzie resigned from the BBC in January 1938 following her marriage to
television producer John Morley, but by contrast Doris Arnold was
retained in her post after she married producer Harry S. Pepper in 1943.4
I am also conscious that this study has been largely London-centric
because of the greater availability of primary source material relating to the
capital and because it was the programme-making heart of the Variety
Department. However, this does not diminish the importance of, and the
substantial contribution to, Variety’s overall programme output made by
the regions, including the North Region which employed talented staff
who produced many important and memorable programmes. Significant
among them were Richard (Dick) Kelly of the BBC’s Newcastle office who
was a champion of local talent and Ronnie Taylor, the North Region’s
Senior Variety Producer. He was described by Variety production secretary
Pat Lawrence as ‘an absolutely fantastic man who created all sorts of
programmes’. He introduced artists such as Al Read and Morecambe and
Wise to the radio audience and produced Variety Fanfare, the North’s
answer to London’s Variety Bandbox. Writer and producer James Casey,
best known for The Clitheroe Kid, deserves more recognition. These were
all important if lesser-known examples of key figures in BBC radio enter-
tainment based outside London. While regional producers and artists were
often known only through a credit at the end of a programme or in Radio
Times, they have been insufficiently acknowledged as contributors not only
to BBC light entertainment but to British popular culture in general.
Prior to 1961, when Asa Briggs published the first volume of his out-
standing History of Broadcasting in the United Kingdom, little had been
written about broadcasting in Britain.5 Today, much of the scholarship
relating to the BBC concerns itself with the period 1922 to 1945 and then
INTRODUCTION 11
with the ‘serious’ side of the Corporation’s output. A general sense of the
history and work of the Variety Department might be pieced together
from existing but scattered secondary sources, but it would create only a
partial and limited picture of the Department.6 This book sets out to rem-
edy this. Full bibliographic details of secondary source material consulted
are listed at the end of each chapter and in the Further Reading section.
Historical research into the Variety Department is not extensive, and while
authors have touched on the subject in monographs, book chapters and a
number of innovative articles, there has been no specific enquiry into its
history and work. This book builds on and adds greater detail to what is
available through the use of largely unseen primary source material from
the BBC’s Written Archive Centre. It provides a unique insight into a little
researched programme-making department of the BBC. It sheds new light
on the work of the Department particularly in the post-war period, an era
which remains largely unexplored by media historians. It also serves as
microcosm of the activity within BBC radio programme-making depart-
ments to help understand the upheaval within the BBC from the mid-
1950s as radio struggled to find a role as it was being overwhelmed by
television. I hope that I have captured at least some of the Variety
Department’s excitement, particularly its chaos and overwork, the sense of
the last minute, the urgency, the inter-departmental rivalries and the com-
plaints, criticisms and edicts sent down from above.
Notes
1. HV—Head of Variety; HLE (S)—Head of Light Entertainment (Sound);
HAR—Head of Audience Research; AHLMP (S)—Assistant Head of Light
Music Programmes (Sound); HCat—Head of Catering; ASEBOB—
Assistant Superintendent Engineer, Sound Broadcasting, Outside
Broadcasts; MOLE(S)—Music Organiser, Light Entertainment (Sound). A
full list of abbreviations appeared at the end of each BBC Staff List.
2. For histories of variety in Britain, see for example, Roger Wilmut, Kindly
Leave the Stage! The Story of Variety 1919–1960, London, 1985 and Oliver
Double, Britain Had Talent, Basingstoke, 2012.
3. The principal files groups used are listed in the Further Reading section at
the end of this book together with secondary and other primary sources not
cited in the chapters.
4. For a study of women at the BBC during the 1920s and 1930s, see Kate
Murphy, Behind the Wireless: A History of Early Women at the BBC, London,
2016.
12 M. DIBBS
5. Among the earliest books on the BBC and broadcasting in Britain are those
written by the founding members of staff of the British Broadcasting
Company: A. R. Burrows, The Story of Broadcasting, London, 1924; C. A.
Lewis, Broadcasting From Within, London, 1924; and J.C.W. Reith,
Broadcast Over Britain, London, 1924. Maurice Gorham’s Broadcasting
and Television Since 1900, London, 1952, is probably the earliest history of
broadcasting in Britain and provides a broad sweep up to c. 1950.
6. Information about the Variety Department is included in the works of some
authors writing generally about BBC history, but it is Barry Took’s Laughter
in the Air: An Informal History of Radio Comedy, London, 1976, which
comes closest to being a history of the work of the Department with its
central focus being on artists and programmes and, to a lesser extent, pro-
ducers and administrators. Andy Foster and Steve Furst’s Radio Comedy
1938–1968, London, 1996, is a useful reference work cataloguing the most
popular programmes of the Variety Department’s comedy output which
includes the cast, scriptwriters, production credits and transmission details
of programmes from the 1930s to the 1960s. There are also a number of
autobiographies and biographies of radio writers, artists and former BBC
staff associated with the Variety Department as well as books about specific
radio programmes. These are either cited in the text or appear in the Sources
and Further Reading section.
CHAPTER 2
1922–1933: Variety Before Variety
The Dawn of Radio Entertainment

Broadcasting in Britain started before the establishment of the BBC.1
Experimental broadcasts of speech and music from the Marconi Company’s
station at Chelmsford, Essex, began in January 1920. While these were for
the purpose of testing transmitters, they were also used to gauge public
interest in broadcasting and were welcomed by amateur radio enthusiasts.
The broadcast of the opera singer Dame Nellie Melba on 15 June 1920
was significant as the major broadcasting event to date. It was arranged by
Lord Northcliffe of the Daily Mail, and the broadcast was heard by an
estimated 10,000 listeners throughout Europe and as far away as
Newfoundland. Of the occasion, H.M. Dowsett, then Chief of the Testing
Department of the Marconi Company, wrote:
The renown of the singer, the world-wide attention which was given to her
performance, the great distance at which good reception was obtained, all
combined to give the Melba concert the atmosphere of a great initiation
ceremony, and the era of broadcasting for the public amusement…may be
said to have completed its trials and to have been definitely launched on its
meteoric career from this date.2
This broadcast captured the listening public’s imagination and demon-

strated that broadcasting had the potential to become a form of
© The Author(s) 2019 13

M. Dibbs, Radio Fun and the BBC Variety Department, 1922–67,
Palgrave Studies in the History of the Media,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95609-1_2
14 M. DIBBS
ass-entertainment. While these experiments continued, there was a delay

m
in the development of a public radio service in Britain mainly because of
objections by the armed forces, concerned about interference to military
transmissions. Consequently, broadcasts from Chelmsford were suspended
in November 1920. However, petitions to the Post Office from the bur-
geoning amateur radio community eventually led to the reintroduction of
regular broadcasts.
The first officially sanctioned broadcasting service began in February
1922 from an unprepossessing former Army hut on Marconi’s Writtle site
(call sign 2MT) on the outskirts of Chelmsford. These pioneering broad-
casts were made at 7 pm every Tuesday evening for a half-hour, and in
May 1922 Writtle was joined by another Marconi experimental station
(2LO) at Marconi House in the Strand, London. The broadcasts from
Writtle ran until January 1923 and comprised gramophone records, sto-
ries, news and live musical and dramatic performances organised by
Captain P.P. Eckersley, Head of Marconi’s Experimental Section. Eckersley
was a natural entertainer and arguably the first radio star. When he began
to talk informally one evening instead of playing records, the small listen-
ing audience responded with enthusiasm. R.T.B. Wynn, a former Marconi
employee and later Chief Engineer of the BBC, recalled that rudimentary
programme planning:
was done at the ‘Cock and Bell’ up the road, about half an hour before-
hand…But our star was Eckersley. He’d go up to the microphone, and
apparently without effort, be spontaneously funny for ten minutes at a time.
He talked to our listeners as if he’d lived next door to them for years, and
they loved it.3
Eckersley subsequently became the BBC’s first Chief Engineer but

