General Information

If you ever doubted how important BBC Radio Nottingham is in the life of Nottinghamshire folk, you should have been in Nottingham on 17th January 1996.

Dennis McCarthy MBE

The funeral of much loved presenter Dennis McCarthy, MBE literally brought the city to a standstill. Twenty thousand listeners lined the streets up to five deep.

Dennis presented on the station for 25 years and was truly loved by listeners. He interviewed six Prime Ministers, Red Rum, and hundreds of film and TV stars.

Beginnings

BBC Radio Nottingham went on air on January 31st 1968. Dennis joined shortly after. Events did not always go according to plan.

We made the national news on New Year's Day in 1969, when the breakfast show was half an hour late going on air.

The station manager Gerald Nethercott blamed technical problems. He flatly denied staff had forgotton to switch on the equipment because they were suffering from hangovers.

Such teething problems did not stop the station becoming popular.

The TV personality Hughie Green even wanted to take over BBC Radio Nottingham and turn it into a commercial station. However, opportunity did not knock for Hughie.

Strange days

If you listened in the early days, the programmes were very different.

The station was only on the air for a few hours each day. Regular slots included "Town Crier" with the weather forecast, daily diary and road reports, "Bran tub" for the under fives, and "Elevenses" described as a programme for women at home.

In those days the news was compiled by a news agency, which unfortunately was a good distance away from the radio station.

Bulletins were delivered, not by walking the short distance from the newsdesk to the studios, but by bike across the city.