Langley, Bob

Bob was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland. He worked in insurance and served in the RAF, before travelling around America, He later worked as a lumberjack in Canada.

His broadcasting career began in the early 1960s, in the early days of Tyne Tees Television, as a scriptwriter.

A year later he moved in front of the camera as a presenter and worked on the news programme Six-Five. He remained with the company for five years.

He later recalled: “The early days could be a bit catastrophic, a real string and sealing wax job. 

“There weren’t too many of us who really knew what we were doing. We didn’t even have an autocue, and when we had, it was like a giant toilet roll. But we had an awful lot of fun.”

In 1968, Bob joined the team of BBC TV newsreaders for a six-month period, making his debut on 3rd June.

He appeared on the Main News and the weekend news and was always credited in the Radio Times as Robert Langley. His last bulletin was on 29th December 1968.

In June 1979, he joined ex-colleagues for a photoshoot in the news studio at BBC TV Centre to celebrate the 25th anniversary of BBC TV News a month later.

He spent seven months as a roving reporter on 24 Hours (1969) and worked on Panorama, before joining BBC One’s Nationwide in 1970.

Due to the success of his and Donny McLeod’s appearances, they were both asked to launch Pebble Mill at One, a live lunchtime weekday magazine programme from the foyer of BBC Birmingham.

He presented from 1972 until 1986. Sadly only a handful of programmes are known to survive within the archives.

He also presented Saturday Night at the Mill (BBC One, 1976 – 1981) and Six Fifty-Five (BBC Two, 1983) from the Pebble Mill foyer.

He also presented:

• The Border Line (BBC One, 1974);
• The Pennine Way (BBC One, 1975);
• Lakeland Summer (BBC Two, 1975 and BBC One, 1977);
• Series from the Antarctica – Langley South (BBC Two, 1982);
• Take Me Back to New Orleans (BBC Two, 1982);
• Making Waves (BBC Two, 1984 – 1985);
• Osprey Summer (BBC Two, 1987);
• A Week in the Country (BBC One, 1996);
• Langley Country within The Countryside Hour (BBC Two, 1997 – 2000).

He presented the trophy on One Man and His Dog (BBC Two, 1988) and was one of the celebrities featured on Style Challenge (BBC Two, 1999).

He was a guest on Alan Titchmarsh at the Mill, which celebrated 21 years of broadcasting from the Pebble Mill studios (BBC Radio 2, 20th June 1992).

Langley wrote ten novels, including The War of the Running Fox (1978), Falklands Gambit (1984) and Traverse of the Gods.

He also wrote a number of non-fiction works, including a study of the sinking of the Argentinian light cruiser General Belgrano and a coast-to-coast guide Walking the Scottish Border.

Personal information

Clips of Bob on The TV Room

Bob may be featured in video/audio clips on our other websites. Click the links below to display a listing (a 404 error will appear if no clips are found):

Rewind | Clean Feed

Online presence

Acknowledgements