The run
BBC news bulletins and announcements recorded off air in 1939 and 1940, including the Overseas Service bulletin of 9 April 1940. Held by the Internet Archive's wartime audio collections.
Restoration quality — measured from the surviving files
Source collection
Internet Archive audio collections
Rights
Public domain — no renewed US copyright
Cataloguing
Air dates and notes from the Archive item record
The shape of the run
7 dated broadcasts across 2 years on the air, with 1 year where nothing is known to survive. Brightness is transfer quality; empty cells are months lost to time.
Episodes
Start here
Restored broadcasts from 1939, in original transmission order.
1 Jan 1939 · 17 min
Transferred from the Internet Archive item “1939RadioNews”, part of the Old Time Radio Researchers public-domain collections.
11 Apr 1939 · 27 min
Transferred from the Internet Archive item “1939RadioNews”, part of the Old Time Radio Researchers public-domain collections.
28 Aug 1939 · 4 min
Transferred from the Internet Archive item “1939RadioNews”, part of the Old Time Radio Researchers public-domain collections.
1 Sep 1939 · 1 min
BBC bulletin, 1 September 1939. Preserved in the Internet Archive's 1939 radio news collection.
1 Sep 1939 · 3 min
Transferred from the Internet Archive item “1939RadioNews”, part of the Old Time Radio Researchers public-domain collections.
3 Sep 1939 · 1 min
BBC bulletin, 3 September 1939. Preserved in the Internet Archive's 1939 radio news collection.
3 Sep 1939 · 12 min
Transferred from the Internet Archive item “1939RadioNews”, part of the Old Time Radio Researchers public-domain collections.
7 Sep 1939 · 3 min
Transferred from the Internet Archive item “1939RadioNews”, part of the Old Time Radio Researchers public-domain collections.
Same night on the air
Everything else the archive still holds from the night of 12 Nov 1939.
12 Nov 1939 · 59 min
Transferred from the Internet Archive item “edgar-bergen-1937-12-12-32-guest-mae-west”, part of the Old Time Radio Researchers public-domain collections.
12 Nov 1939 · 55 min
Broadcast on Syndicated. Transferred from the Internet Archive's Old Time Radio Researchers collection (public domain).
Also on BBC
Other series the network carried while London Calling: BBC News at War was on the air.
Same seasons
Series in the same genre whose runs overlapped this one.
What it became
Wartime correspondence and Cavalcade of America established the daily explainer and the narrated history hour long before either had a feed.
Lineage is written by our editors, not inferred from listening data.
Descendants
Modern series carrying this form forward.
If you liked this
Chosen by the same editors.
