TIMELINE


The timeline below lists major births, deaths, discoveries and events from the show. All recoveries should be listed in chronological order. Recovery dates listed either refer to when that particular item became public knowledge or when the discoverer of the item found it. This page will always be a work-in-progress page, as the process of recovering Doctor Who material will continue for some time yet. As such this page will (hopefully) be updated on a regular basis.

 1890

Date unknown: Jack Hodges Bligh is born. Bligh has the distinction of being the earliest born individual to have worked on the series, appearing as Gaptooth in the 1966 serial The Smugglers. Bligh passed away on the 25th of September the following year aged 77.

 1908

8 January: William Henry Hartnell (the First Doctor) is born.

 1913

26 May: Peter Cushing (Dr Who from Dr Who and the Daleks and Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 A.D) is born.

 1918

1 March: Roger Delgado (the first Master) is born.

 1919

7 July: Jon Pertwee (the Third Doctor) is born.

 1920

25 March: Patrick Troughton (the Second Doctor) is born.

 1922

18 October: The British Broadcasting Company – or BBC for short – is created. It would retain this name until 1927 when the royal charter is granted, becoming the British Broadcasting Corporation.

 1923

27 October: Peter Bryant (fourth producer of the classic series) is born.

 1924

19 November: William Russell Enoch (Ian Chesterton) is born.

 1925

26 March: Barry Letts (sixth producer of the classic series) is born.

20 September: John Wiles (second producer of the classic series) is born.

24 December: Innes Lloyd (third producer of the classic series) is born.

 1927

21 April: Gerald Robert Flood (voice of Kamelion) is born.

 1928

29 December: Bernard Cribbins (Tom Campbell from Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 A.D, Wilfred Mott) is born.

 1929

16 December: William Nicholas Stone Courtney (Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart) is born.

17 December: Grace Jacqueline Hill (Barbara) is born.

 1931

10 October: Victor Pemberton (writer of Fury from the Deep) is born.

 1932

31 August: Roy Castle (Ian from Dr Who and the Daleks) is born.

 1934

20 January: Tom Baker (the Fourth Doctor) is born.

1 July: Jean Marsh (Sara Kingdom) is born.

 1935

27 November: Verity Ann Lambert (first producer of the classic series) is born.

Date unknown: David Brierly (voice of K-9) is born.

 1936

15 January: Richard Franklin (Cpt Mike Yates) is born.

16 April: Derrick Sherwin (fifth producer of the classic series) is born.

2 November: The world’s first “high definition” broadcast is made from Alexander Palace in north London, heralding the start of the BBC Television Service. Compared to today’s description of high definition being 1080 lines of resolution, Alexander Palace was using Marconi-EMI’s 405-line system (alternating with John Logie Baird’s 240-line resolution system, which was phased out in 1937).

Date unknown: Jill Curzon (Louise from Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 A.D) is born.

 1937

22 July: Adrienne Hill (Katarina) is born.

 1939

10 February: Peter Purves (Steven Taylor) is born.

1 September: The BBC shuts down all television broadcasts with the outbreak of World War Two, out of the fear the television signal could be used as guidance for enemy bombs.

8 December: Jennie Linden (Barbara from Dr Who and the Daleks) is born.

 1940

22 January: John Hurt (the War Doctor) is born.

16 June: Carole Ann Ford (Susan Foreman) is born.

19 September: Caroline John (Liz Shaw) is born.

 1941

10 July: Jackie Lane (Dodo Chaplet) is born.

20 October: Anna Katarina Willys (Anneke Wills) is born.

24 December: John Anthony Woods (Sgt Benton) is born. He used the stage name John Levene to avoid being confused with an actor of the same name.

 1942

29 November: Michael Craze (Ben Jackson) is born.

 1943

16 March: John Leeson (voice of K-9) is born.

8 June: Colin Baker (the Sixth Doctor) is born.

29 June: Maureen O'Brien (Vicki) is born.

20 August: Percy James Patrick Kent-Smith (the Seventh Doctor) is born. Percy adopted the stage name Sylveste McCoy after appearing in a play entitled An Evening with Sylveste McCoy. Later, he would use Sylvester McCoy to avoid the theatre superstition of having a 13-letter stage name.

 1944

22 September: Frazer Hines (Jamie McCrimmon) is born.

1 October: Philip Hinchcliffe (seventh producer of the classic series) is born.

20 October: Ian Don Marter (Harry Sullivan) is born.

 1945

24 May: Graham Williams (eigth producer of the classic series) is born.

7 June: Frazer Hines (Jamie McCrimmon) is born.

 1946

1 February: Elisabeth Clara Heath-Sladen (Sarah Jane Smith) is born.

7 June: The BBC resumes television broadcasts for the first time since 1939 with announcer Jasmine Bligh saying "Good afternoon everybody. How are you? Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh?". She then played a Mickey Mouse cartoon, the last programme to be broadcast before the war, almost seven years earlier.

14 October: Catherine Ann "Katy" Manning (Jo Grant) is born.

 1947

12 August: John Turner (ninth and final producer of the classic series) is born. He would later change his name to John Nathan-Turner to avoid being confused with an actor of the same name.

7 December: Wendy Padbury (Zoe Heriot) is born.

 1948

2 January: Deborah Watling (Victoria Waterfield) is born.

The BBC creates the BBC News Unit, and to accompany it the BBC Film Library. Initially the Library is split between Windmill Road, Lime Grove and Ealing Studios.

 1950

22 March: Mary Tamm (Romana I) is born.

21 May: Lime Grove Studios is reopened by the BBC after purchasing them from the Rank Organisation the previous year. The move was designed to be only temporary until the planned Television Centre could be completed, however the BBC ultimately used Lime Grove until 1991.

 1951

13 April: Peter Davison (the Fifth Doctor) is born.

20 April: Louise Jameson (Leela) is born.

28 June: Sarah Ward (Romana II) is born. Ward's stage name 'Lalla' is based on her attempts as a toddler to pronounce "Sarah".

 1953

18 July - 22 August: The first of three Quatermass serials airs on the BBC. The Quatermass Experiment, as it was called, was a six-part science fiction serial written by Nigel Kneale and starred Reginald Tate as Professor Bernard Quatermass. The serial was a huge success, garnering an average of 3.9 million viewers over the six episodes and individually reaching 5 million for the last instalment; an impressive feat considering a year earlier the BBC believed the total viewing audience was less than 2.5 million. A second serial, Quatermass II, was broadcast in 1955 and Quatermass and the Pit following in 1958. Due to telerecording services being in their infancy, only the first two episodes were retained (on 35mm film) with the last four episodes effectively transmitted live without being recorded. These two episodes, along with the other serials from the 1950s, were released on DVD in 2005. The show was heavily influential in many British science fiction series for decades to come, including Doctor Who.

9 August: Roberta Tovey (Susan from Dr Who and the Daleks and Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 A.D) is born.

9 September: Janet Fielding (Tegan Jovanka) is born.

 1955

22 September: Associated-Rediffusion begins broadcasting. The regional contractor working under ITV (Independent Television) is the first independent station to launch, as part of the Television Act 1954, to break up the monopoly the BBC had on television broadcasts. Broadcasting is limited to London and surrounding counties.

 1958

14 April: Peter Capaldi (the Twelfth Doctor) is born.

 1959

6 April: Mark Strickson (Vislor Turlough) is born.

14 November: Paul McGann (the Eighth Doctor) is born.

 1960

29 June: Television Centre is officially opened by the BBC.

11 October: Nicola Jane Bryant (Peri Brown) is born.

8 October: The BBC Television Service is renamed BBC TV.

 1961

18 November: Steven Moffat (second executive producer / head writer of the revived series) is born.

12 December: Sarah Sutton (Nyssa) is born.

19 December: Matthew Waterhouse (Adric) is born.

 1962

20 August: Sophie Aldred (Ace) is born

 1963

30 January: Daphne Lee Ashbrook (Grace Holloway) is born.

11 March: Alex Kingston (River Song) is born.

27 April: Russell T Davies (first executive producer / head writer of the revived series) is born (birth name Stephen Russell Davies).

27 September: The pilot episode of Doctor Who is recorded at Lime Grove Studio D. This episode would prove to be unsuitable due to dialogue errors, camera mistakes and other issues which creator Sydney Newman had problems with.

18 October: The first episode of Doctor Who is remounted and recorded.

22 November: US President John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas. His death would overshadow the broadcast of Doctor Who the following day in the UK. The assassination itself was mentioned in Silver Nemesis, Rose, Let’s Kill Hitler, Who Killed Kennedy (novel), The Space Race (audio), The Conspiracy (audio), Zagreus (audio), 1963 (audio) and The Cambridge Spy (K9),

23 November: The first episode of Doctor Who, An Unearthly Child, screens on the BBC at 5.16pm. It attracts an audience of 4.4 million viewers. It marks the first on-screen appearance by the Doctor (William Hartnell), Susan (Carol Ann Ford), Ian (William Russell) and Barbara (Jacqueline Hill). This episode would be repeated the following week prior to the broadcast of the second episode, The Cave of Skulls, due to a power outage, as many viewers around the country would not have seen the initial broadcast.

21 December: The first episode of The Daleks airs on the BBC, garnering 6.9 million viewers. Six weeks later when the final episode of the serial ends, that number jumps to 10.4 million.

 1964

16 February: Christopher Eccleston (the Ninth Doctor) is born.

20 April: BBC2 begins broadcasting, using the more advanced 625-line resolution. The first broadcast was interrupted by a fire at Battersea Power Station, which knocked out power to Television Centre and much of London. BBC TV – which had just been renamed BBC1 – was able to continue broadcasting via Alexander Palace (using the older 405-line system) but BBC2 proper launch was ultimately delayed until the following day.

22 July: Bonita Melody Lysette “Bonnie” Langford (Mel Bush) is born.

26 December: The final episode of The Dalek Invasion of Earth airs, marking the final appearance of Carol Ann Ford, who played the Doctor’s granddaughter Susan. This would mark the first time a companion would depart the series. Ford was apparently displeased with her character’s development and asked to leave the series.

 1965

2 January: Maureen O’Brien joins the cast as Vicki in The Rescue.

18 April: Camille Coduri (Jackie Tyler) is born.

26 June: The Chase 6 airs on BBC1. This marks the final appearance of both William Russell (Ian) and Jacqueline Hill (Barbara) as regular companions, and also introduces Peter Purves as Steven Taylor. Purves had previous appeared in The Chase 3 as a different character.

9 October: Mission to the Unknown airs on BBC1. This single-episode story marks the only time in Doctor Who history that neither the Doctor, the Tardis nor any companion feature in an episode.

6 November: The Myth Makers 4 airs on BBC1, marking the final appearance by Maureen O’Brien as Vicki, and the first appearance by Adrienne Hill as Katarina.

4 December: The Daleks’ Master Plan 4 airs on BBC 1. The episode features the first death of a companion, namely Katarina, whom the show’s producer’s felt was unsuitable for the series and asked writer Terry Nation to write her out of the show as soon as possible. Ironically, Adrienne Hill’s first material filmed for the show was her death scene, recorded on 27 September, followed by her first studio recording on 8 October. Another companion, Sara Kingdom played by Jean Marsh, is also killed off at the end of this story. Kingdom’s tenure as a companion is disputed, as she only appears in a single story.

25 December: The Feast of Steven airs on BBC1, episode 7 of the 12-part story The Daleks’ Master Plan. It remained the only episode of the classic series broadcast on Christmas Day, and the only Christmas special until The Christmas Invasion aired in 2005, exactly 40 years later.

 1966

26 February: Jackie Lane joins the regular cast as Dorothy (Dodo) Chaplet in the final episode of The Massacre. Despite having a strong cockney accent in this episode, it is heavily reduced in subsequent episodes to the “more acceptable” BBC English.

20 May: Mervyn Pinfield dies aged 54. He was the show’s first associate producer from An Unearthly Child to The Romans, and also directed some episode of The Sensorites and Planet of Giants, and all of The Space Museum. Mervyn is also credited as inventing the autocue.

18 June: Peter Purves leaves the series after playing Steven Taylor since The Chase. His final episode is The Savages 4. Peter would go on to being a long serving host of the children’s show (and fellow British institution) Blue Peter.

25 June: Michael Craze and Anneke Wills join the cast as Ben and Polly respectively with the broadcast of The War Machines 1. A week later on 2 July, Jackie Lane leaves the series when her contract expires upon the completion of The War Machines 2. As such, her character never receives the traditional ‘goodbye’ scene.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         
29 October and 5 November: The Tenth Planet 4 screens on the BBC, marking the final appearance of William Hartnell as the Doctor. Ill health forced him to retire from the role, and was replaced by Patrick Troughton. This is the first time regeneration is seen on screen. Initially, the Doctor transformation was to have been shrouded in the Doctor's cloak and the change itself happen 'off-screen', but BBC vision mixer Shirley Coward came up with a technique to switch between actors using a dissolve transition, thus creating the first iconic regeneration sequence. 

17 December: Frazer Hines is cast as Jamie and makes his first appearance in The Highlanders 1. His character would stay with the show until the final episode of Patrick Troughton’s tenure.
 
 1967

09 March: The engineering department routinely wipe master tapes for re-use, and after four years on air the department began erasing Doctor Who episodes. The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Highlanders 1 2 3 4.

11 March: John Barrowman (Cpt Jack Harkness) is born.

15 April: Michael Craze (Ben) and Anneke Wills (Polly) leave the show during The Faceless Ones 2. They were originally contracted to appear up until The Evil of the Daleks 2, but producer Innes Lloyd had grown dissatisfied with their performance as companions and requested David Ellis and Malcolm Hulke write them out of The Faceless Ones early on. They were however allowed to appear in a pre-recorded insert in which their characters elect to stay in then-present day London, during the broadcast of The Faceless Ones 6 on 13 May.

27 May: Deborah Watling makes her first appearance as Victoria Waterfield in The Evil of the Daleks 2.

1 July: BBC2 begins broadcasting in colour, over two years ahead of BBC1.
 
17 August: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - An Unearthly Child 2 3 4, The Daleks 1 2 3 6 7, The Edge of Destruction 1, Marco Polo 1 2 3 4 5 6 7, The Keys of Marinus 1 2 3 5 6, The Aztecs 1 2 3 4, The Sensorites 3 4 5, The Reign of Terror 1 2 3 5 6, The Dalek Invasion of Earth 1 2 4 6, The Rescue 1, The Romans 1 2 3 4, The Web Planet 2 3 4, The Crusade 2, The Space Museum 1 3 4, The Chase 2 4 6, The Time Meddler 1 3 4, Galaxy 4 1 2 4, The Myth Makers 2 3 4, The Daleks Master Plan 1 2 4 5 7 8 9, The Massacre 1 2 3 4, The Ark 1 2 3 4, The Gunfighters 1. It should be noted that the erasure of The Daleks’ Master Plan 7 on this day is generally considered to be the first episode of Doctor Who to be lost forever. There is no indication this episode was transferred to 16mm film, or when The Daleks’ Master Plan was offered for overseas sale the serial was marketed as an 11-part story.

November 1967: The father of Toby Chamberlain recorded all six episodes of The Ice Warriors off-air during their original BBC broadcast on a domestic reel-to-reel video recorder at the Birmingham Dental Hospital. During the holidays that followed, Toby was left to watch the six episodes while his father worked. Due to the purpose of the video recorder - making demonstration tapes for students - the tapes were likely wiped days after Toby viewed them.

 1968

17 February: The Web of Fear 3 airs on BBC1. This instalment marks the first appearance of Colonel Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, played by Nicholas Courtney. Courtney previously appeared as Bret Vyon in The Daleks’ Master Plan three years earlier, and Lethbridge-Stewart would go on to be a regular character during the Pertwee era.

20 April: Deborah Watling leaves the series at the end of Fury from the Deep 6, though she appears briefly in a film insert at the start of The Wheel in Space 1.

27 April: Wendy Padbury makes her debut as Zoe Heriot in The Wheel in Space 1.

12 May: Catherine Tate (Donna Noble) is born (birth name Catherine Ford).

28 May: The BBC sent audition prints of The Ice Warriors 1 2 3 4 5 6 to ZDF in Germany, who decide not to purchase the series.

August: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Evil of the Daleks 1 2 3 4 5 6.

2 November: The first episode of The Invasion airs on BBC1. The story sees the return of Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney), last seen in The Web of Fear and now with the rank of Brigadier, and introduces Corporal Benton (John Levene).

November: The BBC Film Library consolidates its resources into a single location at Windmill Road, closing the branches at Ealing and Lime Grove.

