THE SECOND WORLD WAR was inconvenient for the BBC’s new Television Service. Launched at the end of 1936, its first outside broadcast was the coronation of George VI and by the end of 1938 there was a packed programme of live sporting events laid on for the 11,436 homes that then owned a television set.
As well as Wimbledon, the Lord’s Test match and a football international between England and Scotland, the BBC broadcast the Varsity Match, the first football game — rugby or association — to be televised in full, and the Boat Race, with John Snagge’s radio commentary laid over a graphic in which two magnetic boats were slowly moved along a chart of the course. Three live cameras covered the finish.
It was taken as read that those university challenges would be among the crown jewels at the dawn of broadcasting. They had long been part of the national sporting conversation — it was the 63rd Varsity Match and the 90th Boat Race — and even though the large majority of those watching or following in the newspapers would not have been to university, there was still the belief that these were the crucibles of heroes.
