The references below are grouped into Topics,
Places, Museums,
Organisations and Other
Resources,
with links to this web site and many others.
Topics |
|
Communications |
Chronology of Communication Events:
A global perspective from an author based at Harvard. |
Early broadcasting |
Radio Emma Toc.
Information about 2MT.
Early Radio and
Television UK magazine articles on early radio and
television, from the period 1925-1940, the politics, economics, technology. |
Reminiscences |
Features Index on MB21.
Recommendation: Tales from a Cold Field, by Ray Cooper.
Research,
Designs,
Equipment,
Comms Projects,
Transmitter Projects,
Studio & O.B. Ops.,
Comms Ops.,
Transmitter
Ops. and War on
BBCeng. |
Studios |
BBC Radiophonic Workshop
A good website full of video, captioned pictures and technical
articles about the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, showing its development over the
years.
Radiophonic Museum
Radiophonic Museum of BBC Audio Engineering and Design (in
Stockport). This is a living, working museum rather than just a repository of
relics in glass cabinets. Much of the restored BBC heritage is used on a daily
basis by a younger generation of musicians and engineers who have never seen
anything like it and find it amazing to work with.
Normal Stop
BBC World Service equipment and studio operations in Bush House
from the late 1950s to the last transmission on 12th July 2012.
The link no longer works. If you know where the content has gone please
let me know.
Old
broadcasting equipment and memories
Pictures of old BBC radio equipment and memories from the people who used it.
The Tech Ops History site
Pictures and memories from "the golden age of television".
An incomplete history of London's
television studios
Deals mostly with the main large studio complexes that have a
history that goes back to the origins of ITV and the BBC.
Museum of the
Broadcast Television Camera
This site is under construction, but already has many pictures of
television cameras as well as information about them. |
Technology |
Mainly in
Designs,
Eng Inf and
Technical Reviews
on BBCeng.
'Wonders
of World Engineering': Engineering articles from the
1930s, including Television and Droitwich. |
Television |
100 Voices that made
the BBC – The Birth of TV
The British Heritage
Television Group Alexandra Palace and more.
MHP - Home of the Test Card Gallery:
Dedicated to everything television.
The Test Card
Circle: Test cards and associated music that was
played during BBC and ITV Trade Test Transmissions.
Animated clocks:
Includes the BBC's first
electronically generated clock, as originally designed by
Richard Russell.
VT Old Boys: From VERA to D3 - the entire history of
videotape in the BBC.
Slow motion video - 1966 style:
An article by Peter Rainger, ex-Head of BBC Designs Department.
TV Outside Broadcast
History: Includes descriptions of the technical
systems used for major UK OBs. (New
in 2020)
O.B.
vehicles: Article from 1951 in Commercial Vehicles
publication. (New in 2020) |
Transmitters |
UK
Terrestrial Radio & TV Transmitters: Information
about past, present and future transmitters.
ET4336
RCA transmitter.
Radio Bygones
Magazine, No. 87 Feb/Mar 2004 (Part 1) and No 88 (Part 2).
A
Passion for Radio: A personal view of BBC
transmitting stations. Many good pictures. |
Museums |
|
If you know of
any important examples of BBC equipment that are in danger of being
scrapped, please contact an appropriate museum. |
Science Museum, London |
Science Museum: Information about
2LO, the BBC's first transmitter. |
Science and Industry Museum, Manchester |
Science and Industry
Museum. Includes items from Studio B (regional
TV) which was installed at BBC Oxford Road in Manchester in 1980 by the BBC
Studio Capital Installations Department. |
Museum of Communication, Scotland |
Museum of Communication Burntisland, |
Wireless in Wales |
Wireless in Wales
Vintage Radio Museum Denbigh. |
Radio Museum in Somerset |
The Radio Museum, Watchet. |
Pye |
Cambridge Museum of
Technology Pye, founded in Cambridge in 1894 and taken
over by Philips in 1967, was a major supplier of cameras, transmission
equipment and other kit to the BBC and other broadcasters, as well as making
domestic radios and televisions. A new permanent exhibition at Cambridge
Museum of Technology has an excellent selection of old equipment that will
please anyone interested in engineering and industrial design and is well
worth a visit. |
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