resigned in May 1929 following an affair with Dorothy Clark, estranged
wife of Edward Clark of the Corporation’s Music Department. The
landmark development in early broadcasting came in 1922 when the Post
Office—anxious to avoid the American experience of lack of control over
allocation of wavelengths leading to too many stations drowning each
other out—invited the leading radio manufacturers to form a broadcasting
partnership whose service it was hoped would encourage sales of wireless
sets.4 Following an initial meeting of the manufacturers in May 1922, it
was agreed that the six largest manufacturers would form a committee to
decide on organising and running the service. Their subsequent discussions
1922–1933: VARIETY BEFORE VARIETY 15
held between May and July 1922 led to the formation of the British
Broadcasting Company which was granted a monopoly of broadcasting in
Britain in October 1922. Each of the ‘Big Six’ contributed £10,000
towards the authorised £100,000 capital with the remainder being pro-
vided by smaller companies. In addition to the share capital, the Company
was financed through a licencing system in which each household was
required to buy an annual licence, issued by the Post Office on behalf of
the BBC. Manufacturers also paid the Company a royalty on each wireless
set sold which had to be of an approved type.
The Company commenced broadcasting from Magnet House, the
offices of the General Electric Company, in London’s Kingsway (call sign
2LO) on 14 November 1922. The following day broadcasting began from
Birmingham (5IT) and Manchester (2ZY). Newcastle (5NO) followed in
December, Cardiff (5WA) in February 1923, Glasgow (5SC) in March,
Aberdeen (2BD) and Bournemouth (6BM) in October and Belfast (2BE)
and Nottingham (5NG) in September 1924. Initially, the broadcasting day
was short, beginning in mid-afternoon and lasting for about seven hours.
In April 1923 the Company moved to larger premises in Savoy Hill which
was to be its home until the opening of Broadcasting House in 1932.5
In the early years of broadcasting, the audience would ‘listen-in’ to the
BBC mainly through headphones using a crystal set. Crystal sets, the sim-
plest and cheapest form of receiver, could be purchased or made for
between £2 and £4, but the quality of reception was dependent on signal
strength and atmospheric conditions. The valve wireless with its loud-
speaker was expensive at £20, but by the mid-1920s, with the growing
popularity of wireless listening, its cost had dropped considerably as more
models came on to the market. Radio design changed from being purely
functional, basically box-like or in a cabinet, to a distinctive piece of living
room furniture. At this time radio construction established itself as a
national pastime, and plans and instructions appeared in a growing num-
ber of specialist magazines. A cheaper alternative to owning a receiver was
to rent a loudspeaker from a relay exchange to which programmes would
be fed from a central point. Although sound quality was good and the
subscriber was not subject to maintenance charges, listeners had no choice
in the programmes broadcast by the exchange operators. Subscriber num-
bers rose from 446 in 1927 to 130,998 in 1933 and reached 270,596 by
December 1939.6 This system enjoyed popularity from the mid-1920s
until the war but was only financially viable in areas of high population.
Relay exchanges were opposed by all the main parties concerned. The Post
16 M. DIBBS
Office, who had to issue them with a licence, felt that it infringed its
monopoly, the manufacturers felt that they were being deprived of radio
sales and the BBC thought that exchanges also threatened its monopoly
by transmitting foreign stations as well as their own.
Broadcasting grew swiftly. A sense of the popularity of early radio may
be gained from some figures. Between 1923 and 1933 the numbers of
wireless licences held rose from 595,496 to 5,973,758.7 The cost of a
wireless licence was 10s.0d. (£0.50) which represented a fifth of the aver-
age weekly wage of £2 10s.0d. (£2.50). By 1933 it was estimated that half
the nation’s households owned radios. Radio Times, first published on 28
September 1923, achieved average weekly net sales of 800,000 copies dur-
ing its first 15 months, rising to almost two million by 1933. Magazines
for radio construction enthusiasts also had huge circulations: the weekly
Popular Wireless and Modern Wireless were each selling 125,000 copies in
the autumn of 1924, while Amateur Wireless and Wireless achieved sales of
100,000 and 150,000, respectively.8
John Reith: Architect of the BBC

Radio’s rise to prominence was achieved under the guidance of John Reith
who, by his own admission, did not know what broadcasting was when he
applied for the job of General Manager of the British Broadcasting
Company. He was a Scots engineer of Calvinist conviction and high moral
standards which were not consistently reflected in his personal life.9 Reith
led the organisation both as a private company and a public corporation
from his appointment in 1922 until he resigned in 1938. Little was known
about the potential of radio or what its effects would be on society and,
with limited experience in the area of programme production and little
knowledge of the audience and its tastes, radio was very much a tabula
rasa at this time. As Reith observed: ‘There were no sealed orders to open.
The commission was of the scantiest nature’.10
Under his leadership, an ethos for public service broadcasting in Britain
was established which would have far-reaching effects on broadcasting.
Reith was probably the single most influential individual in radio broad-
casting anywhere. His book, Broadcast Over Britain, which was written
after just 18 months in office, is imbued with a strong moral purpose and
sets out his personal manifesto for broadcasting. For Reith, broadcasting
had the potential to become a huge national asset—a means of diffusing
knowledge and culture to all throughout society rather than just for the
privileged. Such an improving medium for the nation could only be

brought about through the creation of a monopolistic body financed by a
licence fee with a strong public service ethic to enable it to act in the
national interest. It would be distant from government to ensure its inde-
pendence and free from commercial pressures in order to maintain the
conditions necessary for the creation of high-quality programming. In
March 1924 Reith articulated the broad policies of the BBC and public
service broadcasting as being:
to entertain, to interest, to enlighten in all these ways to bring the very best
of everything and to spare no effort to do it, to the greatest possible num-
ber; to aim always at the highest standards in every line of achievement in
whatever direction it may be; to exert our every endeavour to secure that the
broadcasting service is looked to as giving the best that there is; that the
amusement or instruction it provides may be as universally acceptable as
possible to young and old.11
The Company did not simply want its listeners to keep to the safety of
the familiar rather it wanted them to experience the full range of its out-
put. Reith believed that the more open listeners were to new interests, the
better he would be able to provide something for everyone. Consequently,
‘mixed programming’ was offered, that is, scattering programmes
throughout the broadcasting schedule rather than offering the same or
similar programmes at the same or a similar time every day or week, in
order to surprise the audience and arouse their curiosity with unfamiliar
and interesting topics. Radio required careful management if its potential
was not to be wasted purely on entertaining the public. Reith possessed an
idealistic notion of what the public should be given and believed that the
Company should lead public taste rather than be driven by it. He saw
broadcasting as a form of cultural paternalism:
It is occasionally indicated to us that we are apparently setting out to give

the public what we think they need – and not what they want, but very few
know what they want, and very few what they need…In any case it is better
to overestimate the mentality of the public than to underestimate it.12
However, while Reith developed the concept of public service broad-

casting in Britain, he was not the first to hold these views. The American
broadcasting pioneer David Sarnoff had already set out the parameters in
a letter of 17 June 1922 to a director of RCA:
18 M. DIBBS
I think that the principal elements of broadcasting service are entertain-

ment, information and education, with emphasis on the first feature – enter-
tainment: although not underestimating the importance of the other two
elements…broadcasting represents a job of entertaining, informing and
educating the nation and should, therefore, be distinctly regarded as a pub-
lic service.13
Sarnoff’s aspirations were taken up by Reith, but with a different

emphasis. Reith’s mission was the cultural enlightenment of Britain by
informing and educating the population, particularly those of limited edu-
cation and poor social background, and only lastly to entertain. He was
not opposed to broadcast entertainment and encouraged it as an antidote
to the humdrum and stressful nature of daily life, but the audience was
expecting too much if it wanted to be continually entertained; besides,
they would soon grow tired of a single diet:
To entertain means to occupy agreeably. Would it be urged that this is only

to be effected by the broadcasting of jazz bands and popular music, or of
sketches by humorists?14
Maurice Gorham, one-time editor of Radio Times, had definite ideas

about Reith’s attitude towards the radio audience and entertainment
generally:
Personally I believe that Reith suffered increasingly from a subconscious

horror lest the listener should have too good a time. Giving pleasure to the
ungodly was not among his objectives for the BBC. If they liked it too
much, it could not be doing its job.15
While the public focused on radio as a source of entertainment, the

Company recognised the potential of broadcasting as a means of dissemi-
nating ideas and values on a scale hitherto unknown, believing that if high
culture was made available to the public, it would welcome it.
Early Programme-Making and Criticism

With the growth of the radio audience, but no information on numbers or
programme popularity, the programme makers had little to guide them in
building a schedule which would accommodate all tastes. Programme-
making was a matter of guesswork and trial and error and relied heavily on
the producer’s own experiences and their assumptions about the audience.
While the BBC had a policy of trying to please everyone, it was quickly
realised that programme output would always be subject to criticism from
someone.
The listening public was kept informed of the Company’s policies and
contemporary broadcasting topics through Radio Times. In December
1923 it sought the views of some prominent figures in public life in an
unrepresentative test of opinion of the Company’s output. By and large
they felt that the BBC was doing a good job. For example, Viscount
Burnham felt that the majority ‘wished to be amused rather than preached
at…[but] appreciate[d] a judicious mixture of seriousness with their enter-
tainment’. Sir Landon Ronald, the composer and conductor, while desir-
ing less dance music, recognised the diversity of tastes among the radio
audience. He thought the BBC had been successful so far and, presaging
what Reith would write later, believed ‘it was up to the broadcasting com-
pany to give us the very best they can’. J.R. Clynes, Labour MP for
Manchester North East, viewed broadcasting as an institution for culture
and learning for the deprived and not exclusively for entertainment.16
As programming developed so did the internal mechanisms for its regu-
lation. From May 1924 the Programme Board (later Committee) met on
a weekly basis to consider broadcast output five weeks in advance and later
to review and evaluate the previous week’s broadcasts and reflect on criti-
cal response and listener correspondence. Programmes became more
ambitious, but despite the outward signs of success, there was concern
from within the Company about programme standards and the availability
of quality material to broadcast. This brought an immediate response from
the top, and the problem was seen as being caused by inexperience, rigid-
ity of scheduling and lack of rehearsal time. Arthur Burrows, Director of
Programmes, welcomed the Controller’s suggestion for the provision of
more musical vocal items:
a really good glee party or small choir of men’s voices can entertain when all
else fails. How deeply seated is this love of pure harmony in all classes can be
judged by the attempts at part-singing that are frequently heard in football
crowds, amongst troops or even public-house corners – whenever a few men
assemble together.17
At this time, much of the audience could only receive a single station
which had to cater for all tastes. Determining audience preferences was a
20 M. DIBBS
difficult task, and the expressions ‘highbrow’, ‘lowbrow’ and ‘middle-

