I just thought that after the turmoil we have just had in England politically it would be interesting to go back almost 70 years to 1955 and look at the comparison. At that time Prime Ministers and Cabinet Ministers did not appear on Television but on this occasion in May of that year they did

Anthony Eden took to the airwaves The Prime Minister, hosted a ground-breaking half-hour television election programme for the Conservative Party, pitting government ministers against newspaper editors in the first broadcast of its kind.

The style chosen by Sir Anthony evoked the first televised press conference, staged in the United States earlier the same year by the American president, Dwight D. Eisenhower.

ABOVE – Sir Anthony was flanked by four ministers: the Chancellor, Rab Butler, the Foreign Secretary, Harold Macmillan, the Health Minister, Iain Macleod, and the Minister of Labour, Sir Walter Monckton.

Looking at the above politicians one thing strikes me – they all served their country in Wartime – Harold McMillan and Anthony Eden were both wounded in the First War and Ian MacLoed wounded in France in the Second World War. The other two served in the Wartime Government. Added to this Anthony Eden lost a son in the Second World War.

They had all seen their fair share of conflict and didn’t want to see it again.

ABOVE – Sir Anthony Eden

ABOVE – Sir Anthony Eden in this long shot of the Studio is watched by his wife

BELOW – same era and same year – we turn to more light hearted matters – Billy Bunter with a dis-approving Headmaster Quelch

Gerald Campion played Billy Bunter and Kynaston Reeves was Quelch who I also remember being in one of my favourite horror films ‘Fiend Without a Face’.