First Black Television Reporter On British Television – Barbara Blake Hannah

Judith Bodley presents E-Live Unplugged.

Barbara Blake Hannah trained as a journalist working under her father Evon Blake on his Spotlight and Newday magazines. She emigrated to London, England in 1964 and trained as a public relations practitioner, working as PR executive for the Jamaica tourist board.

She has worked in the film and television production industry for more than 30 years, beginning in Jamaica with JBC-TV and continuing in Britain, becoming the first black TV journalist in a job as a current affairs reporter and interviewer on Thames TV daily evening programme “Today with Eammon Andrews”, “ATV Today”, Birmingham, and as producer on BBC-TV weekly current affairs programme “Man Alive” including a documentary on the Cannes Film Festival.

It doesn’t stop there….now there is a new journalism award named after Britain’s first TV news reporter. Barbara Blake Hannah. Here’s her story in her own words.