1964 General Election Part 1

I am back. with most of the coverage of the 1964 general election. which is the last one to be presented by Richard Dimbleby (8 more parts to come)

[@That_Random_Bloke]

At 6:12 a nice moment: "Thank you son..."

[@firmannugraha8236]

1:15:20 another nice moment : "also worthy son" that was soon followed by a jocular chuckle xD

[@sylvesterlennon8925]

Very impressed with this coverage. Great presenters, intelligent questioning and no interrupting (except for an incoming result)

[@Waterford1992]

5:20 LOL David Dimbelby.. I just spat my coco pops up the wall.!!!!!

[@johnking5174]

Richard Dimbleby was suffering from testicular cancer when he hosted this election coverage. He knew it was highly likely he would die within a year of this, as cancer treatment was virtually non existent in the 1960s. His cancer was diagnosed in 1960, but Richard left it and did not bother with treatment until a few years later, which made his recovery impossible as it had spread by 1964, according to his son David. This is why we got that wonderful "Thank you son" at 6:15 - he knew he was dying. So sad, as he was a wonderful broadcaster, warm, safe, trusted and a great man during the war with the BBC.

[@daisuke9022]

You'd never know it seeing him here. What a great professional.

[@martm216]

Yes, I agree with all of that. What a wonderful man he was and what a loss. If only he'd had treatment earlier.

[@martm216]

@@daisuke9022 yes indeed.

[@johnking5174]

@@martm216 Most likely the treatment on offer in 1960 would not have helped him too much. Cancer treatment has come a long way since 1960.

[@martm216]

@@johnking5174 yes, very true. Imyself was diagnosed with prostate cancer eight years ago. The hospital was great, and I seem to be in the clear. Back in the early sixties it might have been a death sentence. Probably would have been.

[@TyrSkyFatherOfTheGods]

Very interesting! As a Canadian watching elections in the UK, operating with basically the same Westminster model as used in the Old Country, I'm struck by the national predictive power of local party swings. It suggests a very cohesive national "mood." In Canada, the country is so vast, the population so dispersed, and the regional interests and preoccupations so distinct; that it would be very difficult to infer an approximate final allocation of seats by looking at the accumulation of constituency outcomes. You can often see an overall national trend developing, but elections here are very much a region-by-region, or even riding-by-riding thing.

[@Woody93185]

cheltenham doing a sunderland lol.. Seriously though uploading these to youtube is a fantastic idea.. It's so important from a historical context and because I'm a sad sad nerd who is fascinated with broadcasting methods of these periods it's just fascinating to see this.. many thanks :)

[@thedativecase9733]

It's not just you, there are political nerds everywhere. We just don't draw attention to ourselves.

[@garethbrown9191]

Great that we an watch presenters, reporters and commentators at the top of their game!

[@sylvesterlennon8925]

This is brilliant. Better broadcasters then today, I think.

[@altfactor]

How the late Tim Russert would have loved to have used a swingometer to cover Senate and Congressional elections!

[@JeffGR4]

David Butler = genius. Bob McKenzie = genius.

[@molfeta]

Sir Alec Douglas Home great gent and great prime minister

[@FloraW]

Thank you for this, I was hoping someone would have coverage of this one :)

[@altfactor]

At 15:05 of this clip, anchor Richard Dimbleby breaks away from the election coverage to report that Soviet leader Nikita Kruschev has "resigned"; and then introduced an discussion with London Times reporter Alan Quinn-Jones and CBS News London bureau chief Charles Collingwood (the latter was probably going to be at BBC Television Centre that night anyway to do hourly reports from the BBC election studio for the CBS Radio Network's on-the-hour newscasts, and maybe one TV report by satellite for the TV network).

[@altfactor]

The beginning of the coverage shows The March Of The BBC News Production Assistants. Richard Dimblely was considered "The Walter Cronkite Of Great Britain"; both are still considered the top network TV news anchors in the respective histories of TV in their countries.

[@BenG9216]

I highly respect Richard and I also really respect his son David too, brilliant journalists the both of them.

[@thisiszaphod]

altfactor Walter Cronkite wasn't in the same league as Richard Dimbleby.

[@wheelsdnfd40]

October 15/16 1964 was a very eventful 24 hours. Khrushchev got the chop, the Tories got the chop and the Chinese tested their first nuke!

[@lameduck3630]

Sir Alec was pure class.

[@ian_b]

"Can't hear Salford. Never mind."

[@buckspa]

Thanks so much! This one should be really exciting.