 1969

31 January: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Edge of Destruction 2, The Keys of Marinus 4, The Sensorites 1 2 6, The Reign of Terror 4, Planet of Giants 1 2 3, The Dalek Invasion of Earth 3, The Rescue 2, The Web Planet 1 5 6, The Crusade 1 4, The Space Museum 2, The Chase 3 5, The Time Meddler 2, Galaxy 4 3, The Myth Makers 1, The Daleks Master Plan 3 6 10 11 12.

21 June: The final episode of The War Games airs, and thus the last episode of Patrick Troughton’s tenure. This also marked the final appearance of Wendy Padbury’s character of Zoe, and Frazer Hines’ character of Jamie (though both would return for the 1983 anniversary episode The Five Doctors). Frazer currently holds the record for most appearances by a companion on Doctor Who, with 117 episodes under his belt.

17 July: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Daleks 5, The Chase 1, The Abominable Snowmen 4.

20 July: Apollo 11 touches down on the moon, fulfilling American President John F Kennedy’s vision of landing a man on the moon by 1970. Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin become the first humans to step foot on another heavenly body. It should be noted that the Doctor had already visited the moon twice by this stage…

21 July: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Underwater Menace 1 2, The Moonbase 1 2 3 4, The Faceless Ones 1 2 3 4 6, The Ice Warriors 4, The Enemy of the World 2 3 4 5, The Wheel in Space 1 2 3 4 5, The Dominators 1 2 4 5, The Mind Robber 1 2 3 4, The Krotons 2 3 4, The Seeds of Death 1 2 3 6, The Space Pirates 1 3 4 5 6.

22 September: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Underwater Manace 3 4, The Faceless Ones 5, The Evil of the Daleks 7, The Tomb of the Cybermen 1 2 3 4, The Abominable Snowmen 1 2, The Web of Fear 2 4.

25 September: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Abominable Snowmen 3 5 6, The Ice Warriors 1 2 3.

20 October: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Tenth Planet 4, The Ice Warriors 5 6, The Enemy of the World 1, The Web of Fear 1 3 5 6.

15 November: BBC1 and ITV begin broadcasting in colour.
  
 1970

3 January: Spearhead from Space 1 airs on BBC1. This is the first time the show screens in colour, and marks the first appearance by Jon Pertwee as the Doctor, Caroline John as Liz Shaw and Nicholas Courtney reprising his role as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart.

April 1: The NZBC in New Zealand conducted an audit of their Harriett St Film Store in Wellington. Mentioned in the audit were Marco Polo 3 4 5 6 7, The Underwater Menace 1 2 3 4 and The Moonbase 1 2 3 4, although it should be pointed out that Harriett St was the main location for the NZBC so all Doctor Who episodes were likely stored here at some stage.

20 June: Caroline John leaves the series at the conclusion of Inferno. John was pregnant with her first child and wanted to depart the show, but at the same time producer Barry Letts felt the character of Liz Shaw wasn’t working as a companion, and wasn’t going to renew her contract anyway. John would return in a cameo role in The Five Doctors.

July: The NZBC in New Zealand sent their 16mm film copies of The Faceless Ones 1 2 3 4 5 6 back to BBC London. This story did not air in New Zealand and the BBC likely requested it be returned for resale, knowing the films hadn’t been attacked by the censor’s knife. It is possible that The Ice Warriors and Fury from the Deep – two stories which also didn’t screen in New Zealand – were also sent back to London.
  
 1971

2 January: The first episode of Terror of the Autons airs on BBC1. This marks the first appearance of Jo Grant (Katy Manning), Mike Yates (Richard Franklin) and The Master (Roger Delgado).

18 April: David Tennant (the Tenth Doctor) is born.

20 May: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The Pilot Episode, An Unearthly Child 1, The Invasion 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8, The War Games 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10.

June 18: The NZBC in New Zealand destroy their 16mm film copies of The Reign of Terror 1 2 3 4 5 6.
 
 1972

This year, BBC Enterprises at Villiers House began systematically junking the film copies of Hartnell & Troughton episodes which were deemed no longer viable for overseas sales. Stories which were junked this year included Marco Polo, The Reign of Terror, The Crusade and The Myth Makers.

10 January: The NZBC in New Zealand sends a large shipment of films to RTS in Singapore, including many missing episodes. The batch consisted of The Savages 1 2 3 4, The Smugglers 1 2 3 4, The Tenth Planet 1 2 3 4 and The Power of the Daleks 1 2 3 4 5 6. In the case of the latter two stories this was the final known broadcast destination.

20 September: The NZBC in New Zealand sends a further shipment of films to RTS in Singapore, consisting of - amongst others - Galaxy 4 1 2 3 4, The Myth Makers 1 2 3 4, The Massacre 1 2 3 4 and The Celestial Toymaker 1 2 3 4.

30 December 1972 – 20 January 1973: The four-part story The Three Doctors airs on BBC1, marking the start of the tenth season and thus the tenth anniversary of the show. William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton reprise their roles as the First and Second Doctor respectively, though William Hartnell is too ill to perform as needed, and thus his role is reduced to reading cue cards to camera (explained as his character is ‘trapped in a time eddy’). The serial is very successful, with the final episode almost reaching 12 million viewers. This would be Hartnell’s final acting role before his death in 1975.
  
 1973

BBC Enterprises at Villier's House junk the prints for The Celestial Toymaker and The Savages.

31 March: Frontier in Space 6 airs on BBC1. This would mark the final appearance of Roger Delgado as The Master, who was killed three months later in a car accident.

18 June: Roger Delgado was driving in a car whilst filming Bell of Tibet in Turkey when it left the road and crashed down a ravine. Delgado and two technicians were killed in the accident. Jon Pertwee has said this was an influencing factor which would ultimately lead him to leaving the show. Delgado played the first televised role of The Master from Terror of the Autons to Frontier in Space. His planned final appeared was in a script called The Final Game, which would also see the Doctor regenerate. The story was scrapped following Delgado’s death. He was 55, and Bell of Tibet was never finished. (See the entry for 11 February, 2015 for more details).

5 November: Long running BBC series Blue Peter airs a special episode dedicated to Doctor Who’s tenth anniversary. The show featured several clips, including the regeneration scene from the end of The Tenth Planet 4. This gives rise to the biggest fan myth surround missing episodes; that Blue Peter had and then lost the Film Library’s copy of The Tenth Planet 4. Given the 405-line quad tape was wiped in 1969 and the show was still being offered for overseas sales the following year, and that the Film Library never actually had a copy of the episode to begin with, the story is ultimately false.

 1974

BBC Enterprises at Villiers House continues to junk their collection of film prints. Stories junked this year include Mission to the Unknown, The Daleks Master Plan, The Massacre, The War Machines, The Smugglers, The Tenth Planet, The Power of the Daleks, The Highlanders, The Underwater Menace, The Moonbase, The Macra Terror, The Faceless Ones, The Evil of the Daleks, The Abominable Snowmen, The Ice Warriors, The Web of Fear, Fury from the Deep, The Wheel in Space, The Invasion and The Space Pirates.

March: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - The War Machines 1 2 3 4, The Macra Terror 1 2 3 4.

8 June: Planet of the Spiders 6 airs on BBC1, revealing the regeneration of Jon Pertwee into Tom Baker. It also marked the final appearance of Mike Yates (Richard Franklin), though he would briefly appear in The Five Doctors.

June 27: The NZBC in New Zealand destroy their 16mm film copies of The Macra Terror 1 2 3 4.

July: The master tape for the following episode was erased on this date - Mission to the Unknown.

Late 1974: The master tapes for the following episodes were erased on this date - Fury from the Deep 1 2 3 4 5 6. The master tapes from Fury from the Deep would be the last known video tape erasure for the sixties. Of the episodes where the fate isn't recorded: Planet of Giants 4 (the original studio recording tape) The Crusade 3, The Celestial Toymaker 1 2 3 4, The Gunfighters 2 3 4, The Savages 1 2 3 4, The Smugglers 1 2 3 4, The Tenth Planet 1 2 3, The Power of the Daleks 1 2 3 4 5, The Enemy of the World 6 and The Seeds of Death 4. Of the episodes where a master tape doesn't exist due to the episode originating on 35mm film: The Daleks 4, The Dalek Invasion of Earth 5, The Power of the Daleks 6, The Wheel in Space 6, The Dominators 3, The Mind Robber 5, The Krotons 1, The Seeds of Death 5, The Space Pirates 2. 

Mid-late 1974: The NZBC in New Zealand shut down their Harriett St Film Store in a bid to move their facilities to a central location at Avalon Studios in Lower Hutt, north of Wellington. Crucial films and videotapes are removed but the rest are scheduled for junking. Harriett Street is the last known location for many Doctor Who stories that aired in New Zealand, some of which appeared on an audit taken four years earlier. It was during this shut down that the 16mm film print of The Crusade 1 would be rescued from the rubbish dump and find its way into the hands of Bruce Grenville in 1998.

Late 1974 (or early 1975): New Zealand fan Neil Lambess, who 25 years later would be instrumental in the return of The Crusade 1, recalls watching a pair of Doctor Who episodes at school, episodes which would later be classed as missing. According to the story, Neil attended Harley Street School in Masterton, when a joint summer sports day with Fernridge School was rained off. In order to occupy the kids for at least an hour before the busses would arrive to pick them up, teachers organised the screening of a handful of Doctor Who episodes on 16mm film in a school hall. Neil recalls he watched two episodes of The Macra Terror, before the busses arrived and took the kids home. It is possible the episodes were still screening when Neil was forced to leave to catch his bus, implying more than two episodes could have screened that day. Neil believes this event took place at the end of the year or at the start of 1975 as it was an athletics meet and would likely have taken place in the New Zealand summer. If Neil’s recollection is true, this event took place after the wiping of the NZBC’s copy of The Macra Terror, which took place on 27 June, 1974. Similarly, Neil recalls a conversation with a TVNZ employee who recalls seeing a few Dr Who episodes at Avalon in the late 1970s, and specifically recalls seeing an episode of The Highlanders. In 2013, English based fan David Crichton began investigating The Macra Terror incident and was able to contact several dozen students from both schools. His story even made the headlines of the Waiararapa news. His efforts into finding out more about this story and the possible fate of the film prints are on-going at time of writing this page.
  
 1975

23 April: William Hartnell dies in his sleep from heart failure. Hartnell played the first incarnation of the Doctor from An Unearthly Child to The Tenth Planet, reprising his role for The Three Doctors (though ill health restricted him to sitting reading cue cards to camera). He had suffered from arteriosclerosis which eventually led to him retiring from the show. In late 1974 he was permanently admitted to hospital, and then in early 1975 suffered a series of strokes. William Hartnell was 67 years old.

June 4: BBC London received a shipment of films from the ABC in Australia. The batch consisted of The Space Museum 1 2 3 4, The Chase 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Time Meddler 1 2 3 4, Galaxy 4 1 2 3 4, The Myth Makers 1 2 3 4, The Ark 1 2 3 4, The Smugglers 1 2 3 4, The Tenth Planet 1 2 3 4, The Power of the Daleks 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Underwater Menace 1 2 3 4, The Moonbase 1 2 3 4, The Faceless Ones 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Evil of the Daleks 1 2 3 4 5 6 7, The Tomb of the Cybermen 1 2 3 4, The Abominable Snowmen 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Ice Warriors 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Enemy of the World 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Web of Fear 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Dominators 1 2 3 4 5, The Mind Robber 1 2 3 4 5, The Invasion 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8, The Seeds of Death 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Space Pirates 1 2 3 4 5 6, The War Games 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10. It is often believed that many orphaned episodes recovered over the years – such as Galaxy 4 3, The Underwater Menace 2, The Faceless Ones 3, The Evil of the Daleks 2, The Web of Fear 1, The Dominators 5 etc – stem from this shipment, which could’ve gone ‘walkies’ when scheduled for destruction. It is interesting to note that a copy of The Chase 1 and an edited copy of The Faceless Ones 1 were both found to exist in Australia in the late-1970s, despite being sent back to BBC London – either they never made it back or the ABC made copies.

6 December: Noel Clarke (Mickey Smith) is born.

 1976

The Krotons 1 2 3 4 are returned to BBC London from the ABC in Australia.

22 February: Peter R Newman dies after suffering a brain haemorrhage sustained from a fall at the Tate Gallery, from where he was working at the time. Newman wrote The Sensorites during the first season of Doctor Who.

BBC Enterprises at Villiers House junks their prints of Galaxy 4.

November: In readiness for a planned documentary for the Lively Arts series, a BBC production team drew up a list of surviving episodes within the BBC to source clips from. The list included An Unearthly Child 1 2 3 4, The Dalek Invasion of Earth 5, The Crusade 3, The Chase 1, Galaxy 4 2, The Daleks Master Plan 4, The Gunfighters 4, The Faceless Ones 1, The Enemy of the World 3, The Wheel in Space 6, The Dominators 3, The Mind Robber 5, The Krotons 1, The Seeds of Death 5 and The Space Pirates 2, plus colour prints of all four episodes of Spearhead from Space. The list contained a few errors, some films listed as 35mm when only 16mm existed, the Galaxy 4 episode wasn’t in the library, etc. Had this list been correct, it indicated less than 20 episodes from the 1960s survived in the Library at the time.

 Late 1976: 16mm film copies of The Massacre 1 2 3 4, The Celestial Toymaker 1 2 3 4, The War Machines 1 2 3 4, The Highlanders 1 2 3 4, The Macra Terror 1 2 3 4, Fury from the Deep 1 2 3 4 5 6 and The Wheel in Space 1 2 3 4 5 6 are all junked by the ABC in Australia.

 1977

3 April: The Lively Arts series screens a special instalment entitled Whose Doctor Who, the first proper documentary about the series, and included clips and behinds the scenes media from the show's previous 14 years. Clips used in the show included footage from An Unearthly Child, The Daleks, The Dalek Invasion of Earth, The Web Planet, The Space Museum, Galaxy 4, The Mind Robber, The Invasion and The Seeds of Death, plus various clips from Tom Baker and Jon Pertwee stories, though for the latter, many of his clips required 16mm black and white film as the colour master tapes had already been wiped. The show ran for 50 minutes and was later released on The Talons of Weng-Chiang DVD as an extra.

28 April: Anthony Coburn dies of a heart attack aged 49. Coburn wrote the first serial An Unearthly Child back in 1963. Another of his scripts, The Masters of Luxor, was delayed and ultimately abandoned by the production team. Because of this, Coburn opted not to write for the show again.

Mid-1977: Long-time fan Ian Levine purchases all six episodes of Frontier in Space from the BBC in the first ever private sale to an individual. The episodes were transferred onto U-Matic tape and cost a rather hefty £3000. He wishes to acquire material from the 1960s but is told at the time that rules prevent them from selling episodes older than seven years.

As interest in private sales of old material begins to grow, the BBC conducted another audit of their holdings at the Film Library. A slightly healthier number of 47 surviving episodes were found to exist: An Unearthly Child 1 2 3 4, The Keys of Marinus 5, The Romans 1 3, The Web Planet 2, The Crusade 3, The Space Museum 3, The Time Meddler 2, The Ark 3, The Gunfighters 4, The Tenth Planet 1 2 3, The Underwater Menace 3, The Moonbase 2 4, The Faceless Ones 1, The Enemy of the World 3, The Dominators 1 2 4 5, The Invasion 2 3 5 6 7 8, The Krotons 2 3, The Seeds of Death 1 2 4 6 & The War Games 2 5 8 9. The prints for The Dominators 4 & 5 were edited. It has long been believed that the print for The Invasion 6 was edited also, but this appears to be just a rumour. Also recovered were the 35mm prints of The Dalek Invasion of Earth 5, The Wheel in Space 6, The Dominators 3, The Mind Robber 5, The Krotons 1, The Seeds of Death 5 & The Space Pirates 2. Also found were the 16mm colour prints of Spearhead from Space 1 2 3 4. This left 206 episodes from the first six years missing.

Late-1977: Ian Levine is finally granted permission to purchase material from the 1960s from the Film Library. He is given special compensation by the Writer’s Guild and Equity, and begins acquiring the 47 episodes that existed at Windmill Road. It was during this time that he and John Bridger (from the Film Sales Department) discovered a copy of An Unearthly Child with a different running time. Upon viewing it they discovered they had found the original pilot episode, complete with bloopers, dialogue errors and 3 different takes of the second half of the episode.

