Southern Television was the
ITV
ITV or iTV may refer to:
ITV
*Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of:
** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...
broadcasting licence holder for the
South and South-East of England from 30 August 1958 to 31 December 1981. The company was launched as 'Southern Television Limited' and the title 'Southern Television' was consistently used
on-air throughout its life. However, in 1966, during the application process for contracts running from 1968, the company renamed itself 'Southern Independent Television Limited',
a title which was used until 1980 when the company reverted to its original corporate name. Southern Television ceased broadcasting on the morning of 1 January 1982 at 12:43am, after a review during the 1980 franchise round gave the contract to
Television South
Television South (TVS) was the ITV franchise holder in the South and South East of England between 1 January 1982 at 9.25 am and 31 December 1992 at 11.59 pm. The company operated under various names, initially as 'Television South plc' and ...
.
Launch
When the
Independent Television Authority
The Independent Television Authority (ITA) was an agency created by the Television Act 1954 to supervise the creation of "Independent Television" ( ITV), the first commercial television network in the United Kingdom. The ITA existed from 1954 un ...
(ITA) advertised for applicants to run the south of England station in 1958, Southern Television beat eight other applicants for the contract. Its initial shareholders were
Associated Newspapers
DMG Media (stylised in lowercase) is an intermediate holding company for Associated Newspapers, Northcliffe Media, Harmsworth Printing, Harmsworth Media and other subsidiaries of Daily Mail and General Trust. It is based at Northcliffe House in ...
, the
Rank Organisation
The Rank Organisation was a British entertainment conglomerate founded by industrialist J. Arthur Rank in April 1937. It quickly became the largest and most vertically integrated film company in the United Kingdom, owning production, distrib ...
and the
Amalgamated Press
The Amalgamated Press (AP) was a British newspaper and magazine publishing company founded by journalist and entrepreneur Alfred Harmsworth (1865–1922) in 1901, gathering his many publishing ventures together under one banner. At one point the ...
, each holding one third of the company. Associated Newspapers was allowed to remain a shareholder in Southern, only on the condition that it sold its remaining 10% stake in
Associated-Rediffusion
Associated-Rediffusion, later Rediffusion London, was the British ITV franchise holder for London and parts of the surrounding counties, on weekdays between 22 September 1955 and 29 July 1968. It was the first ITA franchisee to go on air, ...
to avoid owning parts of two ITV companies; the Amalgamated Press dropped out of the consortium before the station went on air. This led to Associated Newspapers and Rank increasing their stakes to 37.5% each, and
D. C. Thomson & Co. Ltd taking the remaining 25%.
Southern Television was the ninth ITA franchise to launch, beginning transmissions on 30 August 1958 at 5:30 pm with the first playing of ''Southern Rhapsody'', the station theme which was used to begin each day's transmission until 31 December 1981, written by composer
Richard Addinsell
Richard Stewart Addinsell (13 January 190414 November 1977) was an English composer, best known for film music, primarily his '' Warsaw Concerto'', composed for the 1941 film '' Dangerous Moonlight'' (also known under the later title ''Suicide S ...
and performed by the
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (BSO) is an English orchestra, founded in 1893 and originally based in Bournemouth. With a remit to serve the South and South West of England, the BSO is administratively based in the adjacent town of Poole, s ...
, with Addinsell himself conducting. The first presenter on air was continuity announcer Meryl O'Keefe (later to become a BBC announcer); her first on-air announcement was followed by an outside broadcast link-up fronted by
Julian Pettifer
Julian Pettifer OBE (born 21 July 1935) is an English television journalist.
He was president of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and is vice president of the Royal Society of Wildlife Trusts and the RSPB. He was voted BAFTA 'Repor ...
(later a war correspondent) and a regional news bulletin read by Martin Muncaster.
Other opening night programmes included a ''Filmed Playhouse'' drama entitled ''The Last Reunion'', a preview programme called ''Coming Shortly'', an episode of the American crime drama ''
Highway Patrol
A highway patrol, or state patrol is either a police unit created primarily for the purpose of overseeing and enforcing traffic safety compliance on roads and highways, or a detail within an existing local or regional police agency that is prima ...
'' and a networked opening night programme entitled ''Southern Rhapsody'', starring
Gracie Fields and the
Lionel Blair
Lionel Blair (born Henry Lionel Ogus; 12 December 1928 – 4 November 2021) was a Canadian-born British actor, choreographer, tap dancer, and television presenter. From the late 1960s until the early 1980s, he made regular appearances as a danc ...
