Phil Archer when the show began airing nationally on 1 January 1951. During his time with "The Archers", Painting wrote a best-selling book entitled "Forever Ambridge" and wrote over a thousand scripts for the show between 1966 and 1982. Painting was later inducted into the Guinness World Records for being the longest-serving actor, without a break, in a single soap opera. In later years, Painting's appearances on the show became limited due to his ill health. On 29 October 2009, two days after he had gone to the recording studio, Painting died. BBC Radio 4 controller, Mark Damazer, said "Norman Painting was
The Archers change anything." Vanessa Whitburn was succeeded as editor by Sean O'Connor in September 2013. In September 2016, Huw Kennair-Jones took over as editor though O'Connor continued to oversee the Helen and Rob storyline until its conclusion.. Kennair-Jones announced in October 2017 that he was to leave the BBC to work as commissioning editor for ITV.. The short presence of two successive Archers editors in the job led to concerns that there might be a trend of radio drama editing being seen as “training ground” for higher-paid positions in TV. Alison Hindell, the BBC’s head of Audio Drama until October 2018,