A Little Bit of Radio Nostalgia

 Another week of lockdown fun. Working from my dining room table whilst trying to prevent my cat from joining my online meetings with the excitement of a supermarket visit to purchase my weekly shopping. I could use these same sentences to describe my life since New Year. Yes, just plodding along.

However, a little bit of excitement this week with a social media post that awakened the nostalgic part of my brain. The Big Wood files have been found. Now you may think 'what is she talking about?' or 'who is this Uncle Bill character?' but those of you from a military family may remember listening to these stories broadcast on BFBS radio. I certainly did.

It has been over 75 years since the first broadcast during the Second World War of the British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBS) to soldiers serving in Algiers. It developed and evolved to provide a radio service to the armed forces, their families and veterans keeping them in touch with home, including the BBC's General Forces programme which included 'Forces Favourite' from 1945. BPBS was soon providing a radio service to places such as Singapore, Malta and Hong Kong. 

BPBS provided a radio service in West Germany and as a family living there in the early 70s, we would regularly listen to Uncle Bill's stories of tales in Bigwood. A highlight for me was hearing my name read out on the radio before an episode, my parents recording it for posterity onto cassette tape. We still have the recording and brings back familiar memories when it has been played.

BFBS continued to provide a radio service around the world and in the 1970s added television to its offer. It's current website tells readers it is there to '...Educate, Inform, Connect and Champion wherever you are in the world - bringing you a little piece of life back home while you're serving your country overseas.' The wide range of locations now includes the Falklands Islands, Belize, Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as many others.

This nostalgic blog post might feel a little self-indulgent, but as one of our Museum social media posts this week focussed on the 2018 exhibition 'Follow the Drum' (FTD) it made a connection with me. FTD had a section within it that focussed on military wives and their lives within the military family. From MFO boxes to 'marching out', these ladies were responsible for looking after the family, sometimes miles away from their homeland. Nowadays, the internet and the world-wide web has opened up the virtual world connecting people online and BFBS has to provide a service in a competitive world, but in the 1970s for a military family living in West Germany, BFBS radio provided a much-appreciated familiar homely feel. 

Thanks Uncle Bill.


With thanks to https://www.bfbs.com/



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