PROSPEROThe newspaper for retired BBC Pension Scheme members • April 2019 • Issue 2

PENSION SCHEME

THE BRITISH WAY OF FUN AND GAMES

PAGE 7

2

| PENSIONS

Marital status surveyOur thanks to everyone who has provided confirmation of who might be eligible to receive a benefit from the Scheme, after their death. Over 8,000 pensioners have provided this information to date.

This information may not have changed since you last notified the Scheme but it is useful to know that the information is still up to date. Even if you do not have anyone to nominate, it will assist us to have this information.

This is important because it’s best practice to ensure any information we hold about you, and your spouse, civil partner or nominated dependant, is up to date. The Pensions Regulator, who gives guidance to work-based pension schemes, advises that we maintain accurate records.

In addition, this information can help the Scheme put in place efficient investment arrangements to match expected future payment of pensions.

If you haven’t provided this information yet then don’t worry. You can do so by logging onto myPension online. Alternatively you should have received a reminder letter from us and a paper form that you can complete and return. If you haven’t received the form and would like to be sent a copy, or if you have any queries, please contact the service line on 029 2032 2811 or email mypension@bbc.co.uk

VOLUNTEER VISITINGSCHEME

COFFEE SHOP

Would you welcome occasional contact with

former colleagues?

Available throughout the UK to BBC pensioners over age 70

Visitors are also BBC pensioners

Operates from the Pension and Benefits

Centre

Visitors carry ID cards with them for your

security

Meet at home for a chat or somewhere public like a

coffee shop

We can also offer support during

difficult times such as bereavement

Want to know more about what the VVS has to offer?Call the pension service line on 029 2032 2811 or

email myPension@bbc.co.uk

Over 2,000 pensioners already use the scheme

2019 pension increaseFrom 1 April 2019, pensions will increase as follows:

- Old and New Benefits members’ pensions in payment and deferred pensions: 2.7%. Old Benefits members who elected to receive the Pension Increase Exchange will receive a lower increase, and in some cases, no increase.

- Career Average Benefits (‘CAB’) 2006 members’ pensions in payment: 2.5%.

- CAB 2011 members’ pensions in payment: 2.1%.

- A revaluation increase of 2.7% to pensions built up to 31 March 2018 for active and deferred CAB 2006 members.

- A revaluation increase of 2.1% to pensions built up to 31 March 2018 for active and deferred CAB 2011 members.

No discretionary increase over and above those detailed above has been agreed.

Would you like to sit on the Pension Trust Board?The Board of Trustees is responsible for looking after the assets of the BBC Pension Scheme and ensuring that benefits are paid at the right time to the right people.

This year the Board will be holding an election for a former contributing pensioner to join the Board from 1 January 2020. Being a Trustee is demanding, but the work is stimulating and rewarding.

If you’re interested in pensions and committed to helping to ensure the continued success of the Scheme, look out for the information that will be sent later this spring on what’s involved and how to stand for election.

You can also find out more here: bbc.co.uk/mypension/news

BBC Club Broadcast Centre, BC2 B3, 201 Wood Lane, London W12 7TP

020 8752 6666

BBC.CLUB@BBC.CO.UK

MusicThe BBC Club Ariel Orchestra has appointed Mark Eager to be new Principal Conductor. Mark is an international conductor who travels the world as a guest conductor and was a former principal trombonist of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. The orchestra meets every three weeks at the BBC Maida Vale Studios and is keen to hear from retired musicians who would be interested in playing with them.

Email: BBC_Ariel_Orchestra@hotmail.co.uk or emma.rippon@bbc.co.uk

Canal cruisingBBC Club’s narrow boat is now available to hire at greatly reduced rates for Club members and sleeps up to seven. It is moored in Anderton in Cheshire. Training is given at the start of your week!

See the website for details: bbcclub.com/connect/canal-cruising

GolfThe Golf Society costs £30 per year for Club members; why not join or renew your membership now.

