A Three-Hour Televised Tantrum: Southern Television's Demise, and its associated effects.

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Picture this, you're a television presenter. You just hear that the TV station you work for is shutting down. You'd be understandably upset, right?

That's how many people felt when Southern Television, a station that was part of the UK's ITV network. 

Note: From ITV's founding in 1955 until 2002, it was represented by 14 licensees in 12 regions of the UK (London had 2 franchises, one serving the city on weekdays, and the other on weekends). In 1994, stations were allowed to buy each other out. This resulted in only 4 companies remaining by 2002, Carlton Communications, Granada, Scottish Television, and Ulster Television (UTV, serving Northern Ireland. UTV would later be acquired by ITV plc [formed from a merger between Carlton and Granada] in 2016). Scottish Television is the only remaining independent franchise left in the ITV network.

But back to Southern. After the bad news got out, the final days of the station had a gloomy vibe to them. The presenters and announcers would be standing in front of a tombstone-style graphic, with a circular sign reading "SOUTHERN TELEVISION 1958-1981"

But when New Years' Eve night hit, as ITV's other regions (including ATV, whose license to broadcast in the Midlands region) were airing the network programs scheduled, Southern aired its own program, a "nearly three-hour televised tantrum" called "And It's Goodbye from Us", hosted by Southern announcer Christopher Robbie. 

The show opened with a theme composed by Jonathan Burton, known as the Southern Fantasia, which arranges the station's acoustic guitar jingle into a full orchestral piece, with a big band jazz opening, leading to a somber arrangement of Auld Lang Syne, ending with a slow, bombastic, and rather emotional reprise of the Southern Jingle as a rising fanfare ending with a booming flourish.

Other memorable and bittersweet moments include a clip show of Southern's one-off productions, and operas. 

The most infamous scene included footage from Southern's annual company dinner party, where the station's owner had a major bone to pick with ITV's governing body, the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) over their decision to close Southern Television down, ending wi

My personal favorite segment is when comedic musician and pianist Richard Stilgoe sang what could only be described as the musical equivalent of flipping their successor Television South (hereafter TVS) off. The song was called "Portakabin TV", due to the fact that TVS was using portable office buildings in Southern's parking lot until Southern ceased transmissions.

But the most remembered, and frankly, rather unsettling, part of the special, is the endcap (the closing logo for the station). After a reprise of Southern Fantasia, with a final closing shot of Southern's well-loved presenters, the "SOUTHERN COLOUR PRODUCTION" card appears, and its blue background fades into a star-filled space background. The Star symbol starts spinning slowly and gains momentum as it zooms out into space. As it disappears, the acoustic guitar jingle plays one last time, its final note echoing. The image fades to black slowly. 

Viewers of "The Station That Serves The South" have witnessed their beloved station perish before their very eyes that night. 

There was just the sound of silence after that. No God Save The Queen, no closedown announcements, no "don't forget to switch off your set" reminder, just plain silence until the transmitter was switched off. It was the end of ITV in the South.

Actually, it wasnt! At 9:30 AM on New Year's Day 1982, TVS went on the air with a bold new colorful look, a classy brassy fanfare, and almost all of Southern's staff were retained!

But later in the 1988, TVS wanted to go bigger! They wanted to be a multinational corporation, and so, they underwent a restructuring as TVS Entertainment Ltd.

This new company acquired MTM Enterprises from Mary Tyler Moore, and as such, the first-ever byline for said logo appeared, reading "A TVS ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY"

TVS's acquisition of MTM caused the company to bleed money, and by the time the 1990 franchise auction hit, they would lose to Meridian Television, who would later be acquired by Granada in the 1990s after a failed merger with Carlton.

MTM was sold off to International Family Entertainment, which was later acquired by 20th Century Fox. The MTM library stayed with Fox after 2001's sale of Fox Family assets to Disney-ABC.

Nowadays, The TVS name and flower logo are owned by an independent company of the same name.