 1978
 
21 January: Geoffrey Orme passes away aged 73. Orme wrote The Underwater Menace in 1967.

In a bid to end the process of junking material and capitalise on the growing domestic market, the BBC decide to merge the Film Library, which had existed since 1948, and the engineering department which was responsible for the videotape side of production, and create the Film and Videotape Library. Sue Malden is appointed the Library’s first archive selector, and to get a handle on how television shows may have survived within the BBC she chose Doctor Who as her pet project. With the 47 films from the Film Library already accounted for (see 1977 entry above), Sue turned her attention to surviving videotape masters. There were no 2" quad master tapes from the 1960s were left in existence (that is to say, none with Doctor Who on them; the master tape for The Enemy of the World 3 for example still exists but with another programme recorded over it). The complete list included The Ambassadors of Death 1, The Claws of Axos 1 4, The Daemons 4, Day of the Daleks 1 2 3 4, The Sea Devils 4 5 6, The Mutants 3 4 5 6, The Three Doctors 1 2 3 4, Carnival of Monsters 1 2 3 4, Frontier in Space 4 5, Planet of the Daleks 1 2 4 5 6, The Green Death 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Time Warrior 1 2 3 4, Invasion of the Dinosaurs 2 3 4 5 6, Death to the Daleks 2 3 4, The Monster of Peladon 1 2 3 4 5 6 and Planet of the Spiders 1 2 3 4 5 6.

Once the restrictions for purchasing old Doctor Who episodes had been lifted, Ian Levine followed up on a rumour that more Dr Who episodes existed elsewhere, and organised a trip down to the film vault at Villiers House in London, where BBC Enterprises kept all their footage for overseas sales. What Ian found was a staggering 79 episodes, most of which didn't exist in the newly formed Film & Videotape Library. Ian's quick reactions saved these film prints from destruction, as, according to the story, they were sitting there just waiting to be junked. Ian had located An Unearthly Child 1 2 3 4, The Daleks 1 2 3 4 5 6 7, The Edge of Destruction 1 2, The Keys of Marinus 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Aztecs 1 2 3 4, The Sensorites 1 2 3 4 5 6, Planet of Giants 1 2 3, The Dalek Invasion of Earth 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Rescue 1 2, The Romans 1 2 3 4, The Web Planet 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Space Museum 1 2 3 4, The Chase 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Ark 1 2 3 4, The Gunfighters 1 2 3 4, The Mind Robber 1 2 3 4 5 & The Seeds of Death 1 2 3 4 5 6.

Sue Malden pressed further and managed to find every single story for Jon Pertwee's first four seasons, albeit as 16mm monochrome film recordings. The discovery included Spearhead from Space 1 2 3 4, The Silurians 1 2 3 4 5 6 7, The Ambassadors of Death 1 2 3 4 5 6 7, Inferno 1 2 3 4 5 6 7, Terror of the Autons 1 2 3 4, The Mind of Evil 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Claws of Axos 1 2 3 4, Colony in Space 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Daemons 1 2 3 4 5, Day of the Daleks 1 2 3 4, The Curse of Peladon 1 2 3 4, The Sea Devils 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Mutants 1 2 3 4 5 6, The Time Monster 1 2 3 4 5 6 (episode 6 would later become redundant after a PAL – albeit black & white – 2” quadraplex tape was found in 1987), The Three Doctors 1 2 3 4, Carnival of Monsters 1 2 3 4, Frontier in Space 1 2 3 4 5 6, Planet of the Daleks 1 2 3 4 5 6 and The Green Death 1 2 3 4 5 6. This left just two episodes, Death to the Daleks 1 and Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1, still missing from Jon Pertwee's era. 

During the junking period, some Production Teams (people responsible for specific shows) would gift some of their material to The British Film Institute for preservation, mainly as an example of genre. Sue Malden contacted the BFI and they promptly returned 3 complete Troughton stories from Season Six; The Dominators 1 2 4 5, The Krotons 1 2 3 4 & The War Games 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10.

A check of a stack of film cans recently returned from Hong Kong lead to Sue Malden finding The Web of Fear 1. However new research into this may indicate the film was actually from the batch of films returned from Australia three years earlier. The film was likely sitting with a batch from Hong Kong and but had been at the BBC for some time.

Ian Levine, who had recovered almost the entire first two seasons a few months earlier, came into contact with a film collector in Australia called David Gee. David had in his possession The War Machines 2. After negotiations, he was able to convince David to return his film to the BBC, where a copy was made. This film clearly survived the purge at the ABC two years earlier.

Upon checking the material used in the Whose Doctor Who documentary from 1977 – and material that hadn't been used – Sue Malden found a short clip from an episode that didn't exist; 30 seconds from Galaxy 4 1.

The last discovery of 1978 came in the form of Film Inserts from The Abominable Snowmen 2 & The Daleks Master Plan 2. They were recorded on either 16mm or 35mm film, and would be added to the final episode during studio filming. Despite being archived, this footage wasn't deemed important at the time.

30 October: Brian Hayles, author of stories The Celestial Toymaker, The Smugglers, The Ice Warriors (and thus creator of the Ice Warriors), The Seeds of Death, The Curse of Peladon and The Monster of Peladon, dies aged 47.

Despite the junking officially ending in 1978, returned material was junked as late as 1981, partially due to the new directive not being passed down to all departments, but mainly due to an individual who blatantly ignored the rules at the time. This individual was eventually reprimanded, but not before junking more returned material – including Doctor Who films – recently returned from overseas. It is not known if the material junked between 1978 and 1981 by this man is currently missing from the archives. Paul Vanezis mentions these events in this post on the Missing Episodes forum.

Still missing at the end of 1978: 136 - 60 Hartnell / 75 Troughton / 2 Pertwee

 1979

20 March: Freema Agyeman (Martha Jones) is born.

6 July: Writer Malcolm Hulke passes away at the age of 54. His writing credits included The Faceless Ones, The War Games, The Silurians, The Ambassadors of Death, Colony in Space, The Sea Devils, Frontier in Space and Invasion of the Dinosaurs.

After searching the Film Library and BBC Enterprises, Sue Malden turned her attentions to overseas sales. Up until a few years earlier, the BBC would 'telerecord' episodes to 16mm films for overseas sales. Towards the middle of the 1970s however, overseas broadcasters would now be sent standards converted episodes (that is to say, the "British" PAL video system converted to the "American" NTSC system) on the same tape format as used by the BBC, namely 2" Quadraplex tape. One of the first episodes to be returned came from Canada, an episode from Jon Pertwee's final season and one of the two missing from his era; Death to the Daleks 1. This left Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1 as the only outstanding episode from Pertwee's tenure. Also recovered in 1979 were The Claws of Axos 1 2 3 (episode 1 redundant), The Curse of Peladon 1 2 3 4 (episode 3 no longer exists in this format), The Mutants 1 2 3 4 5 6 (episodes 3-6 redundant) and The Time Monster 1 2 3 4 5 6 from TVO, Ontario and Colony in Space 1 2 3 4 5 6 from CKVU, Vancouver, all from Canada.

Still missing at the end of 1979: 136 - 60 Hartnell / 75 Troughton / 1 Pertwee

 1980

4 February: David Whitaker, the show’s first script editor (credited as story editor), dies aged 51 from cancer. David’s tenure lasted from An Unearthly Child to The Dalek Invasion of Earth. David also wrote a handful of stories for the show, namely The Edge of Destruction, The Rescue, The Crusade, The Power of the Daleks, The Evil of the Daleks, The Enemy of the World, The Wheel in Space and The Ambassadors of Death, although the latter was heavily rewritten by Terrence Dicks, Malcolm Hulke and Trevor Ray. David also penned The Curse of the Daleks stage play and several novelisations, including the first Dalek serial.

Peter Brachacki dies aged 54. Brachacki was the show’s first designer, and famously designed the console room of the Tardis. He was however unhappy with working on the show, and conversely director Waris Hussein wasn’t happy with Brachacki’s work. His time on the show only lasted the first episode, after which he was replaced with Barry Newbery.

Still missing at the end of 1980: 136 - 60 Hartnell / 75 Troughton / 1 Pertwee

 1981

21 February: Ron Grainer passes away after a short battle with cancer at the age of 58. Ron composed the original theme tune for Doctor Who in 1963. He was born in Queensland, Australia and was taught piano by his mother at the age of four. His other credits include Steptoe and Son, That Was The Week That Was and The Prisoner.

21 March: The final episode of Logopolis airs on BBC1, ending with the regeneration of Tom Baker. Baker’s time as the Doctor is the longest by any actor to play the role (172 episodes over 7 seasons), and is replaced by Peter Davison.

27 May: Dr Kit Pedler dies of a heart attack. Pedler was a scientist and parapsychologist, and became Doctor Who's unofficial scientific advisor during the 1960s. Pedler wrote three scripts for the show; The Tenth Planet, The Moonbase and The Tomb of the Cybermen (Tenth Planet and Tomb co-written with Gerry Davis). Pedler and Davis also created the BBC series Doomwatch. Kit Pedler was 53 years old.

Still missing at the end of 1981: 136 - 60 Hartnell / 75 Troughton / 1 Pertwee

 1982

February: BBC employee Roger Stevens purchased a batch of seven episodes from a film collector. Amongst these films was a 16mm print of The Abominable Snowmen 2. The print was passed to Ian Levine who returned it to the BBC. Two additional prints in the collection, The Space Museum 1 and The Moonbase 4, were redundant yet higher in quality to the existing BBC versions.

May: A Dr Who fan learned The Reign of Terror 6 was being sold at a film fair. With Ian Levine's help he managed to negotiate with the seller, and the film was successfully returned to the BBC.

17 June: Jodie Whittaker (the 13th Doctor) is born. Arthur Darvill (Rory Williams) is born.

22 September: Billie Piper (Rose Tyler) is born.

28 October: Matt Smith (the Eleventh Doctor) is born.

19 December: Elwyn Jones dies aged 58. As well as writing The Highlanders for Doctor Who, Jones also co-created Z-Cars and the spin-off Softly, Softly.

A third hand report indicating a “friend of a friend’s uncle” who had visited Freetown, Sierra Leone in 1982 (or 1983) saw an episode of The Savages on television. This would not only indicate an illegal broadcast (screening the episode after the rights had expired) but also the existence of a missing episode in a foreign country. However the description of the episode – which was made public a quarter of a century after the event – could also refer to an episode of The Monster of Peladon, which also screened in the country a couple of years earlier. This has never been properly verified, though paperwork released in 2012 indicated The Savages, along with several other Doctor Who episodes, were lost in the civil war which ripped the country in 1999-2002, when the old SLTV building was overrun by rebels and the film store housing much of the country’s archives was destroyed. However, archivist Philip Morris ventured into Sierra Leone in 2014 and discovered paperwork indicating The Savages was indeed sent back to the BBC in 1974, and thus the third hand report must refer to the Jon Pertwee story.

Still missing at the end of 1982: 134 - 59 Hartnell / 74 Troughton / 1 Pertwee

 1983

March: Fan David Stead found a 16mm film print of The Wheel in Space 3. Stead bought the print from a film collector for £15, and planned to give it back to the BBC in November of that year. However illness and other factors prevented the BBC from receiving the print until the following year, finally obtaining it in April 1984. David retained the print until 2004 when he sold it to Francis Niemcyyk.
 
June: Ian Levine returned a copy of the final missing episode of Jon Pertwee's era to the BBC, Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1. Ian had acquired the print from Roger Stevens the previous year in the batch of seven prints, yet elected to retain the print for future bargaining material. 
 
September: Gareth Morris, the assistant head of the Film & Videotape Library, took a call from a Mormon parish who were about to move into a building previously occupied by the BBC. They advised Gareth that a handful of film cans had been found in a basement area and asked if the BBC like them back. Gareth advised them to return the film cans to Steve Bryant (Sue Malden's successor to the role of Archive Selector) and promptly did so. Steve discovered the small collection included The Daleks' Master Plan 5 & 10. There was also an episode of a show called Warship and another called Adventure World.

ABC Australia contacted the BBC after discovering PAL master tapes from a serial from Jon Pertwee's tenth season. They promptly returned Frontier in Space 1 2 3 4 5 6. Episodes 4 & 5 were redundant as they were already held at the FVTL.

Canada would come to the party again with the return of The Sea Devils 1 2 3 4 5 6; although episodes 4 & 6 were redundant, episode 5 was needed as the PAL master was discovered to be damaged (although thanks to the Restoration Team the damaged PAL version was restored to broadcast quality).

25 November: BBC1 screens the anniversary special of The Five Doctors. The one-off special saw the return of Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Nicholas Courtney, Carole Ann Ford, Frazer Hines, Wendy Padbury, Caroline John, Richard Franklin, Elisabeth Sladen and John Leeson. William Hartnell has passed away eight years earlier, and was replaced by William Hurndell. Tom Baker chose not to appear in the special, and so footage from the unfinished serial Shada (which included Lalla Ward) was used instead.  The special was broadcast on the 25th of November, which was a Friday, but was broadcast in America two days earlier on the actual anniversary, one of only two times an episode of Doctor Who has premiered outside of the UK.

Still missing at the end of 1983: 130 - 57 Hartnell / 73 Troughton / 0 Pertwee - all of Jon Pertwee’s episodes are now recovered

 1984

27 January: Director Douglas Camfield suffers a heart attack and dies, aged 52. Douglas directed several stories including Planet of Giants (Ep3 only), The Crusade, The Time Meddler, The Daleks’ Master Plan, The Web of Fear, The Invasion, Inferno, Terror of the Zygons and The Seeds of Doom. He also submitted a script during the Philip Hinchcliffe era about the French Foreign Legion but the script was rejected.

February: During a routine examination of its film archive, the Australian TV broadcaster ABC discovered a 16mm print of The Celestial Toymaker 4. The ABC have documentation listing the story as being junked in late 1976. When the film was returned to the BBC, it was discovered that the ‘Next Episode’ caption had been edited from it.

16 March: Almost three years to the day since taking the role, Peter Davison bows out as the Doctor, being replaced by Colin Baker in The Caves of Androzani 4. Colin had previously guest starred in Arc of Infinity the previous year.

Two complete stories, The Time Meddler 1 2 3 4 and The War Machines 1 2 3 4 were returned from Nigeria with thanks once again to Ian Levine, although most of the episodes were edited; The Time Meddler 1 was missing the first couple of minutes set in the Tardis.

Still missing at the end of 1984: 123 - 50 Hartnell / 73 Troughton

 1985

16 February – 2 March: The Two Doctors airs on BBC1. The serial sees Patrick Troughton reprise his role as the Second Doctor for the third and final time since leaving the show in 1969. Frazer Hines also stars as Jamie McCrimmon, and the character of Chessene is played by Jacqueline Pearce (Servalan from Blake’s 7).

Future Restoration Team stalwart Paul Vanezis, undertaking a personal search in Cyprus, found 16mm film prints of The Reign of Terror 1 2 3 and a redundant copy of episode 6 on 16mm film. It is generally considered that the missing two episodes of this story, parts 4 & 5, were lost in the Cyprus civil war in 1974, 11 years earlier, when an attack destroyed one of their film archives. The films were Suppressed Field recordings; the existing BBC print of episode 6 was a Stored Field copy and thus superior to this version. Ian Levine was conducting his own search at the time and also found the episodes, alerting the BBC who contacted CBC who returned the episodes.

A couple of months later, the same collector who returned The Reign of Terror 6 in 1982 also returned another copy of The Reign of Terror 3. This was a Stored Field version (which wasn't actually discovered until the BBC borrowed the film again to make a new transfer, this time in 1994) and was thus superior to the Cyprus print, although the Cyprus version is considered a better quality film. This is currently the last recovery of any on-screen video footage from Season One.

The Web Planet 1 2 3 4 5 6 were returned from Nigerian Television on 16mm film. These were mainly redundant, having been recovered previously by Ian Levine in 1978. However episode's 1 & 6 were edited on the existing copies, so this finally made the story complete.

TV Ontario in Canada contacted the BBC to announce they had uncovered a complete 7-part doctor who story in their archives. This lead to a rumour that The Evil of the Daleks had been recovered. When further information released that it was a colour story the rumour was extended and many believed The Evil of the Daleks had been found in colour! The find turned out to be the classic season seven serial Inferno. The NTSC 2" quad tapes of Inferno 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 were returned to the BBC, whereas before they only existed as black & white film recordings.

16mm copies of all six episodes of The Sea Devils were found on an air force base in the Ascension Islands. As the BBC already had copies of this story on both 16mm film and 2" NTSC quad tape, these films were ultimately not returned to the FVTL.
 
Still missing at the end of 1985: 120 - 47 Hartnell / 73 Troughton


 1986

27 April: Jenna-Louise Coleman (Clara Oswald) is born.

24 May: Robert Holmes dies aged 60. Robert was a key writer for the classic series, beginning with The Krotons in Season 6 and wrote his final story in Season 23 (he was supposed to write the last two episodes of The Trial of a Time Lord but died whilst writing Part 13, which was finished by Eric Saward, and the duties for Part 14 were taken over by Pip and Jane Baker). Robert wrote numerous stories for Doctor Who over the years, including Spearhead from Space, Pyramids of Mars, The Deadly Assassin, The Talons of Weng-Chiang and The Caves of Androzani. He also served as script editor for Seasons 12 to 14, and is responsible for creating the Autons and Sontarans.