See the website for more details: bbcclub.com/connect/golf or email: steven.letham@bbc.co.uk

RamblingBBC Rambling Club organises rambles (usually circular) of between 6 and 12 miles every 3rd Sunday in the Home Counties. Lunch will be at a local pub, or bring your own. All abilities welcome!

See the website for more details: bbcclub.com/connect/rambling or email: cora.flynn@bbc.co.uk

Flying ClubThe Ariel Flying Club, which has a new home at North Weald airfield, offers subsidised training hours and discounted flying hours, as well as no landing fees and more!

See the website for more details: bbcclub.com/connect/flying or email: cristian.pana@bbc.co.uk

Yacht ClubThe BBC Yacht Club welcomes all from beginner to experienced ocean sailor. We have two yachts and cater for those who wish to learn, race or just enjoy!

See the website for more details: bbcclub.com/connect/yacht or email: CommodoreBBCYC@gmail.com

Prospero AGMThe Prospero Society AGM will be held in BBC Club W1 on a Thursday – 11 April, 11am – rather than the traditional Tuesday. It is open to all BBC Club Prospero Society members, to share views and comments about the Society.

BBC Club W1The best place to meet friends and relax after a visit to the West End, the BBC Club retired members’ lunch price is now £6 for one course and £7.50 for two courses from 1 April and is available Monday to Friday 12-2pm.

Club websiteThe Club Extra section of the BBC Club website is undergoing some changes. The Club Extra Offers section has been replaced by a monthly Club Extra e-newsletter detailing all the current Club offers.

PENSION TRUST LTD

3PROSPERO APRIL 2019 |

Letters 4-5

Pensions 2

Prospero is provided free of charge to retired Scheme members, or to their spouses and dependants.

Prospero provides a source of news on former colleagues, developments at the BBC and pension issues, plus classified adverts. It is available online at bbc.co.uk/mypension

To advertise in Prospero, please see page 12.

Please send your editorial contributions, or comments/feedback, to: Prospero, BBC Pension and Benefits Centre, Broadcasting House, Cardiff CF5 2YQ

Email: prospero@bbc.co.uk

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PROSPERO

Odds & ends 12- Reunion news- Contacts- Classifieds- Caption competition

Prospero April 2019

The next issue of Prospero will appear in June 2019. The copy deadline is Tuesday, 7 May 2019.

Contents

Memories 6-8- Reminiscences of a revolution- Richard Baker- Around the World in 80 Days- Briefs, pink knickers and pic-nickers- Saxophones & Wurlitzers

Mystery Sudoku NS O H

O A T D

L T NN A L E

T N O

A O H LL H S

EWIN£10

Complete the grid so that every row, column and 3x3 box contains the letters ADEHLNOST in some order. One row or column contains a five or more letter word, title or name with a BBC connection. Solve the Sudoku to discover what it is and send your answer to: The Editor, Prospero, BBC Pension and Benefits Centre, Broadcasting House, Cardiff CF5 2YQ by Tuesday, 7 May 2019.

The winner gets a £10 voucher. Many thanks to Neil Somerville for providing this puzzle.

The Sudoku winner in February 2019 was Mr Vincent Fitzgerald. The answer was PROFILE.

Back at the BBC 3

Obituaries 9-11

| BACK AT THE BBC

THE BUZZ IN THE NEWSROOM IS FANTASTICRebecca Curran and Martin Geissler (pictured below) are the faces of BBC Scotland’s new nightly flagship news and current affairs programme, The Nine.

We caught up with them as they prepared to go live on Monday 25 February from a brand new studio, right at the heart of Glasgow’s

Pacific Quay.

There are just days to go now until the launch. How have the pilots been going?Martin: Every day is different. News is funny because the news agenda dictates your day, but there is so much more for us to think about in terms of the programme’s structure. Getting miles on the clock is important because we’re both on-the-road reporters, which means learning a new skill. There is no substitute for hours in the studio before you go on air.

