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Post by gbaker on Feb 25, 2023 14:20:20 GMT
What actually seems to have happened is that they were either destroyed on London’s instructions or sent to London for destruction. Yes, a few “escaped”: but not very many. I dare say that PM is the man with the most information about what happened to those Nigerian/Zambian films - perhaps he will spill the beans in the fullness of time. Alas, he did not have a warrant to search any mansions in the Zambian copper mining belt!
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Post by John Wall on Feb 25, 2023 16:02:15 GMT
What actually seems to have happened is that they were either destroyed on London’s instructions or sent to London for destruction. Yes, a few “escaped”: but not very many. I dare say that PM is the man with the most information about what happened to those Nigerian/Zambian films - perhaps he will spill the beans in the fullness of time. Alas, he did not have a warrant to search any mansions in the Zambian copper mining belt! One day perhaps we’ll get the full story, with dates. I speculated a while back that he might have first located Enemy and Web before Airlock and UM2 were returned.
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Post by andyparting on Feb 25, 2023 18:25:42 GMT
The last broadcasts of the missing episodes were in the mid 70s, in Nigeria and Zambia. (Last one being The Space Pirates in 1976). At this time, videotape was first becoming available. Is it possible that these episodes exist on domestic video tape recorded at the time? I did wonder about Christian missionaries from the UK and US working in Nigeria and Zambia - did they have TVs and domestic video recorders? All I could find online was this link here - archives.lib.duke.edu/?f%5Baccess_subjects_ssim%5D%5B%5D=Baptists+--+Missions+--+Nigeria- one entry of which reports: "The video recordings in the collection include videos of Mary Jane Whorton accepting a donation of a grinder at Promised Land". Though whether this was the original grinder that lasted until it was junked before Season 26 went into production remains to be seen.
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Post by Nicholas Fitzpatrick on Feb 27, 2023 17:46:04 GMT
In 1976 in Africa? Gosh, they were hardly common in the expat community a decade later in Asia!
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Post by John Wall on Feb 27, 2023 18:13:18 GMT
In 1976 in Africa? Gosh, they were hardly common in the expat community a decade later in Asia! About that time Fletcher’s wife was allegedly telling neighbours that he was doing missionary work……in Scotland!
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Post by andyparting on Feb 27, 2023 18:18:33 GMT
In 1976 in Africa? Gosh, they were hardly common in the expat community a decade later in Asia! Christian missionaries were active in Africa long before '76. If they had TVs in the 60s they would have been spoiled rotten with Hartnell/Troughton broadcasts.
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Post by andyparting on Feb 27, 2023 18:19:37 GMT
In 1976 in Africa? Gosh, they were hardly common in the expat community a decade later in Asia! About that time Fletcher’s wife was allegedly telling neighbours that he was doing missionary work……in Scotland! Fletcher of Depeche Mode? I know he did do mission work for the Methodist church, but this and his marriage would have materialised later than 76.
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Post by John Wall on Feb 27, 2023 19:15:58 GMT
About that time Fletcher’s wife was allegedly telling neighbours that he was doing missionary work……in Scotland! Fletcher of Depeche Mode? I know he did do mission work for the Methodist church, but this and his marriage would have materialised later than 76. Nope, Fletcher doing Porridge 😆
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Post by Leighton Haberfield on Mar 12, 2023 13:42:35 GMT
The only chance I see is if someone bought a Sony Umatic recorder in late 71 72 and happened to live abroad where Troughton was still being shown and was a fan of the show
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Post by sonnybh on Mar 12, 2023 13:54:42 GMT
The only chance I see is if someone bought a Sony Umatic recorder in late 71 72 and happened to live abroad where Troughton was still being shown and was a fan of the show The Philips N1500 was also launched around that time, but I can't imagine many machines being exported to to those places.
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Post by Ed Brown on Mar 13, 2023 2:40:35 GMT
Umatic was never considered a home entertainment system. But I think the Philips N1500 and some other models were marketed to domestic consumers.
The snag was they were very expensive. Also, a big snag, especially after 1970, was that they only recorded in black and white, but tv had gone into colour. Galton and Simpson wrote the colour episodes of Steptoe and Son for tv in 1970, and had bought a video recorder, but ended up with a lot of black and white 405-line recordings, although their show was in colour on the new 625-line service.
Consumers were not likely to buy home video recorders, which became avilable in about 1968 IIRC, because (a) they were too expensive (certainly for your average 11-year-old 'Who' fan in 1970), and (b) they could only record in b/w but everyone knew in 1968 that tv was about to go into colour: BBC2 began a colour service on UHF in 1967.
A kid could afford a cheap battery operated portable cassette recorder for £15 or £20 in 1969, but what kid could afford £200 for a b/w video recorder? And adults knew better than to buy a black and white machine that was going to be obsolete in 12 months time when colour came in.
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Post by peterconvery on Mar 16, 2023 0:21:11 GMT
To put some perspective on it, my brother in law went to school with a girl who's father worked for Granada TV in the 60s. He used to tape programmes on other channels for assessment and to take notes before the tape was used again to tape something else. He only had the one tape to use; and so it would be wiped over and over again. The machine he used was 'on loan's to him. Thats a tv exec who was in the business and needed it to do his job. That's not to say there might have been 1 eccentric multi millionaire who taped everything at the time and kept it. Bob monkhouse collection springs to mind - so it could've been done at the time.......
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Post by John Wall on Mar 16, 2023 0:30:00 GMT
To put some perspective on it, my brother in law went to school with a girl who's father worked for Granada TV in the 60s. He used to tape programmes on other channels for assessment and to take notes before the tape was used again to tape something else. He only had the one tape to use; and so it would be wiped over and over again. The machine he used was 'on loan's to him. Thats a tv exec who was in the business and needed it to do his job. That's not to say there might have been 1 eccentric multi millionaire who taped everything at the time and kept it. Bob monkhouse collection springs to mind - so it could've been done at the time....... In retrospect it’s a shame that Ian Levine wasn’t born a few years earlier.
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Post by peterconvery on Mar 16, 2023 15:01:18 GMT
To put some perspective on it, my brother in law went to school with a girl who's father worked for Granada TV in the 60s. He used to tape programmes on other channels for assessment and to take notes before the tape was used again to tape something else. He only had the one tape to use; and so it would be wiped over and over again. The machine he used was 'on loan's to him. Thats a tv exec who was in the business and needed it to do his job. That's not to say there might have been 1 eccentric multi millionaire who taped everything at the time and kept it. Bob monkhouse collection springs to mind - so it could've been done at the time....... In retrospect it’s a shame that Ian Levine wasn’t born a few years earlier. Or Graham Strong or Richard Landen or any others who audio taped it all in the 60s. I think there might be a few in Australia in private hands from late 60s - due to the more affordable VTRs coming onto the market (67/8 - 71). The recent find from the hoarder in Melbourne gives me hope, although I think we were too late in recording any missing who from this recovery.
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Post by John Wall on Mar 16, 2023 15:56:17 GMT
Some things were only missed by a couple of years, but we’re very lucky to have what we’ve got 👍
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