Country Calendar the longest running show as NZ celebrates 60 years of TV

June 1, 2020

To mark the special 60—year anniversary, we take a look back.

Today marks the 60th anniversary of television in New Zealand with Country Calendar the longest running show having brought rural stories to urban audiences since 1966.

The first broadcasts in 1960 were only available in Auckland and in black and white so a lot has changed since.

New Zealand's first television broadcast has been taped over but it lasted three hours, featured an episode of Robin Hood and could only be viewed in Auckland.

In the years to come, Christchurch, Dunedin and Wellington would get their own channels, featuring local programming and news bulletins.

Television news came of age with the Wahine disaster in 1968. Unlike today, where pictures can be beamed around the country, live reels of footage had to be driven to each main centre to make it on screen.

The very next year New Zealand’s first nationalised news broadcast started.

Jennie Goodwin started as a continuity announcer for AKTV2, she made history in 1975 by becoming the first woman to read a nationwide bulletin.

She says the speed of news production is a huge change.

"Nothing was instant news like we had today... but then we had the moon landing - but we saw that a week after Neil Armstrong walked on the moon," she said.


SHARE ME

More Stories