20 September: Dennis Spooner suffers a fatal heart attack and dies aged 53. Dennis was the show’s second script editor, from The Rescue to The Chase. Dennis also wrote The Romans, The Time Meddler, six of the twelve episodes of The Daleks’ Master Plan and helped with the characterization for the Patrick Troughton’s incoming Doctor in The Power of the Daleks.

28 October: Ian Marter dies on his 42nd birthday from a heart attack due to complications brought on by his diabetes. Ian played Harry Sullivan from Robot through to Terror of the Zygons, with a guest appearance in The Android Invasion. Ian had originally auditioned for the role of Mike Yates under Jon Pertwee’s Doctor, but was forced to turn it down. He also penned several Doctor Who novels, two of which were published after his death.

6 December: The Trial of a Time Lord 14 airs. This would prove to be the final appearance by Colin Baker, as he was forcibly replaced by BBC management and producer John Nathan-Turner forced to hire a replacement for Season 24. Baker would return on-screen for the charity episode Dimensions in Time in 1993.
 
Still missing at the end of 1986: 120 - 47 Hartnell / 73 Troughton

 1987

28 March: Patrick Troughton was attending a convention in Columbus, Georgia, when he suffered a heart attack. Troughton had played the second incarnation of the Doctor from The Power of the Daleks through to The War Games, and reprised his role three times in The Three Doctors, The Five Doctors and most recently The Two Doctors just two years earlier. Troughton was a heavy drinker and smoker, and had suffered two previous heart attacks in the past. He spoke at the convention on the 27th (the final recorded footage of Troughton can be found here) and then on the morning of the 28th had just ordered breakfast when the final heart attack took place. Despite paramedics being called, Patrick Troughton died on the scene, three days after his 67th birthday.

18 April: Richard Landen reveals his reconstruction of The Power of the Daleks 2 to convention goers at Telly Con in Birmingham. Richard is credited with the first reconstruction of a missing episode. He would later release a revised version in 1990.

7 September: Sylvester McCoy makes his first appearance as the Doctor in Time and the Rani 1. Despite being offered the chance to film a regeneration sequence, Colin Baker refused to return.

28 November: Karen Gillan (Amy Pond) is born.

Newbie film collector Gordon Hendry bought The Faceless Ones 3 and The Evil of the Daleks 2 from a film fair in Buckingham in 1982. Three years later, a cinema owner tried to screen both films at his cinema in Brighton, and Saied Marham, an associate of Gordon, tried to get Doctor Who fans interested at that years’ Panopticon convention. After being branded a hoax, the films went into hiding, with Paul Vanezis spending the next 15 months trying to convince Saied to return the prints. A tribute was to be organised for the recently deceased Patrick Troughton at TellyCon, on April 18. After a tense wait and uncertainty if Saied would provide an episode, The Faceless Ones 3 arrived in time for the convention. The weeks that followed saw Saied and Gordon obtain films from shows like Doomwatch, Out of the Unknown and Doctor Who from Ian Levine, who in return was able to make his own duplicate prints. Gordon then handed both films to Steve Bryant at Windmill Road, where duplicates were made.

A black and white 2” Quad tape of The Time Monster 6 was discovered at the BBC. While a similarly monochrome telerecording already existed of the episode, this would give the Restoration Team a much cleaner signal when trying to restore the episode to colour.
 
Still missing at the end of 1987: 118 - 47 Hartnell / 71 Troughton

 1988

During a clear out of Villiers House in London, a BBC Enterprises employee was surprised to find a handful of film cans pushed to the back of a storage cupboard. The cans found were labelled The Ice Warriors 2 4 5 6 and Fury from the Deep 6. On inspection, The Ice Warriors 2 was actually The Ice Warriors 1 (the label had all the correct details for ep 1 except for the instalment number), and the can labelled Fury from the Deep 6 sadly didn't contain the missing episode.

Still missing at the end of 1988: 114 - 47 Hartnell / 67 Troughton

 1989

12 April: Gerald Flood dies of a heart attack aged 61. Gerald provided the voice of Kamelion from The King’s Demons through to Planet of Fire. Kamelion also appeared in The Awakening, though the scene was cut for timing reasons; and The Caves of Androzani as a vision when the Fifth Doctor is regenerating. It’s possible Kamelion and thus Gerald could have appeared in more serials but the robot prop had a tendancy to break down often, and the prop’s creator, Mike Power, died in a boating accident and no one else knew the computer codes to access it properly.

6 December: The final episode of Survival airs, which also marked the final episode of Sylvester McCoy’s era (though he would return seven years later for the TV Movie) and the final episode of the classic era. This is also the last appearance of Anthony Ainley who had portrayed the Master since Logopolis.

Still missing at the end of 1989: 114 - 47 Hartnell / 67 Troughton

 1990

New Zealand fan Graham Howard discovered two film cans labelled Marco Polo 7 and The Moonbase 3 whilst searching at TVNZ (formerly NZBC) in Wellington New Zealand, but sadly the contents didn't match the label.

17 August: Graham Williams dies aged 45. Graham succeeded Philip Hinchcliffe as producer and made the show lighter, with help from script editor Douglas Adams. It was during his tenure that the show achieved its highest ratings ever; 16.1 million viewers for the final episode of City of Death. Graham steered the show from Horror of Fang Rock to The Horns of Nimon. He wrote large sections of City of Death and The Invasion of Time, and years later wrote The Nightmare Fair for Season 23, though the script was shelved after the show went on its 18 month hiatus, and Graham ultimately wrote the novelisation of it. His cause of death is listed as a shooting accident at his home in Devon.

Still missing at the end of 1990: 114 - 47 Hartnell / 67 Troughton

 1991

April: Ian Levine returned unedited copies of The Time Meddler 1 & 3 on 16mm film just prior to the screening of that story on BBC1. Unfortunately, this act of generosity created a stir in the fandom; he had kept those episodes, maybe he had more… Ian Levine has simply retained these complete episodes as a favour to friends of his, and because they were not his property, he didn’t see fit to return them himself.

David Stead, who previously had recovered and returned The Wheel in Space 3 in 1983, was examining a batch of material recently returned from the United Arab Emirates. In the collection, which was sitting outside in the poor weather, was a full and unedited version of Death to the Daleks 1 as a 2” PAL master tape. Previously only a 2” NTSC colour master and a 1” (but edited) PAL master existed. This discovery allowed the story to be fully restored to its original format.
 
2 July: Writer Don Houghton dies. He wrote Inferno and The Mind of Evil. He was 61 years old.

July: Lime Grove Studios in West London are closed by the BBC. Lime Grove was the early home of Doctor Who's production team, especially Studio D, where over 20 serials were filmed or partially filmed, including the Pilot Episode and An Unearthly Child. The BBC had been operating Lime Grove since May 1950, impressive considering the BBC were only supposed to be using the studio as a "stop gap" measure until Television Centre was built. The studio was demolished two years later and is now a housing estate.

23 August: Innes Lloyd passes away aged 65. Innes was the show’s third producer from The Celestial Toymaker through to The Enemy of the World. Innes was able to implement a change inhibited by his predecessor John Wiles and replace William Hartnell with another actor, thus creating the concept of regeneration. Introduced during Innes tenure were the Cybermen, the Yeti and the Ice Warriors.

31 August: Script editor Gerry Davis dies in Venice, California aged 61. He tenure lasted from The Massacre to The Evil of the Daleks. Gerry also co-wrote The Tenth Planet and The Tomb of the Cybermen with Dr Kit Pedler, created the Cybermen and the character of Jamie McCrimmon.

27 October: Paul Erickson, writer of The Ark, dies aged 70.

Late 1991: Hong Kong returns 16mm prints of The Tomb of the Cybermen 1 2 3 4. The story was rush released onto BBC Video in May 1992, where it became an instant hit.

Around this time the BBC were looking to experiment on the Jon Pertwee episodes that were original shot in colour but now only existed as monochrome film recordings. Apart from an experiment with Terror of the Autons a few years earlier, this would be the first full scale attempt to colour a black & white story (in this case The Daemons). Ian Levine in the 1970s had contacted an associate, Tom Lundie, who hired a brand new Betamax recorder and recorded Doctor Who serials off air from broadcasts in the United States, who at the time still had colour master tapes. Thanks to this, many of the monochrome serials now had a colour version in existence, albeit as an NTSC copy on U-matic tape. The BBC's Restoration Team managed to successfully extract the colour signal from the NTSC copies and match it from the luminance signal from the monochrome film recordings. Their efforts were impressive, and allowed for the successful re-colourisation of The Silurians 1 2 3 4 5 6 7, Terror of the Autons 1 2 3 4 and The Daemons 1 2 3 5. The Ambassadors of Death would prove to be problematic, as colour banding was present on the NTSC recordings, and as such a complete re-colourisation couldn't be attempted. Only episode 5 could be successfully coloured, in addition to around 90 minutes of the rest of the serial - just under half in total - leaving the rest, including episode 4 entirely, in monochrome. A colour copy of The Mind of Evil was unfortunately recorded over before its value was realised, and thus only a small portion of episode 6 remained in colour.

Still missing at the end of 1991: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton
 
 1992

3 January: Resistance is Useless airs on BBC2. The 30 minute programme used clips from all 26 seasons of the classic series, linked by a man dressed in an anorak and was created by the BBC’s Music and Arts Department.

Still missing at the end of 1992: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton
 
 1993
 
18 February: Jacqueline Hill, who played the role of Barbara Wright from An Unearthly Child to The Chase, and played the role of Lexa in the Tom Baker story Meglos, dies of cancer aged 63. Hill was the first companion to appear on screen, and is notable for speaking the first lines of dialogue for the show.

The British Film Institute hosts the first annual Missing Believed Wiped event. MBW was organised by Derek Fiddy, and showcases material that has been lost due to the BBC’s and ITV’s junking procedures, and have since been found. Then event is also designed to draw awareness of missing episodes to the general public. The 2011 event showcased the two episodes returned that year, namely Galaxy 4: Airlock and The Underwater Menace 3.

May: William Emms passes away. Emms submitted several scripts during the calssic series, with only one – Galaxy 4 – being accepted. Emms also wrote for several series, including Z-Cars and Crossroads.

26/27 November: The charity special Dimensions in Time airs as part of the annual Children in Need appeal. The two-part special, running seven and a half minutes and five and a half minutes respectively, sees the following actors returning: Jon Pertwee (Third Doctor), Tom Baker (Fourth Doctor), Peter Davison (Fifth Doctor), Colin Baker (Sixth Doctor), Sylvester McCoy (Seventh Doctor), Carol Ann Ford (Susan), Deborah Watling (Victoria), Nicholas Courtney (Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart), Richard Franklin (Captain Yates), Caroline John (Liz Shaw), Elisabeth Sladen (Sarah Jane Smith), Louise Jamison (Leela), John Leeson (voice of K-9), Lalla Ward (Romana I), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Nicola Bryant (Peri) and Sophie Aldred (Ace). The story centres around the Rani (Kate O’Mara) attempting to trap all the Doctor’s incarnations in a time loop, with the First and Second Doctors already being captured (thus avoiding the need to recast William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton who had passed away years earlier). The story was notably as it was the last official appearance of the Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee passed away three years later), and the only pairing of the Sixth Doctor and the Brigadier on screen. Due to the special being a crossover with the BBC soap opera EastEnders, the special was partly shot on the Albert Square set, and many characters from that series appear as well. Part One screened during the live Children in Need Telethon on the 26 of November (13.8 million viewers) and Part Two as part of Noel’s House Party the following night (13.6 million viewers). As viewers could ring in and vote for which EastEnders character saved the Doctor, two versions of Part Two were shot; one with Mandy Salter (which won), the other featuring Big Ron (which has never been released). As part of the charity deal, no one was paid for working on the special, and the special isn’t allowed to be sold for profit. The special raised over £100,000 for the charity. This marked the only new dramatized material shot for the series to mark the show’s 30th anniversary.

29 November: Thirty Years in the TARDIS airs on BBC One. The special ran for 50 minutes and featured numerous interviews and clips from the past 30 years. The following year, an extended version running to 90 minutes was released on VHS, entitled More Than 30 Years in the Tardis. In 2013, the extended version was released on DVD in the Legacy Collection box set.

Still missing at the end of 1991: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 1994

11 August: Peter Cushing dies of prostate cancer aged 81. Cushing played the role of the Doctor (credited as "Dr. Who") in the two Amicus Productions films, Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965) and Daleks - Invasion Earth: 2150 A.D (1966). The films were based on the tv serials The Daleks and The Dalek Invasion of Earth respectively. Cushing stated he took the role to soften public opinion of him, as at the time he was well known for appearing in horror movies.

2 September: Roy Castle dies of lung cancer. Castle played the role of Ian in the Amicus Productions adaptation of Dr. Who and the Daleks. He passed away two days after his 62 birthday.

Researcher Andrew Pixley located an episode of 'Blue Peter' from 1973 and discovered 90 seconds of 16mm footage from The Daleks' Master Plan 3, as part of research for the More Than Thirty Years in the TARDIS video release.

20 November: John Lucarotti dies in Paris aged 68. Lucarotti wrote Marco Polo, The Aztecs, The Massacre and The Ark in Space, although the latter was re-written by Robert Holmes, and Lucarotti ultimately didn’t receive an onscreen credit.

Still missing at the end of 1994: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 1995

A complete copy of The Dominators 5 was returned to the BBC. It isn’t entirely known where this came from.

March: Richard Develyn releases his first reconstruction of a missing story, which would begin a flurry of releases – by him and by others – over the next few decades. The Web of Fear is the first story released (RD1).
Information about reconstructions and release dates have been collated and graciously provided to me by Hugh M. Pearson.

June: Richard Develyn releases the reconstruction of The Wheel in Space (RD3).

October: Richard Develyn releases the reconstruction of The Ice Warriors (RD4).

Late 1995: RT member Steve Roberts was enquiring with the ABC about a 20 year old programme that may have included some clips from missing Doctor Who episodes. The programme, called Perspective: C for Computer, was rumoured to have footage from The Power of the Daleks. Acting on information provided to him by Robert Mammone, who managed to find the original transmission date for the programme in question, Steve Roberts eventually obtained 16mm film sequences containing 4 clips from The Power of the Daleks 4 & 5.

Still missing at the end of 1995: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 1996

A British audio production company by the name of Big Finish Productions is formed. Big Finish began their association with Doctor Who by producing novel adaptations in 1998, and then a year later moved into original authorised audio plays. Various actors from the original and new series appear occasionally. More can be found here.

March: Richard Develyn releases the reconstruction of Fury from the Deep (RD2).

12 May: The TV Movie “Doctor Who” airs in Canada. Sylvester McCoy reprises his role as the Doctor before regenerating into Paul McGann. The Master is portrayed by American actor Eric Roberts. Two days later the movie airs in the US.

20 May: Whilst on the convention circuit in America, Jon Pertwee suffered a fatal heart attack and died aged 76. He played the third incarnation of the Doctor from Spearhead from Space through to Planet of the Spiders, and reprised his role in The Five Doctors. He also appeared in the non-canon fan film Devious which he filmed in 1995; twelve minutes of this was released on The War Games DVD, and audio from this film was used in the Big Finish production of Zagreus made for the show’s 40th anniversary. On May 2nd he performed in the Isle of Wight as part of his one-man show, and met several Doctor Who fans afterwards; footage of this is currently the last known material shot of Jon Pertwee, who died 18 days later.

27 May: Doctor Who the TV Movie airs in the UK and attracts 9 million viewers. The broadcast was edited from the original Canadian version, removing some of the gun battle at the start and footage from the Seventh Doctor on the operating table to screen a pre-watershed timeslot. The broadcast also included a tribute to Jon Pertwee who died a week earlier.

August: Change of Identity release the reconstruction of The Savages (COI1). In the same month Michael Palmer releases his reconstruction of The Tenth Planet (MP1).

September: Michael Palmer releases his reconstruction of Mission to the Unknown (MP2).

November: A busy month for reconstructions; Change of Identity release The Power of the Daleks (COI2) while Richard Develyn releases The Highlanders (RD7) and The Moonbase (RD9).

Late 1996: Damian Shanahan, an Australian fan, was researching at the ABC in Australia when he discovered a 16mm reel of footage. On the reel was footage from various episodes currently missing. The footage, totalling roughly 4 minutes, was in fact deletions made by the censor, and under the contract had to retain the footage to prove it had been deleted. Details can be found here.