Dancers, televised from the station's studios in a converted cinema in the Northam area of Southampton and the ocean liner ''
Caronia
Caronia ( Sicilian: ''Carunìa'', Greek: ( Ptol.) or ( Diod. et al.), Latin: ''Calacte'' or ''Cale Acte'') is a town and '' comune'' on the north coast of Sicily, in the province of Messina, about half way between Tyndaris (modern Tindari) ...
'', which was berthed in
Southampton docks
The Port of Southampton is a passenger and cargo port in the central part of the south coast of England. The modern era in the history of the Port of Southampton began when the first dock was inaugurated in 1843. The port has been owned and op ...
.
Programming
Regular programmes produced by Southern Television included the regional news magazine ''Day by Day'', presented by
Cliff Michelmore
Arthur Clifford Michelmore (11 December 1919 – 16 March 2016) was an English television presenter and producer.
He is best known for the BBC television programme '' Tonight'', which he presented from 1957 to 1965. He also hosted the BBC's t ...
, Christopher Peacock,
Barry Westwood
Barry Westwood (7 September 1927 – 3 July 2011) was an English presenter and producer at ITV franchise Southern Television from 1959 until 1981. For most of that time, he was the front-man of '' Day by Day'', the station's evening news maga ...
, Peter Clark, and long-serving weather forecaster
Trevor Baker; ''Out of Town'', a countryside programme introduced by
Jack Hargreaves
Jack Hargreaves OBE (1911–1994) was an English television presenter and writer whose enduring interest was to comment without nostalgia or sentimentality on accelerating distortions in relations between the city and the countryside, seeking ...
, who would later join Southern Television's board of directors; ''
How
How may refer to:
* How (greeting), a word used in some misrepresentations of Native American/First Nations speech
* How, an interrogative word in English grammar
Art and entertainment Literature
* ''How'' (book), a 2007 book by Dov Seidma ...
'', a children's science programme also featuring Hargreaves along with
Fred Dinenage
Frederick Edgar Dinenage MBE (born 8 June 1942) is an English author and retired broadcaster and television presenter. His television career spanned nearly 60 years, including the long-running children's programme '' How'' and ITV's regional p ...
,
Bunty James (later replaced by Marian Davies) and
Jon Miller
Jon Miller (born October 11, 1951) is an American sportscaster, known primarily for his broadcasts of Major League Baseball. Since 1997 he has been employed as a play-by-play announcer for the San Francisco Giants. He was also a baseball annou ...
; ''
Freewheelers
''Freewheelers'' is a British television series made by Southern Television between 1968 and 1973 for the ITV network. It was created by the television producer Chris McMaster, who was aware of the popularity of adult action series such as '' ...
'', a children's spy series; ''
Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years'' and ''
Worzel Gummidge
Worzel Gummidge is a scarecrow in British children's fiction, who originally appeared in a series of books by the English novelist Barbara Euphan Todd. '', starring
Jon Pertwee as the eponymous walking
scarecrow
A scarecrow is a decoy or mannequin, often in the shape of a human. Humanoid scarecrows are usually dressed in old clothes and placed in open fields to discourage birds from disturbing and feeding on recently cast seed and growing crops.Lesley ...
. Southern Television also produced a programme aimed at the farming community, presented by Mark Jenner, ''Farm Progress'' was broadcast at around 10:30 on Sunday mornings. A late-night epilogue was introduced by
Roger Royle
Roger Michael Royle (born 30 January 1939) is a British Anglican priest and broadcaster. He is known for having presented the '' Sunday Half Hour'' programme on BBC Radio 2 for 17 years from 1990 to 2007.
Early life and education
Royle was b ...
. Alongside 'Trevor the Weather', weather forecasts were also presented by Cyril Ockenden.
Generally, the company produced more networked children's programmes than shows for adults, scoring a particularly strong seller internationally with an adaptation of
Enid Blyton
Enid Mary Blyton (11 August 1897 – 28 November 1968) was an English children's writer, whose books have been worldwide bestsellers since the 1930s, selling more than 600 million copies. Her books are still enormously popular and have b ...
's ''
The Famous Five
''The Famous Five'' is a series of children's Adventure fiction, adventure novels and short stories written by English author Enid Blyton. The first book, ''Five on a Treasure Island'', was published in 1942. The novels feature the adventures ...