brow’ came into increased usage around this time. Inevitably there were
links to class, and these terms were used to describe types of listener as well
as the cultural hierarchy. ‘Highbrow’ was synonymous with discriminating
listeners and high culture. ‘Middlebrow’ was associated with cultural aspi-
ration, comprising a group which Punch magazine described satirically as
being ‘people who are hoping that some day they will get used to the stuff
they ought to like’.18 ‘Lowbrow’ referred to the uncultivated masses and
populism. In 1924, Norman Edwards, editor of Popular Wireless, captured
the early sense of the radio audience in describing the lowbrows and high-
brows as ‘difficult folk’ opposed to each other’s tastes, while the middle-
brows were ‘amiable and broadminded’. The highbrows, with an air of
superiority, characterised the lowbrows as only wanting jazz, comedy and
light music, while to the lowbrows, the highbrows were welcome to their
classical and modern music. By contrast, the middlebrows preferred a mix-
ture of popular and classical music which Edwards considered the BBC
provided. He felt that the middlebrows were now in the majority after the
Company had gently encouraged listeners to appreciate ‘good class music’
and that ‘the protests from the staunch low-brows have eased up consider-
ably’.19 This would not always prove to be the case.
For the first few years of broadcasting, radio was a novelty and func-
tioned more as a hobby. Many listeners focused more on building and
improving their radios and quality of reception rather than programme
content. The audience was typically male, comprising amateur radio build-
ers and enthusiasts together with those fascinated by, and wanting to expe-
rience, the new phenomenon of radio. However, women gradually became
an increasingly important section of the audience as listening developed
into a backdrop to domestic life. As radio embedded itself within the cul-
ture of the nation, the audience became more critical of the content and
quality of programmes. For a while in the mid-1920s, the Company
employed listeners to report on and make suggestions regarding pro-
gramme content, but this system was discontinued in 1927. Reith was not
opposed to programme criticism and he welcomed it from both the indus-
try and the listening public. In April 1924 he had written to the Company’s
member firms:
We endeavour to cater for all tastes in our programmes…Will you be good

enough to send us…any NOTES ON PROGRAMMES…We are anxious to
do our best by the trade, and in your business you come into touch with the
public to such an extent as would make your comments most useful…We

shall welcome criticisms no matter how drastic but please make them con-
structive and as brief as possible.20
That year, the Company set up a Programme Correspondence Section

and its postbag grew from 20,000 to 60,000 letters a year by 1927.21
Critical response from the wireless audience particularly over the provision
of light entertainment was already becoming a burning issue, and the
Radio Times frequently published articles concerning programmes and
programme policy. The first edition of the magazine carried a letter of
complaint about too many highbrow programmes and a plea for more of
a majority taste. Later another complainant requested more music hall and
other humorous broadcasts. A regular contributor to the journal thought
that the standard of vaudeville was good but could be improved. He sug-
gested that each act ‘should be severely tested at the microphone before
being let loose on the air’. A satisfied listener thought that ‘for all my
grumblings, our wireless programmes are excellent – if only you use them
the right way’. It is difficult to deduce from these opinions how wide-
spread these views on broadcast light entertainment were at the time.
Programme criticism also came from specialist wireless organisations
and societies which had been formed to serve the interests of two broad
groups: the technically minded and the listening public. The Wireless
League, which represented the views of listeners, frequently submitted
programme reports to the BBC. It recommended that light entertainment
should prevail in the schedules. The Wireless Organisations Advisory
Committee reported that this was in fact the case. Music was responsible
for 70 per cent of total wireless output, of which 55 per cent comprised
light, popular and dance music, while variety and drama was 6 per cent of
total programme content. The situation was more positive a year later
when the Wireless League reported that:
the programmes broadcast during the period under examination have met
with a greater measure of approval than any on which we have previously
reported. Complaints are less frequent and criticism is of a more definite and
helpful character. The public appreciates the evident desire of the BBC to
remove causes of complaint, but demands for an alteration of the Sunday
programme continues to be received.22
While there were complaints about a preponderance of ‘syncopated

items’, an increase in variety and vaudeville was welcomed, although the
22 M. DIBBS
standard was described as inconsistent. The Company’s Board, once they

began listening to the audience, realised that Reith’s public service broad-
casting ethos was becoming a focus of disquiet and concluded that it was
operating an excessively highbrow programme policy. Early in 1925,
W. Witt Burnham, a director of the Company, intervened and wrote to
Reith suggesting that there should be a greater proportion of lighter
entertainment programmes broadcast in the evenings instead of those
with a high intellectual content.
Nothing much happened as a result of Burnham’s intervention, and in
December 1925 he again expressed concern to Reith concerning short-
comings in output and summarised the main criticisms complaining of:
too much education, too many lectures and matters of that sort…too many
uninteresting items, such as Elizabethan music, newfangled songs, weird
quartettes and quintettes, groaning Chamber Music quite unappreciated by
the public, readings from unknown poets etc…also talks on subjects which
are of no interest to 99% of the listeners…Too short a programme on
Sunday evenings.23
Burnham and fellow director Basil Binyan attended some Programme

Board meetings where they produced letters of complaint about pro-
grammes from radio retailers. While Burnham believed that there was too
much nightly variation in programmes, he was impressed by the enthusi-
asm of the programme staff. The Company defended its programme pol-
icy and made no apology for ‘sixteenth century and “futurist” music: a
certain amount of this should be included, and the Programme Board
does not feel it is being overdone in any way’.24 A programme analysis for
the months of October and November 1925 supported the notion that
popular entertainment was strongly featured in the BBC’s schedules.
Popular music, including the categories of orchestra or band with songs,
entertainers, instrument solos, musical comedy, revue, star entertainers
and celebrity, and restaurant and cinema music represented 30.7 and
23.96 per cent for those two months respectively. The corresponding fig-
ures for dance music were 6.62 and 11.51 per cent.25 Following this, there
was no further representation concerning programmes from the directors
for the remainder of the company’s life.
With the BBC showing increasing expertise and growing confidence in
programme-making, listeners were reminded that owing to the diverse
nature of the audience they could not expect to be constantly entertained
but had to accept a balance in broadcast output. In 1928 the Radio Times
explained to its readers that only the BBC was equipped with the capacity
to meet the programme needs of the radio audience:
There is nothing that an outside organisation could provide that is not already
available to the programme builders of the BBC and while advice and sugges-
tions are always warmly welcomed, no ideas have come from outside which
have not already appeared within the organisation itself and been considered,
adopted or rejected…[and despite occasional criticisms the audience’s inter-
ests were]…conscientiously and jealously guarded by the BBC in its task of
entertaining, amusing and cultivating. There is no hour or minute which is
employed in any other way than in giving the best that is possible.26
A benevolent paternalism was making itself more apparent: it was clear

that the Company knew best and it would lead rather than be dictated to
on matters of public taste.
Filson Young, a programme adviser, consistently urged the audience to
adopt a more cerebral approach to listening. In his first weekly column for
Radio Times, he put the blame firmly on the listeners if they were unhappy
with the programmes. They needed to be more discriminating in their
choice of programmes and to concentrate when listening. He lambasted
them:
many of you have not even begun to master the art of listening; you have
not even begun to try…The arch-fault of the average listener is that he does
not select.27
In this Young was complaining about the listener who switched the
radio on and left it on all day. This ‘tap’, or non-discriminating, listening
was eschewed by the BBC who offered tips on good listening and in
upper-case type for emphasis:
LISTEN AS CAREFULLY AT HOME AS YOU DO IN A THEATRE OR

CONCERT HALL. YOU CAN’T GET THE BEST OUT OF A
PROGRAMME IF YOUR MIND IS WANDERING, OR IF YOU ARE
PLAYING BRIDGE OR READING…IF YOU LISTEN WITH HALF AN
EAR YOU HAVEN’T A QUARTER OF A RIGHT TO CRITICISE.28
Clearly the Corporation was encouraging listeners to be more discern-

ing in their listening habits and reminding them of the necessity to
24 M. DIBBS
c oncentrate on the programmes and not to use the radio simply as a back-
ground noise to daily domestic life. This was advice frequently repeated
throughout the 1930s.
First-Generation Radio Artists

