Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio was 'born' at 7.30 pm on Monday December the 4th 1978 after more than a year of planning and fundraising by a team of dedicated people who thought that Stoke Mandeville Hospital should have it's very own radio station.

The first voice to be heard was presenter Geoff Tyrell who started the station off with an old TV jingle called 'Let us be the one you turn to' which was followed by the Les Reed instrumental "Man of Mystery". The very first request to be played was for 'Colin' on the burns ward who asked us to play 'Sir Duke' by Stevie Wonder. The request show was presented by the programme controller at the time Dave Ralph.

Later in the evening Alan Brunham presented the very first Chart Show on the station. The Number One at the time was Mary's Boy Child by Boney M. The rest of the team included Peter Royal - chaiman, Jenny Royal - secretary, Chris Payne - chief engineer, Mary Payne - fundraiser, and our President was (and still is) Freda Roberts. One of the first fundraising events was a 100 hour sponsored drumming marathon and there were donations from the likes of Aylesbury round table, The Harding trust, Carreras Rothmans Ltd and pupils from Aylesbury high school.

At this time we were only broadcasting for three evenings a week. During the next few years our hours of broadcasting (and our record library) increased as we continued entertaining the patients and raising more funds. Other big fund raising events at the time included a 50 hour sponsored programme in 1980 by Martin Kinch and Shane Carlson with special guests including Labi Siffre, Roy Wood, Tim Rice and D.L.T who also compared a fashion show at The Civic Centre for us.

Other celebrities who have helped us over the years include Noel Edmunds, Colin Baker, John Craven, Bev Bevan, Norman Wisdom, David Icke, Carl Wayne, Vince Hill, Anne Robinson, Geoffrey Palmer, Blue Weaver, Isla St Clair, Kenneth Cope, Annie Haslam, Terry Wogan, Ken Bruce and Jimmy Savile to name just a few.

IIn 1997 Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio was one of two Hospital Radio stations to be awarded a temporary experimental AM licence by Ofcom (The other station was Hospital Radio Tyneside in Newcastle) and as a result of the success of that experiment we and many other Hospital radio stations are now able to broadcast permanently on AM (or as some people still like to call it, Medium Wave).

At 2pm on Monday 26th January 1998 DJ Simon Bates came to the station to help us launch our new AM service on 1575 kHz with an opening speech and a visit to some of the wards. He told TV and newspaper reporters "The radio station is part of the community and this is long overdue". On the same day we also started broadcasting 24 hours a day with a mixture of live programmes and an automated sustaining service using the Myriad PC playout software.

In 2002 we celebrated 50 years of number ones by playing every number one hit; a lot of those records were sponsored either by patients and staff of the hospital, local companies or members of the station and their family and friends. We also held a phone in auction for celebrity memorabilia which included a gold disc of The Pet Shop Boys album 'Please', a silver disc of the 'Saturday Night Fever' soundtrack and signed photos from the likes of Kylie Minogue, Tom Jones and Chris Eubank. Many local companies also gave us items to auction off.

With the help of our local Internet service provider Nildram, January 2004 saw the launch of our this website where you will find lots of information about the station and our programme schedule. If you would like a request played for a patient or a member of staff you can now do so "on line" by going to the contact page.

In 2006 the Hospital trust told us that we would soon have to move out of the building that our studio was based in, this was due to the re development of the hospital which meant that our studios (along with other buildings in the old part of the Hospital) would have to be demolished.

We managed to continue broadcasting until March 2007 with Alex Trick and Tom Clare presenting the last live programme from the old studios on Sunday the 18th March. As we started to dismantle the studios, and with the bulldozers getting nearer every day, our computer carried on broadcasting non stop music until we had to pull the plug at 10pm on Thursday the 22nd of March 2007.

After just over 28 years of broadcasting from that building it was time to move on.

Our members then had the mammoth task of moving equipment, records and CDs to another part of the hospital where our engineer had the task of building us a new studio, Aerials and transmitters had to be erected and the miles of cables had to be re laid.

On Tuesday the 12th June 2007 the computers were started back up and the sound of Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio was once again broadcasting to the hospital complex. With a few more days spent getting the studio ready for live broadcasting it was at 6pm on Monday the 18th June that Martin Kinch presented Solid Gold, the first live programme from the new ( temporary) studio, this was followed by the first request show at 8pm presented by Matthew Nash.

In September 2008 we were very pleased to find out from the Hospital trust that in 2009, we will be moving to an exciting new onsite location. The new premises provide the vital extra space required to enable us to upgrade our facilities to include a second live studio, which will also be used for the training of new volunteers. These new facilities will enable us to offer an even better service to the Patients and Staff at Stoke Mandeville Hospital by way of more request shows and children's entertainment programmes, along with many other programmes promoting patient and listener involvement.

On December 4th 2008 Stoke Mandeville Hospital Radio celebrated the fact that we had been broadcasting to the Hospital for 30 years. Current members of the station, as well as some former and founder members got together for a chat and a bite to eat. Also present was the President of the Hospital Broadcasting Association June Snowden, who presented some of our members with long service awards.Members of The Hospital Trust were there as well as the Voluntary Services Manager Helen Wareham, We even had a return visit from broadcasting legend DLT who originally came to see us back in 1980. Presenters Faye and Mark Grantham presented a special request show during the evening and also interviewed some of our guests including June Snowden, Grahem Ellis (Chairman of The Bucks Hospitals Trust) Ian Garlington (Director of Facilities and estates) and former SMHR Chairmen Chris Long and Terry Meades.

More details, and photos from the evening can be found here

On the 14th February 2009 at 9am, Mark Withey presented The Aylesbury Chart Show which was the last programme to be broadcast from our temporary studio in Ward 4X.

In May 2009 The Sun newspaper along with the paint company Dulux held a competition for charities in the UK to have somewhere of their choice painted, and we were voted as one of the lucky winners.The Hospital had given us some empty old rooms and the timing of winning this competition was just right.Special thanks go to all the people that voted for us, Our treasurer Stella Withey who entered us into the competition in the first place said "It has given a real boost to everyone working here." Our President, Freda Roberts was there, as well as members of the Hospital Trust, and Sir Jimmy Savile also came along to pay tribute to the volunteers at the station. Sir Jimmy said "This is absolutely fantastic. The radio station is manned totally by volunteers and they do a brilliant job for the patients."

We are currently 'Off Air' for a while as we move into our new studio complex.

This is due to the redevelopment of the Hospital.

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.