Tattooing on BBC TV - 1930

Tattooing first featured on the BBC in the 1930’s. The very first tattoo artist to appear on BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) TV was Brighton born British tattooer George Burchett – who appeared on the 27th of January 1938.

Radio broadcasting started as a national service in Great Britain on the 14th of November 1922 and the BBC television service on the 2nd of November 1936.

So Burchett was not only the first tattoo artist to appear on television – he was indeed one of the very first to be seen – even though few households in Britain had a TV set at the time – as television in1938 was still in its experimental stages.

There is a very short film clip that was made by the Pathe news group in 1936 (Possibly the piece shown on the Television in 1938) showing George (Burchett) tattooing, entitled ‘Painting the Lily’ that survives today and can still be obtained for a fee via the ‘Pathe News’ web-site.

Copyright…Paul Sayce. Posted on 15th Spril 2009