The first radio variety programme to be broadcast, Veterans of Variety, was
transmitted on 30 January 1923. Most artists were poorly paid, and the
established stars of music hall and variety theatre were too costly to employ
regularly, even if they were permitted to broadcast by their managements.
The Company therefore looked for alternatives, frequently employing
amateur groups and individuals who were cheaper than professional enter-
tainers, including BBC employees and their friends who could be trusted
to provide acceptable, if not high-quality, entertainment. Many of the acts
employed at this time were of the concert party type which had its roots in
seaside entertainment, comprising a number of musical and comedy acts
performed by members of the same company. The first concert party cre-
ated especially for radio was Radio Radiance which initially broadcast on
6 July 1925. This form of entertainment maintained its popularity into the
war years.
Among the earliest and most popular artists was Helena Millais who
created radio’s first comedy character Our Lizzie and first broadcast a
week after the BBC opened. In her publicity material, Helena Millais said
of her character:
She may be telling you of her visit to a West End theatre, or her lost ’and-
bag, or her shopping at Woolworth’s on Saturday night but whatever she
does she is…one of the truest cockney types ever put on the stage. She is
LONDON. Lizzie is deservedly one of the most popular characters ever
broadcast.
Norman Long, who made his debut on 28 November 1922, a fort-

night after the BBC had gone on air, was one of the first variety artists to
appear on the radio. He specialised in comic songs to his own piano
accompaniment. In the theatre he was billed as ‘a song, a smile and a
piano’. When appearing for the BBC, the word ‘smile’ was replaced with
‘joke’ on the basis that a smile could not be seen on the radio. John Henry,
the stage-name of Norman Clapham, played a lugubrious Yorkshireman
and made his initial broadcast on 31 May 1923. With his catch phrases and
domestic tiffs with his wife Blossom, his rise to national fame was due
entirely to radio. However, radio’s first big star was civil servant Leslie
Harrison Lambert who broadcast under the pseudonym A.J. Alan between
1924 and 1940. To the radio audience, he was a mystery man and his true
identity remained secret throughout his career. He specialised in telling
humorous stories, beginning each of his broadcasts with the words ‘Good
evening everyone’, and was the first artist to master the art of creating an
intimacy between the broadcaster and the listener. He restricted his broad-
casts to about five a year in order to both protect his privacy and keep the
public wanting more. His stories appeared in the press and magazines and
were later published in two volumes.29 Mabel Constanduros created the
Buggins Family which was initially aired on 1 September 1925 and ran
regularly until 1948. Much to her surprise, she achieved national fame.
During the war the Ministry of Food used her Mrs Buggins character to
broadcast recipes. She also appeared on commercial radio as well as in
drama and films and played an important role in establishing and defining
the style of British radio comedy. Ronald Frankau, an Old Etonian, was a
cabaret entertainer who wrote much of his own material. He first broad-
cast in 1925. As a recording artist, much of his Parlophone output was
considered too risqué for broadcasting although it was reported that in
1932 his recordings sold in excess of 100,000 copies. When he toned
down his act, he became a frequent broadcaster and a favourite of John
Reith. He teamed up with Tommy Handley in 1930 to form probably the
first radio double-act ‘North and South’, which in 1934 became
‘Murgatroyd and Winterbottom’. Stainless Stephen, the alter ego of
Arthur Clifford Baynes, began his career as a teacher and became a music
hall entertainer after the First World War. He made his first broadcasts
from Sheffield in January 1923 and nationally in May 1925. His trade-
mark act normally comprised monologues and comments on current
affairs both of which included spoken punctuation. In 1932 he was voted
the most popular entertainer on radio and continued to broadcast into the
mid-1950s.
Other popular radio entertainers of the period were the duo Clapham
and Dwyer, Leonard Henry and Gillie Potter. The first comedians, in the
accepted sense of the word to broadcast, included Will Hay, Rob Wilton
and Tommy Handley. Handley was to achieve national stardom during the
Second World War with the radio show It’s That Man Again better known
as ITMA. All these artists had what the Company wanted, the capability to
connect with and entertain an unseen audience. Despite changes in public
26 M. DIBBS
taste, some of these pioneering artists were able to sustain their careers
into the 1950s. Although many are now forgotten, this does not diminish
their importance as performers who laid the foundations for popular
entertainment on radio to be built upon by succeeding generations of
radio artists.
Early Organisation of Light Entertainment

Light entertainment was present in the BBC’s schedules from the very
start of broadcasting, although there was no specific department for the
production of popular entertainment or variety. From the mid-1920s,
light entertainment programmes were made under the auspices of the
Productions Department under its Director R.E. Jeffrey whose experience
lay in drama. At this time there were very few within the organisation
experienced in the whole spectrum of popular entertainment. However, in
January 1926 Bertram Fryer, a former actor, producer and theatrical man-
ager, transferred from the post of Station Director in Bournemouth to
London, in order to concentrate on music hall and variety productions.
There he joined John Sharman, a producer since 1925, who explained
that there were two different types of variety entertainment:
one was in the more intimate style with well-known instrumentalists and the
quieter type of sketches and entertainers. In the other type we included
singers of popular songs and the broader type of comedian. One was called
Variety and the other Vaudeville.30
That there was departmental rivalry in these formative years was made
clear by Lionel Fielden, a member of the Talks Department:
At Savoy Hill…we were short of staff and money, and there was violent and
healthy competition between the various ‘departments’. ‘Talks’ thought
that ‘Variety’ was vulgar: ‘Variety’ thought that ‘Talks’ should not exist:
‘Talks’ and ‘Variety’ thought that ‘Music’ over the microphone was hope-
less: ‘Sport’ seemed an odious frivolity: as for ‘Drama’ –well, I ask you, plays
which you could not see!31
The Company thought of light entertainment largely in terms of its

traditional setting within the variety theatre and music hall, and producers
had the task of transferring artists who had developed in these spheres to
a live audience in radio. Not all popular artists could make the transition,
and Radio Times articulated the fine line between success and failure for
radio artists, ‘when broadcasting, you are aiming not at the great audito-
rium but at thousands of individual sitting rooms’.32 With its sound-only
format, radio variety was broadly limited to song and speech which inevi-
tably translated into singers, comedians, instrumentalists and impression-
ists. The BBC was continually searching for either established performers
or those with the potential to be moulded into radio artists. It frequently
made appeals for more ‘turns’ and the BBC Year Book 1933 advised:
There is always room, too, for “speciality instrumentalists”, whistlers, ven-

triloquists and artists with other out-of-the-way gifts, for vaudeville pro-
grammes must be balanced.33
It was estimated that during the late 1920s and early 1930s, between
1500 and 2000 auditions per year were arranged, of which less than one
per cent met the standard required. In 1931, while the BBC published an
impressive list of artists who had broadcast, only 123 new variety acts were
introduced against the estimated 300 required for the year.34 Auditions
played only a peripheral role in the search for new talent, and in 1933 they
were reported as taking up a great deal of producers’ time while only real-
ising about five per cent of suitable artists. The BBC’s policy of trying not
to over-expose successful acts for fear they would grow stale with the pub-
lic added to this problem.
The Company’s ability to produce popular entertainment programmes
was also influenced by the attitudes of those who ran the entertainment
industry. While the BBC was anxious to broadcast live from variety the-
atres and music halls, few within the organisation had any notion of the
workings of show business at this time. From the mid-1920s, the BBC
experienced an acrimonious relationship with various theatre and artist
managements. With the music hall and variety theatre facing competition
from the cinema, there was a hostile attitude towards radio which was seen
as another threat to audience numbers. Radio’s potential to bring artists
to the notice of a nationwide audience, make them household names and
thereby improve box office receipts was not immediately realised by the
entertainment industry whose managements would insert clauses into
their artists’ contracts prohibiting them from broadcasting. Many artists
refused to broadcast because they claimed their material which might have
lasted for years, once used on radio, would be unusable on stage. An esti-
mated 50 per cent of artists including George Robey and Ted Ray were
28 M. DIBBS
contractually prevented from broadcasting by music hall and theatre man-

agements. Some not under contract were coerced into declining the offer
of broadcasts by threats of an embargo on their stage appearances. Others
such as Sir Harry Lauder and Gracie Fields, two very big stars who could
afford to defy powerful theatrical interests, saw radio as enhancing their
careers and accepted broadcasts.35
Between 1923 and 1925, outside broadcasts from theatres and music
halls were proscribed by the Entertainment Protection Association, a con-
federation designed to protect theatrical interests from the threat of
broadcasting. However, in 1925 the BBC formalised its relationship with
the major entertainment organisations through membership of the
Entertainment Organisations Joint Broadcasting Committee. This agree-
ment was intended to remove obstacles to broadcasting for variety artists
but did not include the Variety Artists Federation, a body implacably
opposed to its artists making broadcasts. By March, a campaign against
the BBC had begun by Sir Oswald Stoll of Moss Empires and Charles
Gulliver of London Theatres of Variety Ltd. The Entertainment Protection
Association demanded that the entertainment industry should either be
allowed to broadcast from a station of its own or control variety broadcast-
ing from the BBC’s studios. Neither of these ideas was acceptable to the
Company nor was a proposal from George Black of the General Theatre
Corporation (GTC) to assume responsibility for all its variety programmes.
To accede to this would have meant the BBC losing a significant part of its
output and control over the content.
In 1928 Gerald Cock, Director of Outside Broadcasts and one of the
few people in the BBC with in-depth knowledge of show business, was
anxious to begin any sort of variety broadcasts. He arranged a series of
organ recitals by Reginald Foort from the London Palladium in con-
junction with George Black. However, these recitals ceased after an
injunction was obtained against the Palladium due to sound leakage
which interfered with the work of the Marlborough Street Police Court.
The GTC was now unable to perform the terms of their contract, but as
a friendly gesture, Cock waived the remainder of the contract and, as a
result, was subsequently successful in arranging for a series of variety
broadcasts from the theatre from October 1928. Walter Payne, Chairman
of the Society of West End Theatre Managers, tried to stop these broad-
casts, but Black argued that his actions were in accordance with an ear-
lier agreement of 1927 and that as the GTC were one of the major
players in the entertainment world, their collaboration with the BBC
was essential. Managements gradually realised that artists who had

become famous through radio had a value to them, not only since the
public came to see these artists in a live show but also because there was
the potential for increased audiences if they permitted extracts from
their shows to be broadcast. In 1929, following a successful approach to
the BBC from Sir Oswald Stoll regarding the possibility of broadcasting
from his Alhambra and Coliseum theatres, the radio audience was able
to hear many well-known stage artists. With Black and Stoll on board,
the BBC could then claim that it had little difficulty in engaging leading
performers for radio. It subsequently celebrated George Black as some-
one ‘who at once grasped the possibilities of broadcasting, and by his
ready co-operation contributed in no small measure to the successful
development of the present system’.36 As acrimony turned to harmony,
the BBC could look forward to being able to broadcast using a combi-
nation of its own stars together with those of show business and thereby
continue to control its output.
Cleaning Up Its Act

