Groups and Locations

history, archive, museum, tv, television, media, video, audio, database, europe

The BIRTH Television Archive brings together five major European television archives to present the first Internet archive dedicated to the early years of European television. The project aims to develop a multimedia and multilingual pool of archive material from the first broadcasting days 50 years ago for online access by different user-groups. The website home page contains an overview of the project with links to fuller information on its development, including interviews, presentations and related documents. A library of 'General' and 'Science' articles related to television history is available, as well as 'mediafile' access to early programmes, such as 'It's hard to be a housewife', a 1960s German guide to domestic skills; 'This is English', the first Austrian Television English language course, shown in 1961; and the 1965 speech by Queen Elizabeth II at the inaugural ceremony of President John F. Kennedy, which was shown live. Commentary is provided on the significance of each programme, both in terms of its reflection of the society of its time, and its importance in television history. Most of the material on the site is in English, as well as the original language of the author, and while the site is presented in English, it may also be viewed in Dutch, German or French. A comprehensive search facility is available, which has sophisticated tools for searching across languages. Interested researchers may register as either a scientist or a TV producer to contribute their own articles to the site. There does not seem to be any selection process involved in this. A multilingual thesaurus is available, as well as a timeline search. At first viewing, the chatty presentation of this site suggests a resource aimed more at the general public. However, the invitation for research contributions, sophisticated search features and comprehensive range of articles, programmes and associated documents reveals a much more serious and useful resource. The site is extremely well organised, taking full account of the needs of users of several nationalities, with clear instructions and an impressive breadth of material.