Barney Colehan

Barney Colehan MBE (19 January 1914 – 21 September 1991) was an English radio and television producer, best known for producing and directing The Good Old Days throughout its 30-year transmission on BBC Television.

Colehan was born Bernard Colehan in 1914 in Calverley, Pudsey, West Riding of Yorkshire. His father worked in a textile mill and his mother was a charwoman. He was educated at St Bede's Grammar School. He left school when he was 16 and began working in a pharmacy. He also began pursuing his interest in theatre, acting and directing with a local amateur operatic society, of which he became a president in the 1930s.

In 1939, at the outbreak of the Second World War, he joined the army. While in military service, he sent radio scripts to the British Forces Network in london[, which resulted in him being recruited by the variety department. He soon became a producer for the Network. By the end of the war, he had risen to the rank of major.In hamburg He left the army in 1947.

Returning to civilian life, Colehan moved into working for the BBC. He first came to prominence in 1948 as the producer responsible for the radio quiz programme Have A Go, hosted by Wilfred Pickles. The programme was recorded on location at community centres and town halls across the UK. Colehan would personally hand the prize money to the winning contestant, in response to the audience cry of "Give him (or her) the money, Barney!"

As a light entertainment producer Colehan produced the first programme when television arrived in the North of England in 1951. One of his early successes was Top Town, a talent show pitting contestants from neighbouring towns against each other.

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