''. Also worth noting was the children's programme ''The Saturday Banana'', hosted by
Bill Oddie
William Edgar Oddie (born 7 July 1941) is an English writer, comedian, songwriter, musician, artist, birder, conservationist, television presenter and actor. He was a member of comedy trio The Goodies.
A birder since his childhood in Quinto ...
(then one of
The Goodies
The Goodies were a trio of British comedians: Tim Brooke-Taylor (17 July 1940–12 April 2020), Graeme Garden (b. 18 February 1943) and Bill Oddie (b. 7 July 1941). The trio created, wrote for and performed in their eponymous television com ...
) which saw the placing of a
fibreglass
Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass (Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass clo ...
banana outside the studios, supported by its peeled 'skin'. Southern also produced the children's game show ''
Runaround'' which was hosted by
Mike Reid.
The broadcaster was known for its enlightened classical music broadcasting, including studio concerts by the local
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (BSO) is an English orchestra, founded in 1893 and originally based in Bournemouth. With a remit to serve the South and South West of England, the BSO is administratively based in the adjacent town of Poole, s ...
in ''Music in Camera''. From 1972, Southern Television broadcast up to two operas from
Glyndebourne
Glyndebourne () is an English country house, the site of an opera house that, since 1934, has been the venue for the annual Glyndebourne Festival Opera. The house, located near Lewes in East Sussex, England, is thought to be about six hun ...
each season, some of which have since been issued on DVD.
The Southern Television archive passed to Australian company Southern Star, which later sold it to Renown Pictures, which shows some of the content on its own channel
Talking Pictures TV
Talking Pictures TV (TPTV) is a British free-to-air vintage-film and nostalgia television channel. It was launched on 26 May 2015 on Sky channel 343, but later also became available on Freeview, Freesat, and Virgin Media. It is on air for 24 h ...
, including Southern
soap opera ''Together'', amongst other old film libraries that Renown owns.
In its last three years on the air Southern showed many foreign-language films in its Friday ''Late, Late Show'', including as many as eight by
Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Rainer Werner Fassbinder (; 31 May 1945 – 10 June 1982), sometimes credited as R. W. Fassbinder, was a German filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the major figures and catalysts of the New German Cinema movement.
Fassbinder's main ...
and others by
Werner Herzog
Werner Herzog (; born 5 September 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, author, actor, and opera director, regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema. His films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with u ...
,
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Witold Wajda (; 6 March 1926 – 9 October 2016) was a Polish film and theatre director. Recipient of an Honorary Oscar, the Palme d'Or, as well as Honorary Golden Lion and Honorary Golden Bear Awards, he was a prominent member of the ...
,
Wim Wenders,
Federico Fellini and many more. These were particularly valuable in the more rural parts of its region where these films were rarely shown in cinemas and home video barely existed.
Studios
Southampton
The station's original studios were in a converted cinema, the Plaza, in Northam,
Southampton
Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...
.
With the advent of colour in 1969, the company moved to purpose-built new studios next door to the existing site, built on land reclaimed from the
River Itchen.
The studios at Northam were sold on to
TVS in 1981, and sold again by TVS to
Meridian Broadcasting
ITV Meridian (previously Meridian Broadcasting) is the holder of the ITV franchise for the South and South East of England. The station was launched at 12:00 am on 1 January 1993, replacing previous broadcaster Television South, and is owned ...
in 1992. Meridian relocated to a much smaller office building in
Whiteley
Whiteley is a community in the county of Hampshire, England, near Fareham. The development straddles the boundary between two council districts: the Borough of Fareham to the south and east, and the city of Winchester to the north and west.
L ...
in 2004, and the site at Northam was sold to developers. The studio complex was demolished in 2010. Blocks of flats have now been erected on the site.
Dover
The company also ran production offices and a studio in
Dover, to serve the eastern part of its region. The studio was opened in 1961, after the
ITA's VHF Dover television transmitter went into operation the year before. The studio on Russell Street was mainly used for regional news production although some non-news programmes including the long-running rural affairs series ''Farm Progress'', feature series and documentaries such as ''Elusive Butterflies'' and ''Dougalling'' and the nightly Epilogue (known for years as ''Guideline'') were also produced from Dover.
