The BBC: What was *kept*?

[Jeff Stone]

Hi all,
now, we're all familiar with the story
of the TV shows the BBC junked during
the 70s, but a question hardly anyone
asks is: what did they *keep*?

Now, I understand that a sliding
scale from A to (I presume) D was
used to determine the archival value
of programmes. A being 'Keep
everything' and D(?) being 'Wipe
the lot'. As an example, Doctor Who
was C, which was 'Destroy most,
keep a handful as a representative
sample'.

What I'd like to know is: what shows
were given a B rating, and what ones
an A? I'm not asking for a complete list,
just a...well, representative sample
of what the appallingly shortsighted
Beeb decided was more worth holding
onto than, say, Not Only But Also or
the aforementioned Dr Who.

[John Stewart Miller]

Jeff said:

Hi all,
now, we're all familiar with the story
of the TV shows the BBC junked during
the 70s, but a question hardly anyone
asks is: what did they *keep*?

Now, I understand that a sliding
scale from A to (I presume) D was
used to determine the archival value
of programmes. A being 'Keep
everything' and D(?) being 'Wipe
the lot'. As an example, Doctor Who
was C, which was 'Destroy most,
keep a handful as a representative
sample'.

What I'd like to know is: what shows
were given a B rating, and what ones
an A? I'm not asking for a complete list,
just a...well, representative sample
of what the appallingly shortsighted
Beeb decided was more worth holding
onto than, say, Not Only But Also or
the aforementioned Dr Who.

I think it was A to E Jeff. This was outlined briefly in one of the 'Dr Who' mags years ago. Like you I'm not sure of the exact details, but I believe it was something like; A = work of artistic importance (art). 'Snakedance' (1982) was apparently graded thus.

I recall 'five doctors' was given a high grade because it was seen as a special anniversary example of the show.

I can't recall what 'B' was, but as it went down the ladder, the lowest grades would symbolise 'work of a producer'. A higher graded example might be 'work that represents technical developments in TV'. There was a grade something like this but not worded as such. The lowest grades were just 'examples of general output'.

This grading system apparently did not exist until the post of the 'Archive selector' was created at the BBC in 1978 under recommendation from a report in the House of Lords.

Sue Malden was the first selector and in interview said that 'before the post was created selection of material for the library was handled by general librarians'. Accepting items in tape form doesn't seem to have happened till the 70s as the library preferred to deal with, or was equipped only to deal technically with film stock.

The most obvious pitfalls of VTs were: size of reels, insecure gummed edits in the tape, drop out, oxide decay, and gumming up of reels that weren't played through for some time.

2 inch VTs used in the 1960s could not be fast forwarded on vision to examine the contents.

Hope this is helpful.

[Laurence Piper]

Biggest pitfall of VT for me was the fact that it could be wiped!

[andrew martin]

I seem to remember answering the question here before, but the archive categories have nothing whatever to do with a scale of importance. Programmes are either archived or not, the letter codes refer to the reason they were to be kept according to genre, so that a proper proportion of material relating to say current affairs, news, arts and music etc were kept. Some categories are quite wide though, to reflect the general output (so that not just the cream of programmes were represented, but also the ordinary everyday type of programme), there is even a category for material to be kept until it is properly assessed/identified. When things like "Dr Who" or "Top of the Pops" were being junked, the system did not exist, so there was no methodical selection. What still exists is a mixture of things retained for possible repeat or commericial expoitation, requests from producers, and whatever has been retained by BBC Enterprises' library and other broadcasters. There may well have been things that were kept because people working in the tape stores thought they ought to be, or have survived purely by accident - there are some odd things like studio tapes etc that look like they ought not to have survived. Film holdings are a similar set of circumstances to VT, though with the additional factor that as film isn't re-usable (though separate magnetic tracks could be wiped) there wasn't the same economic pressure to get rid of it - other than to save space. [Ultimately, I'm not sure anyone really knows the whole story (and maybe we never will...).]

[John Stewart Miller]

That's right, I recall you mentioning Andrew in relation to TV series in general on 'the mausoleum forum'. Sorry I didn't refer this.

What about news though. I thought that WAS an intentional piece of archiving, when the film library was initially established ? Mind you only retaining footage so it could be reused in the news, not as a reference for posterity.

I always thought this might be why the Oxford ? Cambridge boat races were telerecorded, so sports footage could be included in news bulletins.

[andrew martin]

Indeed the News Library was the first part of the library to be set up - although at first it would have been part of the BBC Film Unit, as the 1948-1954 Newsreel wasn't produced by the BBC's News division. News still maintains its own library, where the individual cut stories are kept for five years after transmission, then transferred to the main archive. The reason for having a news library was mainly to have a store of footage for re-use, as you say - including for the annual 'Retrospect' programmes featuring Newsreel highlights of the year.

[John Stewart Miller]

Just to add that Andrew is a BBC senior, and thus the more reliable source. My reference source was just quoting published articles in fanzines; probably read 15 years or so ago ! This seems to be what created the confusion over the grading issue.

I believe it was the Lord Annan comittee report of 1977 which led the BBC to take up recommendations on archive system methods.

I think the original notion behind this thread was something a friend pondered a few years ago, i.e. maybe it wasn't so much a question of considering what to purposefully junk; than what they were going to keep.

The factors, as Andrew points out that lead to individual programmes' survival are much less cut and dried though.

[pete]

one wonders if they discovered that things were missing whilst reeling the archive for Jubilee sources in 1977 that stuff was missing

[andrew martin]

Indeed BBC anniversary celebrations in 1972 and 1976 (50th anniversary of the BBC and 40th of television) helped to raise awareness of the holes in the archive both internally and with the wider world. The first BBC tv archivist was a senior film researcher on the 1976 celebration programme "Forty Years" (as it happens).