Still missing at the end of 1996: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 1997

January: Richard Develyn releases his reconstruction of The Smugglers (RD5).

February: Change of Identity releases their reconstruction of Marco Polo (COI3) while Richard Develyn releases his reconstruction of The Abominable Snowmen (RD10) and Harold Achadz releases his first reconstruction, The Daleks Master Plan 1 (HA1).

9 March: Terry Nation, the man responsible for the first Dalek story and numerous Dalek adventures since, passes away aged 66. Terry wrote almost all of William Hartnell’s Dalek stories, sharing writing credit for half of The Daleks Master Plan with Dennis Spooner. He returned to the show in mid-seventies and created the character of Davros in Genesis of the Daleks, who would go on to appear in all remaining Dalek stories of the classic era. As well as penning mostly Dalek stories, he also wrote The Keys of Marinus and The Android Invasion. Outside of Doctor Who, Terry worked on Macgyver, Out of the Unknown, The Saint and The Avengers, as well as creating Survivors and Blake’s 7.

March: Michael Palmer releases his reconstruction of The Reign of Terror (MP3).

July: Change of Identity release their reconstruction of The Moonbase (COI4) while also releasing an enhanced version of The Savages (COI1).

August: Michael Palmer releases enhanced versions of his three previous reconstructions.

September: Michael Palmer releases his reconstruction of The Invasion (MP4). Richard Develyn releases his reconstruction of The Power of the Daleks (RD6).

6 October: Adrienne Hill dies of cancer aged 60. She played the short-lived companion Katarina in The Myth Makers and The Daleks’ Master Plan, and is notable as the first companion to be killed. Her final acting role was on the New Zealand soap opera City Life; the episode she starred in was broadcast after her death.

13 October: The writer for The Savages, The War Machines and The Macra Terror, Ian Stuart Black, passes away aged 82.

30 October: Sydney Newman, the man credited as being the creator of Doctor Who, dies of a heart attack aged 80. In 1986 it was reported Sydney was contacted by BBC Controller Michael Grade to ask if Sydney had ideas that might revitalise the show. Despite sending a proposal and offering himself as an executive producer, nothing came of this.

Still missing at the end of 1997: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 1998

October: Steve Cole at BBC Video took a call from someone who claimed to have tapes of Doctor Who recorded off-air from the sixties and seventies. Steve Roberts, Mark Ayres and Paul Vanezis visited the man, who was over 70 years old. They found a handful of Doctor Who tapes, including a black & white recording of an episode of Carnival of Monsters and a very early colour recording - possibly the earliest known - of Frontier in Space 5. Also found was a tape which, they believed, contained a poor recording of The Space Pirates 3. Upon checking again however, the tape turned out to contain The Space Pirates 2, which already existed.

8 December: Michael Craze, who played Ben Jackson from The War Machines to The Faceless Ones, dies aged 56. He had fallen down a set of stairs on December 7, but due to a pre-existing heart condition he couldn’t be operated on. He died of a heart attack the following day.

Still missing at the end of 1998: 110 - 47 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 1999

January: The eight-year drought of a missing episode find was finally broken when a missing episode turned up in New Zealand. In mid-1998 film collector Bruce Grenville visited a film fair in Napier and spotted an otherwise unmarked can labelled ‘Dr Who’. He bought the print off fellow film collector Larry Duggan for $5. The can contained The Crusade 1, one of the three missing episodes from Season Two. Bruce took the film back to Auckland where he listed it on his website for the entire world to see, yet it was never spotted. Bruce ran Sedang Cinema, a “mobile picture service” which can provide screenings of films at a client’s location. During one of these screenings he showed The Crusade 1 to Cornelius Stone, who mentioned it to fan Neil Lambess. In January 1999, Neil got in touch with Bruce who went round to his flat, accompanied by Paul Scoones, who runs the New Zealand Doctor Who Fan Club. Paul filmed the episode off screen with his video camera as they watched it, and contacted Steve Roberts of the Restoration Team that evening to break the news. The film was sent by FedEx to the UK and arrived January 11. After the BBC made a DigiBeta copy of the film, it was returned to Mr Grenville, after which he sold it at auction. The full story of the find can be found here. Neil’s own “ramblings” on the discovery and insights into the days and weeks that followed can be found here.

5 April: John Wiles dies age 73. John succeeded Verity Lambert as the show’s producer, running it from The Myth Makers to The Ark. John clashed with William Hartnell often, and had many of his planned changes, such as a companion with a cockney accent (Dodo) and forcing the change of the lead actor, vetoed by his superiors, leading to his eventual resignation.

July: The first issue of Nothing at the End of the Lane is released, edited by Richard Bignell, Robert Franks and Bruce Robinson. The magazine is dedicated to the “research and restoration” of Doctor Who. Issue 1 features a look at the 1960s by Stephen James Walker, filming locations by Richard Bignell, reconstructions by Bruce Robinson, William Hartnell’s archive status by Robert Franks and Matt Dale, plus many more. The issue is now out of print however it can still be sourced via an ‘omnibus’ edition released with issue 2.

28 December: Donald Cotton dies aged 71. Cotton wrote two stories for season three, The Myth Makers and The Gunfighters.

Still missing at the end of 1999: 109 - 46 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2001

11 May: Douglas Adams dies of a heart attack whilst in California. Adams, best known for his novel, radio and tv show The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, served as script editor for season 17, and wrote The Pirate Planet, City of Death and the unfinished Shada. Adams is also one of only two people outside of the main six Monty Python troupe to receive a writer’s credit during the Monty Python Flying Circus series, and appeared in two sketches during its final season.

22 May: Actor Jack Watling passes away aged 78. He stared in Doctor Who as Professor Travers, appearing in The Abominable Snowmen and The Web of Fear, and reprised the role in the non-BBC spin off Downtime. He was the real life father of Deborah Watling (Victoria Waterfield).

3 July: Delia Derbyshire dies of renal failure at the age of 64. Delia is best known for her work in the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, and is responsible for creating the Doctor Who theme composed by Ron Grainer, one of the first themes ever created entirely by electronic means. Her obituary can be read here.

Still missing at the end of 2001: 109 - 46 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2002

1 May: John Nathan-Turner, who produced the series from Season 19 (The Leisure Hive) to Season 26 (Survival), dies of liver failure aged 54. His time on Doctor Who saw the Doctor regenerate three times, the show put on hiatus in 1985 and then ultimately cancelled in 1989. He was the longest serving producer of the classic era. After the series ended John helped produce the seven “Years” VHS tapes which covered five of the seven Doctor’s time on the show, plus the early years of the Daleks and the Cybermen, and also helped release the unfinished story Shada on VHS.

1 November: 3 years after the recovery of The Crusade 1 in Napier, prominent NZ fan Graham Howard located a film collector who possessed the Censor Clips from the NZBC (New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation, now known as TVNZ), similar to those found in Australia in 1996. The reel contained footage from The Web of Fear & The Wheel in Space, as well as episodes already found. The film clips recovered for The Web of Fear are now irrelevant as the episodes they were cut from were found intact in 2013. Details can be found here.

Still missing at the end of 2002: 109 - 46 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2003

30 July: 3’32” of footage from Fury from the Deep 6 was recovered from the BBC Archives at Windmill Road by Andrew Martin. He was checking through some reels of old waste film which had been stored away to use as filler and leader material. The footage exists on 16mm negative film and consists of nearly complete scenes depicting the Weed Creature attacking the control room. Despite being the first major find of 2003, the footage isn’t from the finished episode, but actually from off cuts that were removed during editing and never went to air. Also, the footage has no audio. A reconstruction of what the climactic battle would have looked like was created using this footage and the original audio soundtrack, and released on the Lost in Time DVD.

1 September: A man named ‘Jet’ posted on the Missing Episodes forum claiming that he was responsible for destroying “approximately 300” black & white film prints of Doctor Who back in the 1970s. Considering a batch was sent to New Zealand in 1967 and a larger batch being sent back to BBC London in 1975, he was either mistaken, lying, or BBC Sydney / ABC Australia did indeed produce duplicate prints (which were destroyed). ‘Jet’ also claimed to be responsible as the individual who physically located the film print of The Celestial Toymaker 4 at the ABC vault in 1984.

1 November: A short trailer of The Power of the Daleks 1 was discovered by BBC employee Andrew Martin attached to a 16mm telerecording of 'Beyond the Freeze - What Next?', a political show broadcast on November 4th, 1966 - the night before The Power of the Daleks 1 was to screen. It is believed the operator was testing the film recording equipment and that the trailer was captured simply by chance. The slightly incomplete trailer (only 36 seconds is usable, the actual duration of the trailer is unknown) featuring the Doctor, Ben and Polly discovering the Daleks in the capsule was restored by Steve Roberts of the Restoration Team. The trailer was a surprise to fans as it was screened at the launch ceremony for the 2003 Panopticon 40th Anniversary event.

23 November: Bill Strutton dies aged 85, on the 40th anniversary of Doctor Who. Strutton wrote The Web Planet in 1965.

Still missing at the end of 2003: 109 - 46 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2004

15 January: Francis Watson, former Head of Engineering at Yorkshire Television in Leeds, returned a 16mm print of The Daleks' Master Plan 2 to the BBC after holding onto it for over 30 years. Watson also returned a poor-quality (and redundant) 16mm print of The Daleks 5.

3 May: Anthony Ainley, who portrayed the Master from The Keeper of Traken to the final story of the classic series Survival, dies of cancer aged 71.

May: Whilst preparing the Lost in Time DVD Collection for release, which contained 18 'orphan' episodes from the Hartnell & Troughton eras, the Restoration Team discovered the short clip at the end of The Wheel in Space 6 depicting the events of The Evil of the Daleks 2 is actually from The Evil of the Daleks 1, as it contains extra footage of Kennedy not seen in episode 2. This entry is simply for completists sake, as unfortunately the extra footage only consists of a mere 3 frames.

August: Around 1'35" seconds of 35mm film inserts from The Space Pirates 1 were discovered in a can labelled "Dad's Army" by Ralph Montagu.

Still missing at the end of 2004: 108 - 45 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2005

Whilst getting ready to re-master The War Games for DVD release, Steve Roberts contacted the British Film Institute to see if they still held higher quality prints as the existing BBC copies suffered from a fault which resembled a ‘snowstorm’ of white artefacts. Steve was surprised to learn the BFI held copies of all 10 episodes as pristine negatives, and the films were subsequently shipped to the BBC for transfer to DigiBeta. The story can be read here.

26 March: Doctor Who returns to television for the first time since 1996 with the broadcast of Rose, the first episode of the “revived” series. Helmed by Russell T Davies, the Doctor is now portrayed by Christopher Eccleston, and companion Rose is played by Billie Piper. The episode earns 10.81 million viewers. The series dropped the classic template of 25-minute episodes, instead opting for 45-minute episodes.

18 June: The first series of the revived show ends with The Parting of the Ways, featuring the regeneration of Christopher Eccleston, who opted to only do a single series. He was replaced by Scottish actor David Tennant. The episode also featured the return of the Dalek Emperor, who hadn’t been seen since the final episode of The Evil of the Daleks in 1967.

June: The second issue of Nothing at the End of the Lane is released, edited by Richard Bignell and Robert Franks. This issue looked at tele-snaps, the show’s tenth anniversary, The Dalek’s Master Plan, videotape junking, Troughton’s archive holdings and many more. The issue is now out of print however it can still be sourced via an ‘omnibus’ edition released with issue 1.

25 July: Actor David Jackson passes away aged 71. Jackson was best known for his portrayal of Gan in the series Blake’s 7 and as DC Braithwaite in Z-Cars. He also appeared in Space: 1999, The Avengers and The Saint. Whilst Jackson never appeared in Doctor Who, he did provide his voice for a Big Finish Productions audio drama in 2002.

11 September: BBC Two screened an episode of the television-nostalgia series Sunday Past Times and featured a section of an episode of Tomorrow’s World from 1966. Around 20" seconds of footage from The Power of the Daleks 4 was included in the section. The clips were subsequently recovered by the Restoration Team and were released as part of The Dalek Tapes on the Genesis of the Daleks DVD.

24 October: Robert Sloman dies aged 79. Sloman wrote The Daemons, The Time Monster, The Green Death and Pertwee’s final story Planet of the Spiders.

Still missing at the end of 2005: 108 - 45 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2006

April: An episode of The Evil of the Daleks 2 appeared on eBay, but this was not an original. Sometime after the discoveries of The Faceless Ones 3 and The Evil of the Daleks 2, someone at the BBC decided to ‘borrow’ a selection of 16mm film prints and make his own copies for private sales, both on 16mm film and downscaled to 8mm film as well. This individual borrowed (at least) nine episodes, including The Keys of Marinus 6, The Dalek Invasion of Earth 3 6, The Web Planet 6, The Chase 6, The Evil of the Daleks 2, The Web of Fear 1, The Wheel in Space 3 and The Invasion 6. These episodes often pop up on eBay and other online sale auction sites from time to time.

19 May: Producer Peter Bryant dies from cancer aged 82. Peter ran the show from The Web of Fear to The Space Pirates, and handled The Tomb of the Cybermen as a test run by outgoing producer Innes Lloyd. Peter was also script editor on three of Troughton’s stories, and in 1969 cast Jon Pertwee to replace Patrick Troughton.

July: Another episode on 16mm film appeared on eBay, The Time Meddler 3 (on-screen title A Battle of Wits). The owner had sold it in 2004, re-acquired it in 2005 and was now selling it again.

8 July:  Billie Piper leaves the series at the end of Doomsday, with her character Rose being trapped in an alternate Earth. Despite this, she would return five more times, in Turn left, The Stolen Earth, Journey’s End, The End of Time Pt 2 and The Day of the Doctor.

14 September: Writer Peter Ling dies aged 80 after battling Alzheimer's disease for several years. Ling wrote The Mind Robber in season six (and later the novelisation). Ling co-created (with Hazel Adair) the series Compact (for the BBC) and Crossroads (for ITV), and wrote for other series such as Dixon of Dock Green and The Avengers. Early in his career he contributed to Waterlogged Spa, a radio comedy series starring Jon Pertwee.

26 October: The first episode of Torchwood premieres on BBC Three. The first Doctor Who spinoff since the failed K9 & Company pilot in the early 80s, Torchwood (an anagram of “Doctor Who”) followed Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) and his team who track down alien beings and technology. The series was skewed to a more adult audience, and ran for 4 seasons and 41 episodes.

Still missing at the end of 2006: 108 - 45 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2007

1 January: Invasion of the Bane airs on BBC One, the pilot episode of The Sarah Jane Chronicles. Elisabeth Sladen reprises her role of Sarah Jane Smith, after appearing in the Doctor Who episode “School Reunion” the year before. The show is picked up as a series and would begin broadcasting (jointly between CBBC and BBC One) in September. The Sarah Jane Chronicles was targeted at a younger audience than both Doctor Who and Torchwood. The show lasted five seasons, though the final season only ran half as long due to the tragic death of Sladen before production could be completed.

30 March: Dave Martin dies of lung cancer aged 72. Martin wrote The Claws of Axos, The Mutants, The Three Doctors, The Sontaran Experiment, The Hand of Fear, The Invisible Enemy, Underworld and The Armageddon Factor. He collaborated with fellow writer Bob Baker for all of his scripts, and they are credited with creating K-9 and the evil Time Lord Omega.

9 July: Voice actor Peter Tuddenham passes away aged 88. He had provided voice work for The Ark in Space, The Masque of Mandragora and Time and the Rani, but was best known as the voices of Zen, Orac and Slave for the series Blake’s 7.

22 November: Verity Lambert, the first producer of Doctor Who, passes away aged 71 from cancer. Verity produced the show from An Unearthly Child to Mission to the Unknown. Her obituary can be read here.

Still missing at the end of 2007: 108 - 45 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2008

2 April: Writer Johnny Byrne dies aged 72. Byrne wrote The Keeper of Traken, Arc of Infinity and Warriors of the Deep, and is credited with creating the character of Nyssa. Byrne also wrote for All Creatures Great and Small (also starring Peter Davison), Space 1999 and created the drama Heartbeat.

24 April: Composer Tristram Cary passes away aged 82. Cary composed music for several William Hartnell stories, including The Daleks (which was later repeated in various other serials), Marco Polo, The Daleks’ Master Plan and The Gunfighters, plus would return one last time for The Mutants under Jon Pertwee.

