The Genesis of Doctor Who

After reading Timeless Adventures:
How Doctor Who Conquered TV by
Brian J Robb, I concluded just how
fortunate Whovians are that the
show was produced at all.

In March 1962, Eric Maschwitz 
(1901-1969), assistant to then
Controller of Programmes, Stuart
Hood, assigned Alice Frick and
Donald Bull of the BBC Survey
Group to prepare a feasibility study
into the creation of a science fiction
series. A second report by Frick and
 John Braybon recommended a
time travel format.

Sci-fi buff Sydney Newman began
work as new Head of Drama for BBC
 TV that December, and was soon
expanding Frick's work with Donald 
Wilson and C E Webber.
But the old guard at Television Centre were determined for 'Dr.

Who' to fail, and only for it's defenders - key personnel Verity

 Lambert, David Whitaker, Anthony Coburn, and Waris

Hussein - then the embryonic show would have fallen at the

first hurdle.

Fast forward to the transmission of the first Dalek adventure in

December 1963 - the Corporation's powers-that-be thankfully

reacted by abandoning the show's intended thirten-week lifespan.

Only after reading the production notes on The Rescue DVD did I

learn that by August 1964, Donald Baverstock again wanted to

 revert the Doctor Who contract to just 13 weeks, and cancel the

show when all remaining stories finished in January 1965.

Only when Lambert and William Hartnell's agent dug in their

heels did Baverstock finally agree to another, twenty-six-week

run, by which time the programme's long term future was

secured.

The threat of cancellation would however revisit the show in

 times of crisis. As The War Games concluded the black and 

white era in 1969, the BBC considered a six year run to have

been a good innings and there was some internal debate about

whether to axe Doctor Who. 

The lowest point in the show's history was the 'hiatus' of 1985

when Michael Grade 'rested' the Doctor's adventures for eighteen

months, then the end finally arrived in 1989 with outright can-

cellation.

It's hard to believe that the programme could have ended after

The Dalek Invasion of Earth (just fifty-one episodes), and was

so close to becoming a footnote in TV history.