With the BBC’s policies and ethical standards in programming at an
evolutionary stage, it was the managerial and production staff with their
almost exclusively middle-class backgrounds, education and opinions
who would mould the Company’s culture. Preserving a high moral stan-
dard was paramount to Reith, and while there was no written policy on
the suitability of variety material for broadcasting, this did not mean that
there was no policy. The BBC assumed the guardianship of the nation’s
morality and developed an over-sensitivity towards causing any sort of
offence to its listeners. It was this imperative which characterised the
majority of the organisation’s first 45 years. Policy evolved based on, and
in response to, internal whim or public murmuring, typically either a
strongly worded memo from a senior member of staff who had heard
something untoward on the wireless the previous night or a letter from
an offended or outraged listener. The BBC’s general sense of concern
was captured in 1932 by Norman Long, a regular broadcaster, in his
light-hearted song We Can’t Let You Broadcast That. It satirised the
BBC’s attitude towards songs which it felt could not be broadcast with-
out causing offence to certain sections of the radio audience. After a
brief spoken introduction, he sings a light-hearted song to his own
accompaniment, gently mocking the BBC:
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transgressors, who fined and imprisoned many of the most
respectable heritors and gentlemen, particularly in the west, and
outlawed others who had declined answering their summons.
Enemies to the gospel of Christ, the prelatic rulers did not confine
their opposition to the preaching of the “outted” ministers, the
indulged were at the same time subjected to greater burdens. It was
evidently one of their main objects to produce division among the
Presbyterian ministers; and as we have seen the indulgence was
admirably calculated to effect this, yet the breach being neither so
wide nor so violent as they wished, “instructions” were issued to
them by the council. Assuming that they had accepted of liberty to
preach under conditions, the council accused them of violating their
engagements by baptizing without the necessary certificates, and
preaching in other places than their own kirk, without any license
from the bishop; and they added this injunction, that they should not
employ or allow any of their brethren to preach for them who had not
also obtained similar liberty. The indulged eluded the charges, by
alleging that they accepted of the indulgence as a boon from
government, not upon conditions, but as a favour granted; and the
instructions they considered as orders upon which they were to act
at their peril. But this neither satisfied the council nor their brethren,
both of whom concurred in thinking it an evasion rather than an
honest justification of their conduct. With the injunction they appear
to have complied also—a very unsatisfactory procedure—which
induced some, particularly of the younger unindulged preachers, to
visit the boundaries of their parishes, and led to heart-burnings and
mutual accusations between those who thought they might yield a
little to the pressure of the times, and those who in nothing would
recede from their avouched principles. These differences, which
afterwards unhappily led to coldness and estrangement among the
friends of “the good cause,” did not produce their most mischievous
effects till the oldest, stanch, tried worthies were removed from the
field. Meanwhile, the dispersion of the ministers, who, when they
were scattered abroad, went every where preaching the word, was
eminently blessed to promote that gospel it was intended to destroy,
and conventicles multiplied on every side both in houses and fields.
Of the period from 1673 to 1679, Shiels gives this animating
picture on reviewing it many years after, when the holy excitement
had subsided, and temporal prosperity had began to diffuse its
seductive influence over the revolution-church:—“When by
persecution many ministers had been chased away by illegal law
sentences, many had been banished away, and, by their ensnaring
indulgences, many had been drawn away from their duty; and others
were now sentenced with confinements and restraints if they should
not choose and fix their residence where they could not keep their
quiet and conscience both—they were forced to wander and
disperse through the country; and the people being tired of the cold
and dead curates, and wanting long the ministry of their old pastors,
so longed and hungered after the word, that they behoved to have it
at any rate, cost what it would; which made them entertain the
dispersed ministers more earnestly, and encouraged them more to
their duty; by whose endeavours—through the mighty power and
presence of God, and the light of his countenance now shining
through the cloud, after so fatal and fearful a darkness that had
overclouded the land for a while, that it made their enemies gnash
their teeth for pain, and dazzled the eyes of all onlookers—the word
of God grew exceedingly, and went through at least the southern
borders like lightning; or, like the sun in its meridian beauty,
discovering so the wonders of God’s law, the mysteries of his gospel,
and the secrets of his covenant, and the sins and duties of that day,
that a numerous issue was begotten to Christ, and his conquest was
glorious, captivating poor slaves of Satan and bringing them from his
power unto God, and from darkness to light.
“O! who can remember the glory of that day, without a melting
heart in reflecting upon what we have lost, and let go, and sinned
away by our misimprovement—a day of such power that it made the
people, even the bulk and body of the people, willing to come out
and venture upon the greatest of hardships, and the greatest of
hazards, in pursuing after the gospel, through mosses, and muirs,
and inaccessible mountains, summer and winter, through excess of
heat and extremity of cold, many days’ and nights’ journeys, even
when they could not have a probable expectation of escaping the
sword of the wilderness. But this was a day of such power, that
nothing could daunt them from their duty that had tasted once the
sweetness of the Lord’s presence at these persecuted meetings.
“Then we had such humiliation-days for personal and public
defections, such communion-days even in the open fields, and such
Sabbath-solemnities, that the places where they were kept might
have been called Bethel, or Peniel, or Bochim, and all of them
Jehovah-Shammah, wherein many were truly converted, more
convinced, and generally all reformed from their former immoralities;
that even robbers, thieves, and profane men, were some of them
brought to a saving subjection to Christ, and generally under such
restraint, that all the severities of heading and hanging in a great
many years could not make such a civil reformation as a few days of
the gospel in these formerly the devil’s territories, now Christ’s
quarters, where his kingly standard was displayed. I have not
language to lay out the inexpressible glory of that day; but I doubt if
ever there were greater days of the Son of Man upon the earth, than
we enjoyed for the space of seven years at that time.”[81]
81. Hind let Loose, p. 132.
The border districts, so notorious in our earlier history as the fields
of constant plundering and murder, exhibited now amid their wild
scenery a warfare of a very different description. “What wonderful
success,” says Veitch, “the preaching of the word has had by
ministers retiring thither, under persecution, in order to the
repressing, yea almost extinguishing, these feuds, thefts, and
robberies, that were then so natural to that place and people, is
worth a singular and serious observation. These news ought to be
matter of joy and thanksgiving to all the truly godly in Britain, that,
though the ark, the glory, and goings of our God be, alas! too much
removed from Shiloh-Ephratah, the ingrounds, the places of greater
outward plenty and pleasure, yet that he is to be found in the borders
of those lands, in the mountains and fields of the woods. Some of
the gentry on both sides of the borders have been forced both to see
and say that the gospel has done that which their execution of the
laws could never accomplish. And is not such a change worthy of
remark? to see a people who used to ride unweariedly through the
long winter nights to steal and drive away the prize, now, upon the
report of a sermon, come from far, travelling all night, to hear the
gospel; yea, some bringing their children along with them to the
ordinance of baptism, although the landlord threaten to eject the
tenant, and the master the servant, for so doing.”[82] Mr Gabriel
Semple gives a similar statement. “These borderers were looked
upon to be ignorant, barbarous, and debauched with all sort of
wickedness, that none thought it worth their consideration to look
after them, thinking that they could not be brought to any
reformation. Yet, in the Lord’s infinite mercy, the preaching to these
borderers had more fruit than in many places that were more
civilized.”[83]
82. Memoirs of William Veitch, written by himself, published by Dr M’Crie, p. 118.
83. Semple’s Life MSS., in Dr Lee’s possession, quoted by Dr M’Crie, as above.
What ought to have filled the breast of every right-hearted minister