Rebecca: I don’t know if is because we are launching something new with a big team of new people but the buzz, enthusiasm and ambition in The Nine newsroom is fantastic.

What have people’s perceptions been when you’ve been talking about the new channel?Rebecca: It’s starting to change now but people were not really familiar with the channel until all the promotion started. When I moved down to Glasgow from the BBC in Aberdeen at the end of last year, people would ask me why I was here and I’d say that I had a new job and tell them a bit about it. People have been genuinely interested in the channel but also in the news hour and what we’re going to be doing differently.

Martin: People are curious but I’m surprised at the number of people I have had to explain it to. By the time we go on air, there should be a feverish element which will make people sit down and watch. Scotland hasn’t had a news programme before which incorporates heavyweight global news with stuff happening at the end of your street as well as entertainment; all presented in an informal way.

What makes The Nine unique?Rebecca: Given that we have an hour, we have a lot more time to get into things. Martin has mentioned it’s more informal. That doesn’t mean we’ll be sitting having a laugh on the couch. We’re able to look at a story, give it more time to breathe; give interviewees time to say their piece but also dig into it afterwards, whether that be with a correspondent or live guests on the couch.

Martin: Hayley Valentine, editor of The Nine, describes it as a programme, not a bulletin. It’s a digest of the most important information from around the world that day, delivered in a style designed to let you sit back and watch as entertainment as well as a source of information.

Rebecca: It is a big investment in journalism in Scotland and we’re both evangelical about the team. The people working on this programme are so creative. The stuff they are coming up with is the kind of material that will help us fulfil our original journalism ambitions – the kind of stories not currently being told in Scotland.

Martin: Everyone, regardless of background, has been left in no doubt that their voice and their opinion matters.

Rebecca: We are told every day; no idea is a stupid idea. Everything is up for discussion. That ends up with excellent discussions and thoughts coming out.

Martin: I’m sitting down with people half my age and we live in the same country, we walk the same streets, live in same world, but it’s a totally different world to them because they see it through different eyes. I find that an education. We want their world to come across. Just because I have been around a bit longer, doesn’t mean my world is what we should be broadcasting. Hopefully our audience will select us as the place they come to for the day’s news because they trust us to understand their lives.

Tune in to The Nine on BBC Scotland from 21:00 Mondays to Thursdays.

| LETTERS

4

Paper envelopesWhilst I agree that a paper envelope is (in one way) more environmentally friendly, it’s pretty useless when it comes to picking up dog poo!

Graeme Aldous

Programme recordingAs most good or interesting programmes commence at 9pm, and most people’s recording machines such as a Humax can only record two programmes while one views another live, why can’t the BBC have BBC1+1, BBC2+1 and BBC4+1? Most of the commercial TV programmes have this feature, which means you can record any additional programmes you want to see an hour later as the programmes you want to see that begin at 9pm appear at 10pm, so you do not miss programmes on BBC by viewing them live or recording them!

Roger Fleming

Scottish orchestrasLike Colin Bradbury, I, too, was somewhat puzzled by Geoff Hall’s account of the 1980 plan to eliminate so many of the BBC orchestras. I had been in the Academy of the BBC (ABBC of fond memory: the chamber orchestra-sized remains of the BBC Training Orchestra, in Bristol August 1974 to January 1976, when I was transferred to the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, thence to the BBC Concert Orchestra in April 1979.

Around the time I left Bristol, the BBC had already announced its intention to disband the ABBC. Amongst several others in the orchestra, I was involved, even after moving to Glasgow, in preparing a submission to the BBC in an attempt to save it. Clearly, we were unsuccessful and the ABBC was disbanded about a year later, in 1977.

