IT was 50 years ago this week that Lord Reith, founding father of the British Broadcasting Corporation and pioneer of public service broadcasting worldwide, died at his home in Edinburgh at the age of 81.

John Charles Walsham Reith, First Baron Reith, of Stonehaven KT, GCVO, GBE, TD, PC, to give him his full title and honours, was born in Stonehaven on July 20, 1889. His father George was a well-known minister of the United Free Church and indeed served a term as its moderator. John Reith was the youngest of five sons, and practically from birth the family nicknamed him “Non”. His English mother Adah and his nurses brought him up as George was always busy.

Educated at Glasgow Academy, Reith was not popular at the school and gained the reputation of being a bully. That he grew to be 6 ft 6 ins tall and always had a volcanic temperament possibly contributed to the dim view of him. Reith insisted, however, that he had been “entirely moral” in his conduct.

In 1904, he moved to Gresham’s, a boarding school in Holt in Norfolk, recommended by his brother Archie who had become an Anglican vicar in that area. Reith’s first reaction was to run away, but he eventually came to enjoy life at Gresham’s where he joined the army cadets and became a crackshot, able to compete at Bisley.

His father deemed Reith not sufficiently able to go to university and secured an engineering apprenticeship for him at the Hyde Park Works of the North British Locomotive Company in Springburn.

He later wrote that he did his best to disguise the fact he was a son of the manse, wearing an engineer’s cap and a muffler instead of a collar, adopting an almost permanent threatening look. He later wrote that the expression “seemingly had congealed”. He moved to London to work in the docks but was not happy there.

Reith joined the Territorial Army and became a commissioned officer in the Fifth Scottish Rifles so that when war broke out in 1914, he was one of the first Scots into the trenches. He transferred to the Royal Engineers and on October 7, 1915, instead of taking the time off that he was due, he went with his commanding officer to inspect damage to the trenches. A German sniper perched hundreds of yards away spotted the tall Scot and fired at his head. Reith fell wounded, shot through the left cheek, his cheekbone shattered and his face disfigured by a wound 5 ins by 3 ins in area. “I’m very angry and I’ve spoilt a new tunic,” he reportedly said.

After recovering he was sent to the USA and joined the Remington arms company near Philadelphia which was producing rifles for the British. He became famous as the first wounded British officer to be in America and gave numerous speeches – he found out that he was an excellent public speaker.

Returning to Britain, Reith had a bizarre ménage a trois with the woman who became his wife, Muriel Odhams, and a young Englishman Charlie Bowser. It has been suggested Reith and Charlie had a gay affair, but there’s no definite evidence, whereas both men were in love with Muriel.

Reith won, and later fell out bitterly with Charlie. He also moved to Glasgow to become general manager of William Beardmore, but then transferred to the civil service in London before gaining the job of managing a new firm, the British Broadcasting Company, set up by a consortium of radio companies to produce content for their customers.

Austere and still very much guided by his Presbyterian faith, Reith became an autocratic manager who somehow hit on the formula for success, mixing news reports of the events of the day with music and moral drama productions, all done live. He started the Radio Times, the name dreamed up by himself, and it sold out its first 285,000 print run.

Friendly with several Government Ministers, Reith persuaded them to make the BBC a public corporation funded by licences. It was the single most important achievement of his life. From 1926, the British Broadcasting Corporation came into being, Reith famously stating it would “educate, inform and entertain”.

The General Strike that year was covered impartially at Reith’s direct order. Winston Churchill wanted the BBC to become the Government’s mouthpiece and the two men developed a lasting enmity.

Knighted for his services to broadcasting, Reith went on to make the BBC very much his creature.

For example, he would issue decrees like this to his broadcasters: “If a person is famous, it is superfluous to point out the fact. If he is not then it is a lie. The word is not to be used on the BBC.”

The BBC history section on the Corporation’s website sums up in just one paragraph what happened to Reith after he left in 1938 to head up Imperial Airways: “During World War 2 he was MP for Southampton, Minister of Information and Minister of Works. Later he led various commercial and public organisations but felt unappreciated and under-employed. He publicly criticised competition in broadcasting and falling standards until he died.”

He really did not like the idea of ITV, writing: “He who prides himself on giving what he thinks the public wants is often creating a fictitious demand for low standards which he will then satisfy.”

The BBC Reith Lectures were begun in his honour in 1948, and he was elected Rector of Glasgow University in 1965, but the honour he most prized was becoming Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1967.

After his death on June 16, 1971, Reith was cremated and at his request his ashes were interred at Rothiemurchus Church in the heart of the Highlands.