10 June: David Brierly dies of cancer. Brierly replaced John Leeson as the voice of K-9 during season 17.

In a similar event to The War Games three years earlier, Steve Roberts contacted the BFI to arrange to borrow the prints of The Dominators ready for DVD release. Upon checking they discovered five 16mm negative prints were still in their possession. These episodes would be the most superior quality prints of four of the episodes (episode 3 exists on 35mm film) and so were used in production of the DVD.

Still missing at the end of 2008: 108 - 45 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2009

30 August: The same team that produces the Nothing at the End of the Lane released a special publication featuring the scripts of two unproduced stories from 1964; the six-part story Farewell Great Macedon (the Doctor, Barbara, Ian and Susan meet Alexander the Great in his final days) and the single-episode story The Fragile Yellow Arc of Fragrance (Barbara faces a dilemma when a native of Fragrance announces his love for her), both written by Moris Farhi. Both stories were later converted to audio plays and released by Big Finish the following year.

9 October: Long-serving producer Barry Letts, who ran the show from The Silurians through to Robot, passes away age 84 after a long battle with cancer. Letts directed a handful of stories including Terror of the Autons, Carnival of Monsters and Planet of the Spiders, as well as a handful of studio sessions of Inferno after Douglas Camfield was taken ill. He also wrote or co-wrote The Daemons, The Time Monster, The Green Death and Planet of the Spiders. Letts would also return as executive producer for Season 18 to assist John Nathan-Turner ease into the role as – who would turn out to be – the show’s final producer of the classic era.

Still missing at the end of 2009: 108 - 45 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2010

1 January: David Tennant leaves the series and is replaced by Matt Smith at the conclusion of The End of Time, Pt 2 (Pt 1 had screened on Christmas Day a week earlier). Matt Smith currently holds the record as the youngest actor to play the Doctor, being cast in the role at the age of 26. The special also marks the final involvement of Russell T Davies, who had served as producer since the show was resurrected in 2005. He is replaced by Steven Moffat.

17 September: Writer Louis Marks dies aged 82. Marks wrote four stories for Doctor Who; Planet of Giants, Day of the Daleks (the original script did not feature Daleks and originally had the name The Ghost Hunters), Planet of Evil and The Masque of Mandragora.

30 September: Richard Molesworth releases Wiped! Doctor Who’s Missing Episodes, an in-depth look at the history and status of Doctor Who and the efforts people have gone through to recover missing material from all over the world. The book, released by Telos Publishing, runs to nearly 500 pages in length.

29 October: Mervyn Haisman dies aged 82. Haisman co-wrote (with Henry Lincoln) The Abominable Snowmen and The Web of Fear for season five, and The Dominators for season six. Due to a dispute with the production team over how The Dominators was handled, the proposed third encounter with the Yeti (during season six) was scrapped. Haisman never wrote for Doctor Who again.

Still missing at the end of 2010: 108 - 45 Hartnell / 63 Troughton

 2011

11 February: Long-time Who actor Nicholas Courtney passes away aged 81. Courtney first appeared in The Daleks Master Plan playing Bret Vyon in 1965. He was later cast as Captain Knight in The Web of Fear but was offered the role of Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart after the original actor dropped out. Courtney reprised the role later that year for The Invasion, and subsequently played the same character during Pertwee’s exile on Earth. Courtney’s character was reduced to guest appearances once the Doctor’s exile was lifted, but through further television adventures and audio stories he managed to appear with the first eight Doctors. His final appearance as the character was in the Sarah Jane Adventure episode Enemy of the Bane, 19 years after he last played the role.

19 April: Elisabeth Sladen dies of cancer aged 65. Sladen appeared as regular companion Sarah Jane Smith from The Time Warrior to The Hand of Fear, but her association with the series would last for several decades. After her own aborted spin off failed (K9 and Company) she appeared in The Five Doctors, then the charity episode Dimensions in Time. Sladen’s last appearance before the series rebooted in 2005 was in the independent film Downtime. In David Tennant’s first season she reprised her role for the episode School Reunion, and would later star in The Stolen Earth, Journey’s End and a brief cameo in The End of Time, Pt 2. The BBC gave Sladen her own series in 2007, The Sarah Jane Adventures, which would also guest star David Tennant and Matt Smith. The show ran for five seasons, although only half the episodes of season five were filmed when Sladen fell ill from cancer, and the show was discontinued when she passed away. Including all of her appearances within the Doctor Who universe, Sladen appeared with a total of nine of the Doctors.

July: Ralph Montagu, Head of Heritage for the Radio Times, met up with film collector Terry Burnett, who was a former engineer at TVS, a former ITV franchise in Southampton. During the conversation the topic of Doctor Who was brought up, to which Terry thought he might have a copy. The following day Terry met up with Ralph and handed him an unlabelled film can containing a 16mm film print of 'Air Lock', otherwise known as Galaxy 4 3. Two weeks later, Terry again contacted Ralph and told him he had found another episode, The Underwater Menace 2. In the 1980s an electrician also working at TVS was organising a school fete and mentioned to Terry he had a box of films if he was interested. Terry bought the films, screened them at his home cinema then put them in storage, and they remained there until the chance encounter with Ralph. Galaxy 4 3 was found to be slightly dirty, with a 'tramline' scratch present throughout the episode, but is intact except for the last 27 seconds, which is missing. The Underwater Menace 2 has worn sprockets which causes the picture to move around when playing. Part way through the episode there is damage which renders one line of dialogue (spoken by Jamie) missing. There is also 20 seconds of footage missing due to censor cuts from the ABC in Australia (believed to be the source of both these prints). However this footage exists as discovered in 1996 by Damian Shanahan. The original transfer made by the ABC at the time is slightly lopsided so another transfer of the censor footage is being sought in a bid to properly restore the cuts to the episode. Despite being found in July, it was decided however not to reveal the discoveries to the general public until December the 11th, when they screened at the British Film Institute's Missing Believed Wiped event in London. The Radio Times press release, including links to off-screen still images for both episodes, can be found here.

August: A family in Essex contacted the BBC to say they had recently purchased a house and discovered a box of film cans, and one of them was a Doctor Who episode. Paul Vanezis and Steve Roberts travelled out there to find the episode was 'Conspiracy', a redundant copy of The Romans 3. The film was a duplicate of another print, and was stored field, made after 1966. Details can be found here.

Still missing at the end of 2011: 106 - 44 Hartnell / 62 Troughton

 2012

January: Issue 3 of Nothing at the End of the Lane is released, edited by Richard Bignell. This issue highlights the cancelled 30th anniversary production Lost in the Dark Dimension, several unproduced storylines by writer Brian Hayles, rare photographs from The Evil of the Daleks, The Smugglers, The Enemy of the World and The Invasion, a look at William Hartnell in a Christmas pantomime after his departure from Doctor Who, and many more. The issue is now out of print.

March: An existing episode on 16mm film appeared on eBay. The Reign of Terror 1 (on-screen title The Land of Fear) was eventually won by a bidder who paid a record £1600! This appeared to be an original Suppressed Field recording, and not a dupe print. As this was an existing episode there was no need for the BBC to attempt to recover it, nor did the seller have any additional Doctor Who episodes in his collection. The closed auction can be viewed here.

April: Another episode of Doctor Who on 16mm film appeared on eBay, this time The Web Planet 6 (on-screen title The Centre). This was identified as a dupe print. The winning bid was £747.97. As this was an existing episode there was no need for the BBC to attempt to recover it, nor did the seller have any additional Doctor Who episodes in his collection. The closed auction can be viewed here.

May: A 16mm mute print containing film inserts for Invasion of the Dinosaurs 5 was listed on eBay. The winning bid was £172.

5 June: Caroline John dies of cancer aged 71. She played Jon Pertwee’s first companion Liz Shaw from Spearhead from Space to Inferno. She was married to actor Geoffrey Beevers, who also starred alongside Caroline in The Ambassadors of Death and later as The Master in The Keeper of Traken.

26 July: Mary Tamm dies of cancer aged 62. Mary played the first incarnation of Romana from The Ribos Operation to The Armageddon Factor. In 2007 she revealed in an interview she offered to film a regeneration scene for Lalla Ward who was taking over her character from Destiny of the Daleks onwards, but the production team declined to take up the offer.

16 August: As with The Dominators and The War Games, the Restoration Team contacted the BFI to arrange to borrow the prints of The Krotons 2 and 3, as the quality of the BBC’s versions was not very good. Some of this story can be read here.

Still missing at the end of 2012: 106 - 44 Hartnell / 62 Troughton

 2013

For 2013, I have added rumours that popped up from time to time regarding missing episodes. “Quotes in bold” are direct quotes from the source. Very special thanks must go to Paul McDermott for helping me keep track of these rumours.

January: Being the anniversary year, it was a sure bet a strong torrent of rumours would hit the internet, and it was no surprise that a rumour - which had been making noises prior to this - turned up saying that 54 episodes had been recovered but not in a position yet to go public.

28 February: The second edition of Wiped! Doctor Who’s Missing Episodes is released, and includes numerous updates and corrections from the first edition, plus details about the discovery of Galaxy 4: Airlock and The Underwater Menace 2, which were found since the first edition was published.

March: A 16mm film print of Carnival of Monsters 3 appeared on eBay. Bidding almost reached $300 although the reserve was ultimately not met.

10 March: The Mind of Evil, which up until now had previously existed as a black and white story due to the lack of any colour masters (save for a few minutes recorded off air by Tom Lundie for episode 6), was screened in full colour for the first time since the 1970s, at the British Film Institute. The Mind of Evil 2 3 4 5 6 were re-coloured using Chromadot recovery while The Mind of Evil 1 was manually re-coloured by Stuart Humphryes from BabelColour. Click here to read Stuart’s efforts on the restoration. The DVD was released on June 3, 2013.

14 March: Jason Onion, whilst researching the links between Doctor Who and Herne Bay in Kent, England (and in the process of building a TARDIS for charity), stumbled upon a box of scripts from Anthony Coburn, the script writer who wrote the very first Doctor Who story, An Unearthly Child (known then as The Tribe of Gum). Initially passed over as just scripts from the first story, Jason soon discovered the scripts were in fact earlier versions and as such were of high historic value. The collection included two earlier versions of the first episode, and an early draft of the second episode, along with scripts of the remaining episodes in the serial. The earlier versions hinted at the Doctor’s past, and his granddaughter Susan – who in the scripts is referred to as Suzanne – here is described as “a princess saved from another world”. Additional details can be read here.

31 March 2013: BBC Television Centre is closed. Opened in 1960, the Doctor Who production team used this multi-studio production facility for several dozen classic serials, from as early as The Aztecs to the final serial filmed, Ghost Light, plus scenes for Aliens of London for the 2005 series. The building was sold to property developers Stanhope plc for around £200 million.

11 April: A year after The Web Planet 6 appeared on eBay, another existing episode of Doctor Who on 16mm film was put up for auction: The Rescue 1 (on-screen title The Powerful Enemy). The winning bid was £620.00. The closed auction can be viewed here.

28 April: Paul Vanezis is granted access to the 11 film prints recovered from Nigeria by Philip Morris in order to check their physical status and viability for restoration. The prints remain outside of the BBC for the time being.

3 May: Rumours continue to surface of a significant find of missing episodes in Africa.

31 May: Philip Morris personally delivers the 11 film prints recovered from Nigeria to the BBC Archive Centre in West London. News of this wouldn’t be revealed until later in the year.

13 June: The rumours suddenly went viral thanks to a post by Rich Johnston from Bleeding Cool news, who suggested “an eccentric engineer who worked for broadcasters across Africa with a taste for science fiction and a habit of taking things for “safe keeping”, is that the BBC have secured a large number of presumed-wiped episodes of early Doctor Who”. Stories including The Tenth Planet and The Evil of the Daleks were mentioned, although anyone familiar with sales of early Doctor Who will know these two stories never made it to Africa. Hours after Johnston made the first posting, he added an update claiming he had received confirmation from another, better connected source”. The number of possible episodes recovered had now reached 60 (out of the 106 missing). Doctor Who blog Kasterborous also reported on it.

14 June: Entertainment site Ain’t It Cool News also ran a story about the possibility of a missing episode discovery. On the same day, Big Finish author Johnathon Morris tweeted “Three words regarding rumours raising fans' hopes of missing episode recoveries: cruel, irresponsible, bullsh*t.”

15 June: Bleeding Cool runs a follow up article about the rumour regarding reactions over the last 48 hours.
                 
16 June: Twitter exploded with several comments, including (Babelcolour’s) Stuart Humphryes saying “Things like this start as a simple misunderstanding, then exaggeration, false rumour & ultimately dashed hopes.” Archivist Ian Levine said “There will always be 106 Doctor Who episodes missing. And yes you can quote me on that.” Planet Mondas wrote an update for those playing at home from the dawn of time until now.

17 June: The rumour now reaches the height of 90 episodes recovered – the name ‘Omnirumour’ starts to float around. Ian Levine made a few tweets: “You all need to get real. I was told that if its true it's Ninety. And 90 missing Dr Who episodes ARE REALLY NOT TURNING UP” and ”Absolute Last Word. I spent 35 years looking for episodes since I saved The Daleks from being destroyed. I am convinced none have been found” and “Look,I DO believe no episodes have been found,based on what certain people told me at the BFI. But I suppose they could have lied to my face”

18 June: Ian again on Twitter wrote: “To answer loads of comments online, the rumour I heard from an impeccable source was eight thousand BBC film cans containing ninety missing Who episodes which would complete 21 missing stories. Plus duplicates or most of what exists. Leaving 16 missing but however amazing that may sound, however much we all wish for it to be true, I now don't believe a word of it. But it's 90 if true.” Ian also spoke of another rumour at the same time: “But I do know if that guy Pianist believes only 3 stories have been found, which I knew 6 mths ago, if true it's only the tip of the iceberg” and “He is claiming only 3 full stories have been found. But if the rumour is true,21 missing stores have been found. He's wrong.” Ian later indicates which episodes are NOT in the collection: “Okay everbody - as I don't believe it,or was lied to, the 16 eps still missing were Masterplan-9 Mission-1 Ice Warriors-2 Wheel-2 Invasion-2”

19 June: BBC America joins the fun with their own article. At the same time, Ian Levine suddenly changes his view on the rumour with a handful of rapid fire tweets: “I have just seen "three tons" of evidence that tells me it's all true. Saying no more. Apart from I now believe it again.” and “I've just been given proof that backs up the entire story,from 2011. So yes I now really believe he has found 90 missing episodes” and “I am so f*cking speechless, I have no idea how I am going to sleep tonight. I was utterly wrong, but I was lied to, yes barefaced lied to.” and “Just three serials is a bad joke.There are literally three tons of film cans and that's just from 2011. I have the actual proof” and “Right now I'm holding on to the proof + not leaking it publicly. But I assure you I have proof of 3 tons of film cans arriving.” Bleeding Cool ran an article on this, and also mentioned on 17 September 2011 a large shipment of films arrived in Liverpool from Zambia via Nigeria. The shipment was addressed to a man called Phillip Morris. Kasterborous posted their own story.

20 June: In response to the growing rumours, the BBC issues a statement, saying “There are always rumours and speculation about Doctor Who missing episodes being discovered. However, we cannot confirm any new finds” (from Philip Fleming, BBC Worldwide). Philip Morris, Executive Director of T.I.E.A who featured prominently in the rumours, published a statement on Facebook: “T.I.E.A. does not hold any missing episodes of the long-running Dr Who series… They are not missing but destroyed. The end.”

24 June: Bleeding Cool News dives back into the rumour pool with speculation a trailer for a missing episode will appear in the release of Terror of the Zygons later in 2013.

July: A pair of 16mm Doctor Who film prints appeared on eBay; An Unearthly Child 1 (AKA the first episode of Doctor Who) and The Tenth Planet 2. These prints appear to have been duplicates made in the 1980s and not original films. An Unearthly Child 1 eventually went for £692.87 while The Tenth Planet 2 sold for £820. The auctions can be viewed here and here.

15 July: Jon Pertwee’s opening story, Spearhead from Space, was released on Blu-Ray. Due to the strike at the BBC studios when this show was being shot, the entire production was forced to be produced on location and shot on 16mm film. Because of this, the artefacts inherent in videotape when up scaling to HD would not be present, as would be the case for all other productions of Doctor Who in the classic era, making this – as present levels of technology allow – a one of a kind release. Details of this unique release can be found here.

29 July: Bleeding Cool reports the rumour could be 40 or 93, plus a full copy of The Web of Fear will be broadcast on November 23rd on BBC4.

1 August: Slice of SciFi mentions the Restoration Team have their contracts extended until 2016, explaining that the DVD releases should be finished by the end of 2013

16 August: Restoration Team member Richard Bignell discovers the only surviving television interview of William Hartnell, which was originally broadcast in January 1967. The interview appears as an extra on The Tenth Planet DVD release. More can be found
here.

