Life, liberty and the pursuit of digital happiness

One little break, that’s all you need. The rest is up to you.

On the morning of September 1, 1939 the engineer in charge of the British Broadcasting Corporation transmission towers at Alexandra Palace in London got up from his morning tea to answer the phone. On the line was the head of BBC Television himself. “You will switch off television service immediately,” he said. Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister, declared war on Nazi Germany just two days later. Great Britain was preparing for war. If the towers were powered down they could not act as homing beacons for the Luftwaffe bombers everyone knew were coming.

As that call came in, the BBC was broadcasting a Mickey Mouse cartoon called “Mickey’s Gala Premiere.” Without warning the cartoon stopped and a continuity announcer called Mr. Alvar Liddell appeared on the screen, sitting behind a desk, dressed as was the custom then in black bow tie and morning coat. In sonorous tones he explained that the television service was about to be suspended. “Good day and may God bless you all,” he said when he was done.

TV screens went dark. The world went to war.