In What About the Princess? The Life and Times of Mona Baptiste we had this to say about her first appearance on the radio after disembarking from the Windrush on 22nd June: ‘Mona’s first professional engagement in the UK that we have been able to trace was on 9th August 1948.’
So glad we added that caveat about it being the first we could trace (!) because, sure enough, there is now evidence of an earlier appearance. In Jamaica The Gleaner reported on 6th July that Mona would be featuring in Calling the West Indies on the BBC World Service.
So, Mona was actually featuring on the radio just two weeks after arriving in England. She must surely have been known to people at the BBC before leaving Trinidad, it is difficult to imagine she could have got on the air so soon otherwise.
Taking a look at a couple of the other items: For those with an interest in cricket we can report that Australia thrashed Gloucestershire in their tour match at Bristol. Australia scored 774 runs for 7 wickets before declaring and bowling the county side out for 279 and 132.
Although he was born in South Africa, the pianist Isadore Goodman spent much of his adult life in Australia. After World War Two Goodman performed in England but, in spite of a Command Performance for King George VI and Queen Elizabeth at St James Palace in October 1948, he never really established himself and returned to Australia in 1955.
The music of Michael Krein’s Saxophone Quartet can be found on Spotify (and no doubt on other similar services) where a channel devoted to his music has a devoted following of seven listeners.
The Parliamentary Review at 7.15 most probably reported on the debates in the House of Commons that week on the subject of European economic co-operation, a topic that remains equally relevant (some might say more relevant) today, over seventy years later.