of the gospel with joy, excited the fellest passions in the bosoms of
the prelates, who evinced their filiation by doing the deeds of their
father, (John viii. 44,) furiously seeking to destroy those who
declared the truth; because, wherever a Presbyterian preacher
came, the Episcopalian churches were forsaken, and the curates
were left to harangue to empty pews. Political squabbling for power
between Hamilton and Lauderdale, had diverted the attention of the
two parties for a while from Scottish ecclesiastical affairs, which the
ministers eagerly took advantage of to pursue their sacred vocation,
judging wisely that the respite which they enjoyed would be at best
precarious. When Lauderdale gained the ascendency, they
anticipated a longer continuance of the “blink;”[84] but the clouds soon
gathered thicker and darker. He knew he could only maintain his own
elevation by exalting Episcopacy; and he quickly showed that his
repeated declarations were not empty bravadoes. More correct in
their calculations, the bishops improved the opportunity; and the
council, his and their ready tool, issued fresh proclamations against
conventicles, increasing in severity as they increased in number.
84. “Blink”—a glimpse of sunshine in foul weather.
Averting their eyes from the loveliness of these bright prospects
that shone around them, they mourned withal “the sad and sensible
decays religion had of late suffered, and the great and dangerous
increase of profaneness through the most unreasonable and
schismatical separation of many from the public and established
worship, and the frequent and open conventicles, both in houses and
fields, by such as thereby discover their disaffection to the
established religion, and their aversion to his majesty’s authority and
government, endangering the peace of the kingdom, and dividing the
church under pretence of scruple:” therefore, to manifest their zeal
for the glory of Almighty God, the interests of the Protestant
reformed religion, and of the church—to secure the same by unity in
worship, and procuring all due reverence to archbishops, bishops,
and all subordinate clerical officers—the magistrates of the several
burghs were specially required to seize upon all persons who were,
or should be, intercommuned, and to remove the families of such
from all places under their jurisdiction, together with all preachers
and their families who did not attend the public worship! All
noblemen, gentlemen, and others, were strictly forbid to afford
shelter or aid to any intercommuned person, upon pain of being
themselves intercommuned; and whosoever should discover those
that transgressed, were to receive five hundred merks reward
immediately. Magistrates were also rendered liable to severe fining,
if they did not rigorously fulfil the imperative duty of searching out
and punishing all such as worshipped God after the manner they
chose to call heresy.
What means they thought lawful for obtaining information from
suspected persons, is evinced in their treatment of James Mitchell,
who made the unsuccessful attempt upon Sharpe. He had left the
country at the time, and did not return till he supposed the affair was
forgotten, when he married a woman who kept a small shop not far
from the primate’s town residence. In passing this way, his Grace
observed a person eye him keenly, which rather alarmed him, as he
thought he recognized his foiled assassin; and he caused him to be
arrested. A pistol, loaded with three bullets, being found in his
pocket, increased his terror, and he became extremely anxious to
know the extent of his danger. Accordingly, before the prisoner was
examined, he swore by the living God, if he would confess the act,
he would obtain his pardon; and a committee of the privy council,
consisting of Rothes, Lord Chancellor; Primrose, Lord Register;
Nisbet, Lord Advocate; and Hatton, Treasurer-depute, authorized by
the Commissioner, gave him a similar assurance. Disappointed,
however, by his confession, as they expected to discover a
conspiracy, on finding he had no accomplice, and unwilling that he
should thus escape, they remitted him to the Justiciary Court,
evading their solemn engagement by a jesuitical quibble, that the
promise of securing his life did not guarantee the safety of his limbs.
Having received a hint, as he was passing to trial, he disclaimed his
confession at the bar; and there being no other proof, the judicial
proceedings were abandoned, or, in Scottish law-phrase, the “diet”
was deserted, and he was remanded to prison, where he remained
till January this year, when the spirit of cruelty which appeared to
actuate the then rulers against all who were rigid Presbyterians,
especially preachers, urged them to subject their unhappy victim to
the torture.
About six o’clock in the evening of January 18th, Mitchell was
brought before a meeting of Justiciary, where the Earl of Linlithgow
sat president, and questioned whether he would adhere to his former
confession. He replied, that the Lord Advocate having deserted the
diet against him, he ought to have been, agreeably both to the law of
the nation and the practice of the court, set at liberty, and therefore
knew no reason why he was that night brought before their lordships.
Without any attention being paid to this strictly legal objection, he
was again asked, if he would adhere to his former confession? He
refused to own any confession; and Hatton most outrageously
exclaimed, “that pannel is one of the most arrogant cheats, liars, and
rogues I have ever known!” Mr Mitchell retorted, My lord, if there
were fewer of those persons you have been speaking of in the
nation, I would not have been standing at this bar. The President
said, “We will cause a sharper thing make you confess.” “I hope, my
lord, you are Christians and not Pagans,” was the prisoner’s
response, with which the business of that evening closed.
Upon the 22d, he was brought before them in the lower Council-
Chamber, and the question repeated, the President at the same time
pointing to the boots, said, “You see, sir, what is upon the table; I will
see if that will make you confess.” “My lord,” answered Mitchell
intrepidly, “I confess by torture you may make me blaspheme God,
as Saul did compel the saints; you may compel me to call myself a
thief, a murderer, a warlock, or any thing, and then pannel me upon
it; but if you shall, my lord, put me to it, I here protest before God and
your lordships, that nothing extorted from me by torture shall be
made use of against me in judgment, nor have any force in law
against me or any person whatsomever. But to be plain with you, my
lords, I am so much of a Christian, that whatever your lordships shall
legally prove against me, if it be a truth, I shall not deny it; but, on the
contrary, I am so much of a man, and a Scottishman, that I never
hold myself obliged by the law of God, nature, or the nation, to
become my own accuser.” Hatton rudely answered—“He hath the
devil’s logic, and sophisticates like him; ask him whether that be his
subscription.” “I acknowledge no such thing,” said the pannel, and
was remanded to jail.
Two days after, the judges, in formal pomp, arrayed in their robes,
and attended by the executioner with the instruments of torture, like
true inquisitors, first attempted to terrify their prisoner, before they
literally put him to the question. It was in vain. They could not shake
him. Had they not been dead to every nobler feeling of our nature,
they must have quailed when he thus addressed them:—“My lords, I
have now been these two full years in prison, and more than one of
them in bolts and fetters—more intolerable than many deaths. Some
in a shorter time have been tempted to make away with themselves;
but, in obedience to the express command of God, I have endured
all these hardships, and I hope to endure this torture also with
patience, on purpose to preserve my own life, and that of others
also, as far as lies in my power, and to keep the guilt of innocent
blood off your lordships and your families, which you doubtless
would incur by shedding mine. I repeat my protest. When you
please, call for the men you have appointed to their work.” The
executioner being in attendance, immediately tied Mr Mitchell in an
arm-chair, and asked which of the legs he should take? The lords
said, “Any of them.” The executioner laid in the left; but Mr Mitchell
taking it out, said, “Since the judges have not determined, take the
best of the two; I bestow it freely in the cause.” He was interrogated
about his being at the battle of Pentland, his meeting with Wallace or
with Captain Arnot—all of which he could veritably answer in the
negative. The tormentor then began to drive the wedges, asking at
every stroke if he had any more to say? To this he generally replied
“No.” After a while, when the pain began to be excruciating, he
exclaimed, again addressing his inquisitors—“My lords, not knowing
but this torture may end my life, I beseech you to remember, that ‘he
who showeth no mercy, shall have judgment without mercy;’ for my
own part, my lords, I do freely and from my heart forgive you who are
judges, and the men who are appointed to go about this horrid work,
and those who are satiating their eyes in beholding. I do entreat that
God may never lay it to the charge of any of you, as I beg that God,
for his Son Christ’s sake, may be pleased to blot out my sin and
mine iniquity.” At the ninth, the sufferer fainted through the extremity
of pain. “Alas! my lords,” said the executioner, “he is gone!” The
unfeeling wretches told him “he might stop,” and coolly walked off.
When Mitchell recovered, he was carried in the same chair back to
his prison. Here he continued till January 1677, when he was sent to
the Bass.
BOOK X.
A.D. 1676-1677.
Remarkable sacramental solemnities occasion harsher measures—Council new

modelled—Committee for public affairs—Kerr of Kersland—Kirkton—The
expatriated pursued to Holland—Colonel Wallace.
Political power, combined with ecclesiastical, essentially forms a

