On the 18th April 1930 the BBC announced that there was no news worth broadcasting… so they played music instead in the radio news bulletin slot.

This 90 second flashback from the BBC remembers the day when there was no news and discusses why. It is from the BBC archival series celebrating that British national broadcaster’s 90th birthday.

BBC News Director Helen Bowden says it could never happen today:

“You’ve got to remember that it was an age of deference… there was an accepted mode of that the public should hear about and on that day that accepted mode and convention meant that there was nothing suitable fot the public to hear.”