Although the ITA had no doubts that the best course was to offer
the two transmitters together,
Two applicants made interviews, both held on 3 May 1960. The first
called was `Solway TV', a mixture of two earlier groups, one from
each side of the border. The other was Border Television, who had a
much greater array of big names, including the chairman of Reuters,
Sir John Burgess OBE and Sir Michael Balcon, a film producer. An
unusual feature was the participation of the Vice Chancellor of
Glasgow University and Brasenose College Oxford, although they
weren't proposing to focus on education.
Both companies seemed to have sound business cases and be mainly
locally based. In the end the ITA came down in favour of Border,
although they required an additional Scotsman to be on the Board.
There was a ceremony, albeit a brief one on the opening day of 1
September 1961, where there was the obligatory on-screen appearance
by the station's bigwigs who were never seen of again. After the ITN
news at 17:55 they reverted to local programmes of news and current
affairs; they managed a very creditable two-and-a-half hours of local
material during their first week. One notable absence was schools
programmes; it was considered that no schools in its area had a
television set, and probably they thought such a service to be too
expensive. Another missing feature was the epilogue.
... to be continued ...
Scheduling the transmitters
With the area being low in population, Border was keen to start only
when both transmitters were available. Work on the 1000 foot
`Carlisle' transmitter (from a site at Caldbeck) was adversely
affected by winds during the winter of 1960/1, and could only be
ready by May 1961, about three months later than the original plans.
This was not a good time to start for advertising revenue, and Border
asked to delay their start until 1 September 1961. Selkirk had delays
arising from its novel nature: it was an unmanned repeater, picking
up Caldbeck, and rebroadcasting it on a different frequency. Border's
MD, Robin Gill persuaded the ITA to erect a temporary 200 foot mast
to provide coverage over some of the eastern part of their region
for the lucrative pre-Christmas period
before the proper installation could be completed.
The Black Hole of the Isle of Man
It was clear to Gill and the ITA engineers that Caldbeck would
provide coverage of the eastern part of the Isle of Man, including
Douglas. This extra area could be attractive for advertisers.
However, the 1954 Television Act did not extend to the Isle of Man,
and the local parliament had been lobbying the Postmaster General for
some years for the right to licence both local television and radio.
Although the ITA had not previously stopped either
UTV or
Granada from showing portions of the
Isle of Man on their coverage maps issued to potential advertisers it
would not allow Border to, even though their signal was likely to be
stronger than either of these. However it was a typical compromise in
that there was no restriction on advertising their reception on the
Isle of Man itself, but the ITA would not levy additional rental
for extra viewers.
'Get Ready to Switch to Border'
The advertising campaign was initiated in July 1961. The station
symbol had been chosen - officially 'to suggest in abstract design
the two distinct parts of the region brought together by the
electronic medium', although to many it was a rather squashed 'B'.An almost instant success
Unlike some of the other larger regionals, Border turned an operating
profit in its first year of operation, and paid off its start-off
costs by the next. This can be attributed to a very quick penetration
of its market with an audience share normally of 60%. The local
programmes too had gained a greater than usual following.
Transmitters
VHF
Caldbeck 11H 1/09/61
Selkirk 13V 1/12/61
Richmond Hill 8H 26/03/65
Whitehaven 7V 30/01/68
UHF (main)
Caldbeck 28H 1/9/71
Selkirk 59H 1/3/72