broad basis for the most excruciating tyranny, especially in spiritual
matters, which admits of no medium between implicit obedience or
cruel constraint. Accordingly, we always find, after some of those
hallowed seasons in which the persecuted had been able to elude
the vigilance of their oppressors, and had experienced them to be
indeed times of refreshing from on high, that immediately some new
and more violent proclamation followed, attempting, had it been
possible, to have interdicted their sacred intercourse with heaven.
Thus, the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper having been longed for by
many of those in the west who could not receive it at the hands of
the incumbents of their parishes, several ministers resolved to
celebrate it at different places, which was accordingly done with
peculiar solemnity, under the covert of night, to numerous
assemblages in the parish of Kippen, Stirlingshire; at the House of
Haggs, near Glasgow; and in a barn at Kennyshead, parish of
Eastwood; and it was remarked that the Lord very much owned
these communions as sweet sealing ordinances; but no sooner were
these doings whispered abroad, than a former proclamation against
conventicles was repeated, of more extensive comprehension, and
imposing a heavier penalty on every heritor in the land on whose
estate they should be held. Several council-committees were
appointed to perambulate the country, in order to enforce a vigorous
execution of the extra-legal mandates. This they did by requiring a
number of respectable gentlemen and ministers, whom they called
before them, to declare upon oath what conventicles they had
attended since the year 1674, what number of children they had
seen baptized, and whether they had reset or harboured any
intercommuned persons. Those who appeared were fined in various
sums, according to their circumstances, from fifty merks to a
thousand pounds Scots. In this iniquitous inquisition, silence was
construed into contempt; and to refuse, what no human law has a
right to require, becoming one’s own accuser, was punished even
more severely than an acknowledgment of default.
At the same time, the council was new modelled. The primate was
appointed president in absence of the Chancellor, and the two
archbishops with any third creature of their own, formed a quorum of
“the committee for public affairs,” who assumed the entire
management of ecclesiastical matters, then the chief if not the whole
of public business. Perhaps the most detestable feature in the
proceedings of this execrable committee was the system of
espionage they carried into private life. An example will best illustrate
the remark. Robert Kerr of Kersland having been forced to go abroad
with his family, his lady returned to Scotland to arrange some little
private business. He followed secretly, and to his great grief found
her sick of a fever when he arrived, yet durst not lodge in the same
house, but was wont to visit her stealthily in the evenings. Robert
Cannon of Mardrogat, a base spy, who hypocritically attended the
secret meetings of the persecuted, at a time when he knew Kersland
would be waiting on his sick lady, made application to Lauderdale for
a warrant to apprehend Mr John Welsh, represented as then keeping
a conventicle in her chamber. A friend of her’s who was with the
Commissioner when he received the information, assured him that it
was false, as she knew that Lady Kersland was very unwell. The
warrant, however, was granted, but with express instructions from
Lauderdale that the sick lady should not be disturbed if no
conventicle appeared in the house.
A party came—there was no conventicle—and they were
departing; but the reptile informer had told one of them that when
any strangers came into the room, Kersland was wont to secrete
himself behind the bed. He, accordingly, stepped direct to the place,
and drawing the gentleman from his concealment, ordered him to
surrender his arms. Kersland told him he had no arms but the Bible
—the sword of the Spirit—which he presented to him. He was
immediately made prisoner. When led away, his wife displayed great
composure, and besought him to do nothing that might wound his
conscience out of regard for her or her children, repeating earnestly
as he left her—“No man having put his hand to the plough, and
looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Before the council, he undauntedly defended the patriotic “rising”
at Pentland, as a lawful effort in defence of their liberties; on which
he was immediately ordered to prison. When being carried off, the
Chancellor sneeringly asked him what it was his lady said to him at
parting? He replied “he did not exactly remember.” “Then I will
refresh your memory—she exhorted you to cleave to the good old
cause;—ye are a sweet pack!” He was after this imprisoned in
different jails for several years, till at last, being ordered into close
confinement in Glasgow tolbooth, to be kept there during the
archbishop’s pleasure, who had a personal dislike at him, a dreadful
fire most opportunely broke out in the town, which threatening the
prison, the populace with instinctive humanity released all the
inmates; and Kersland among the rest regained his liberty.[85] He
then went to Holland, the common asylum for Protestant sufferers,
and died at Utrecht, in November 1680.
85. “Nov. 3, 1677. The fire brake up in Glasgow in the heid of the Salt-mercat, on
the right, near the cross, which was kyndled by a malicious boy, a smith’s
apprentice, who being threatened, or beatt and smittin by his master, in
revenge whereof setts his work-house on fyre in the night-tyme, being in the
backsides of that forestreet, and flyes for it. It was kyndled about one in the
morning; and having brunt many in the backsyde, it breaks forth in the fore
streets about three of the morning; and then it fyres the street over against it,
and in a very short tyme burned down to more than the mids of the Salt-
mercat; on both sydes fore and back houses were all consumed. It did burn
also on that syd to the Tron Church, and two or three tenaments down on the
heid of the Gallowgate. The heat was so great, that it fyred the horologe of
the tolbooth (there being some prisoners it at that tyme, amongst whom the
Laird of Carsland was one, the people brake open the tolbooth-doors and
sett them free); the people made it all their work to gett out their goods out of
the houses; and there was little done to save houses till ten of the cloke, for it
burnt till two hours afternoon. It was a great conflagration and nothing inferior
to that which was in the yeir 1652. The wind changed several tymes. Great
was the cry of the poor people, and lamentable to see their confusion. It was
remarkable that a little before that tyme, there was seen a great fyre pass
through these streets in the night-tyme, and strange voices heard in some
parts of the city.” Law’s Memorials, p. 135.
Perhaps a more flagrant and vexatious example of the harassment

to which honest individuals were then exposed can scarcely be
given, than that of the venerable Kirkton the historian. He was
walking along the High Street of Edinburgh at mid-day, in the month
of June, when—but we shall let him tell his own tale—“he was very
civilly accosted by a young gentleman, Captain Carstairs, attended
by another gentleman and a lackey. Carstairs desyred to speak a
word with him, to which he answered he would wait upon him; but
because he knew not to whom he spake, he quietly asked the other
gentleman (James Scott of Tushiclaw) who this young gentleman
might be; but Scott answered with silence and staring. Then Mr
Kirkton perceived he was prisoner among his enemies, but was very
glade they carried him to a private house, and not to the prison,
which they were very near; but they carried him to Carstairs’
chamber, ane ugly dark hole, in Robert Alexander, messenger, his
house. As soon as ever he was brought into the house, Carstairs
abused him with his tongue, and pusht him till he got him into his
own chamber, which made the people of the house weep. After he
hade got him into his ugly chamber, he sent away Scott and
Douglass, his lackey, (as Mr Kirkton supposed) to fetch his
companions; but as soon as they were alone, Mr Kirkton askt him
what he meant? what he would doe with him? Carstairs answered,
sir, you owe me money. Mr Kirkton askt him whom he took him to be,
denying he owed him any thing. Carstaires answered, are not you
John Wardlaw? Mr Kirkton denied, telling him who he was indeed.
Then Carstaires answered, if he were Mr Kirkton he hade nothing to
say to him. Mr Kirkton askt him who he was. He answered he was
Scott of Erkletone, whom indeed he did much resemble, but spoke
things so inconsistent, Mr Kirkton knew not what to think; for if
Carstaires had designed to make him prisoner, he might easily have
done it before. But after they hade stayed together about half an
hour, Mr Kirkton begane to think Carstaires desired money, and was
just beginning to make his offer of money to Carstaires, when
Jerviswood, Andrew Stevenson, and Patrick Johnston came to the
chamber-door, and called in to Carstaires, asking what he did with a
man in a dark dungeon, and all alone? Mr Kirkton finding his friends
come, tooke heart. ‘Now,’ sayes Mr Kirkton to Carstaires, ‘there be
some honest gentlemen at your door, who will testifie what I am, and
that I am not John Wardlaw; open the door to them.’ ‘That will I not,’
sayes Carstaires, and with that layes his hand on his pocket-pistoll;
which Mr Kirkton perceiving, thought it high time to appear for
himself, and so clapt Carstaires closs in his armes; so mastering
both his hands and his pistoll, they struggled a while in the floor; but
Carstaires being a feeble body, was borne back into a corner. The
gentlemen without hearing the noise, and one crying out of murther,
burst quickly the door open (for it hade neither key nor bolt,) and so
entered, and quietly severed the stragglers, tho’ without any violence
or hurt done to Carstaires.
“As soon as Mr Kirkton and the gentlemen had left Carstaires
alone, Scott, his companion, came to him, and they resolved not to
let it goe so, but to turn their private violence into state service; and
so to Hatton they goe with their complaint; and he upon the story
calls all the lords of the councill together, (tho’ they were all at
dinner,) as if all Edinburgh hade been in armes to resist lawfull
authority, for so they represented it to the councill: and he told the
councill when they were conveened that their publick officers hade
catcht a fanatick minister, and that he was rescued by a numerous
tumult of the people of Edinburgh. The councill tryed what they
could, and examined all they could find, and after all could discover
nothing upon which they could fasten. Mr Kirkton hade informed his
friends that it was only a reall robbery designed, and that indeed
money would have freed him, if Carstaires and he hade finished
what he begune to offer; and the councill could find no more in it,
and so some councillors were of opinion. But Bishop Sharpe told
them that except Carstaires were encouraged, and Jerviswood made
ane example, they needed never think a man would follow the office
of hunting fanaticks; and upon this all those who resolved to follow
the time and please bishops, resolved to give Sharpe his will. So the
next councill-day, after much high and hot debate in the councill,
Jerviswood was fyned 9000 merks—[£562. 10s. sterling, a grievous
sum in those days]—(3000 [£187. 10s.] of it to be given to Carstaires
for a present reward;) Andrew Stevenson was fyned 1500 merks
[£92. 15s.]; and Patrick Johnston in 1000 [£62. 10s.]; and all three
condemned to ly in prison till Mr Kirkton was brought to relieve
them.”
It would be difficult to find language to designate this transaction.
Kirkton further informs us that it occasioned “great complaining,” and
“all the reason the councill gave of their severe sentence was, that
they found Jerviswood guilty of resisting authority by Captain
Carstaires’ production of his warrand before the councill. But this did
not satisfie men of reason; for, first, it was thought unaccountable
that a lybell should be proven by the single testimony of ane
infamous accuser against the declaration of three unquestionable
men, and all the witnesses examined. Next, Carstaires’ producing a
warrand at the councill table, did not prove that he produced any
warrand to Jerviswood, and, indeed, he produced none to him,
because he had no warrand himself at that time; as for the warrand
he produced, it was writ and subscribed by Bishop Sharpe after the
deed was done, tho’ the bishop gave it a false date long before the
true day.” What infuriated the council, was the deep interest the
inhabitants of Edinburgh took in this foul business; when it came
before them, the passages to the Council-chamber were crowded
with anxious inquirers; and it was debated at the council-board,
whether all who were in the lobby should be imprisoned or not?—it
was decided not, only by one voice.
[1677.] Prelatic inveteracy was not, however, bounded by
Scotland, it pursued into other countries those who found among
foreign Protestants that freedom of conscience denied them at
home. Messrs Robert Macwaird and Mr John Brown, two eminent
ministers, who had sought refuge in Holland, having been requested
by the other Scottish refugees to exercise their sacred function
among them at Rotterdam, the states-general were instantly required
by Charles to dismiss them from their territories; and, in order to
escape a war with England, were forced to comply with the tyrant’s
demand, yet not till they had afforded their respected guests an
opportunity of disposing of their effects to the best advantage and
looking out for another asylum.
The persevering rancour of Charles, and the reluctance of the
states, occasioned a protracted discussion of two days in their
senate; and Sir William Temple declared that it had been the hardest
piece of negotiation he had ever entered upon. Its issue was
productive of a nobler and more durable testimony to the worth of
the persecuted exiles, than could otherwise have been procured,
and will hand down to posterity the everlasting remembrance of
these righteous men, while the memory of the worthless monarch
shall rot. The states entered on their record a resolution, importing
that “the foresaid three Scotsmen have not only behaved and
comported themselves otherwise than as became good and faithful
citizens of these states, but have also given many indubitable proofs
of their zeal and affection for the advancement of the truth, which
their High Mightinesses have seen with pleasure, and could have
wished that they could have continued to live here in peace and
security.” Besides which, each received a separate testimonial on
their departure. The following is a copy of the one put into the hands
of Colonel Wallace:—“The States-General of the United Netherlands,
to all and every one who shall see or read these presents, health: Be
it known and certified that James Wallace, gentleman, our subject,
and for many years inhabitant of this state, lived among us highly
esteemed for his probity, submission to the laws, and integrity of
manners. And therefore we have resolved affectionately to request,
and hereby do most earnestly request, the Emperor of the Romans,
and all Kings, Republics, Princes, Dukes, States, Magistrates, or
whomsoever else our friends, and all that shall see these presents,
that they receive the said James Wallace in a friendly manner
whenever he may come to them, or resolve to remain with them, and
assist him with their council, help, and aid; testifying, that for any
obliging, humane, or kindly offices done to him, we shall be ready
and forward to return the favour to them and their subjects
whensoever an opportunity offers. For the greater confirmation
whereof, we have caused these presents to be sealed with our seal
of office, and signed by the President of our Assembly, the sixth day
of the month of February, in the year one thousand six hundred and
seventy-seven.”
Colonel Wallace was afterwards forced to lurk about the borders of
France or the Netherlands, whence he addressed to “the Lady
Caldwell, widow of William Mure of Caldwell,” the following letter,
which I give as a specimen of the seditious correspondence he was
accused of holding with the fanatics:—
“Elect Lady and my worthie and dear Sister,—Your’s is come to
my hand in most acceptable tyme. It seems that all that devils or men
these many years have done (and that has not been lytle) against yow, to
dant your courage, or to make yow, in the avoweing of your master and
his persecuted interests, to loore your sailes hes prevailed so lytle, that
your fayth and courage is upon the groweing hand, ane evidence indeed
to your persecuters of perdition, bot to yow of salvation, and that of God.
It seems when yow at first by choyce tooke Christ by the hand to be your
Lord and portion, that yow wist what yow did; and that notwithstandeing
all the hardnesses yow have met with in bydeing by him, your heart
seems to cleave the faster to him. This sayes yow have been admitted
into much of his company and fellowship. My sowle blesses God on your
behalf who hath so caryed to yow, that I think yow may take those words,
amongst others, spoken to you—‘Yow have continued with me in my
aflictions; I appoint unto yow a kingdom.’ It seems suffering for Christ,
loseing any thing for him, is to yow your glory—is to yow your gayn. More
and more of this spirit maye yow enjoye, that yow may be among the few
(as it was said of Caleb and Joshua) that followed him fullie—among the
overcomers, those noble overcomers, mentioned Revel. ii. and iii.—
among those to whom only (as pickt out and chosen for that end) he is
sayeing, ‘Yow are my witnesses.’ Lady and my dear sister, I am of your
judgement; and I blesse his name that ever he counted me worthie to
appear in that roll. It is now a good many years since the master was
pleased to even me to this, and to call me forth to appear for him; and it is
trew these fortie years bygone (as to what I have mett with from the
world) I have been as the people in the wilderness; yet I maye saye it to
this howre, I never repented my ingadgements to him, or any of my
owneings of him; yea, these rebutes to say so I gott from men, wer to me
my joye and crowne, because I know it was for his sake I was so dealt
with; and this, it being for his sake, I was ready in that case (as Christ
sayes) when men had taken me upon the one cheek for his sake, to turn
to them the other also. Never was I admitted to more neerness, never
was my table better covered, then since I left Rotterdam. Let us take
courage and goe on as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, endureing hardnes.
O for more fayth! O for more fayth among his people! As to this people,
there is nothing to be seen in their waye that is promiseing of any good;
bot on the contrar. O! I feare the Lord hes given them up unto their owne
heart’s lusts. They doe indeed walke in their owne counsels. That same
spirit of persecution, and these same principles, that are among you, are
heir; bot as God is faythfull, they shall be all brocken to pieces and turned
backe with shame that hate Zion. Wayt but a lytle; they are diggeing the
pit for themselves. The Lord hath founded Zion, and the poore of the
people shall trust in it. Let us mynd one another. My love to all friends
whom yow know I love in the Lord. God’s grace be with yow, and his
blessing upon your lytle ones whom he hath been a father to. In him I
rest. Your’s as formerly.
“Ja. Wallace.”
BOOK XI.
A.D. 1677.
Meeting of the ministers in Edinburgh—Prosecutions for not attending the kirk—

