Development When the
British Broadcasting Company first began transmissions on 14 November 1922 from station
2LO in
the Strand, which it had inherited from the
Marconi Company (one of six commercial companies which created), but technology did not yet exist either for national coverage or joint programming between
transmitters. Whilst it was possible to combine large numbers of
trunk telephone lines to link transmitters for individual programmes, the process was expensive and not encouraged by the
General Post Office as it tied up large parts of the telephone network. The stations that followed the establishment of 2LO in
London were therefore autonomously programmed using local talent and facilities. By May 1923,
simultaneous broadcasting was technically possible at least between main transmitters and
relay stations, the quality was not felt to be high enough to provide a national service or regular simultaneous broadcasts. In 1924, it was felt that technical standards had improved enough for London to start to provide the majority of the output, cutting the local stations back to providing items of local interest.
Main stations Each of these main stations was broadcast at approximately 1
kilowatt (kW):
Relay stations Each of these
relay stations were broadcast at approximately 120
watts (W):
Regional scheme On 21 August 1927, the BBC opened a high-power
medium wave transmitter 5GB at its
Daventry site to replace the existing local stations in the
English Midlands, that allowed the experimental
longwave transmitter 5XX to provide a service – which eventually came to be called the
BBC National Programme from
London and available to the majority of the population. By combining the resources of the local stations into one regional station in each area with a basic sustaining service from London, the BBC hoped to increase programme quality whilst also
centralising the management of the radio service known as the "regional scheme". The local transmitters were gradually either converted to a regional service relay or closed entirely and replaced by high-power regional broadcasts. Some local studios were retained to provide for programming from specific areas within each region. Most transmitters also carried the National Programme on a local frequency to supplement the longwave broadcasts from 5XX; initially these were on three separate frequencies and programming included some local variations. As the regional network expanded these transmissions were fully synchronised with those from
Brookmans Park and several other frequencies initially: A
relay station for Brookmans Park on 1402 kHz was due to open at
Acle near
Norwich in 1940, but construction was postponed by the outbreak of
World War II. The station was never completed and was replaced by one at
Postwick.
Closure Upon the outbreak of
World War II, the BBC closed both existing National and Regional radio programmes to replace them with a single channel known as the
BBC Home Service. The transmitter network was synchronised on 668 kHz and 767 kHz in order to use the other frequencies for
propaganda broadcasts in foreign languages. Each transmitter group would be turned off during
air raids to prevent their signals being used as
navigational beacons. Listeners were required to retune to a low-powered single-frequency network on 1474 kHz which did not offer any meaningful directional information to aircraft. On 29 July 1945, within 12 weeks of
Victory in Europe Day, the BBC reactivated the Regional Programme but kept the name "Home Service" (until 30 September 1967 as the station became
BBC Radio 4). The National Programme was also reopened under a new name as the
BBC Light Programme. ==Sources==