1953: Those Radio Times

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BBC Radio 4 Extra - 1953: Those Radio Times

Nick Baker celebrates the Best of British in Coronation year.

In Coronation year, television is taking off. With the help of the sounds, songs and some wonderful programme highlights, Nick Baker discovers that radio was still going strong.

*  The Glums are thinking of buying a TV set. 
*  Butter rationing is troubling the Any Questions audience. 
*  Stanley Matthews makes the Cup Final. 
*  Wilfred Pickles makes an appearance in some Cold War propaganda.

Nick Baker celebrates 1953: Those Radio Times. The year of the Coronation. 

Taking sounds, songs and radio highlights, he evokes a year shaking off its shabby post-war austerity and preparing for fun, pomp and a great summer of sport.

We hear from Robert Oppenheimer. We hear about Mary Whitehouse's first appearance on Woman's Hour in David Kynaston's Family Britain, read by Dominic West. Lord Hailsham rails against commercial television on London Forum and there's an extraordinary interview with novelist Evelyn Waugh for Frankly Speaking. His grandson claims the programme sent him mad.

Fancy a round of Twenty Questions? 
Want to know what listeners to the BBC Light Programme woke up to? 
Listen to eye-witness accounts of flying saucers seen over Cheshire in People Talking. 
Meet a pre-Animal Magic Johnny Morris in a sweet factory for Pass The Salt.

1953: Those Radio Times pits radio against television in the year it took off and its audience outstripped that of the wireless, for the first time.

Could radio win the battle with a hit from the team at Take It From Here? Or could it do it by landing on the Moon?

Made for BBC Radio 4 Extra by Testbed Productions and first broadcast in June 2013.

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