Readers with a keen sense of timelines will have noticed that, following my moves to Glasgow and London, each orchestra I left had a year or so left before being disbanded or threatened with it – an unfortunate coincidence not lost on some of my Concert Orchestra colleagues at the time! In the event, as pointed out by previous correspondents, the BBC SSO did survive, not so the BBC Scottish Radio Orchestra. I am relieved to report that, although I retired from the Concert Orchestra several years ago, it is still going strong.

It seems to me that Mr Hall has conflated two separate rounds of orchestral cuts, unless he has archived memos to support the notion that disbanding the ABBC was a direct and linked precursor to the much larger cull announced in 1980. I do not doubt Mr Hall was ‘there’, but, in one apparent respect, it was a different ‘there’.

Clive Hobday

Green & white liveryI was distracted from the text of the Kingswood Warren article (Prospero, February 2019) by the picture of balloon testing, with a van in the background — clearly a BBC vehicle by the distinctive green-with-a-grey-stripe livery. It was a fine design, both distinctive and dignified, and I wonder who designed it — is it known?

It was also used in reverse (grey with a green stripe), and I wondered if there was any significance to this. If it was a general change of colour over the whole fleet, when did it come about?

The attached pic shows both liveries, photographed in the Manchester OB Yard sometime in the late 70s. (Sorry that I can’t attribute the photo to anyone.)

Graeme Aldous

Music marring programmesI have just recently suffered the overwhelming use of music that marred the two follow-up programmes on BBC2 of The Fifteen Billion Pound Railway.

These programmes were extremely interesting and did not need loud, dramatic music to enhance the explanation of the difficulties and skills involved in installing huge fans or very long escalators.

In the February issue of Prospero, John Hale reports that the reply to his complaints about this subject was that levels were well judged and that the BBC will not engage further with his complaint.

My reaction to that is that I will not engage further with BBC documentaries.

How I mourn the demise of documentaries of the quality of The Two-Thousand-Year-Old Computer on BBC4, 2012.

Geoff Higgs

London Hostels rememberedMay I express my thanks to Prospero for publishing in the last edition my article on the London Hostels and SADG/Folk Club memories from the late 1960s.

I was delighted to hear from a number of former colleagues, most of whom I had not been in touch with for over 50 years! I have replied to each individually, and have even been able to extend through some of these colleagues communication with others who do not have email, such as the former head of Redbourne Hostel, Jean Ballantine.

If there are still others out there who remember me and/or any of the names mentioned in that article, do please get in touch.

Hopefully, we will remain in touch, and there is even talk of a reunion with a few of us, if the logistics might prove feasible.

Thanks again to Prospero for facilitating a valued renewal of long-lost contact.

Bob Woodbobwoodmedia@aol.com

Dynasties ruined by loud musicI am the widow of Maurice Turner, former WS newsreader and announcer at Bush. Maurice also served as presentation & administration officer in Malaysia/Singapore and on Ascension Island.

Whilst on Ascension, we had the pleasure of hosting David Attenborough for one night and I have been an avid reader of his books and watcher of his programmes ever since.

I seldom switch on the television, however, last evening I made sure I was all set to watch his latest series, Dynasties.

I was enraged to find I could not hear most of the commentary, as it was drowned out by totally unnecessary, very loud music. I am 88 and can guarantee my hearing is in perfect order.

In Prospero, I have read many letters of complaint about this intrusion. I hope my letter will make the producers leave out the ‘background’ music and allow the commentator and wonderful photography to tell the story.

I do so enjoy Prospero with items, names and photographs, which bring back many happy memories.

Mrs V Turner, New Zealand

BBC SoundsBBC Sounds: not a service, an irritation. Mr Grierson is perfectly correct. I try to access Sounds and frequently fail. I have collided unintentionally with ‘BBC Pop Out Player,’ and ‘BBC Media’ – what the h*** are these?

Frances K Jones

I WAS VERY pleased to read what William Grierson had to say about BBC Sounds. I have had a similar experience. I too downloaded Sounds, only to discover that its intuitive approach was not at all to my liking. I want to be in control of what I listen to – not subservient to some algorithm designed for younger audiences who want their preferences served up to them on a plate.

