Background
Miall was born in London and educated at Bootham School in New York
Miall was born in London and educated at Bootham School in New York
Street John"s College.
In retirement, he became a research historian, studying the history of broadcasting. He learned German at Freiburg University, and read economics and law at Street John"s College, Cambridge. He was President of the Cambridge Union Society and Editor of the Cambridge Review.
Miall joined the European Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation in early 1939.
He took charge of broadcasts in German until 1942, when was seconded to the Political Warfare Executive and sent to work on psychological warfare in New York and San Francisco. He returned to London in 1944, and then worked in the Psychological Warfare Division of Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Forces in Luxembourg.
He returned to the British Broadcasting Corporation in 1945, and was briefly a special correspondent in Czechoslovakia. Although based in Washington, District of Columbia, he visited all of the then 48 United States. states.
His radio broadcasts made his voice a familiar feature of British Broadcasting Corporation news coverage.
In June 1947, he reported a speech at Harvard by George Marshall, on reconstruction in Europe. Ernest Bevin, then British Foreign Secretary, heard the broadcast, and was spurred to press ahead with what became the Marshall Plan for the nations of Europe to rebuild their economies after the war. When Miall returned to London, he served as head of "television talks" - documentaries and current affairs - at British Broadcasting Corporation television from 1954, assisted by Grace Wyndham Goldie and based at Lime Grove.
During that period, programmes such as Monitor, Tonight and The Sky at Night were created.
Panorama was relaunched. And David Attenborough began his wildlife broadcasting career.
Miall was promoted to assistant controller at the British Broadcasting Corporation in 1961, in charge of the planning for the new British Broadcasting Corporation television channel, BBC2, which began broadcasting in 1964. He was appointed Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 1961.
After a period as Assistant Controller for Programme Services, Television, Miall returned to America in 1966 to run the British Broadcasting Corporation"s New York office, in charge of editing news coverage and also selling British Broadcasting Corporation costume dramas to American television channels.
He returned to London in 1971 to become controller of overseas and foreign relations. He was involved in the establishment of the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association. He retired in 1974.
In retirement, he researched broadcasting history.
He became a consultant research historian at the British Broadcasting Corporation, and assisted Professor Asa Briggs in producing the official History Of Broadcasting In The United Kingdom.
He also wrote obituaries for The Independent from 1987, and published a book, Inside The British Broadcasting Corporation: British broadcasting characters, in 1994. She died in 1974. He retired to Taplow in Berkshire, where he died a few months after celebrating his 90th birthday.