Dr Who is missing several episodes and stories which were originally broadcast in the 1960s because the BBC, at that time, had no central archive and no proper archiving process.
It meant that copies of TV programmes were variously held at the BBC sales department (which tried to sell copies to foreign counties, especially Commonwealth members where ex-pats were likely to live) as well as centrally at the BBC.
However, storing tape and film is expensive and takes up valuable space so these various departments which had copies of programmes were instructed to destroy them once they were past their usuable life. Nobody had thought to check if the copy being thrown away was actually the last copy. Pretty much everybody assumed there was another copy somewhere else.
When Britain switched to colour TV, black & white copies were particularly vulnerable to this cultural vandalism because they were seen as less valuable.
British TV archives are missing large swathes of programmes of cultural and historical importance such as:
Match of the Day
Top of the Pops
Dixon of Dock Green
Sherlock Holmes (starring Peter Cushing)
etc etc. The lists go on and on.
We even threw away the last copy of the BBC broadcast of the moon landings. That's right folks - the greatest achievement of mankind in the 20th century and the BBC threw away the film. Only a few seconds of footage that got re-used for other programmes now survives.
But all is not lost.
Remember that I said the BBC sold copies to foreign archives? These were sold on the condition that they were thrown away or disposed of after they had been broadcast. However, many of these African countries weren't so happy to treat these films as ephemerally as the BBC were - they kept them.
It means that there may be hundred (or even thousands) of cultural gems sitting in foreign archives around the world.
It's how some very valuable Dr Who episodes were discovered back in 2013, as you might remember:
https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-24467337
Sadly, when it comes to recovering these missing episodes there is a snag - they are valuable.
The BBC had decided in the 1970s when they wanted them junking that they were not and ordered foreign archives to throw them away or junk them. We should be thankful for the fact that they did not. However, the foreign stations were technically in breach of their contract.
The material is now valuable, the BBC still own the copyright to the material but the legal owners of the actual filmcans is disputable. Arguably they belong the foreign station even though they did not follow their instructions to dispose of the material.
All this means that in order to repatriate such material there are legal minefields. This material is valuable and the stations know it. They rightly want a bit of remuneration for saving our cultural heritage. And then there is the BBC, which is forbidden to buy its own material by it carter but which now wants its valuable material returning, even though they originally wanted it destroying...
That's where this obsessive Dr Who fan comes in.... He had the idea that he would offer an "archiving service" to foreign stations: He would digitize, rescue and catalogue their ageing (and often badly stored) archives and in return he would get the opportunity to "repatriate" films of historical interest which may be missing from our own archives.
It's a neat solution because everybody gets something out of it. But there's still a minefiled of negotiations to get through.
There are rumours that he's found thousands of missing programmes that would be of national interest but, quite naturally, he's having to negotiate a fair price with the stations who kept them over the years.
Why have I written all this doing on a BFC forum?
The details of what may, or may not, have been found are being kept strictly confidential so nobody knows what might have been recovered. However, the man in question seemingly enjoys teasing out little details here and there.
He's just posted an image of a film can that is a copy (presumably the only one in existance) of "Saturday Sport" from November 24th 1962.
https://twitter.com/archives1963/status ... 6765849600
I've looked up the synopsis for that episode and it's presented by Kenneth Wolstenholme and features a look at the 1962 cup final from the summer of that year.
https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/ae2432fc976 ... 3e66aa87eb
Hopefully one day we'll be able to watch it again and we'll perhaps get a little bit of new footage, interviews or little bit of additional insight into the '62 cup final.
I imagine the footage of the game will already exist but there's a strong chance we might get to hear an interview or a bit of analysis that has hitherto been lost to time.
Here's hoping!