My concern is that the BBC, although very reliant on older listeners and viewers, treats us with disdain – assuming we can be counted on and have nowhere else to go. Will the bureaucrats finally just consign iPlayer to the dustbin and force us to use Sounds? I fear so.

Fortunately, there are other offers we could turn to, including a range of other radio stations around the world, including NPR. I don’t say this because I want to lose what I already have from the BBC, but because it may be snatched away.

Martin Plaut

Left to right: Kyle Mackay, Monica Mackeness and Denise Butler.

5PROSPERO APRIL 2019 |

Licence fee consultationI think Chris Coneybear’s submission to cancel the over-75s licence neglects to recognise a fact that was published in the same edition of Prospero. He mentions that he is 66 years of age and so, presumably, receives a State Pension at the higher rate. I am 20 years older and my State pension is almost £40 per week lower! Enough said?

Helen Grierson

I WAS DRAWN to the letter from Chris Coneybeer in the February 2019 Prospero – and totally agree that, as a welfare payment offered by the Gordon Brown government in 2002, it is the government of the day to continue to provide free TV licences for the over-75s, not the BBC.

However, it seems that, at the government’s insistence, the BBC has for some reason accepted that it should pick up the tab in the future, thus further diminishing resources available for programme making.

This being the case, and to diminish the acute loss of finances caused by the government’s decision, it is right that the free licence for over-75s should be examined in the Consultation Document, where various options are suggested. All options offered have consequences either to the BBC’s finances or to the welfare of the elderly, so a compromise must be sought.

It seems to me wrong that all households with just one member over 75 are eligible, so I feel strongly that the new system should only give free licences to households where all members are over 75. For example, I am just over 75 but my wife is not, so we would not be eligible until she too is 75. However, if our son in his 40s came to live with us when we were both over 75, our household would again become ineligible.

Thus any household with anyone aged between 18 and 75 living there would have to pay. This would be fair and save the BBC millions!

John Hale

I READ CHRIS Coneybeer’s letter in the February Prospero about the consultation on the BBC licence fee.

He calls it the BBC TV licence fee concession, which it is not. The licence fee is required to watch any television in Britain, whether BBC, ITV or any other broadcast source on a television set. However, I have never seen in his, or any other comments on the subject, consideration of the cost of independent television. It is certainly not free; we all pay in the increased cost of retail items, particularly household goods, which is needed to pay for the advertising.

The government decided that people over 75 (which this year includes me) should not have to pay to watch television. But we do! The licence was made free to the over-75s, but I still have to pay the inflated prices every time I go shopping for items which are advertised on independent television. This is very unfair; not only to me, but also to the BBC. If the BBC has to cover the cost of the licence fee to over-75s, as is proposed, then the government should also make the independent television companies refund to those over 75 what they have contributed in supermarkets and shops to the running of independent television.

Many people do not realise how much this is. The cost of running all independent television channels is roughly comparable to the running cost of the BBC. We all pay for ITV, not only those over 75, but even people without a television set! The only way of avoiding it is to note the products being advertised and avoid buying them when you go shopping. But that will not work, because the advertising revenue is sometimes spread across a company, and not just applied to the one product.

So in future, I look forward to a refund of £150.50 (approx) per annum, in addition to my free licence.

Colin Pierpoint

Landing too lowMike Curtis’s story about a complaint of aircraft noise because they were ‘landing too low’ stirred the memory.

I was on attachment to News at AP in 1987 as a very new TA. Nearly all film inserts were mute and my job was to play in sound effects from our limited number of BBC Sound Effects 45 rpm records.

