Speaking clock

A coach driver and a pub DJ have been shortlisted to be the new voice of the Speaking Clock. They are among 15 people with regional accents vying to succeed current voice Brian Cobby saying: "At the third stroke..."

Driver Keith Gladman, 60, from Torquay, and DJ Scott Crawford, 29, from Dundee, are against contenders from Northern Ireland, Wales, the North of England and Midlands.

The winner will be announced during Children In Need on BBC1 tomorrow. They will be only the fourth person in the job since the service began on July 24, 1936.
- A London telephonist, Jane Cain was the first voice in 1936 and lasted until 1963.

- Miss Pat Simmons, a supervisor in a London telephone exchange became the second voice from 1963 until 1984. Miss Simmons passed away in November 2005, aged 85.

- The present voice, belongs to Brian Cobby (77) who was an assistant supervisor at Withdean exchange in Brighton. He became the first male voice at 11 am on 2nd April 1985. Brian Cobby, an actor by profession before he joined BT, was selected from 12 finalists in BT’s Golden Voice competition, on 5th December 1984.

The BT Speaking Clock has also been known as TIM (the three-letter code, short for TIMe, that users dialled in the days of alphabetical dials!).

The BT Speaking Clock has been ticking 24-hours a day, seven days a week since 24th July 1936 – which is 67 years, more than 24,000 days, more than 586,000 hours or 35 million minutes!

Originally the accuracy of the BT Speaking Clock was one-tenth of a second, it is now correct to within five thousandths of a second!

There have only ever been three voices for the BT Speaking Clock, apart from a two week period in March 2003 when Lenny Henry did a special version of the Speaking Clock in aid of Comic Relief and a week long stint by 12 year old Alicia Roland.