The birth of a station!

FIRST Edition, Sounds Country, Mel Hill's Jazzbeat, Jaywalk, Ivan Gaskell's Sportsbeat, Anglers' Club, Richard Walker's Folk Show. If you recall any of these programmes, you'll probably have grown up as a regular listener to BBC Radio Stoke.

- MERVYN EDWARDS

However, let's take our story right back to the 1960s and consider interest in the forthcoming radio station, and how it came to be launched and sent down the slipway.

Its imminent arrival was keenly anticipated by one Burslem business who perhaps saw a nice little earner around the corner.

Bew's of Burslem, which readers will recall as being on the junction of Market Place and Westport Road, advertised on the front page of this newspaper in March, 1968: "Are you ready to receive Radio Stoke on March 14th? See our range of VHF transistor radios by leading manufacturers."

Bevan's Sound Centre in The Strand, Longton also jumped on the bandwagon, advertising its VHF radios from as little as £9, it being reported at the time that our area was witnessing a rush for VHF sets. One Hanley dealer reported that his VHF sales were up by 160 per cent.

Radio Stoke itself took out advertising space in The Sentinel and stridently promoted its launch: "Tomorrow another lusty bawling baby will be born. One thing is certain and that is that it will do more bawling than any child born in any of the City's Maternity Hospitals on the same day, for this newborn infant is BBC Radio Stoke, the latest of the BBC's offspring.

"Most of us have heard and read about the experimental stations opening in key cities, but it only really comes home to us when we hear mentioned our own districts - Smallthorne, Milton, Blurton and the like, places that have probably never been spoken of before by a BBC announcer."