The third series of Who Do You Think You Are? began last night on BBC1. The two previous series had been shown on BBC2 and repeated on BBC3 and had awakened such an interest in family history and genealogy that the BBC is pushing this one out on its main channel.
The programme is an example of what the BBC does best in my opinion, the programme combines social history, politics, art, economics, sport, drama, comedy all wrapped up in a one hour slot.
Watching last night's programme which featured Barbara Windsor you could see why the show has been such a surprising success, it works on so many levels. I bet you could fit last night's audience into four categories:
1) Those who wanted to see where the actress they watch as Peggy Mitchell came from
2) Those already involved in their own family history looking for some coincidences or helpful tips
3) Those who have considered researching their family history but aren't sure how to go about it and
4) The casual viewer who doesn't mind births, deaths and marriages straight after the watershed but could do without the sex and violence.
I probably fell into the second group I have a tenuous connection with Barbara Windsor via my mother - who I have to say looks uncannily like her. They grew up in the same area in Bethnal Green, my uncle (mum's brother) was in the same class at school as the Krays and whilst they became infamous in the sixties he, ironically, became a police officer and the Kray-Windsor connection is well known.
Watching the programme I was struck by how similar many East End families roots are, one of my great grandfathers was in and East End Workhouse for five years, one branch of my family came from Ireland during the famine, another moved from Suffolk (as I've said on the 'Why the Long Face?' post a couple of weeks ago) and to top it off the family that was left in Suffolk were the poor relations of a famous landowner.
This is where the series really works well, you can spot the similarities and be encouraged to find out more. One final similarity was when Barbara Windsor visited Flatford Mill at East Bergholt, guess where my Suffolk roots began?
Carry on (and) Constable!
5 comments:
I sky+'d the programme so am yet to watch it but I am hoping that because it is now on BBC1, that the quality hasn't suffered.
The only problem I have WDYTYA is that when it's on air certificates from the GRO take weeks to arrive instead of days and that the rootsweb lists that I belong to get swamped by mungs who think they can trace their FH in three days back to 1066 with the internet.
D'oh!
Hi Mags
Yes some people do have a strange idea of tracing their FH!
"Mungs" is that a Black Country word? Sounds great!
I agree with your assertion that this is the BBC at it's best. this is what a public service broadcaster should be producing.
Did you not think that the researchers seemed to spend an awful lot of time trying to soften the blow for Babs, as they broke the news that her ancestors all came from dodgy backgrounds.
You're right Six - but I think that's because a lot of people watching would have been fans of Peggy Mitchell rather than interested in FH and they would sympathise more.
If you know about genealogy some of the information is really no-brainer stuff but they are trying to widen the appeal by using 'celebs' rather than the BBC4 approach which used 'ordinary' people and had just as (if not more) interesting results.
I don't think mungs is a BC word. It's a word my son uses so it must be in general pre-teen and teen usage around here at present, I do like the word though. Sums up frightful people in a perfect way and sounds more polite than mongs.
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