History of Radio Stoke

Best Local Radio Personality Do you have stories about any of Radio Stoke’s broadcasters over the last decades? If you do, please drop us an email, to: stoke@bbc.co.uk

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The station has always attempted to recruit its staff both from local people and from among the best new broadcasters in the country.
The aims dovetailed in 1973, when David Harding was appointed the station’s manger at the very young age of 29, the station’s only locally-born or bred manager.
David had graduated from Keele University, near Newcastle under Lyme, before taking a job at Stoke College of Art.
Even more remarkably, he'd only been a broadcaster for two years; but the appointments board said that his local knowledge and high-quality educational programmes made him the ideal man for the job.

Phil Drabble, one of the presenters of the TV programme 'One Man And His Dog', was also a well-known voice on Radio Stoke in the eighties and nineties, when he had a weekly guest spot - in which he would talk about his love of the natural world.

One feature of the station which has been virtually continuous since the early days is the station’s commitment to its listeners of Asian origin.
Presenters such as Jamila Azam, Nusrat Shah, Khaleid Hussein, Shabina Akhtar, Sajida Ahmed, Ramaa Sharma and Anisha Shah have all been involved in programmes which had titles such as Eastern Horizon, Asian Connection and more.

Tony Maddox was a reporter for Radio Stoke in the eighties. He made a rapid ascent through media management and became the vice-president of European Operations for the huge international news-gathering TV operation, CNN.
In his public lectures, Tony tells one of the best and funniest stories about the high regard in which Radio Stoke is held in this corner of the world. On one of his trips home to visit his family in Newcastle under Lyme, a neighbour he had not seen for a while asked him how he was getting on. Tony told him that he ran CNN’s Europe operations. “Ah”, said the neighbour, sympathetically, “I guess you couldn’t make things work out for you at Radio Stoke, then?” 

Pam Spall's laugh... Anyone who was listening in the nineties will remember this Mancunian lady's distinctive raucous laugh - it was infectious! 
Pam was the boss of 'Action Line' - a first-stop organisation which worked with the area's voluntary groups, and which was attached to Radio Stoke. Presenters would tell her a joke, wind her up, and do anything - just to make her laugh. And, as she was so much fun, it wasn’t hard to get her laugh muscles going.

The ‘Jeremy Paxman’ of Radio Stoke was Jason Dean, who hosted a lunchtime current affairs programme in the eighties and nineties. He had been with Radio Stoke even before he left school, starting out as a volunteer tea-boy. 
More than one politician crossed swords with Jason in his day - but, outside the combative interviewing of the studio, there was said to be respect on both sides.
Jason still works for the BBC, but left Radio Stoke in the mid-nineties.

John Collard, the manager in the 80s, was mad for cricket; so much so, he encouraged the formation of a station cricket team. He promptly assumed the position of wicket-keeper… 

The first radio station in North Staffordshire was the BBC's 6ST (as its 'call-sign' was known). It ran from 1924 to 1928. The famous Lila Boulton hosted the output's Children's Hour, and she was known as Auntie Lila.

The most popular character (arguably) on the station was, and is, a thorough rascal, and a man who would rob you as soon as look at you. Luckily, he is fictional. 
The stories of Owd Grandad Piggott first appeared on the station’s airwaves in 1985 and were read out by the author Alan Povey - as they are to this day.

Guest presenters have been numerous. Here are just some...
The fine jazz writer and player, Mel Hill, presented the jazz programme for eighteen years and his programme ended up with an international reputation.
The musician Legendary Lonnie was in charge of a weekly eclectic programme playing anything from film soundtrack to novelty discs. 
The Amazing Miller was on air in the seventies with a request programme (in fact the man behind the pseudonym was a long-time actor at the New Vic Theatre in Newcastle).
The most unusual guest presenter perhaps was the then Stoke City captain George Berry. Sports editor Mike Straw discovered that George had an all-abiding love of soul music and persuaded him to come in once a week to talk about and play his favourite records.

The tight budget of today probably wouldn’t allow this to happen now, but in 1992, Ivan Gaskell (who now works on BBC TV’s Match Of The Day) managed to spend a full four days with the Stoke City players as they went to Wembley for the Autoglass Trophy final.
Ivan and his team witnessed up close Stoke's victory over Stockport on the day - the club’s first silverware in two decades.

Bruno Brookes, who went on to become one of Radio One's most popular DJs after a long stint on Radio Stoke, was a local boy made good. He invented 'radio bingo' which was incredibly successful. (However, we don't quite know however how the bingo competition worked - do you remember?)

Rob McKeon, who still does occasional presenter shifts with the station, claims that he holds a record - as the youngest-ever person, at that time, to have been employed as regular dee-jay on mainstream radio.
When he had just turned fifteen, he was asked to co-present the Radio Stoke youth show 'Input 946', when Pete Woolley, the incumbent, was lured away by BBC Nottingham.
Rob dubbed himself the 'Nearly Famous Rob' and so managed to get himself written about in many a teenage magazine of the time.

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Where Are They Now?

Alison Greatbatch is best remembered for her enormously popular Sunday lunchtime show. She is now working in PR in Birmingham.

Nigel Jay presented Jaywalk, a fast-moving current affairs programme. The title was, of course, named after the quick-thinking presenter. 
Nigel moved to BBC TV in Manchester for a second successful career.

Grant Leighton was the larger than life personality in the late afternoon show in the eighties. He left Stoke on Trent to go to America’s mid-West, where he is a successful professional photographer.

Chris Ramsden was the much-feared, long-time news-editor in the 80s and 90s. He was, and is, fluent in French, and had worked for the BBC at the EU’s HQ in Brussels.
Now he concentrates on his love of classical music and … surprisingly, revealing a softer side… his adored grandchildren.

One name that always crops up when discussing Radio Stoke personalities down the years is Sam Plank. Sam was about as Potteries as you could get, and his larger-than-life fun personality meant that he always got the largest listening figures on the station.
Sam got too big for the Saturday morning children's programme he had started on, and when he moved to a daily show he soon became the 'voice of Radio Stoke'. In the late eighties, he was nominated for a Sony 'Local Radio Personality of the Year' Award (the 'Oscar' of broadcasting), and was narrowly pipped to the post for it, getting a silver.
In later years, he moved to other local stations including Signal and the short-lived Focal.

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Do you have stories about any of Radio Stoke’s broadcasters over the last decades? If you do, please drop us an email, to: stoke@bbc.co.uk