Granada Television has provided the
ITV service for North West England since 1968, and previously provided the service for the North of England on weekdays from 1956 to 1968.
Granada plc took over the services for London at weekends, Yorkshire, the North East, the South, the East, Cumbria and southern Scotland before merging with
Carlton Communications to form
ITV plc.
The
Independent Television Authority (ITA) awards Granada the North of England contract for Monday to Friday -
ABC gets the weekend licence.
1955
No events.
1956
3 May – Granada Television launches, originally just broadcasting in the North West.
3 November – Granada and weekend contractor
ABC, begin transmitting across most of Yorkshire from the newly built
Emley Moor transmitting station.
1957
No events.
1958
13 February – Granada becomes the first British broadcaster to fully cover a
by-election.[1] Granada's groundbreaking coverage of the
1958 Rochdale by-election includes two candidate debates.[2]
1959
No events.
1960s
1960
9 December – The
first episode of the soap opera Coronation Street, is aired on ITV.[3] Intended as a 13-week pilot, it continues to this day as the world's longest-running television soap opera.[4][5]
1961
No events.
1962
21 September – The first episode of the quiz show University Challenge is broadcast and is one of the very few non-news/current affairs programmes on ITV to be transmitted without a commercial break.
1963
7 January – The first edition of Granada's flagship current affairs programme World in Action is broadcast and would run until 1998.
5 May – World in Action broadcasts a film called Seven Up which followed the lives of 14 children aged seven. It continued to track their lives at seven-year intervals and its latest instalment, 63 Up, aired in 2019.
Granada is given a three-year extension to its licence. This is later extended by a further year.
1965
A new relay station in
Scarborough extends Granada's North of England service to the Yorkshire coast.[6]
1966
No events.
1967
The
Independent Television Authority announces that the forthcoming ITV licensing round will see the North of England franchise split between North West England and the
three Ridings of Yorkshire with each licence being seven days a week operations.[7]
1968
29 July – From this day, Granada only broadcasts to the North West although it now operates seven days a week.
August – A technicians strike forces ITV off the air for several weeks although management manage to launch a temporary
ITV Emergency National Service with no regional variations.
Granada launches its famous pointed ‘G’ logo, replacing the “From the North” tagline. The new ident is not animated and consists purely of a static caption.[8]
1969
15 November – Granada starts broadcasting in colour.
1970s
1970
No events.
1971
2 August – The Pendle Forest transmitter is switched on and becomes the first UHF relay service to be operated by the
Independent Television Authority. The transmitter covers east Lancashire.
1972
28 January – The Saddleworth transmitter begins broadcasting and brings improved reception to people living in the eastern areas of Greater Manchester including Saddleworth, Mossley and Stalybridge.
26 June – The Lancaster transmitter is switched on.
16 October – Following the lifting of restrictions on broadcasting hours, Granada launches an afternoon service.
1973
Granada's nightly news programme is relaunched as Granada Reports. It had previously went under various titles, including Northern Newscast, Scene at Six Thirty, Newsview and People and Places.
1974
The 1974 franchise round sees no changes in ITV's contractors as it is felt that the huge cost in switching to colour television would have made the companies unable to compete against rivals in a franchise battle.
1975
No events.
1976
No events.
1977
No events.
1978
10 April – Granada opens a news base in
Liverpool.
1979
10 August – The ten week
ITV strike forces Granada Television off the air. The strike ends on 24 October.
1980s
1980
28 December – The
Independent Broadcasting Authority announces the new contractors to commence on 1 January 1982 and Granada is reawarded its licence although its coverage area is to be slightly reduced with several transmitters along its border being transferred to other companies.
1 February – ITV's breakfast television service
TV-am launches. Consequently, Granada's broadcast day now begins at 9:25am.
14 February – Granada does not broadcast on that day because of an industrial dispute staged by electricians at their Manchester studios that is sparked by discord when a foreman receives a pay rise without union knowledge. Members of the
Electrical, Electronic, Telecommunications and Plumbing Union (EETPU) hold a meeting to discuss the situation, scheduling it to coincide with the evening's broadcast of Coronation Street. As a result, the Monday evening schedule is heavily disrupted while Coronation Street is scheduled as a one-off omnibus edition along with the week's Wednesday episode later in the week and is also aired on
Channel 4 the following Sunday.
1984
No events.
1985
3 January – The last day of transmission using the
405-lines system.
1986
April – Most of Granada's regional news operations is relocated from
Manchester to a computerised news centre at the former Traffic Office building in
Liverpool's
Albert Dock.
1987
7 September – Following the transfer of
ITV Schools to Channel 4, ITV provides a full morning programme schedule, with advertising, for the first time. The new service includes regular five-minute national and regional news bulletins.
31 December – University Challenge is broadcast on ITV for the final time, after being on the air for 25 years. Recent years had seen it aired in off-peak slots and the two London companies had dropped the show in 1983. However, in 1992, a new one-off episode aired on BBC2 as part of a Granada-themed evening which led to a revival in 1994 which is still running to this day.
