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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Entertainment
Emily Retter

BBC's top facts as it turns 100 – including iconic David Attenborough moment captured in error

In the he second part of the Mirror's series celebrating 100 years of the BBC, we reveal the final 50 fascinating facts...

51 Paul Danquah, star of cult 1960s film A Taste of Honey, was the first black host on BBC children's TV in 1965, to be followed soon after by popular black presenters Derek Griffiths and Floella Benjamin on Play School.

52 The longest-running TV football programme in the world, Match of the Day, began in 1964. The highlights show, which has an iconic theme tune, is currently presented by Gary Lineker.

53 One of the biggest events in British sporting history was the 1966 World Cup when England beat West Germany, and BBC commentator Kenneth Wolstenholme said the famous words: "They think it's all over...it is now!"

54 Cathy Come Home was one of the most memorable Wednesday Plays, and its portrayal of homelessness in 1966 shocked the nation and led to a wave of support for charities Shelter and Crisis.

55 The Beatles sang All You Need is Love, commissioned by the BBC, on the world's first ever live satellite international TV link-up in 1967.

56 BBC Two became the first colour service in Europe in 1967, pioneered by David Attenborough who was then controller of the channel. He launched shows such as snooker tournament Pot Black to showcase the innovation.

57 In the 1990s, BBC Two was rebranded with a suite of playful 2s that were a huge hit with the public. Its lead creative said: "BBC Two was probably the first ident that got its own fan mail!"

58 Testcard F was used to help engineers tune televisions – especially important in the advent of colour in 1967. It became memorable for generations of viewers because of the girl (Carole Hersee, daughter of BBC engineer George Hersee) with her clown doll and blackboard. Probably the most aired face in BBC TV history.

59 DJ Tony Blackburn was the first voice on the brand new Radio 1 in 1967, and the first record he played was Flowers in the Rain by The Move.

The Moon Landing was the first all-night broadcast by the BBC (BBC)

60 Radio Leicester launched in 1967, starting a network of local stations numbering 40 this year.

61 The 1969 moon landing, watched globally by 650 million people, was also the first all-night broadcast by the BBC, lasting in total 27 hours.

62 Terry Wogan was the most popular man on BBC Radio and TV from the 1970s onwards, and everyone's favourite Eurovision commentator for 35 years, ("just don't ask me to take it seriously," he famously said).

63 The idea of a "university of the airwaves" first came up in 1924, and The Open University finally launched in 1971, opening up tertiary education to all for the first time. Over two million people have since gained OU degrees.

64 We are a nation of quiz lovers, from The Brains Trust (1941) to Mastermind (1972). The latter's intimidating atmosphere was apparently inspired by producer Bill Wright's interrogations at the hands of the Gestapo during the Second World War.

65 That’s Life, starring Esther Rantzen, not only ran for an incredible 21 years from 1973, it also launched two groundbreaking charities: Childline (now copied in over 150 countries) and Silver Line for older people.

66 The first "fly on the wall" documentary on British TV was The Family, launched by the BBC in 1974. Shocked and fascinated viewers watched the goings-on of the Wilkins family in Reading, who agreed to be filmed for 18 hours a day over a period of three months.

67 Delia Smith first appeared on air in 1973 in a show called Family Fare. She went on to huge popularity as a TV cook and supermarkets would regularly sell out of any ingredients she cited, most famously cranberries in 1995.

68 Ceefax, the world's first teletext service, was launched in 1974 to exploit the unused capacity of the 625-line television signal, quickly gaining a cult following.

69 Welsh soap Pobol y Cwm (People of the Valley), launched in 1974 at a time when Welsh-language programmes were under threat, is now the longest-running soap on BBC TV.

A Morecambe and Wise special still holds the record for Britain's most-watched BBC show ever (TV Times/Future Publishing via Getty Images)
Angela Rippon was one of the original Top Gear hosts (Getty)

70 The Morecambe & Wise 1977 Christmas show still holds the record for Britain's most-watched BBC show ever, with 28 million viewers across the country.

71 Top Gear 's original presenters in 1977 were Angela Rippon and Tom Coyne, presenting "a monthly show for road users" before the show was rebooted in 2002 as a motoring entertainment show hosted by (among others) Jeremy Clarkson. It is now the BBC's top global brand.

72 Grange Hill was the world's longest-running children's TV drama, running for 30 years from 1978 until 2008. Its writers included later Oscar-winning film director Anthony Minghella. Its cast included Todd Carty and Susan Tully, who went on to star in EastEnders, and even Naomi Campbell (before she became a supermodel).

73 The heart-stopping moment when David Attenborough met the gorillas in the 1979 natural history documentary Life on Earth was only recorded by accident, the cameraman revealed afterwards.