During Southern's tenure as the ITV franchise broadcaster, the company strived to produce dedicated opt outs for the east of the region – the first British television service of its kind. Southern's South East news team in Dover produced separate bulletins for the area as an opt-out into the ''Day by Day'' programme each weeknight. A dedicated South East bulletin was also broadcast after ''
News at Ten''. More well known to South East viewers was ''
Scene South East'', a weekly magazine programme introduced on 9 October 1964 as ''Friday on Ten'', which replaced ''Day by Day'' on Friday nights. Its popularity led to the introduction of a shorter ''Scene Midweek'' programme on Wednesdays from 1977 onwards. Local commercials specific to the region were also broadcast to the Dover transmitter only, via the presentation control area at the Southampton studios.
Dover-based presenters and reporters included Mike Field, Jeff Thomas, Malcolm Mitchell,
Tim Brinton
Timothy Denis Brinton (24 December 1929 – 22 March 2009) was a British broadcaster and Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party politician. The son of a neurologist, he was educated at Summer Fields School in Summertown, Oxford, Summertown, ...
, Simon Theobalds, Arnie Wilson, Jill Cochrane, Derek Williamson, Pat Sloman, David Haigh (editor of ''Scene South East''), Donald Dougall and Mike Fuller. The Dover studio directors were David Pick and Maurice Harper. The floor manager was John Heather and the production assistant was Gillie Slaven. During the transition from Southern TV to TVS, two production secretaries were appointed, Gwenneth Hughes and Denise Hood.
After Southern lost its franchise to TVS, the studios were used to produce the successor's regional news programmes for the South East — ''
Coast to Coast'' and ''TVS News''. Once TVS's studios in Maidstone were opened, the Dover studios were closed in 1983 and demolished a year later. The site is now a car park.
Other facilities
Unique in ITV and reflecting the area's maritime history the company converted a
Second World War
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 ...
motor torpedo boat into a floating
outside broadcasting
Outside broadcasting (OB) is the electronic field production (EFP) of television or radio programmes (typically to cover television news and sports television events) from a mobile remote broadcast television studio. Professional video camera ...
unit named
''Southerner''.
There were regional offices in
Maidstone
Maidstone is the largest town in Kent, England, of which it is the county town. Maidstone is historically important and lies 32 miles (51 km) east-south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the centre of the town, linking it wi ...
,
Dorchester,
Brighton and
Reading
Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of letters, symbols, etc., especially by sight or touch.
For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process involving such areas as word recognition, orthography (spelling ...
. There were also sales offices at Stag Place, London and Oxford Street,
Manchester
Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...
.
Identity
Southern Television's logo is sometimes said to be a compass (with the directional station name and the fact that the bottom point on the logo is longest suggesting a compass pointing south in the direction of Southern Television's service area); however, the general consensus is that it is a star, named after the Southern Star and because Southern Television's final transmission showed the logo zooming off into the night sky. For the purposes of this article, the logo will be referred to as a star, to reflect what it is most popularly called.
Southern Television's first identity featured an art deco style star which zoomed into screen before the bottom point extended downwards with varying tones.
This was replaced in the early 1960s with a white rotating star against a black background against a drumroll jingle. This was again altered in the mid-1960s to the familiar star shape against a black background and accompanied by a jingle featuring a cacophony of noises. This shape formed from a circle, with the diagonal lines moving out and joining the circle and the horizontal and vertical lines being drawn last, with the name added last.
This ident remained with the station until the end of its existence with some modifications; firstly the jingle was altered to nine notes on a guitar a few years later, and then the background was revealed to be blue in 1969 with the introduction of colour (blue was the background colour of the ident as used in black and white; being shot with black background and white star would have given too much contrast and overexposed the camera). This ident with blue background colour was maintained after the introduction of colour transmissions because this still provided a good contrast on black and white TV sets. This ident, occasionally supplemented by a subsequent caption stating 'The Station that serves the South', lasted until the company ceased transmission in 1982.
In addition to these idents, a clock was used featuring a blue background and Southern legend, and for introducing links between programmes,
in-vision continuity
In broadcasting, continuity or presentation (or station break in the U.S. and Canada) is announcements, messages and graphics played by the broadcaster between specific programmes. It typically includes programme schedules, announcement of the ...
was utilised often. Continuity announcers included:
*
Brian Nissen (transferred to TVS in 1982)
*
Christopher Robbie
Christopher Robbie (born 30 May 1938) is a British actor, television announcer, theatre director and designer, playwright and photographer. He trained as an actor at RADA in London, and has had a distinguished theatrical career, playing the tit ...
