page_title: Media in Cornwall
section_title: Commercial television
hierarchical_section_title: Media in Cornwall / Television / Commercial television
caption_attribution_description: English: Redruth transmitting station, Four Lanes.
context_page_description: The media in Cornwall has a long and distinct history. The county has a wide range of different types and quality of media.
context_section_description: Commercial television could be received in Cornwall from 1961, with the combined launches of Westward Television and the Caradon Hill transmitting station. There was an additional transmitter at Stockland Hill, but this covered the east of Westward's region, namely east Devon, west Dorset and south Somerset. Only the Caradon Hill transmitter covered Cornwall, which meant that reception was virtually non-existent in the West of the county, until the Redruth transmitting station was built in 1964.
  Transmissions used the 405 line black and white analogue system. Initially, content tended to be biased towards Plymouth, as the news and programme making studios were based at Derry's Cross, and Electronic News Gathering facilities were decades away.
  Despite this, those viewers in Cornwall who could receive a signal, the Westward service was a success, as it gave a different, and in some ways, lighter and friendlier media perspective from the BBC's television alternative. Westward were soon keen to distant itself from its near neighbour and part rival, TWW and purchased white Volvos to capture filmed news items. Most of the regional companies found it difficult to capture and show news from the far flung corners of their regions.
  However Westward introduced a regional news slot after the ITV News at Ten national news programme, to enable film to be shipped back to Derry's Cross, be developed, edited and shown all on the same day: this was a first for any ITV station.
  Continuity announcers were not just confined to the studios either. They appeared at village fêtes and town fairs across Cornwall and the Westward region, and soon the station started to build up a loyal following. Although Westward made few programmes for the ITV Network, it produced many regional programmes which covered topics specific to Cornwall, including The Farming Programme and Look Westward as well as features, like walking the South West Coast Path. By 1969, Westward had more than 100 correspondents across the region informing Westward of newsworthy local events and eight film cameramen who would travel the region gathering news.
  Daphne du Maurier was chosen by Peter Cadbury, as an iconic and famous Cornish resident to be on the Westward board of directors. The flamboyant Peter Cadbury made several enemies with the Independent Broadcasting Authority and also with high-profile community leaders. With financial troubles besetting the Company, Westward lost the franchise in 1981, to be replaced by Television South West (TSW) (going on air on New Year's Day 1982), who inherited all the staff and the studios.
  TSW were a far more professional company than Westward, and even made relatively high-brow programmes for their region; in the arts world, they had some big names who worked with them, including Saltash born Moura Lympany, who was one of Britain's leading concert pianists at the time, potter Bernard Leach, and St Ives sculptor Barbara Hepworth.
  Westcountry Television, another independent company, replaced Television South West at 00:00 GMT on 1 January 1993. The first programme aired on the channel was a video welcoming viewers to Westcountry and promising higher levels of regional commitment. Later, Westcountry was purchased by Carlton Television, and it is now simply part of the ITV Network. However, since that original commitment to regional programming in 1993 (and approximately 16 hours of regional programmes per week), in 2007 this had been reduced to less than seven hours per week. There is no longer any mention of Westcountry on the ITV network in Cornwall, except for a vague verbal mention before a local programme is shown. Despite this, Westcountry Television has remained committed to Cornwall since launch, and have two small news studios in the county at Truro and Penzance. There is also a five-minute opt-out, broadcast from Redruth transmitting station of news stories specific to the west of the ITV Westcountry region (there are three others, based in Barnstaple, Plymouth and Exeter.) It does mean though that those viewers in the east of the c
caption: The main transmitter for mid and west Cornwall. It now carries FM, analogue TV, DVB, and DAB. It is situated near the village of Four Lanes, about 2 miles south of Redruth.
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