ABSTRACT
Commercial television began, with suitable fanfares, on 22 September 1955. Agog, viewers watched among many other offerings the first ever British TV advert, for Gibbs SR Toothpaste, and the evening was generally judged a success although somewhat upstaged by the BBC. In that day’s episode of its radio soap opera The Archers, the much-loved Grace Archer was killed in a stable fire. Competition had got off to a flying start.
