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Douglas Smith (broadcaster)
Douglas Arthur Smith''England & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007'' (11 February 1924 – 15 October 1972) was a British radio announcer and comedian who spent 25 years with the BBC. He began his broadcasting career with the BBC European Service (now the BBC World Service, World Service) in 1946 and later worked as an announcer and newsreader on the BBC Home Service, Home Service and the BBC Third Programme, Third Programme. He is probably best remembered as the formal announcer on ''Beyond Our Ken'' (1958–1964), its successor ''Round the Horne'' (1965–1968) and the short-lived ''Stop Messing About'' (1969–1970), where his "Received Pronunciation, BBC accent" was used to comic effect. In this role, he advertised ''Dobbiroids'' (a fictional product for horses) and the huge number of naïve sound effects he made to assist in the development of humorous and often bizarre plots. Smith performed "Nobody Loves a Fairy When She's Forty" in an episode of ''Round the Ho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (founded in 1821) are published by Times Newspapers, since 1981 a subsidiary of News UK, in turn wholly owned by News Corp. ''The Times'' and ''The Sunday Times'', which do not share editorial staff, were founded independently and have only had common ownership since 1966. In general, the political position of ''The Times'' is considered to be centre-right. ''The Times'' is the first newspaper to have borne that name, lending it to numerous other papers around the world, such as '' The Times of India'', ''The New York Times'', and more recently, digital-first publications such as TheTimesBlog.com (Since 2017). In countries where these other titles are popular, the newspaper is often referred to as , or as , although the newspaper is of na ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Broadcasting
Broadcasting is the distribution of audio or video content to a dispersed audience via any electronic mass communications medium, but typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum (radio waves), in a one-to-many model. Broadcasting began with AM radio, which came into popular use around 1920 with the spread of vacuum tube radio transmitters and receivers. Before this, all forms of electronic communication (early radio, telephone, and telegraph) were one-to-one, with the message intended for a single recipient. The term ''broadcasting'' evolved from its use as the agricultural method of sowing seeds in a field by casting them broadly about. It was later adopted for describing the widespread distribution of information by printed materials or by telegraph. Examples applying it to "one-to-many" radio transmissions of an individual station to multiple listeners appeared as early as 1898. Over the air broadcasting is usually associated with radio and television, thou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
BBC World Service
The BBC World Service is an international broadcasting, international broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC, with funding from the Government of the United Kingdom, British Government through the Foreign Secretary, Foreign Secretary's office. It is the world's largest external broadcaster in terms of reception area, language selection and audience reach. It broadcasts radio news, speech and discussions in more than 40 languages to many parts of the world on Analogue signal, analogue and Shortwave listening, digital shortwave platforms, internet streaming, podcasting, Satellite radio, satellite, Digital Audio Broadcasting, DAB, FM broadcasting, FM and Medium wave, MW relays. In 2015, the World Service reached an average of 210 million people a week (via TV, radio and online). In November 2016, the BBC announced that it would start broadcasting in additional languages including Amharic and Igbo language, Igbo, in its biggest expansion since the 1940s. "BBC World Servic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
BBC Home Service
The BBC Home Service was a national and regional radio station that broadcast from 1939 until 1967, when it was replaced by BBC Radio 4. History 1922–1939: Interwar period Between the early 1920s and the outbreak of World War II, the BBC developed two nationwide radio stations – the National Programme and the Regional Programme (which were begun broadcasting on 9 March 1930) – as well as a basic service from London that include programming originated in six regions. Although the programme items attracting the greatest number of listeners tended to appear on the National, the two services were not streamed: they were each designed to appeal "across the board" to a single but variegated audience by offering between them and at most times of the day a choice of programme type rather than simply catering, each of them exclusively, to two distinct audiences. 1939–1945: World War II On 1 September 1939, the BBC merged the two programmes into one national service from Lo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
BBC Third Programme
The BBC Third Programme was a national radio station produced and broadcast from 1946 until 1967, when it was replaced by Radio 3. It first went on the air on 29 September 1946 and quickly became one of the leading cultural and intellectual forces in Britain, playing a crucial role in disseminating the arts. It was the BBC's third national radio network, the other two being the Home Service (mainly speech-based) and the Light Programme, principally devoted to light entertainment and music. History When it started in 1946, the Third Programme broadcast for six hours each evening from 6.00pm to midnight, although its output was cut to just 24 hours a week from October 1957, with the early part of weekday evenings being given over to educational programming (known as "Network Three"). The frequencies were also used during daytime hours to broadcast complete ball-by-ball commentary on test match cricket, under the title '' Test Match Special". The Third's existence was cont ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beyond Our Ken