(transferred to TVS in 1982)
*Keith Martin
*Gill Hewitt
*Verity Martindill
1980 franchise round
The 1980 Independent Television franchise round required Southern Television to re-apply to the
Independent Broadcasting Authority
The Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) was the regulatory body in the United Kingdom for commercial television ( ITV and Channel 4 and limited satellite television regulation – cable television was the responsibility of the Cable Author ...
(IBA) to continue to broadcast to the South and South East of England from 1982. Applications from rival companies were highly competitive. On the 28th December 1980, Southern Television lost its franchise to
Television South
Television South (TVS) was the ITV franchise holder in the South and South East of England between 1 January 1982 at 9.25 am and 31 December 1992 at 11.59 pm. The company operated under various names, initially as 'Television South plc' and ...
(TVS), a new consortium with fresh ideas and bold plans that were quite different from Southern Television's proposals.
Southern's response from the IBA was met with anger and disbelief by its board of directors. Although the IBA gave its standard reason for its decision that the competitor offered greater investment and a better mix of programmes, it was believed the station's non-local ownership may have swayed the balance against it. Another factor may have been the company's conservative nature and that, with a new decade just dawned, the south of England in time would be a radically different area. It was felt that Southern Television's application was more of the same tried and tested formula, which in time would not have reflected the possibilities for the area. Yet another possible factor was the incumbent's complacency: its original application was a mere 16 pages long. Tactfully the IBA invited Southern Television to re-submit, this time asking the company to go into more depth with its plans.
TVS spent months trying to persuade Southern to sell its studios until they relented. TVS was forced to use
portable office buildings (popularly known as Portakabins, a brand name) in Southern's car park as a temporary measure until its day of broadcast on 1st January 1982. Southern reluctantly agreed to lease its studios to TVS for the production of TVS programmes and then sell them back to TVS outright at the end of 1981.
The handover was tinged with acrimony on behalf of Southern's management, which appeared to take its anger at the decision out on TVS rather than the IBA, which had made the actual choice.
In Southern Television's final productions, ''Day by Yesterday'' (a ''Day by Day'' special) and ''And It's Goodbye From Us'', a song was featured, composed and performed by
Richard Stilgoe
Sir Richard Henry Simpson Stilgoe (born 28 March 1943) is a British songwriter, lyricist and musician, and broadcaster who is best known for his humorous songs and frequent television appearances. His output includes collaborations with Andrew ...
, deriding the incoming TVS as "Portakabin TV" and mocking TVS for choosing Maidstone as a production base in the newly enlarged dual region—despite the fact that Southern Television itself had already purchased a site at Vinters Park in Maidstone for a planned studio complex, which it would have built had it retained its franchise. Southern Television sold the land on to TVS at a considerable profit.
Closure of Southern Television
Southern Television's final programme ''And It's Goodbye From Us'' ended at 12:43 am on New Year's Day 1982. The programme closed with a medley of songs sung by Lilian Watson and performed by the
Bournemouth Sinfonietta
The Bournemouth Sinfonietta was a chamber orchestra founded in 1968 as an offshoot of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. It was disbanded in November 1999 after increasing difficulties in obtaining funding from local councils led to the decisio ...
under conductor
Owain Arwel Hughes. The show's presenter and long-serving continuity announcer
Christopher Robbie
Christopher Robbie (born 30 May 1938) is a British actor, television announcer, theatre director and designer, playwright and photographer. He trained as an actor at RADA in London, and has had a distinguished theatrical career, playing the tit ...
, signed off from Southern Television with these words:
Afterwards, the camera panned to show many of the on-air talent and company executives standing solemnly as their names were displayed on-screen and the "Southern Fantasia" (composed especially for the show by Jonathan Burton, and performed earlier on in the programme) was played in the final two minutes. When the piece came to a climactic end, the lights on the set were gradually turned off, for the last time, fading to the Southern Television Colour Production slide which dissolved into the station's logo, spinning away into an animated starry sky.
The
acoustic guitar jingle
A jingle is a short song or tune used in advertising and for other commercial uses. Jingles are a form of sound branding. A jingle contains one or more hooks and meaning that explicitly promote the product or service being advertised, usually ...
played for what would be the final time with a deep extended echo, and the screen slowly and silently faded to black, remaining that way for close to a minute. There were no closing or shut-down announcements, no suggestions for viewers to switch off their television sets, nor even the customary playing of the national anthem.
