The BBC 1 COW Globe's first day in February 1985

I was looking at clips and images of the 1980s BBC 1 mirror globe on TV Ark and there's a clip of the globe from 18th February 1985 before the start of a new series of Grange Hill. TV Ark says that this was broadcast at 5.35, but London viewers would see the old globe one last time before London Plus at 6.35. How come viewers in other regions wouldn't have seen it before their regional news? I have always read the new COW globe first appeared before Wogan at 7.00.

It means that viewers in other regions would have seen their own regional versions of the old globe at 6.35 - only viewers in London and the South East witnessed the final airing of the network globe at 6.35.

I see what you mean now, I hadn't thought about the regional versions of the old globe. I often wonder as well why the BBC 2 logo wasn't changed for over a year, could it have been because the orange and white 2 logo was only introduced in 1979? I think the logo did look dated as soon as the COW took over on BBC 1

Wasn't there a feature on that night's Midlands Today with David Stevens about the change of globe? ISTR him pressing a button on the pres desk to stop the mechanical model spinning with the payoff line was "stop the world, I want to get off"

I hadn't heard about this and Midland Today is my regional news, although I wasn't very old at the time. I'm not sure if there are many old Midland Today clips on YouTube, I haven't found many myself

The reason was, the old globe was burnt onto the London Plus titles, so the new globe resulted in slightly different London Plus titles the next day!

The updated title sequence was introduced on the Monday - I distinctly remember it following straight on from the final showing of the mirror globe.

The decision to launch the new globe at 7pm must have been made fairly late on, because the Radio Times that week stated that it would make its first appearance on Monday morning.

I was living in Plymouth at the time. There I think the last sighting of the old globe might have been 17:35, I seem to remember back then Spotlight didn't use the globe at the start, but rather a silhouetted image of the presenters shuffling their scripts ?

It wasn't until later in the week I actually saw the COW in colour, I loitered outside of a TV rental shop deliberately !

I always got the impression the new globe was launched at 7.00 PM so it would coincide with the launch of Wogan as part of the new weeknight schedule

I’ve read that the 7pm junction was still local in some English regions then, so the unveiling of the new globe in those regions may have been the regional copy. That said, there was usually a BBC1 line-up promo just before 7pm so I’m not sure why a region would go local again if they took this promo.

Didn’t the new “electronic” weather forecasts begin on the same day? It really was “all change” on BBC One on 18th February 1985.

Yes, they did

Was it done that way to save NC1 needing a South East ident on their globe?