Whatever happened to Uncle Cecil? Opening the BBC archives on a missing part of the historical narrative in British children’s television

This paper looks at the contribution to children’s television made by Cecil Madden, employed as Acting Head of Children’s Programmes at the BBC in the early stages of its development from a part of the Talks Department to its own separate identity (between 1950-1951). At best, reference to his stewardship is a brief note or footnote in histories of early British children’s television (Oswell, 2002; Buckingham et.al, 1999). Rather, scholarly and industry emphasis is placed on developments under Freda Lingstrom, who coming from the Schools Broadcasting Department at the BBC, took over from Madden in June/July 1951. Drawing on internal memos, personnel files and policy paperwork from the BBC Written Archives, this paper assesses Madden’s attempts to define a way of speaking to children beyond the Aunties and Uncles of BBC radio’s Children’s Hour. It looks at the development of the child continuity announcer as the face of Children’s Television and bridge to the child audience in those early years. Whilst Jennifer Gay, the most prominent of these child television personalities, was already working for the Corporation before Madden entered post, it was he who insisted on having her employed on a proper BBC contract. Some of the issues that the BBC had in negotiating the legal restrictions in place when employing a child are discussed, along with the Corporation’s rather hesitant reaction to the proto-celebrification of Gay. The paper ends by analysing the tonality this lent to children’s television at this point and how it reflected Madden’s personal drive and interests in broadcasting.