''Letter from America'' was a weekly fifteen-minute speech

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

series broadcast on

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...

and its predecessor, the

Home Service Home Service is a British folk rock group, formed in late 1980 from a nucleus of musicians who had been playing in Ashley Hutchings' Albion Band. Their career is generally agreed to have peaked with the album ''Alright Jack'', and has had an ...

, and around the world through the

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 o ...

. From its first edition to its last, it was presented by

Alistair Cooke Alistair Cooke (born Alfred Cooke; 20 November 1908 – 30 March 2004) was a British-American writer whose work as a journalist, television personality and radio broadcaster was done primarily in the United States.BBC News 31 October 2012: ''Alistair Cooke – Letter from America: Bringing two nations together
Retrieved 2012-11-03

History

''Letter from America'' had its origin in ''London Letter'', a 15-minute talk for American listeners on life in Britain that Cooke recorded during the 1930s while working as London correspondent for

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...

. ''London Letter'' came to an end when Cooke emigrated to America in 1937, but it was not long before he suggested to the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

the idea of continuing the idea in reverse. A prototype, ''Mainly About Manhattan'', was broadcast intermittently from October 1938, but the idea was shelved with the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

in 1939. The first ''American Letter'' was broadcast on 24 March 1946, initially confirmed for only 13 installments, after Cooke had given a one-off talk under that title in the series ''Sunday Newsletter'' on 25 November 1945. The change of title to ''Letter from America'' came on 30 September 1949. The series lasted for 2,869 broadcasts over nearly 58 years and gathered an enormous audience, being broadcast not only in Britain and in many other

Commonwealth A commonwealth is a traditional English term for a political community founded for the common good. Historically, it has been synonymous with "republic". The noun "commonwealth", meaning "public welfare, general good or advantage", dates from the ...

countries, but throughout the world by the

. On 2 March 2004, at the age of 95, following advice from his doctors, Cooke announced his retirement from ''Letter from America''; he died less than a month later, on 30 March 2004, at his home in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Five years later, BBC Radio 4 premiered ''

Americana Americana may refer to: *Americana (music), a genre or style of American music *Americana (culture), artifacts of the culture of the United States Film, radio and television * ''Americana'' (1992 TV series), a documentary series presented by J ...

'', touted as the successor to ''Letter from America'', however it lasted less than three years, ending in the autumn of 2011.

Availability

A compilation of the programme's transcripts was published in 2004. Scripts are available to the public via Boston University http://archives.bu.edu/web/alistair-cooke/. In 2012, the BBC made over 900 episodes freely available online in full. The BBC also broadcast a documentary by

Alvin Hall Alvin D. Hall (born June 27, 1952) is an American financial adviser, author, and media personality. Early life Hall was born June 27, 1952, in Crawfordville, Florida, one of seven children to a family of farmers, day workers and fishermen. Inte ...

about ''Letter from America''. In March 2014, the BBC announced it had recovered over 650 lost editions of the programme, recorded by two listeners, Roy Whittaker in

Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlantic ...

and David Henderson in

Warwickshire Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avon an ...

.Letter from America rediscovered
bbc.co.uk, 28 March 2014

References

External links

* *
Episodes available for download
{{BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 programmes BBC World Service programmes Peabody Award-winning radio programs Works about the United States United Kingdom–United States relations British documentary radio programmes 1946 radio programme debuts 2004 radio programme endings