24 August: Bleeding Cool posted a couple of quotes from Gallifrey Base, about the new M.E.W rumour (Marco Polo, The Enemy of the World and The Web of Fear). This would lead to article author Rich Johnston being banned from both Gallifrey Base and the Missing Episodes forum.

1 September: Whilst preparing the biography of Dr Kit Pedler (who amongst other things co-created the Cybermen in 1966), author Michael Seely unearthed copies of a handful of scripts, including the original drafts of William Hartnell's final story The Tenth Planet. Aside from various differences in dialogue and characters, the most notable difference is the fact that the regeneration is absent from the end of The Tenth Planet 4. Details can be found here.

15 September: Philip Morris, Executive Director of T.I.E.A, posts another statement on Facebook: “T.I.E.A understands the passion felt by Doctor Who fans and that looking for missing episodes of doctor who plus many other series is an important but tiny part of the work that T.I.E.A does. The main aim of this organisation, is to assist those archives, whose own cultural items are at risk and with the management of their facilities. If any films/tapes of missing British TV do exist overseas, their location, identification and recovery, especially from areas of civil and political instability, can be seriously hindered by inappropriate scrutiny and publicity from uninvolved third parties. If any such films do exist T.I.E.A will endeavour to recover them safely, as with the two sky at night episodes.”

6 October: The Mirror starts up a storm as it announces that “at least 100 episodes” have been unearthed from Ethiopia. An announcement would still be a while away. Hours later however the Radio Times stated that a BBC announcement would come on Wednesday the 9th of October and that episodes would available for download shortly after that. 

7 October: Gallifrey Base, The Missing Episodes Forum and Outpost Skaro all close their missing episode rumour forums as speculation continues to grow. The Guardian reports the same story as heard from Radio Times, that an announcement is imminent. Kasterborous releases a report saying Tom Spilsbury (editor for Doctor Who Magazine) and Paul Vanezis still deny the claims; Kasterborous also reported the '100 episode' rumour from the day before.

8 October: Metro mentions an announcement from the BBC is imminent. Shortly after however, the BBC make an official announcement stating episodes have indeed been found, and a press conference will be held October 10, from 3.30pm, delayed from the previous Wednesday prediction. Rich Johnston of Bleeding Cool news however felt that the news is premature, and that the BBC “is simply repeating the stories broken by the Radio Times and The Mirror earlier in the week.” The Hollywood Reporter quotes the same.

9 October: Deborah Watling (Victoria Waterfield) confirms via her website that she will be attending the press conference, the first indication from an outside party that the announcement is confirmed. Ian Levine is confident the world will see nine episodes on October 10 but believes Philip Morris (who denied finding the episodes earlier this year) is holding onto more. During a conversation between Doctor Who Archive and Ian; @ianlevine, are you suggesting Phil Morris has extensive episodes that he won't give back for free and wishes payment for their return?” Ian replied with @dwarchive I think that's pretty much the gist of it, yeah. We know he's announcing 9 eps tomorrow. We don't know if he'll say anything else.“ The Telegraph nicely reminds viewers at home what we’re waiting for.

10 October: The Press Conference screens a couple of hours earlier than planned. The embargo is set for 0000 UTC (Friday midnight). Shortly after the press conference however, the Northern Echo website breaks the embargo several hours early, announcing The Web of Fear and The Enemy of the World have been found. Quoting Phil Morris from TIEA: “I remember wiping the dust off the masking tape on the canisters and my heart missed a beat as I saw the words Doctor Who. When I read the story code, I realised I’d found something pretty special.” The article states nine missing episodes have been found at a Nigerian TV relay station – The Enemy of the World is complete while The Web of Fear is missing episode 3 (see the 26 September, 2015 entry below for more details). An hour later, the Northern Echo retract the story and apologise for breaking the embargo. Ninety minutes before the embargo is lifted, the Daily Mirror tweeted the front cover for their October 11 edition newspaper. All 11 recovered episodes of both stories plus the reconstruction of The Web of Fear 3 begin appearing on iTunes half an hour before the embargo is lifted.

11 October: At 0000 UTC, the embargo is lifted and flood of press releases begins. The BBC release their official news item, while The Mirror releases theirs, The Independent release theirs, and also interviews with Phillip Morris and a separate interview with Frazer Hines and Deborah Watling. Gareth Kavanagh for KasterborousTV films part of the press conference and releases it on YouTube. DrWho-Online releases a great wrap of events, including images of the predicted DVD covers. Doctor Who Magazine uses the discovery to release their new website and trail issue #466 (released October 17) revealing exclusive details of the recovery, and featuring two collectable covers highlighting each recovered story. OffTheTelly release transcripts from the press conference, images of the t-shirt received from BBC Worldwide and an image of the film can from The Web of Fear 4. Bleeding Cool release two articles about the discovery, one about the initial announcement and later an updated story.

Phillip Morris recovered The Enemy of the World 1 2 3 4 5 6 and The Web of Fear 1 2 4 5 6 from a television relay station in the Nigerian city of Jos. The films were left over from their sale to BPTV in 1975. The recovery of all of The Enemy of the World is the first full story to be found since The Tomb of the Cybermen in 1991. The newly discovered copy of The Web of Fear 1 is superior to the existing version, and was used in the iTunes/DVD release. The Enemy of the World 3 was already represented by the original camera negative so the newly discovered Nigerian print was the inferior version. For the first time, Doctor Who episodes are available for online download ahead of a physical DVD release. For both stories, a trailer lasting over two minutes was offered for free.

21 November: BBC Two screens An Adventure in Space and Time, a tv movie based on the creation of Doctor Who and focusing on the life and health of William Hartnell around that time. The movie starred David Bradley (William Hartnell), Brian Cox (creator Sydney Newman), Jessica Raine (first producer Verity Lambert), Sacha Dahwan (director Waris Hussein) and Lesley Manville (Heather Hartnell), written by Mark Gatiss and directed by Terry McDonough. Nicholas Briggs, who provided the Dalek voices in the new series, appears as original Dalek voice artiste Peter Hawkins. Other cast and crew members involved in the original series to appear in the movie included William Russell, Carol Ann Ford, Mark Eden, Anneke Wills, Jean Marsh and Donald Tosh. The movie features recreations of various scenes from missing Doctor Who episodes, including Marco Polo and The Massacre, plus Hartnell’s final episode of The Tenth Planet.

23 November: Doctor Who celebrates its fiftieth anniversary with the worldwide release of The Day of the Doctor, a feature length episode staring Matt Smith, Jenna Coleman, John Hurt and returning cast members David Tennant and Billie Piper. It was broadcast in 94 countries around the world simultaneously, which Guiness World Records officially recognised as the largest ever simulcast of a tv drama. Viewing figures for BBC America and Space in Canada broke records, as well as becoming the most watched drama of 2013 by the BBC. The show generated a great deal of Twitter traffic; at one point nearly 13,000 tweets per minute were registered. As well as the television broadcast around the world, the episode was also released in 1500 cinemas worldwide in 3D, generating over US$10 million at the box office.

Philip Morris does an interview with the BBC at an event in East London, speaking about his finds and hope for the future.

8 December: Doctor Who Archive reports on several leaked emails to and/or from the BFI over details regarding episode discoveries in Africa (some of these were acquired via a Freedom of Information request, though others have been acquired by unauthorized methods. As such, I won’t reprint any of the contents of those emails here). DWA also prints a short article on Bob Furnell and his efforts to find the Canadian prints of Marco Polo. His efforts show it’s likely the prints were either returned to the BBC or destroyed in Canada.

9 December: DWA further expands on the BFI emails scandal.

10 December: The Telegraph runs an article reminding viewers at home of the other shows which are still missing, and of Phil’s other discoveries, including the return of Patrick Moore’s The Sky at Night. Paul Vanezis and the BFI’s Dick Fiddy are also quoted.

19 December: Ian Levine announces via Twitter that he found five 16mm film cans in Taiwan, though all five episodes are duplicates of existing episodes. "The hunt goes on. I have found five 16mm Dr Who film prints in Taiwan, but it's 2 eps of Dominators, 2 of War Games, and one Seeds Of Death". He goes on to say that "They were sent to American Forces TV back in the 1960s, during the Vietnam War. They were held by the owner of a radio station". "War Games 1 and 2, Dominators 2 and 3, Seeds Of Death 2. So sad it wasn't the Space Pirates instead. It easily could've been". "I've been on the trail of these Dr Who episodes for a long long time now. There were supposed to be eight but we found five. Well I did try. And I kept Paul Vanezis in the loop all along, but I specifically asked him not to say anything till we found out what they were". More can be found here.

25 December: The Time of the Doctor airs on BBC1, marking the final appearance by Matt Smith as the Doctor. He is replaced by Scottish actor Peter Capaldi, who had previously guest starred in the series 4 episode The Fires of Pompeii.

Still missing at the end of 2013: 97 - 44 Hartnell / 53 Troughton
 2014

16 January: Ian Levine reveals on Twitter he has found five more orphan episodes from Taiwan, similar to his discovery in December 2013. "Found five more Dr Who eps in Taiwan including Enemy Of The World 6. If only I found them sooner. Two Ambassadors eps, Marinus 6, Krotons 3." On Facebook Ian expanded more to include: "Talk about so near yet so far. We have now found five more Doctor Who episodes in Taiwan, including The Enemy Of The World 6. If only I found them sooner. If only I had found them pre-October 11th. DAMN !!!!!!! The other four episodes are The Ambassadors Of Death episodes 1 and 3, The Keys Of Marinus 6, and finally The Krotons 3. Having found ten in total, the odds were in favour of some being missing ones. it is simply INCREDIBLY BAD LUCK that they weren't." The latter four already existed pre-1980 but The Enemy of the World 6 was only revealed to be in existence as of October 2013. He added: "The 10 episodes are from the collection of Keith Perron. They are in not so great condition. Bad splices and mold. He's been asked to let Paul inspect them." " We found ten episodes. He thought he had eight originally. When he searched his storage it turned out to be ten. He thinks there may still be more in either Viet Nam, Taiwan, or Cambodia. From the American Forces Network, not from the TV Stations." Keith added in a comment on the same post that the episodes were "...censored by AFRTV. Bad splices." AFRTV are the Armed Forces Network, who distributed programming to overseas soldiers.

7 February: Christopher Barry suffers a fall on an escalator in a shopping centre in Banbury, Oxfordshire, and died from his injuries. Barry directed 10 serials over 16 years on Doctor Who, including the first Dalek serial, The Power of the Daleks, The Daemons and Robot, thus having worked with the first four Doctors. He had also worked on Compact, Z-Cars, Out of the Unknown and The Tripods. He was 88 years old.

27 March: Veteran director Derek Martinus, who helmed important stories such as The Tenth Planet, The Evil of the Daleks and Spearhead from Space, passes away aged 82. He had also worked on Z-Cars and Blake’s 7.

30 March: Kate O’Mara, who played renegade Time Lord the Rani opposite in Colin Baker in The Mark of the Rani and Sylvester McCoy in Time and the Rani, as well as the Children in Need charity special Dimensions in Time, dies age 74 after a short illness.

2 April: Glyn Jones dies aged 82. South African-born Glyn wrote The Space Museum in season two, though much of Glyn's original content, particularly the humour, was removed by script editor Dennis Spooner. Glyn also went on to appear in front of the camera in The Sontaran Experiment over a decade later, playing the character Krans.

April: Concerns have been raised as to whether the ten films found in Taiwan actually existed, and that the entire story could have been a hoax. Paul Vanezis tweeted “…Keith hasn't responded to any of my messages and there's no evidence that the films actually exist.” Tom Spilsbury, editor of DWM, posted on GallifreyBase: “It's a shame that it's now come to light that no-one has seen solid evidence of these films' existence… We compiled the news story, and I passed it under the nose of Paul Vanezis before we sent it to be published. Paul told me then that the films had not been returned to the UK at this time – but it honestly didn't occur to me that there was any question of whether they actually existed at all. Neither Paul nor Ian pointed this out to me, but to be fair, neither did I ask them that question. Naïvely, I assumed that all that would have been verified before Ian announced it to the world.” Tom did raise the point that if it were a hoax it doesn’t follow the usual path: “In my opinion, it still seems likely that the films are there in Taiwan, simply because it doesn't seem to make much sense to hoax about ten films which are already held in better quality by the BBC.” Keith Perron replied later on Facebook:I'm fed up of all the dr who fans who have been contacting me. I'm fed up. I'm at the point where I just feel like destroying these films to end it or just lock them up and only have them released when I die… I'm not making any money from this and not interested. I'm very annoyed that someone passed this information about these rotten old films.”

11 May: According to Ian Levine, director Waris Hussein has found his original set of scripts for Marco Polo complete with handwritten notes and cast lists from 1964. He believed they were long since lost but found them in an old suitcase. The set includes Episode 4, which Waris ultimately didn’t direct.

25 May: The Wheel in Space 3 is put up for auction on eBay, though the auction was pulled, relisted and then closed again by the seller before the auction was completed. The print isn’t an original but likely a dupe made in the late eighties.

30 May: An 8mm print of The Evil of the Daleks 2 is put up for auction on eBay. It sold for £200. Again this is likely a dupe print made in the late eighties.

10 June: The Time Meddler 3: A Battle of Wits is once again put up for auction on eBay. The winning bid was AU$1200.

20 July: Philip Morris, who located nine missing episodes in 2013, held a Q&A session on the Doctor Who Missing Episodes Discussion Group on Facebook. When asked about further discoveries this was his reply: “And fans will just want a yes or no haven't you or have you. But its complex all I can say is the wind is blowing the right way be patient. I don't wish to jeopardise the ongoing project in any way .And feel the fans of all lost tv will be very happy with the outcome.” Details can be found here. The Mirror published a story based on Phil’s comments. Philip also mentioned information about Sierra Leone; “I have visited sierra leonne .and I do posses there programme traffic records .I can tell you all Doctor Who prints were sent back to london in 1974”. This confirms the fate of the prints thought lost in the civil war in 1999 was incorrect, however the fate of those films once they arrived in England still remains unknown.

8 September: Jane Baker, who co-wrote (with husband Philip) both Rani stories and five of the 14 episodes of The Trial of a Time Lord in the 1980s, dies.

Still missing at the end of 2014: 97 - 44 Hartnell / 53 Troughton
 2015

31 January: The much sought after copy of Desert Island Discs starring William Hartnell is discovered in the collection of a listener who retained a copy, although only half the episode survives. The copy runs for just over 16 minutes out of a possible 35, and frustratingly cuts out just prior to William Hartnell discussing his work from 1963 onwards, which would include his time on Doctor Who. The instalment originally aired on the 23rd of August, 1965, a couple of weeks prior to the broadcast of Galaxy 4. More news can be found here. The surviving audio recording can be heard here.

11 February: A YouTube user uploads a French video called La Cloche tibétaine, which translates into ‘The Bell of Tibet’, the fourth episode in a series. This is the production – a television series and not a film as earlier believed – that Roger Delgado was working on when he was killed in a car accident back in 1973. The episode can be viewed here, with Delgado appearing around 13 minutes in.


25 February: Barry Newbery, who was the designer on various stories from An Unearthly Child to The Awakening, dies peacefully in his sleep. Newbery took over from Peter Brachacki after the original pilot episode was shot. He had worked on over a dozen stories for Doctor Who, including Marco Polo, The Crusade and The Daleks’ Master Plan. Other productions he worked on included Z Cars, Softly Softly and Dad’s Army, and in 1980 received a BAFTA nomination for his work on the production of Prince Regent. He was 88 years old. Details can be found here.

16 May: Frazer Hines guest stars in an episode of Outlander, the television adaptation of the novel by Diana Gabaldon. The episode, entitled “Wentworth Prison” (the penultimate episode of season one), sees Frazer playing the role of Sir Fletcher Gordon, the governor of the prison. This role is historically important as it was Hines’ character of Jamie McCrimmon from the Patrick Troughton era that would inspire Gabaldon to set her novel in 18th century Scotland, and for naming the main character Jamie Frazer.