74 Children in Need 's popular mascot Pudsey Bear was named by BBC graphic designer Joanna Lane after her West Yorkshire home town.

75 The wedding of the century between Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer in 1981 was watched by 750 million viewers in 74 countries.

David Attenborough's iconic Life on Earth moment was captured in error (PA)

76 The biggest fan of 1980s political satire Yes Minister was the then-Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who actually appeared in one episode as herself, demanding the abolition of economists – and quickly.

77 Newsnight's most famous presenter was perhaps Jeremy Paxman (1989-2014). In an interview with the Tories' then-Home Secretary Michael Howard in 1997 he repeated his question "Did you threaten to overrule him?" 14 times in an effort to elicit a straight answer.

78 Del Boy, David Jason 's character in Only Fools and Horses, defined the 1980s with unforgettable catch-phrases like "Lovely jubbly!" and "This time next year we'll be millionaires!"

79 See Hear, which launched in 1981, is one of the longest-running disability programmes in the world, pioneering the use of deaf on-air presenters.

Princess Diana and Prince Charles' wedding was watched by 750 million viewers globally (Terry Fincher/Princess Diana Archive/Getty Images)

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80 The BBC transformed the UK's computer literacy at a stroke in 1982 when it launched the BBC Micro computer, powering an IT revolution in schools and homes.

81 Madhur Jaffrey launched her Indian Cookery show in 1982, making us a nation of curry lovers. The actress' passion for cookery began when she felt homesick in London and asked her mother to send her some family recipes from India so she could learn how to cook them.

82 During the Falklands War, BBC news correspondent Brian Hanrahan's memorable 1982 quote – "I counted them all out and I counted them back" – was couched to get round the BBC’s reporting restrictions during the conflict, as he was not able to quote the exact number of jets involved in the Port Stanley raid.

83 Launched at 6.30am on January 17, 1983, Breakfast Time was Europe's first breakfast TV service, pipping TV-am's Good Morning Britain by two weeks.

84 Designed to compete with ITV's long-running soap Coronation Street, BBC1's EastEnders first hit our screens in 1985, bringing the nation its arresting theme tune complete with its famous (and much debated) nine douf-doufs.

85 "Stay in and give us the money" was Live Aid creator Bob Geldof ’s famous phrase as the 1985 concert showed the global power of music to transform lives, in the wake of the Ethiopian famine.

86 Casualty is the world’s longest-running primetime medical drama. It launched in 1986 and is based on a hospital in Bristol.

87 Andrew Davies' 1995 adaptation of Jane Austen ’s Pride and Prejudice transformed costume drama and made a sex symbol of Colin Firth as Darcy. But the famous scene of him swimming in the lake was entirely Davies' invention.

88 Noel's House Party ruled the Saturday night roost in the 1990s, led by Noel Edmonds ’ broadcast from an imagined mansion in a fictional village called Crinkly Bottom.

89 Silent Witness, created in 1996, is now the longest-running crime drama on UK TV.

90 BBC Children's Teletubbies (launched in 1997) was criticised early on for its babyish language, exactly as puppets Bill and Ben had been in the 1950s, but neither criticism stopped the shows being monster hits with kids.

Grange Hill - which included cast members like Todd Carty (left) and Terry Sue Patt (right) - ran from 1978 until 2008 (BBC)

91 BBC launched its first website in 1997, starting a revolution in broadcasting, and the BBC Charter was rewritten for the first time to go beyond standard radio and TV media.

92 Inspired by the success of Baz Luhrmann 's 1992 film Strictly Ballroom, the BBC launched Strictly Come Dancing in 2004, to become a surprise UK and global hit.

93 BBC iPlayer launched in 2007, with content initially viewable for just seven days. It has transformed our viewing habits and 6.6 billion programmes streamed on iPlayer in 2021/22.

94 London 2012 was the first truly digital Olympics, with every event available online, and a global audience of 3.6 billion viewers.

95 Peaky Blinders was such a global success that sales of Tommy Shelby's ( Cillian Murphy ) trademark "newsboy" cap went through the roof.

96 BBC Films won the award for Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema in 2015 in recognition of a catalogue of over 300 films including 2000’s Billy Elliot, 2019’s Judy, and 1990 hit Truly, Madly, Deeply.

97 Some 37 million people watched Blue Planet II in 2017 and 62% said it had changed their behaviour.

98 As well as writing and starring in the award-winning Fleabag, Phoebe Waller-Bridge also wrote the first season of Killing Eve, and was then taken on to help shape the script of latest Bond film No Time to Die.

99 Education initiative Bitesize launched in 1998 with a teeth-snapping shark as its logo. It is now used by 75% of secondary school students.

100 Michaela Coel went through 191 drafts in order to create her award-winning 2020 drama I May Destroy You.

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