Whenever we saw aircraft at Heathrow taxiing about, we reached for the trusty ‘aircraft landing and taxiing’ disc. Unfortunately, there was a very alert lady viewer who got most annoyed at this disc. She took to ringing up the gallery (somehow she had obtained the number) and complained ‘You are playing that record again’. It got so bad that eventually, we had to physically destroy the record to stop it being used.

John Hale is to be congratulated on his campaign to lower intrusive and unrelated ‘music’ in documentaries. The reply he received from Executive Complaints Unit is typically arrogant and dismissive in ‘we know best’ fashion. I too have tried. I had a letter printed in The Times on 22 January suggesting that one of the many buttons on my TV remote control could be programmed to cut the music. There are more buttons here than I needed to make the programmes in the first place in my 30 years as a VT editor. I called it the MOB Rule button, i.e. putting the viewer in control of Music Off.

Ian Rutte

Galleries & Alexander PalaceYour feature on the renovation work at Alexandra Palace (February issue) reminded me of a visit I made there for a Breakfast News OB and how I solved a personal mystery.

I had always wondered why a TV control room was called a ‘gallery’. Looking round the first TV studio at the Palace was the answer – the control room had been in a gallery high on one wall.

And on galleries, I remember the occasion in Glasgow when, due to some switching error, gallery talk-back was broadcast along with the studio sound. Our irrascible news editor stormed out of his office, and before anyone dared point out the mistake he was about to make, crashed into the gallery to announce: ‘Your ******* talk-back is going out on air.’

Andrew Maywood

Fight the good fightIt was encouraging to read another letter of complaint on the escalating debate of intrusive music in most BBC documentaries. I share the frustration of the writer, John Hales, who dubbed many of my films at TVC, as BH’s response to our dissatisfaction was similar. However, I would like to add a rider to his experiences as I feel we should not let the Executive Complaints Unit have the last word.

For my money, the BBC shot themselves in the foot when they launched Slow TV on BBC4. This ‘experiment’ was highly praised by the Corporation, believing they’d found a new method of making documentaries without resorting to music. In my view, Slow TV should not be necessary if the BBC could educate producers to think before drowning their programmes with music – if producers insist on wall-to-wall coverage, could they please ensure the music is not at odds with the visuals. During my time as a film editor on the staff, non-music productions were widespread. We never used music gratuitously; the same applied when I left to become a freelance director.

I first wrote to the director-general on the subject in 2015. His reply was sympathetic, saying he and his executive producers monitor the sound levels of the Corporation’s output under their own ‘best practice guide’. After a further exchange of letters, he passed me over to his acting correspondence advisor. She kindly sent me a copy of ‘Clear sound: best practice tips’, no doubt hoping that this would put an end to my correspondence. Far from it, as the pamphlet contained basic advice that was clearly ignored or not even seen by producers. I felt compelled to write back on this controversial area – this was in December 2017 and I still await a reply.

As I pointed out to the DG, it isn’t just former staff who complain: letters from the general public critical of overpowering music can be found in the national press and even the Radio Times. Nowadays, producers of documentaries have more ‘toys’ to play with, but I believe this is a contributing factor, giving programmes a copy-cat format, regardless of the subject matter.

I am proud of my 15 years on the staff where I learnt my trade. This BBC background was also my passport to freelance directing which lasted another 25 years, mainly on documentaries for Granada, Southern and LWT’s South Bank Show. The latter acclaimed films were produced without music as the natural sounds and effects recorded on location gave me all the atmosphere and depth I required. Melvyn Bragg, who is a good judge, agreed.

My swansong for the Corp in 1980 was to direct Professor Stanley Unwin in a spoof film for Staff Training on the art of programme making. This 16mm short was commissioned by department head, Peter Cantor who screened it at the start of every new course. Perhaps the time is right to dust down this film and put it to work once more!

Paul Foxall

Paul with credit roller from Braden’s Week.

6

| MEMORIES

REMINISCENCES OF A REVOLUTIONHarold Briley, former World Service Correspondent, reflects on the 40th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution.