''Beyond Our Ken'' is a BBC radio comedy programme first broadcast between 1958 and 1964. It starred Kenneth Horne, with Kenneth Williams, Hugh Paddick, Betty Marsden, Bill Pertwee, and, as announcer, Douglas Smith. The title is a play on the name Kenneth and the familiar expression "beyond our ken" (''ken'' being a mainly Northern English and Scots word meaning 'knowledge or perception'). The show ran for seven series, and a total of 121 shows. The scripts were by Eric Merriman, with Barry Took as co-writer in the first two series. Musical accompaniment was provided by the BBC Revue Orchestra, with musical interludes mostly by the Fraser Hayes Four. When the show finished it was replaced by the series ''Round the Horne'' (1965–1968), which built on, and exceeded, the success of the earlier show. Background Eric Merriman had written some material for Barry Took, when the latter was an aspiring stand-up comic.Took, p. 137 They subsequently collaborated in writing material ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Round The Horne
''Round the Horne'' is a BBC Radio comedy programme starring Kenneth Horne, first transmitted in four series of weekly episodes from 1965 until 1968. The show was created by Barry Took and Marty Feldman, who wrote the first three series. The fourth was written by Took, Johnnie Mortimer, Brian Cooke and Donald Webster. Horne's supporting cast comprised Kenneth Williams, Hugh Paddick, Betty Marsden and, in the first three series, Bill Pertwee. The announcer was Douglas Smith (broadcaster), Douglas Smith, who also took part in the sketches. All except the last series featured music by Edwin Braden, played by the band "the Hornblowers", with a song in the middle of each show performed by the Close and open harmony#Vocal music, close-harmony singing group the Fraser Hayes Four; in the fourth series, the music was by Max Harris (composer), Max Harris with a smaller group of players than the earlier series. The show was the successor to ''Beyond Our Ken'', which had run from 1958 to 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stop Messing About
''Stop Messing About'' was a BBC radio series broadcast in 1969 and 1970. Forced by circumstance into being a follow-up to ''Round the Horne'', it retained a number of key talents from the previous show, with Kenneth Williams as the new show's main star. It was rewritten for the stage in 2009. Radio series The sudden death of ''Round the Horne'' star Kenneth Horne at the end of series four prompted a rewrite of the material intended for series five which then found its way into ''Stop Messing About'' alongside new sketches; ''Round the Horne'' writers Johnnie Mortimer and Brian Cooke are therefore credited with series one of ''Stop Messing About'', while series two, which was entirely original, was written by Myles Rudge. ''Stop Messing About'' was recast as a vehicle for Kenneth Williams, who on the day of the first transmission wrote in his diary that "It was mediocre and played to a half empty house ... Joan said 'Let's face it dear, our careers are in the ash can...'" Of a l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Received Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation (RP) is the accent traditionally regarded as the standard and most prestigious form of spoken British English. For over a century, there has been argument over such questions as the definition of RP, whether it is geographically neutral, how many speakers there are, whether sub-varieties exist, how appropriate a choice it is as a standard and how the accent has changed over time. The name itself is controversial. RP is an accent, so the study of RP is concerned only with matters of pronunciation; other areas relevant to the study of language standards such as vocabulary, grammar and style are not considered. History RP has most in common with the dialects of South East Midlands, namely London, Oxford and Cambridge. By the end of the 15th century, "Standard English" was established in the City of London, though it did not begin to resemble RP until the late 19th century. The introduction of the term ''Received Pronunciation'' is usually credited to th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kingston Upon Thames
Kingston upon Thames (hyphenated until 1965, colloquially known as Kingston) is a town in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, southwest London, England. It is situated on the River Thames and southwest of Charing Cross. It is notable as the ancient market town in which Saxon kings were crowned and today is the administrative centre of the Royal Borough. Historically in the county of Surrey, the ancient parish of Kingston became absorbed in the Municipal Borough of Kingston-upon-Thames, reformed in 1835. From 1893 to 2021 it was the location of Surrey County Council, extraterritorially in terms of local government administration since 1965, when Kingston became a part of Greater London. Today, most of the town centre is part of the KT1 postcode area, but some areas north of Kingston railway station are within KT2. The United Kingdom Census 2011 recorded the population of the town (comprising the four wards of Canbury, Grove, Norbiton and Tudor) as 43,013, while ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1924 Births
Nineteen or 19 may refer to: * 19 (number), the natural number following 18 and preceding 20 * one of the years 19 BC, AD 19, 1919, 2019 Films * ''19'' (film), a 2001 Japanese film * ''Nineteen'' (film), a 1987 science fiction film Music * 19 (band), a Japanese pop music duo Albums * ''19'' (Adele album), 2008 * ''19'', a 2003 album by Alsou * ''19'', a 2006 album by Evan Yo * ''19'', a 2018 album by MHD * ''19'', one half of the double album '' 63/19'' by Kool A.D. * '' Number Nineteen'', a 1971 album by American jazz pianist Mal Waldron * ''XIX'' (EP), a 2019 EP by 1the9 Songs * "19" (song), a 1985 song by British musician Paul Hardcastle. * "Nineteen", a song by Bad4Good from the 1992 album ''Refugee'' * "Nineteen", a song by Karma to Burn from the 2001 album ''Almost Heathen''. * "Nineteen" (song), a 2007 song by American singer Billy Ray Cyrus. * "Nineteen", a song by Tegan and Sara from the 2007 album '' The Con''. * "XIX" (song), a 2014 song by S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1972 Deaths
Year 197 ( CXCVII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Magius and Rufinus (or, less frequently, year 950 '' Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 197 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place Roman Empire * February 19 – Battle of Lugdunum: Emperor Septimius Severus defeats the self-proclaimed emperor Clodius Albinus at Lugdunum (modern Lyon). Albinus commits suicide; legionaries sack the town. * Septimius Severus returns to Rome and has about 30 of Albinus's supporters in the Senate executed. After his victory he declares himself the adopted son of the late Marcus Aurelius. * Septimius Severus forms new naval units, manning all the triremes in Italy with heavily armed troops for war in the East. His soldiers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
