Forth - Launch

1975 – and the first breaths for the second commercial station in Scotland, and the tenth in the UK. With a diverse early shareholding, Radio Forth launched on 22nd January; and like so many other stations in history, its chairman quite fancied saying the opening words, albeit they were delivered with both professionalism and passion.

Richard Findlay, formerly from Capital’s newsroom and BBC Scotland before that, was Programme Director. Early presenters included Steve Hamilton, Dave Anthony, Mike Gower, 20 year old Jay Crawford and Ian Anderson looking after music scheduling. The station was also quick to embark on a touch of drama and poetry; and, at a time when commercial radio charts were unpopular, it broadcast a localised ‘Forth Forty’ based on retail sales.

Early audience figures, published in January 76 suggested Forth enjoyed a modest 47% reach, compared with Radio 1's 53% and Radio 2's paltry 35%.

Forth was quick to identify the benefits of working with other stations, and there were early joint on-air projects in the first year with their neighbours at Clyde including a debate on Scottish licensing laws, many, many years before the Scottish stations were in mutual ownership. There were joint sales arrangements too under BMS.

Enjoy here the opening words to ‘Forth Country’ and the lengthy Emison jingle which sums up a time and a place in radio history so well, before the Scottish band Pilot kick in with the luckily-titled song, ‘January’,