The BBC is often criticised, but I had never before heard it blamed for fomenting a revolution and

causing the downfall of such a powerful leader as the Shah of Iran.

After he fled from Tehran in 1979, I had tracked him down to the remote island of Contadora off Panama, where he was living in exile under United States protection. I telephoned him seeking an interview but his wife answered my call saying he would never give the BBC an interview because ‘you brought down the Shah’.

She asserted that the BBC had given the revolution impetus by broadcasting to Iran an interview with Ayatollah Khomeini in exile in Paris.

Not content with her refusal, I walked towards the Shah’s house only to be arrested by Panamanian soldiers guarding him. They put me on a flight back to Panama City, where I made my escape.

A few months earlier, I had been in Iran reporting the revolution. I previously had a briefing in London from a Foreign Office Minister that the Shah was the

strongest ruler ensuring stability in a volatile region. That differed from a briefing from the head of the BBC Persian Service, Jon Dunne, that the Shah would be ousted within a year. He was right and the Foreign Minister wrong.

The BBC Farsi Service played a vital role, widely trusted for its accurate reporting. Even diplomats confined to the British Embassy asked me for briefings on the fighting. I witnessed fierce street fighting in which hundreds were killed. I watched a huge Chieftain tank pushing aside barricades, with a machine gun mounted on the turret mowing down fighters armed only with hand weapons, many of whom were carried into a nearby hospital where I took shelter.

A nurse tending to the wounded on the floor asked me why the British had sold these tanks to the Shah. I dared not reply they were for defence against Soviet attack and that UK policy was not to sell such weapons which could be used by regimes against their own people. I was astonished to see the tank taken out of action by hundreds of crude petrol bombs thrown from

surrounding flat rooftops. The BBC cameraman leaned his camera on my shoulder to film the scene.

One night, the BBC office was attacked by gunmen firing at the door. We lay on the floor with the lights switched off until they left.

I watched as the Shah’s palace, the United States embassy and the notorious Tehran prison were stormed. When the Shah fled and Khomeini flew back from Paris, I got him to talk into my microphone. He was accompanied on the Paris flight by John Simpson and his television crew.

It was a relief to leave Iran on an RAF flight evacuating traumatised British families to the safety of Cyprus.

I returned to Iran nine years later, helping a charity set up a camp for refugees driven across the Iraq border by Saddam Hussein.

Within a few months of reporting the Iran revolution I was reporting another revolution, this time in Nicaragua where the Sandinistas overthrew a military dictator.

Looking back – Around the World in 80 DaysThe February 2019 issue of Prospero asked for staff personally involved with the programmes featured to get in touch...

It was a great pleasure for me to be asked to mix the sound for some of the Around the World in 80 Days series with Michael Palin, and I have a distinct recollection of a brief but humorous incident which, to this day, can be heard on the first episode of the series which, as Prospero mentions, was transmitted on 11 October 1989.

Michael is frantically trying to find his cabin on a ship for the next stage of his voyage but is confronted by endless narrow passages with even more closed doors leading off. In continuing to try to find the one cabin allocated to him, he eventually tries a door which opens. He then quickly comes out and shuts the door, realising that it is certainly not his! He looks shocked and perplexed.

In keeping with Michael’s sense of humour and to emphasise his shocked expression on opening the door, I suggested that it would be fun to put a lady’s scream on the soundtrack just as he barged in! Director Roger Mills liked the idea and, having no appropriate recorded sound effect of ‘a shocked female scream’ to hand, I asked the Production Assistant if she would enter our studio and perform accordingly. After various takes, the selected scream forms a small but important part of the final soundtrack 37 minutes into Episode One!

That programme actually brought a nomination in the BAFTA Sound Awards the following year – I often wonder if the scream helped achieve this in some small way!

John Hale

Richard Baker: face the fansI thought Prospero readers might be interested in a story Richard Baker told us at supper one evening in Manchester after a recording of Face the Music, a BBC2 TV music quiz which I directed in 1970-74.

