📺 'Countdown' Tuesday 02 November 1982 - Ch4: 16:45 Cult word game show 'Countdown was the first programme' to be shown on Channel 4 when it launched on this day forty-three years ago. Countdown outlasted every one of the station’s programmes, bar the news and original host Richard “twice nightly” Whiteley – master of the excruciating pun – endeared himself to millions of television viewers. #countdown | Bernie Briffa