Lord Cardross—Conventicle at Culross—Bond—Lauderdale comes to
Scotland—Pretended moderation—Alarm of the bishops—Carstairs attacks
John Balfour’s house—Council’s design of raising a standing force—
Resolutions of the West country gentlemen—Conventicles increase—
Communion at East Nisbet—Common field-meeting—King authorizes calling in
the Highland clans.
Early in the year, a pretty large meeting, both of the indulged and
unindulged ministers, had been held in Edinburgh, for the purpose of
considering the religious state of the country, and for endeavouring
to heal the differences which still subsisted among themselves
respecting what should have been long before dismissed as
vexatious—the conduct of those who had declared against the
resolutions, and who still lay under the sentence of some of the
church courts. It commenced inauspiciously, Mr Blackadder having
proposed that before they proceeded to business, some time should
be set apart for fasting and humiliation on account of their
defections, especially the tokens of disunion which began to appear
respecting the indulgence. This gave rise to some unpleasant
altercation. Mr Richard Cameron, then a probationer, with two
others, being called to account for their preaching separation from
the indulged, declined the right of the meeting to interfere with their
conduct, it not being a lawfully constituted judicatory, and continued

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Radio Fun and the BBC Variety

Department, 1922—67: Comedy and

Words, Music, and the Popular : Global Perspectives on

Radio Critics and Popular Culture 1st ed. Edition Paul

This is the BBC: Entertaining the Nation, Speaking for

Popular Music in America: The Beat Goes On 5th Edition,

Popular Music Scenes: Regional and Rural Perspectives

The Special Liveliness of Hooks in Popular Music and

The Democratic Sublime: On Aesthetics and Popular

Popular Music, Critique and Manic Street Preachers 1st

Radio Fun and the BBC

Professor Alexander S. Wilkinson

More information about this series at

Radio Fun and the

Palgrave Studies in the History of the Media

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018951786

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019

2 1922–1933: Variety Before Variety 13

3 1933–1939: The Show Begins 47

Some Like It Hot 74

4 1939–1945: We Will Be Working Under Difficulties 107

5 1945–1955: A Golden Age for Radio Comedy 171

6 1956–1967: Sound into Vision; Popular into Pop 229

Sources and Further Reading 283

AEFP Allied Expeditionary Forces Programme

Table 6.4 London Home Service: annual programme content in

There was no television in our house until 1966. Consequently I grew up

© The Author(s) 2019 1

myriad problems, simply got on with the business of entertaining the

morale-boosting by entertaining the nation at home and forces overseas

of a popular music network (Radio 1) and the rebranding of the Light,

1922–1933: Variety Before Variety

The Dawn of Radio Entertainment

This broadcast captured the listening public’s imagination and demon-

© The Author(s) 2019 13

­ ass-­entertainment. While these experiments continued, there was a delay

Eckersley subsequently became the BBC’s first Chief Engineer but

John Reith: Architect of the BBC

privileged. Such an improving medium for the nation could only be

It is occasionally indicated to us that we are apparently setting out to give

However, while Reith developed the concept of public service broad-

I think that the principal elements of broadcasting service are entertain-

Sarnoff’s aspirations were taken up by Reith, but with a different

To entertain means to occupy agreeably. Would it be urged that this is only

Maurice Gorham, one-time editor of Radio Times, had definite ideas

Personally I believe that Reith suffered increasingly from a subconscious

While the public focused on radio as a source of entertainment, the

Early Programme-Making and Criticism

difficult task, and the expressions ‘highbrow’, ‘lowbrow’ and ‘middle-

We endeavour to cater for all tastes in our programmes…Will you be good

public to such an extent as would make your comments most useful…We

That year, the Company set up a Programme Correspondence Section

While there were complaints about a preponderance of ‘syncopated

standard was described as inconsistent. The Company’s Board, once they

Burnham and fellow director Basil Binyan attended some Programme

A benevolent paternalism was making itself more apparent: it was clear

LISTEN AS CAREFULLY AT HOME AS YOU DO IN A THEATRE OR

Clearly the Corporation was encouraging listeners to be more discern-

2 1922–1933: Variety Before Variety 13

3 1933–1939: The Show Begins 47

Some Like It Hot 74

4 1939–1945: We Will Be Working Under Difficulties 107

5 1945–1955: A Golden Age for Radio Comedy 171

6 1956–1967: Sound into Vision; Popular into Pop 229

Sources and Further Reading 283

ass-entertainment. While these experiments continued, there was a delay