HYDE CHESHIRE

Harry Rutherford's
Festival of Britain Mural




Wednesday 19 October 2011

TV licence

I thought it would be interesting to show this TV licence. It cost £4 a year in 1966, which is nothing these days, but I suppose was a lot of money then.By comparison today, a TV licence is £145.50.



The address on the licence, 66 Queen Street, is no longer there. It was demolished along with James North to build the new Redrow housing estate. Interestingly, that part of Queen Street is no longer known as such and is now part of Douglas Street!

1910 Map

Recent Map


66 Queen street was just below the "A" in Douglas Street

5 comments:

Tom said...

This was for a wireless as well... I can remember before we had a TV mum had to pay for a licence for the wireless. There were two dials fixed to the window frame.. and I can recall listening to 'Listen With Mother'

The time is a quarter to two. This is the BBC Home Service for mothers and children at home. Are you ready for the music? When it stops, Catherine Edwards will be here to speak to you. Ding-de-dong. Ding-de-dong, Ding, Ding! Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin!..

Some of my earliest memories are sat by the wireless listening to it, while mum was busy working away on her singer sewing machine.. she'd stop sewing for 'Listen With Mother'

I'm sat here now with some wonderful memories of my early years spent at home with my mum... all because of a picture of the above licence... thank you Nancy. :O)

Dave Williams said...

We had a radio with dials fixed to the window frame too, Tom. It was rented from Rediffusion, and I remember that the numbers on the dial just went from 1 to 6 or 7, the Home Service, Light Programme, and Third Programme being available all the time, but the other numbers varied day by day. This was a time when the only station to broadcast the 'pop' music of the day (Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochrane, Gene Vincent, etc) was Radio Luxembourg, which was sometimes available on the Rediffusion sets, but all too frustratingly often, not.

There's so many repeats on TV nowadays, I wonder if it's worth trying to offer the £4 it cost in 1966 when renewing the licence now.

Tom said...

I think we had our set from Radiffusion to Dave.... I recall getting a little Red Indian squeaky toy and I'm sure it came from there shop..
I agree about the licence for the TV, I've been thinking of changing the way I watch TV all together now and setting up computer to use my TV as the monitor and watch just the programmes I want to that way.... as long as you don't watch live broadcasts or near live broadcast you do not need a licence.. With what is available now on the internet you can still have a great choice of programs.. and keep up with the soaps... I'd miss my 'Corry' other wise.. ha!

JohnT said...

I remember going up on Werneth Low with my crystal set, and and my NEW transistor radio, and listening to Radio Caroline, sat and damp grass with the radios close to the barbed wire that I used as an aerial. Memories.

JohnT said...

Tom, you'll have to explain to me what you mean that you'd miss 'Corry' ;-)