1988
13 February – Granada begins 24-hour broadcasting.[11]
2 September – Granada launches an overnight service called Night Time to make it easier for the smaller companies to introduce 24-hour broadcasting. The service is networked to
Tyne Tees,
TSW,
Grampian and
Border with
Ulster taking the service from 3 October.[12]
3 October – Having been awarded the contract to produce ITV's new flagship daytime programme, This Morning makes its debut, broadcast live from its studios at Albert Dock in Liverpool. Granada had fought off bids from four other ITV companies to produce the show.
1989
5 June – Granada launches a look featuring a translucent pointed G which rotated into place in time to the music against a natural scene.[8]
1 September – ITV introduces its first official logo as part of an attempt to unify the network under one image whilst retaining regional identity. However, Granada refused to adopt it, because the Granada Television logo was incorrectly inserted into the 'V' segment of the logo. The company used a version with its translucent logo shown at the beginning, before continuing with the generic ident and ending with the generic ITV logo.[8]
1990s
1990
2 January – Granada Television's nightly news programme Granada Reports is rebranded as Granada Tonight and the shorter bulletins are rebranded as Granada News.
May – What the Papers Say which has been broadcast on ITV and Channel 4 since 1956, becomes the first Granada commission for the BBC when the show transfers over to them.
4 June – Granada Television in the run-up to the 1991 franchise round, relaunches its on-screen branding to a blue stripe descending from the top of the screen, containing the pointed 'G' against a plain white background accompanied by the same music as before. Variations are seen from which the stripe formed from a falling feather or was backlit.[8]
1991
16 October – The
Independent Television Commission announces the results of the franchise round. Granada Television is reawarded its licence. A rival bid came from
Mersey Television, a company producing the
Channel 4 soap opera Brookside. They bid £35 million compared to Granada's £9m,[14] but Granada won as Mersey TV did not meet the 'quality threshold' applied by the Independent Television Commission.
1992
Granada Tonight returns to
Manchester, although bulletins continue to be broadcast from the Albert Dock newsroom until 1998.
1993
No events.
1994
21 September – University Challenge is revived with the BBC commissioning Granada to produce this version. It is presented by
Jeremy Paxman until 2023 and is still running to this day.
1995
4 June – Granada closes its Night Time service and instead carries the new national overnight service from London.
1 October –
Granada Sky Broadcasting launches. It is a joint venture between Granada and
BSkyB. The four-channel service consists of
Granada Plus, showing entertainment programmes from the archives of Granada and its subsidiaries including classic episodes of Coronation Street,
Granada Good Life, a lifestyle channel split into four segments: Granada Food & Wine, Granada Health & Beauty, Granada TV High Street and Granada Home & Garden,
Granada Men & Motors, a channel aimed at men and broadcasts for three hours each night after Granada Plus and
Granada Talk TV, a daytime-only debate channel.
20 December – The
ITC awards the sole
DTT broadcast licence to
British Digital Broadcasting. However, BSkyB had by now been forced by the ITC to pull out of the joint venture on competition grounds, effectively placed Sky's forthcoming digital satellite service in direct competition with the new service, although Sky was still required to provide key channels such as
Sky Movies and
Sky Sports to ONdigital.[18]
1998
1 May –
Granada Good Life is relaunched as a single channel called Granada Breeze in order to improve ratings.
28 July – BDB announces that the DTT service will be called ONdigital.[19]
The home-shopping channel Shop! launches, in conjunction with Littlewoods.
7 December – After 35 years on the air, the final edition of Granada's current affairs programme World in Action is broadcast. It is replaced the following April by Tonight which adopts a lighter, UK-orientated human interest-led agenda.
28 October – On-air regional identities are dropped apart from when introducing regional programmes and Granada is renamed ITV1 Granada. This leads to sweeping cuts in the organisation, including cutting budgets for programmes[25] and a loss of jobs at Granada's Manchester headquarters.[25]
November – Granada loses its on-air identity when regional programming begins to be voiced as ITV1 or ITV1 Granada over a generic ident.
2007
No events.
2008
22 May – What the Papers Say is broadcast on for the final time following a decision by the BBC not to renew the programme.[27] It had been produced by Granada since the station first went on the air in 1956.
December – All non-news local programming ends after
Ofcom gives ITV permission to drastically cut back its regional programming.[28] From 2009, the only regional programme is the monthly political discussion show.
2009
February – ITV makes major cutbacks to its regional broadcasts in England. Granada News is unaffected by the changes.[29]
16 July – ITV Granada takes over coverage of the Isle of Man from
ITV Border.
September – The iconic "Granada TV" sign on the roof and entrance of
Granada Studios is removed after a safety check revealed the signs which have been in place since the 1950s were severely corroded and unsafe.[30]
16 December – ITV announces that it will move its North West production facilities from the Granada Studios on Quay Street in central
Manchester to
MediaCityUK.
2011
No events.
2012
No events.
2013
24 March – Granada Reports is broadcast from
MediaCityUK for the first time,[31] signifying the completion of the initial phase of Granada's migration from the Granada Studios in Quay Street.[32] The MediaCity site is home to approximately 750 employees at ITV Granada and ITV Studios.[33]