Photos: BBCCoat of arms, 1927, and Arthur Burrows, 1922.
The original British Broadcasting Company was founded in 1922 to broadcast experimental radio services.
The first transmission came on Nov. 14, 1922 from station "2LO'' at Marconi House, London, according to Wikipedia.
The initial staff consisted of four people.
``The task of reading those first bulletins on 14 November, at six o'clock and nine o'clock, fell to the director of programmes, Arthur Burrows,'' according to the BBC. ''He read each bulletin twice - once quickly and once slowly - and asked listeners to say what they preferred.''
In 1927, the company was renamed the British Broadcasting Corporation when it was granted a Royal Charter. To represent its purpose and values, the BBC adopted a coat of arms with the motto "Nation shall speak peace unto Nation".
In 1932, the BBC introduced the Empire Service - its first venture in overseas broadcasting via shortwave. Programs were aimed principally at English speakers, or as King George V put it in the first-ever Royal Christmas Message, the "men and women, so cut off by the snow, the desert, or the sea, that only voices out of the air can reach them."
In the opening broadcast, the Director General of the BBC, Lord Reith said, "Don't expect too much in the early days; for some time we shall transmit comparatively simple programmes, to give the best chance of intelligible reception and provide evidence as to the type of material most suitable for the service in each zone. The programmes will neither be very interesting nor very good."
On Jan. 3, 1938, the first foreign language service, Arabic, was launched.
The Empire Service was renamed the BBC Overseas Service in November 1939, and a dedicated BBC European Service was added in 1941. German programming commenced shortly before the start of World War II, and by the end of 1942, broadcasts were being made in all major European languages.