[@johnking5174]

This was Richard Dimbleby's last time anchoring an election night - he died in December 1965 from cancer

[@ceciledeguire2265]

Science fiction blasting intro for 1964 lol Beeb can roxy too

[@Waterford1992]

Science fictions eh? the same music track was used in Lawrence Oliviers film Henry V from 1944 and that is not a sci fi film

[@TP-qx7zf]

Thank you! I was trying to find this! You earned a subscriber.

[@altfactor]

In most recent British election nights, Sunderland South has been the first place to report results. This Thursday (May 7th), look for Sunderland South to again be first to report....with TV news crews from all over the world there. Sunderland South is to British parliamentary elections what Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, is to American presidential elections---the first to report results. But Dixville Notch is a tiny village where they open polls at 12:01 A.M., and close the polls once everyone has cast their votes, meaning that their results on a U.S. election day are released to the news media over eighteen-and-a-half hours before results are announced from anywhere else in the country. By contrast, every polling place in the UK closes at the same time, and Sunderland South simply beats everyone else.

[@herondelatorre1737]

Sunderland South had been the first to report election results since 1992, but in 2017 it lost that title to Newcastle upon Tyne.

[@johnking5174]

The 1964 election night coverage on the BBC was hated by viewers and critics alike. The 1959 coverage was praised and lauded, five years later it was ridiculed and hated.

[@byrd56]

By the 1970s, Ian Trethowan would move over into management, first as head of BBC Radio, then (as Director-General) of the entire BBC operation.

[@theanonymouspundit4671]

Weird to think that the 1964 GE had occurred just 13 days before my dad was born.

[@stuartlaing4488]

How things change in 51 years in 1964 Scotland had no effect on the national result while in 2015 Scotland virtually handed David Cameron a majority.

[@billsmith5985]

Thank god they did...............

[@cameronferguson4514]

+Stuart Laing What drivel. If every Scot voted Labour, 100% of the country in all 59 constituencies, David Cameron would still have had a majority in May. The Conservatives would be on 329 & Labour on 291.

[@jonnapat3213]

+Me Nobody could be worse than Thatcher.

[@Secular_Scot]

+Stuart Laing SCOTLAND DID NOT HAND BRITAIN A TORY MAJORITY, THE FUCKING SOUTHERN ENGLISH HANDED THE TORIES A MAJORITY BY VOTING FOR THE TORIES!!!!! This myth is so fucking stupid. If every single seat in Scotland had gone to Labour - 59 - then Labour would still only have had 290 seats, with the tories having 330.

[@jonnapat3213]

Capital Bhoy You"re so right. it"s always Tory southern England that gives them so many seats fot the obvious reasons of self interest.

[@Sheffield_Steve]

29:14 Geoffrey Wheeler, to think that he was reporting from Salford for Election '64, then by the 70s, would be the deviser, voice-over, then by the time Jimmy Tarbuck left, the host of Yorkshire TV's "Winner Takes All", that's how I knew him when I was a lad.

[@lucianopavarotti2843]

This somehow seems much faster-paced and precise Tv coverage than recent elections

[@communityrags6048]

1:10:50 an interesting 10 minute stretch begins, where the parties' relative fortunes dramatically transform... go and watch it, no spoilers here (for an election that happened 62 years ago) An amazing on-the-hoof serious of discussions as the results randomly land... and as ladies buy washing powder

[@mummygiraffepresentsclassi8722]

"And when yoo press the right button it says "Naff off I'm busy" ohh if only xxx

[@jamesmitchell8922]

The 60s was the perfect decade of the cultural revolution

[@pm_ordinarychap]

V strange and ominous opening sequence. All those young people being marched around the studio and what were they picking up?

[@johnking5174]

1964 and no wifi or broadband - a simplier time

[@pfarquharson1]

Looking at the scoreboard at 1:27:43 it was all even. That was the thing about this election it was so close - either of the main parties Labour or Conservative's could have won. That's what makes this election one of the best fought as you didnot know who would win in the end.

[@andrewmorris9946]

44:37 What the hell is a Gas and Pube Dance?

[@thedativecase9733]

I've no idea, but now I shall ponder this mystery until I find the answer.

[@ajs41]

The BBC didn't bother to record most programmes at this time, (and they erased most of the ones they did). The only reason these election videos exists is because a few private individuals had equipment capable of recording them. The same is true of all the election shows up to 1979. I believe the elections expert F.W. Craig was responsible for recording a lot of these shows. He also produced election results books.

