Bruce Gyngell
| Bruce Gyngell | |
|---|---|
| Born |
8 July 1929 Melbourne, Victoria, Australia |
| Died | 7 September 2000 (aged 71) Chelsea, London |
| Nationality | Australian |
| Occupation | Australian television executive |
| Years active | 1956–2000 |
Bruce Gyngell AO (8 July 1929 – 7 September 2000) was an influential Australian television executive, prominent for 50 years in both Australian and UK television. Although Gyngell began his career in radio, in the 1950s he stepped into the arena of early television broadcasting, helping to set up Channel 9, the first commercial TV station in Australia. He is credited with introducing the sofa format of breakfast television and in later life, for expressing his attraction to eastern ideas which ranged through Zen Buddhism, meditation and Insight philosophy.
Gyngell was born 8 July 1929 in Melbourne. According to The Guardian, among Gyngell's relatives were an assorted lot of entrepreneurs. His great-grandfather was the pyrotechnician for the wedding of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, while his grandfather, who settled in Australia, introduced Cider-making to the continent. His father ran a flying circus before becoming an engineer with Mobil, and his mother was of Irish extraction.
He was a pupil at Sydney Grammar School and briefly studied medicine. He worked as a disc jockey for the ABC, and joined the university air squadron but the Korean war ended before he had a chance to participate.
Gyngell's media career began in the record industry, in the mid-1950s, when he was hired by Australian label Festival Records. He was soon poached by Sir Frank Packer, who hired him to assist in the establishment of TCN-9, Australia's first commercial television station, in 1956. Gyngell is often credited as being the first person to appear on Australian television on 16 September 1956, when he spoke the words, 'Good evening, and welcome to television'. However, many people (possibly several hundred) had already appeared in various television test broadcasts in Australia prior to Gyngell, including performer Alan Rowe, comedy duo 'Ada & Elsie', 'Happy' Hammond, and Graham Kennedy.
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