BBC Newsline (1996)

THE ROAD TO NEWSLINE: The coming of BBC TV to Northern Ireland was via a small transmitter in an old nissen hut which was installed so that good folk of Northern Ireland could watch the Coronation in 1953. The first regular news magazine for BBC viewers in Northern Ireland was 'Ulster Mirror' which started on 26th November 1954. It was a fortnightly programme of events filmed in Northern Ireland but rarely would have included what we would refer to as hard news. Although the material was filmed here BBC Northern Ireland had no processing facilities so the exposed film had to be carefully packed and transported to the BBC processors in London where it was also edited before being sent back to Ulster in a 'ready to show' state. It was not until 30th September 1957 that BBC Northern Ireland had its first local TV news when it's first presenter was Maurice Shillington. Even then there were still no facilities for film and the only illustration would have been an occasional black and white still photograph. The first news type magazine programme hit then quite small screens on 20th February 1959 when Robert Coulter introduced the very first edition of 'Studio Eight' the snappy title of a news programme direct from the BBC Studio 8 in Belfast. Studio 8 was a remarkably small studio but the hardware, particularly the cameras, in the late 50s were huge and production of programmes from such a small area became a triumph of ingenuity over adversity. Some four years later the Beatles broadcast from the same studio. Over the next few years the programme title changed, first to "Six O'Clock" then to "Six-Five" with Michael Baguely as presenter and then to "Six-Ten". Perhaps having a title that would attract people was not such a priority in the days when there was just the one channel to watch and, sure enough, everyone did watch. In 1969 the more sophisticated "Scene Around Six" came on air and remained with us for thirteen years. This programme made household names of people like Wendy Austin, Barry Cowan and Sean Rafferty and, in spite of great difficulties and danger to camera and crews, never failed to bring on the spot film reports from every corner of Northern Ireland during the worst of the troubles. Older viewers will remember the Scene Around Six presenter always handed over to 'Nationwide' in London for the national news programme. In 1982 a remodelled news magazine programme with a sharper news edge called 'Inside Ulster' was broadcast from Belfast's new 'state of the art' Studio B. This programme began to take advantage of the new breaks through in TV technology using techniques that would have seemed the wildest science fiction in the days of 'Studio Eight' BBC Newsline's first programme was on 12th February, 1996.