How a Darlington youngest mayor became the first chairman of the BBC

The BBC is, understandably, making much of its centenary, but the role of a local lord is often overlooked.

The BBC was officially formed on October 18, 1922, with six competing wireless companies uniting to create one broadcasting organisation chaired by Lord Gainford of Headlam Hall.

In America, there was a cacophony of unregulated transmitters pumping out broadcasts on the same wavelengths, some of which were said to interfere with military communications. The British, naturally, resolved to do things in a more organised way, so the Postmaster General, who issued the broadcasting licences, urged the companies making radio sets to come together to prevent the free-for-all of the American airwaves.

This suited the companies because it meant they didn’t each need to build a forest of masts across the country or make lots of programmes that were not going to be heard. Instead, under the chairmanship of Lord Gainford, they could pool resources.

He was Jack Pease (above), the grandson of Joseph Pease who stands on a statue in Darlington’s High Row. He was born in Woodlands, now St Teresa’s Hospice, in 1860 and went up to Cambridge University where he devoted much time to amateur dramatics, drag hunting and cricket. He was a founder of Durham County Cricket Club, and, from 1886 to 1891, he was the county’s second captain. He also played for the Marylebone Cricket Club for many years, and said his finest moment was when he took catch in the outfield off the bowling of WG Grace and the great man walked over to shake him by the hand.

He played cricket until he was 74 when his “inability to take a quick run forced me to give up the game”.

In 1886, he married Ethel Havelock-Allan, of Blackwell Grange, and in 1888, he became mayor of Darlington – at 28, he was the youngest mayor in the country, and the youngest mayor the town has ever had.

A Liberal, he was elected as the MP for Tynemouth in 1892, and, during a debate on Irish Home Rule, he made his mark in the Commons by rugby tackling an Irish MP to the ground to prevent him piling into a fight.

Jack was seriously constrained by the Peases’ spectacular financial collapse of 1902, but gradually rose through the ranks, catching the eye of the Liberal leader, HH Asquith, who took him into the cabinet as the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

He was in charge of the Franchise Bill of 1913 which would have given the first women the vote if the Speaker had not ordered its withdrawal on a technicality.

With the First World War looming, Jack was in a difficult position. Like all of Darlington’s Quakers, he was a pacifist – the Peases’ emblem, which is still to be found on walls around town, features a dove of peace carrying a peapod of peace in its beak – and he was president of the national Peace Society.

But his 25-year-old son, Joseph, who was manager of Bowden Close Colliery near Crook, was desperate to get at the Germans. After much agonising, Jack resigned from the Peace Society, remained in the cabinet that took Britain into the war, and got Lord Kitchener, the Secretary of State for War, to personally sign Joseph’s call-up papers.

In 1916, Jack became Postmaster General and in Asquith’s resignation honours of 1917, he was raised to the peerage as Baron Gainford of Headlam Hall.

A lovely view over the packhorse bridge towards Headlam Hall, taken on April 29, 1967. Headlam Hall is a Grade II* listed building, and was converted by the Robinson family into a hotel in 1978

When the wireless companies were trying to pull their broadcasting company together, they approached Jack to be chairman as he was a “prominent public man unconnected with any of the constituent companies”. His experience as Postmaster General must have helped.

Having been formed on October 18, 1922, the BBC made its first broadcast on November 14, 1922, from station 2LO which was based in the Marconi company’s London office in The Strand. This featured, at 6pm, the first news bulletin read by Arthur Burrows.

The BBC began creating a national network of transmitters, with 5IT coming on stream in Birmingham and 2ZY in Manchester on November 15, followed by a fourth station, 5NO, in Newcastle on December 24.

At the end of 1922, there were 35,774 receiving licences in the country, and the wireless set owners paid a levy which paid for the programmes on the BBC. They heard music, drama, talks, news and timechecks.

Jack Pease, the 1st Baron Gainford, of Headlam Hall

From February 5, 1924, those checks were the Greenwich pips, but Lord Gainford noticed in his London house that when his grandson, another Joseph known as “Zef” to the family to avoid confusion, heard the 6pm chimes from Big Ben, he would gurgle with delight before his nanny took him to bed. Jack therefore insisted that the 6pm pips should be replaced by Big Ben’s bongs so other babies across the country could enjoy them just as the infant Pease did.

And so even now on Radio 4, while the other hours start with the pips, 6pm is heralded by the sound of “Zef’s bongs”.

As the first chairman of the British Broadcasting Company, Jack piloted the fledgling enterprise until, on January 1, 1927, the Postmaster General took over all of the licences and changed it into a public service funded by a radio licence fee.

He served as deputy chairman and a governor until 1932, and then retired back to Headlam Hall where he died in 1943.

Much of the existing Headlam Hall was built in the early 17th Century on top of an old manor house. This picture was taken in 1978, shortly before the conversion into a hotel. A more recent picture of the hall is below