50 Years of ITV in the South

I was looking through the schedules yesterday, and noticed a programme on Meridian which was due to be shown next thursday at 11:10pm called "Southern's Golden Years", presented by Fred Dinenage, but then looked again today, and it seems to have disappeared from the schedules, and has now been replaced with Customs UK.

Does anyone know anything about this programme, and when it is now going to be shown. Given the title, it looks like there could be one programme for each franchise holder.

Given that Southern launched on 30th August 1958, showing it next Thursday (28th August) did seem a very suitable date.

Looking at itv.com's tv guide, it's still there, following an episode of Customs UK.

Thanks for the heads up. Another ITV obituary show to enjoy, the YTV one was very good I thought.

Look forward to this. Yet another tribute programme with Mr Dinenage.

Wonder if it'll be as good as the nostalgic weekday series he did a few years ago called A Year To Remember? Trevor 'the weather' Baker even returned!

Not sure what Meridian South are doing but in the South East, Mike Field is looking back over the past Southern/TVS decades on Meridian Tonight now.

The programme was rather good I thought. Some interesting archive clips of continuity and news programmes, and interviews with former stars such as Christopher Robbie.

If anyone cares, Christopher Peacock has been seen frequenting my local boozer on a regular basis

Does anyone know if they plan to mention TVS and Meridian in this celebration of 50 years of ITV in the South?

I thought the programme was awful. No structure, they totally by-passed 1958 to 1968, and the rest was just a jumble. it was just a load of random clips thrown together. Useless.

It was however good to see Christopher Robbie (one of the UK's finest continuity announcers) and Trevor Baker.

It could have been a lot better planned the programme should have been on for an hour at least. They just rushed us through clips .They should have spent more time on the programmes that Southern produced .and had more interviews with the former Presenters and staff members .It was all very rushed a shame realy .I'd have loved to see a clips of The Diana Dors Show or Together their lunchtime drama about residents who lived in a block of flats i am sure that Together was transmitted live sometimes .

If you go to the Meridian pages on ITV Local, you should be able to browse for Central South/Thames Valley Tonight's Wesley Smith doing a little mini report about 50 years of TV in the South.

Within the complete is Southern Rhapsody, Wesley reading bits from the first Southern TV Times and a brief interview with Fred Dinenage.

Just caught Wesley Smith's report and it was much better than the actual programme at least he was interested and passionate about it.

I thought the programme was poorly done as well and introduced with that tacky library music I've heard elsewhere as well. They kept showing highlights of old footage then just cutting to Fred going "what a great time that was, Gracie Fields was also in our region.." Clip of Gracie Fields.

They'd have been better off repeating one of Fred's old tribute programmes (he's done plenty of them and they're far better than what was shown last night!).

Happy 50th ITV in the South none the less. The question of 'Will Mike Debens ever appear on TV again' still remains.

I wonder how many of the early Southern shows still exist in a broadcastable form? Difficult to do much about an era if few shows survive in a playable form.

Didn't see the show - and as someone who grew up in the region during the Southern and TVS eras - did they show programmes like Out of Town?