Peggy Bacon (radio producer)

Margaret Bacon (19 November 1918 – 1 March 1976), who worked under the name Peggy Bacon, was a BBC radio and television producer and radio presenter.[1][2]

Peggy Bacon
BornMargaret Bacon Edit this on Wikidata
19 November 1918 Edit this on Wikidata
Kings Heath Edit this on Wikidata
Died1 March 1976 Edit this on Wikidata (aged 57)
London Edit this on Wikidata
Alma mater
OccupationRadio producer, radio personality, television producer, nurse Edit this on Wikidata
Employer

Early life and education

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Bacon was born on 19 November 1918 in Kings Heath, Birmingham, England, to Arthur Charles Bacon and Doris Elizabeth, née Day.[3] She was educated at the city's King Edward VI High School for Girls from 1931 to 1936.[2][4]

Career

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She joined the BBC in Birmingham as a secretary in 1938 before working as a Red Cross nurse, treating wounded servicemen at an emergency hospital in Birmingham for several months in 1940, during World War II.[2]

She produced and presented - as "Aunty Peggy" - the BBC Home Service radio programme Children's Hour for almost 20 years,[2] with the Radio Times first listing her appearance on 17 September 1947.[5] She also edited a B.B.C. Children's Hour Annual book, for the BBC.[6][7]

After meeting two railway-enthusiast film makers, she commissioned them to work on Railway Roundabout, a television series, episodes of which she also produced, and which ran from 1958 to 1962.[8][9]

She commissioned Brian Vaughton to make the documentary The Cats Whiskers: celebrating forty years of broadcasting from the heart of England, broadcast on the Home Service (Midland) on 12 November 1962.[10][11] In 1965, after she made a successful series of programmes for O-level students, she was transferred to the BBC's education department, in London.[2] While there, she edited F. D. Flower's Reading to Learn: An Approach to Critical Reading (BBC, 1969).[12]

Personal life and death

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In her leisure time, she was a singer and linguist, and translated song lyrics from French and German, some of which were broadcast.[2]

She retired in 1975 and died in London on 1 March 1976, aged 57.[1][2]

References

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  1. ^ a b David Davis (5 March 1976). "Miss Margaret Bacon". The Times (59645). ISSN 0140-0460. Wikidata Q110995197.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g "BBC's Aunty Peggy dies". Birmingham Post: 5. 4 March 1976. ISSN 0963-7915. Wikidata Q110995254.
  3. ^ "Births". Birmingham Mail. No. 16498. 20 November 1918. p. 6. OCLC 863516663. Retrieved 21 November 2023 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  4. ^ Hutton, Thomas Winter (1952). King Edward's School, Birmingham, 1552-1952. Blackwell. p. 185.
  5. ^ "Children's Hour". Radio Times. No. 1248. 14 September 1947. p. 14. Retrieved 23 February 2022.
  6. ^ "Personalia". The Publishers' Circular and Booksellers' Record. 165: 1324. 1951.
  7. ^ "B.B.C. Children's Hour Annual (image of cover)". 23 February 2022. Archived from the original on 23 February 2022. Retrieved 23 February 2022.
  8. ^ Hewitt, Sam (19 December 2019). "From the Archive: P B Whitehouse". The Railway Magazine. Retrieved 23 February 2022.
  9. ^ "Railway Roundabout". Radio Times. No. 1896. 11 March 1960. p. 16. Retrieved 23 February 2022.
  10. ^ Vaughton, Brian. "Birmingham Ballads". Charles Parker Archive Trust. Retrieved 23 February 2022.
  11. ^ "The Cats Whiskers". Radio Times. No. 2035. 10 November 1962. Retrieved 23 February 2022.
  12. ^ Reading to learn an approach to critical reading;. OCLC. OCLC 579516566. Retrieved 23 February 2022.