[@paddystrongjaw9995]

As a Doctor Who fan, it is a real tragedy the BBC and ITN decided to junk most of there old recordings.

[@johnking5174]

Hi Andy, do you know if the 1964 general election was the first to be broadcast from BBC Television Centre? I do know Studio TC1 opened in 1964 and so might have been used for election night. Do you know?

[@HappyHauptwerk]

How come when the ballot boxes were opened in Billericay at the beginning of the count all the ballots were already sorted neatly into bundles?

[@matusy1963]

Hi brilliant series - are there still 3 more parts to come and if so when are you posting them ?

[@ossyable]

The cartoon at 9.00 … lol

[@daisuke9022]

They did it much better in those days.

[@jamesmitchell8922]

We cannot hear Salford, never mind.

[@AdmiralBlake]

I still think Wilson is the most charismatic prime minister, Blair's spin was obvious and rather crude (in my opinion) but Wilson was able to pull it off very well.

[@robicenco1]

He was one of the smartest prime ministers we've ever had. Had a mixed record in office, but presided over some good years and was in my view one of the most able PMs of the post-war period.

[@neilsaunders9309]

Wilson was a vastly more intelligent man than Blair.

[@thedativecase9733]

@@robicenco1 Wilson gets a bad rap from the commentariat but I think he was one of our better PMs. He kept us out of the Vietnam War.

[@TP-qx7zf]

I need to know what music that was in the beginning...

[@jamesmitchell8922]

Music during a declaration?

[@Myndir]

Perhaps, but it rarely seemed to matter in elections: the Labour vote fell from 43.8% in 1959 to 39.2% in October 1974 (and as low as 37.9% in February 1974 in spite of tremendous cock-ups by Heath) and it was falling even in 1964. Arguably, though, Wilson was Labour leader during the beginning of a long period of secular decline for the party (not really ending until Blair) because of the repositioning of the Liberal party as a social democratic party.

[@robicenco1]

The important thing in British elections isn't so much the shares of the vote as the gap between the Labour and Conservative shares - so it's perfectly possible for either party to poll weakly and still get a good majority - as long as the other party is doing even worse.

[@Sheffield_Steve]

Does anyone know what the dots represented on some of the cards on some constituencies that were either white dots in the top right corner or a black dot inside the white dot?

[@azshaw123]

Seems strange to hear salford mentioned.

[@kawasaki5187]

Salford always gets a mention as it is one of the first to declare

[@mummygiraffepresentsclassi8722]

indeed, in any context!!

[@stuartlaing4488]

All this talk about working majorities there should be no way that Mr Cameron can stay until 2020.

[@jonnapat3213]

+Stuart Laing The BIG problem with this remark is "Do you want Boris Johnson instead" Most sane people must say NO for sure?

[@herondelatorre4023]

To Stuart Laing and Jonnapat : Well it seems both of you were wrong. By 2020 Mr. Cameron would be out of power for 4 yrs and people would choose Mr. Johnson because he is the current UK Prime Minister in this year. How ironic!?!?!

[@paddystrongjaw9995]

jonnapat well these posts certainly show how attitudes have changed in 5 years.

[@herondelatorre4023]

@@paddystrongjaw9995 I believe the change in attitudes may have occured because no one believed that the Brexit vote would occur and cause both the downfall of Cameron and the eventual rise of Johnson. What is your opinion on this????

[@garethbrown9191]

As time proved.@@jonnapat3213

[@iangraham9988]

"retirement" lol

[@communityrags6048]

Goodness... a lady's verdict (after 1:07:57)

[@garrysimpson1395]

Any I.T.N coverage?

[@jamesmitchell8922]

A black man says Labour to win.

[@garrysimpson1395]

Any I.T.N. Coverage?

[@johnking5174]

ITN coverage is nearly non existent.

[@paddystrongjaw9995]

John King yep all wiped from the archives if I’m not mistaken.

[@johnking5174]

@@paddystrongjaw9995 I think 1966 coverage from ITN exists. I saw clips of it before.

[@johnnyballenatl]

John King 1959’s (their first) exist as well; as a matter of fact, ITN has kept all of their election nights.

[@garrysimpson1395]

@@johnnyballenatl Some of I.T.N"s 1987 coverage is still around. There were just two occasions when I.T.N."S Election Night coverage was better than the B.B.C."s 1964 and 1979 respectively.

[@davidhoward4715]

39:05 It's a landslide! Tories sitting on 100% of the seats!

[@jamesmitchell8922]

Krushchev was sacked

[@ossyable]

The good old days not a woman in sight ………. wink wink