At 12:45 am the transmitters were shut down, putting a permanent end to Southern's broadcasts after 24 years. Exactly 8 hours and 40 minutes later,
Television South
Television South (TVS) was the ITV franchise holder in the South and South East of England between 1 January 1982 at 9.25 am and 31 December 1992 at 11.59 pm. The company operated under various names, initially as 'Television South plc' and ...
began broadcasting in Southern's former region.
Southern Television's programme archive was sold to Southern Star Group and then
Renown Pictures
Renown Pictures Corporation is a British film distributor founded by producer George Minter in 1938.
Releases
Renown's releases include:
* '' Scrooge'' (1951)
* ''Grand National Night'' (1953)
* ''Dance, Little Lady'' (1954)
* ''Svengali'' (1 ...
; the names "Southern Television Ltd", "Southern Independent Television" and "Southern Television", and the star device idents used between 1958 and 1981, all transferred to ''
Art Attack
''Art Attack'' is a British children's television programme revolving around art, currently hosted by Lloyd Warbey on Disney Junior, and originally airing on CITV hosted by Neil Buchanan from 1990 to 2007.
The original programme aired on CI ...
'' and ''
Finger Tips
''Finger Tips'' is a British children's television series that aired on CITV and was broadcast from 3 September 2001 to 14 December 2008. It was produced by The Foundation.
Format
''Finger Tips'' is an arts and crafts series that centres around ...
'' producer Nic Ayling in 2004. Southern Television now trades as an independent production company.
In August 2008, ITV Meridian commemorated the 50th anniversary of Southern Television's first transmission with special reports on ''
Thames Valley Tonight
''Thames Valley Tonight'' was a regional news programme broadcast to part of the ITV Network in the Thames Valley area of southern England. The Thames Valley news region was launched on Monday 4 December 2006 and ceased to exist on 8 February 2 ...
'' and ''
Meridian Tonight
''ITV News Meridian'' is a British television news service broadcast and produced by ITV Meridian.
Overview
The news service is produced and broadcast from ITV Meridian's studios in Whiteley, near Fareham with reporters also based at bureaux i ...
'' (South and South East editions) alongside a half-hour programme presented by
Fred Dinenage
Frederick Edgar Dinenage MBE (born 8 June 1942) is an English author and retired broadcaster and television presenter. His television career spanned nearly 60 years, including the long-running children's programme '' How'' and ITV's regional p ...
.
In 2022, Renown Pictures/Talking Pictures TV put many of the programmes from their Southern TV archive onto their TPTV Encore streaming service. Programmes uploaded to TPTV Encore include ''Runaround'', ''Rogue's Rock'' and ''Tell Me Another''.
See also
*
Television South
Television South (TVS) was the ITV franchise holder in the South and South East of England between 1 January 1982 at 9.25 am and 31 December 1992 at 11.59 pm. The company operated under various names, initially as 'Television South plc' and ...
, Southern Television's successor.
*
ITV Meridian
ITV Meridian (previously Meridian Broadcasting) is the holder of the ITV franchise for the South and South East of England. The station was launched at 12:00 am on 1 January 1993, replacing previous broadcaster Television South, and is owned ...
, the current incumbent of the South franchise.
*
ITV (TV network)
ITV is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network. It was launched in 1955 as Independent Television to provide competition to BBC Television (established in 1936). ITV is the oldest commercial network in the UK. Since the passi ...
*
History of ITV
The history of ITV, the United Kingdom " Independent Television" commercial network, goes back to 1955.
Independent Television began as a network of independently-owned regional companies that were both broadcasters and programme makers, beginn ...
*
Hannington transmitting station
Hannington transmitting station is a television and radio transmitting station located on Cottington Hill near the village of Hannington, Hampshire. The transmitter is actually in the parish of Kingsclere. The station provides broadcast service ...
, the site of a famous
Southern Television broadcast interruption
The Southern Television broadcast interruption was a broadcast signal intrusion that occurred on 26 November 1977 in parts of southern England in the United Kingdom. The audio of a Southern Television broadcast was replaced by a voice claiming to ...
by person or persons unknown in 1977.
*
Timeline of Southern Television
References
External links
Animated Southern Television Identsfrom 625.uk.com
Southern Television Limited– Marking Nic Ayling's ownership of the name and logo device
Southern Television
{{DCThomson
ITV franchisees
Television in England
Television channels and stations established in 1958
Mass media in Kent
Mass media in Sussex
Mass media in Hampshire
Mass media of the Isle of Wight
Mass media in Dorset
1958 establishments in England
1982 disestablishments in England
Television channels and stations disestablished in 1982