26 September: At the Pandorica 2015 event in Bristol, Philip Morris gave a Q&A and opened up about his discovery of The Web of Fear in 2013. Phil located the films in late 2011, and revealed all six episodes of The Web of Fear WERE present in the storeroom of the tv station at Jos in Nigeria. He was granted access to various stations and vaults after providing equipment to transfer Nigerian films to more modern storage formats. After discovering the films he asked they be safely stored whilst seeking permission to remove them from the country. However, after arriving in the UK it was discovered that episode 3 had been removed from the collection, and Phil spent many months of negotiating to try and get the missing instalment returned. With the potential that the stolen instalment may be returned in the near future, Phil opted to release a false story that it had simply been missing when he entered the vault. After struggling for a year, Phil managed to corner the station manager at Jos, who replied “I don’t know anything about the missing episodes”, which Phil considers odd unless they were aware they were missing. Two days after this exchange, the Jos tv station which had safely stored these films for the last 40 years, caught fire and burnt down. Phil is hopeful though – despite the abhorrent nature of the thought to any missing episode hunter – is that the missing episode was sold to a private collector prior to the fire, and believes the film itself may no longer be in Africa. Additionally, Phil revealed that most of the places that Doctor Who was sold to have now been checked, and that official paperwork isn’t always correct. Phil also admitted telling people about the discovery prior to the films being returned no doubt led to word spreading to a collector who contacted the station manager and prompted the private sale; he has ‘learnt his lesson’ and no longer comments to others regarding his ongoing investigations. Some details can be found here.

9 October: Stuntman and actor Derek Ware dies aged 77. Derek coordinated fight scenes for stories as early as the first serial, notably the fight between Kal and Za in An Unearthly Child, the climactic fight between Marco and Tegana in Marco Polo, sword fights in The Aztecs, The Myth Makers and The Smugglers, and most famously the Battle of Covent Garden in The Web of Fear. He founded the stunt group HAVOC, which provided most of the choreographed action scenes for Jon Pertwee’s era, with their first major role being the fight in the warehouse in The Ambassadors of Death. As well as a stuntman, Derek played a handful of minor roles on screen, from the conductor in the last episode of The Chase to the Egyptian Tuthmos in The Daleks Master Plan. Derek also played Private Wyatt in Inferno who famously falls 50 feet from atop a cooling tower (though the fall itself was accomplished by fellow stuntman Roy Scammell). An obituary can be found here.

25 October: Issue 4 of Nothing at the End of the Lane is released. This issue covers original sketches for early Dalek designs, an article on original series designer Peter Brachacki, a look at the original draft of The Tenth Planet 4 without the regeneration scene, the original script for The Trial of a Time Lord episode 13, and much more.

11 October: A photo displaying all 12 film cans as originally discovered by Phil, was released on October 11 – the 2nd anniversary of the Web / Enemy announcement. The photo can be seen here.

Still missing at the end of 2015: 97 - 44 Hartnell / 53 Troughton
 2016

22 February: A 16mm film copy of The Web of Fear 1 appears on eBay. The winning bid was £699. Details can be found here.

13 April: Welsh actor Gareth Thomas dies of heart failure. Thomas was best known for playing the title role of Roj Blake in Blake’s 7. The show was created by Terry Nation, who 15 years earlier had created the Daleks for Doctor Who, and ran for 4 seasons between 1978 and 1981. Though Thomas never appeared on Doctor Who, he did feature in an episode of the spinoff Torchwood. He was 71 years old. Details can be found here.

25 June: The Dalek Invasion of Earth 5 (‘The Waking Ally’) is put up for sale on eBay. The winning bid was £860. Details can be viewed here.

12 August: A seller on eBay lists The Savages 1 for sale, though the details indicate episode 4. The auction is withdrawn shortly afterwards. All indications point to a hoax.

Mid-August: A small selection of clips running to two minutes in length is released on YouTube, depicting scenes from The Power of the Daleks in animated form. No official word on the animation is released, leading to speculation of an animated release or even possibly a missing episode discovery with animation to support the still-missing episodes. Days later the animation is taken down by the BBC.

29 August: The Mirror publish an article hinting that The Power of the Daleks will get a full animated release some time in the near future. The article can be found here.

7 September: The BBC issue a press release confirming The Power of the Daleks will be released fully in animated form, using the original audio recording. The episodes are released from 5 November (the 50th anniversary of the initial broadcast of the first episode) then one episode per day over the following five days, plus a DVD release on November 21st. The official BBC news story can be found here. The announcement on the BBC Store can be found here.

3 October: The Doctor Who Missing Episode Discussion Forum on Facebook enigmatically adds a "4 Days to Go" picture, and updates their cover photo with the same details. Information about what this involves is scarce but rumours already begin flying relating to the discovery of The Avengers episode “Tunnel of Fear”, and the prospect that a Doctor Who episode or episodes may have been found at the same time.

7 October: The Doctor Who Missing Episode Discussion Forum release the long-awaited Q&A featuring Ian Levine, but instead of a text transcription the forum release an extremely comprehensive video of the entire interview, running to approximately 78 minutes in length.

5 November: The BBC Store releases the first episode of The Power of the Daleks in animated form (which coincided with the serial’s 50th anniversary) then subsequently releasing the remaining five episodes over the next five days. The episodes were made available online to other countries throughout November. The serial also received a limited cinematic release in selected countries. A DVD complete with extras, including surviving footage from the original serial, was released on 21 November. Information can be found here.
Still missing at the end of 2016: 97 - 44 Hartnell / 53 Troughton
 2017

2 June: Actor Peter Sallis dies at the Denville Hall nursing home in London, at the ripe old ages of 96. Sallis played the character of Penley in the 1968 story The Ice Warriors. Sallis was best known for his role of Norman Clegg in the comedy Last of the Summer Wine, and has the distinction of being the only actor to appear in all 295 episodes of that series. Younger audiences also know him as the voice of Wallace in the animated Wallace and Gromit series.

19 June: Actor Brian Cant dies after a long battle with Parkinson’s Disease. Cant appeared in 1965 in The Daleks’ Master Plan as Kurt Gantry, and later in 1968 in The Dominators as Tensa. Cant is best know for his association with the BBC children’s series Play School, appearing as a host for over 20 years. Cant was 83 years ago. 

16 July: The BBC announce Jodie Whittaker will play the role of the thirteenth Doctor. Actor Kris Marshall had been tipped as the bookmakers' favourite. This marks the first time the role would be played by a female. Whittaker would take over from Peter Capaldi in December.

21 July: Deborah Watling passes away after a short battle with lung cancer. At the age of 19 Deborah was cast in the role of Victoria Waterfield for The Evil of the Daleks, staying through to Fury from the Deep, and reprised her role in Dimensions in Time and the non-BBC spin off Downtime. Her real life father, Jack Watling, had portrayed Professor Travers in both Yeti stories that she stared in during Season Five, and also returned in Downtime. She also leant her voice to half a dozen Doctor Who audio dramas and appeared in The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot in 2013. She also co-hosted The Missing Years documentary with Frazer Hines in 1998. Deborah was 69 years old. An obituary is here.

2 November: Patricia “Paddy” Russell dies aged 89. Russell began her career in acting but was more interested in working behind the camera. She appeared in The Quatermass Experiment but was also director Rudolph Cartier’s production assistant. She chose the name Paddy for her on-screen credit to avoid any potential disputes with male staff. After becoming the first female floor manager at the BBC, she became one of the first female directors as well. In 1966 she directed The Massacre, the first female director on the show. In the 1970s she directed Invasion of the Dinosaurs, Pyramids of Mars and Horror of Fang Rock. She was also a regular director for Emmerdale.  An obituary can be read here.

4 November: Veteran composer Dudley Simpson passes away. Simpson was the most prolific composer for the classic series, working on over sixty serials. Beginning in 1964, Simpson worked on Planet of Giants, The Crusade, The Chase, The Celestial Toymaker, The Underwater Menace, The Macra Terror, The Evil of the Daleks, The Ice Warriors, Fury from the Deep, The Seeds of Death, The Space Pirates, The War Games, Spearhead from Space, The Ambassadors of Death, Terror of the Autons, The Mind of Evil, The Claws of Axos, Colony in Space, The Dæmons, Day of the Daleks, The Curse of Peladon, The Time Monster, The Three Doctors, Carnival of Monsters, Frontier in Space, Planet of the Daleks, The Green Death, The Time Warrior, Invasion of the Dinosaurs, The Monster of Peladon, Planet of the Spiders, Robot, The Ark in Space, The Sontaran Experiment, Genesis of the Daleks, Planet of Evil, Pyramids of Mars, The Android Invasion, The Brain of Morbius, The Masque of Mandragora, The Hand of Fear, The Deadly Assassin, The Face of Evil, The Robots of Death, The Talons of Weng-Chiang (which Simpson also appeared in a cameo role as a conductor), Horror of Fang Rock, The Invisible Enemy, Image of the Fendahl, The Sun Makers, Underworld, The Invasion of Time, The Ribos Operation, The Pirate Planet, The Stones of Blood, The Androids of Tara, The Power of Kroll, The Armageddon Factor, Destiny of the Daleks, City of Death, The Creature from the Pit, Nightmare of Eden and The Horns of Nimon. He had been booked to work on Shada before the serial was put on hold following strike action at the BBC, and didn’t contribute when the remains of the serial was released on VHS. From the start of Season 18, incoming producer John Nathan-Turner advised Simpson that his services would no longer be required and all incidental music would be produced in-house. Dudley Simpson also worked on The Tomorrow People, The Brothers and Blake’s 7, the latter of which he composed 50 of the 52 episodes for, as well as the iconic theme music. He retired in 1987 and returned to his native Australia. Simpson was 95 years old. An obituary can be found here

25 December: Peter Capaldi departs the series in the Christmas special Twice Upon a Time. Jodie Whittaker takes over the role of the Doctor. The special also starred David Bradley appearing as the First Doctor, who had previously appeared in the 2013 TV movie An Adventure in Space and Time playing William Hartnell. The special also marked the final involvement by Steven Moffat, who had served as producer since 2010. He is replaced by Chris Chibnall. 

Still missing at the end of 2017: 97 - 44 Hartnell / 53 Troughton
 2018

6 March: The BBC announces all twenty episodes of Season 12 - the first season to star Tom Baker - will be upscaled and released on Blu-Ray in High Definition, for a June 2018 release. The releases includes new special effects, new documentaries, new 5.1 sound mixes and The Tom Baker Years, originally released on VHS in the mid-nineties, will be released for the first time on disc. The stories include Robot, The Ark in Space, The Sontaran Experiment, Genesis of the Daleks and Revenge of the Cybermen. To coincide with the release, cinemas in the United States will screen a condensed version of the story. Details can be found here.

21 April: Online auction house The Saleroom lists the original camera scripts from all six episodes of Fury from the Deep, reportedly originating from the collection of the late Victor Pemberton himself. The scripts are all signed by Mr Pemberton, to be auctioned in May. The auction can be seen here


3 May: The creators of The Diary of River Song, an audio drama series made by Big Finish, announce they will feature four previous actors to play the role of the Master; Michelle Gomez (the 12th Doctor era), Derek Jacobi (Utopia), Geoffrey Beevers (The Keeper of Traken) and American actor Eric Roberts (the 1996 TV Movie) will all return for a January 2019 release. Details can be found here.

4 May: An original annotated copy of a script for An Unearthly Child is sold at auction for £6,200. Details can be found here

18 May: Fan Graham Strong passes away aged 69. Graham was responsible for keeping dozens of episodes from the 1960s that he recorded off-air direct from the television set. He graciously loaned his collection to the BBC in 1994, and was some of them were found to be of superior quality to many existing film prints. More information can be found hereThe creator of the blog would like to personally thank Graham for his contribution to Doctor Who.

25 May: The Big Finish audio drama Energy of the Daleks is released on Vinyl record for the first time. The story, initially released in 2012, features Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor and  Louise Jameson as Leela, facing off against the Daleks, voiced by Nicholas Briggs. The release is limited to 1500 units, in an exclusive deal with Sainsbury's Supermarkets. Details can be found here.

29 May: Social video broadcaster Twitch begins screening over 500 episodes from the classic era. This marks the first time the classic series has been available on the digital platform. The broadcasts runs until July 23. For information can be found here.

3 June: In an interview on Radio Free Skaro (broadcast #638), Paul Vanezis reveals that there is "absolutely no question" there are missing episodes in the hands of private film collectors. The interview can be heard here, starting at 30'36" in. 

3 September: Actress Jacqueline Pearce passes away after battling lung cancer. Jacqueline appeared in the Colin Baker story The Two Doctors, but was more familiar to sci fi fans as Supreme Commander Servalan from the series Blake's 7, a role which she played for the show's four year run. She was 74 years old. An obituary can be found here.

14 September: Zienia Merton passes away aged 72. Zienia played the role of Sandra Banes in the sci fi series Space 1999 for both seasons. Her first television role was that of Ping-Cho in the 1964 Doctor Who story Marco Polo. 45 years later, she returned to the Doctor Who universe in The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith, a two-part story from The Sarah Jane Adventures. More can be found here


7 October: Series 11 premieres on BBC1 with The Woman Who Fell to Earth, marking the first full appearance of Jodie Whittaker's thirteenth Doctor. Also appearing is Tosin Cole, Mandip Gill and Bradley Walsh, the first time since the Peter Davison era the Tardis crew comprises of four people.  The episode earned 8.2 million viewers, the highest the series has achieved since 2013. 



Still missing at the end of 2018: 97 - 44 Hartnell / 53 Troughton
 2019


2 January: Broadcast heritage group Kaleidoscope announce a handful of off-air recordings of Doctor Who have been unearthed, after being contacted in late 2018 by one of their volunteers. The tapes, identified as belonging to someone called Randolph, are very high quality, higher than some that already exist. They cover The Daleks Master Plan 1 through to The Moonbase 1. A couple of episodes of The Sky At Night were also in the collection. Details can be found here. 

5 January: Online broadcaster Twitch does an encore screening of the classic series of Doctor Who. As before, various stories are omitted from the run, but this time the broadcast is condensed over 20 days instead of 35. Details can be found here

17 February: Twitch runs a six day marathon screening just classic stories featuring the Daleks. The run features stories omitted from the previous marathons, including stories not written by Terry Nation. Details can be found here.

20 February: Peter Purves announces (via Twitter) that UCLAN students will produce a remake of the lost episode Mission to the Unknown. The planned three-day shoot includes costumes, sets and actors Edward De Souza (who played Marc Cory in the original) and Nicholas Briggs (Dalek voice artiste) will be on set.


29 March: Canadian actor Shane Rimmer passes away age 89. Rimmer appeared in the 1966 story The Gunfighters as Seth Harper. His career included several high profile films including the original Star Wars, Dr Strangelove and three James Bond movies. He is best known however for his voice (and script) work on Gerry Anderon's Supermarionation productions in the 1960s; his most prominent role was Thunderbird 1 pilot Scott Tracy in all 32 episodes of Thunderbirds. Details can be found here

3 June: Actor Paul Darrow (born Paul Valentine Birky) passes away aged 78 after a short illness. Paul appeared as Captain Hawkins in The Silurians and then as Tekker in Timelash. His most famous role however was that of Kerr Avon in the series Blake's 7. Paul met and later married actress Janet Lees-Price whilst working on Emergency Ward 10, and they were together for nearly 50 years until her death in 2012. In the last few years of his life he was confined to a wheelchair; in 2014 Paul suffered an aortic aneurysm and was forced to have both his legs amputated. The press release of his death can be read here.

29 August: Writer Terrance Dicks passes away aged 84. His first work on Doctor Who began in 1968 when he joined the production team during The Invasion as script editor, a role he stayed in (with the exception of The Space Pirates) until Planet of the Spiders in 1974. Terrance co-wrote The War Games in 1969, then under Tom Baker wrote Robot, The Brain of Morbius (which was later re-written by Robert Holmes), Horror of Fang Rock, State of Decay and The Five Doctors. As well as on screen work, Terrance novelised dozens of serials for Target, some New Adventures for Virgin, the stage plays Seven Keys to Doomsday and The Ultimate Adventure (plus their Big Finish adaptations) and several non-fiction books on the show. A news article can be found here

9 October: The BBC, in association with the University of Central Lancashire, release the recreation of Mission to the Unknown online, which was shot back in February. The 9th of October, 2019 marks the 54th anniversary of the original broadcast. The video is introduced by Edward de Souza, who played Marc Cory in the original. The episode can be viewed here

3 December: Donald Tosh, last surviving script editor from the William Hartnell era, dies aged 84. Tosh script edited the show from The Time Meddler to The Massacre. He also rewrote Brian Hayle's original version of The Celestial Toymaker, although his work was later rewritten again by Gerry Davis. He would also write The Rosemariners which, while ultimately never made into a television serial, was later turned into an audio play by Big Finish. His passing is mentioned here

Still missing at the end of 2019: 97 - 44 Hartnell / 53 Troughton
 2020

6 November: Actor Geoffrey Palmer passes away at the age of 93. A long and distinguished career, Palmer appeared in The Silurians and The Mutants in the 1970s, then starred in Voyage of the Damned in 2007. An article of his passing can be found here.