We always regarded Richard Baker as the solid core of the panel participants of Face the Music – Joyce Grenfell, Robin Ray and Bernard Levin regularly among them, quizzed from his dummy keyboard by the affable Joseph Cooper, who with Walter Todds had devised the programme and wrote the questions.

Face the Music depended on wit and conversation, and not so much as to what you knew as how you said it – and they all got on supremely well. It was, however, Richard Baker’s musical knowledge that went wider and with most depth. He was much in the public eye at the time – news-reading and presenting on BBC TV – and told his story with an attractive self-deprecatory charm.

Face the Music was then recorded ‘live’ as an OB, if I remember correctly in a former chapel in Dickenson Road, Manchester. Richard was travelling back to London by train late one evening and decided on dinner in the restaurant car. He rightly valued his privacy and took refuge behind the broadsheet – as it then was – of the Times newspaper and a pair of sunglasses.

By Watford, there was only one other diner left in the carriage. As the train made its final approach into Euston, this man plucked up the courage to walk the length of the empty tables to where Richard was sitting. ‘If you’ll excuse me’, he began, ‘I have been looking at you all the way from Stockport, and I want to know if you are Richard Baker?’

‘Yes I am,’ came the courteous reply.

‘No,’ continued his interrogator, ‘are you the real Richard Baker?’

‘Well, yes,’ said Richard, lowering his newspaper and taking off his dark glasses, modestly and somewhat hesitantly. ‘I suppose I am a real Richard Baker.’

‘Oh’, after a short pause, concluded his interrogator, ‘I am disappointed.’

Sic transit – literally, indeed – gloria.

Denis Moriarty

7PROSPERO APRIL 2019 |

BRIEFS, PINK KNICKERS AND PIC-NICKERSIn his autobiography, Memoir of a Medium Man, former broadcaster Paul Bonner brings to life the ground-breaking days of radio and television, interweaving insights and anecdotes with his personal life story. In this excerpt, Paul describes the making of a 1970 episode about leisure in Britain: The British Way of Fun and Games.

Communal gaspsBriefs, in a totally different context, were to feature again before the day was out. Our researcher, Christine Whittaker, had arranged for us, at the end of a hot day, to be given entry to the Port Talbot Steelworks staff swimming pool.

The changing room for men was totally communal – and huge, like an aircraft hangar. Desperate to get into the water I threw off my clothes and, as I took off my trousers, I heard what seemed to be a communal gasp from around me.

I had forgotten that, for comfort, I was in the habit of wearing Marks & Spencer women’s briefs, which offered much better support than the men’s pants of the time! Worse still, they had been in the wash with some red garment which had run and stained them pink. Effectively, many dozens of steelworkers were transfixed to see every stereotype of a media man fulfilled!

Held to ransomAnother sequence in The British Way of Fun and Games was to follow a lone climber up to the peak of the Brecon Beacons, then swing the helicopter round and pan up to see that marvellous wild landscape.

When we got to the peak we discovered there were two people enjoying a picnic underneath it, who would spoil the shot we’d planned. I couldn’t do without that sequence in the film, so there was nothing for it but to get the pilot to hover while I lowered myself out of the helicopter to ask the picnickers to move round to the other side of the peak so that they would not be in shot.

They were two middle-aged ladies, who were none too pleased to have their scenic lunch, which they’d expended enormous amounts of energy to achieve, so rudely interrupted.

They turned out to be skilled negotiators and, seeing that the helicopter was burning fuel and that I needed to get back into it fast, they demanded a fee for moving round the Beacon and hiding from the camera.

I eventually agreed to pay them £100 but had absolutely no cash on me at all. I scrambled back into the helicopter with difficulty and asked the cameraman or the pilot to lend me money. Geoff fortunately had his expenses with him and was able to lend me the cash. I then had to dismount from the helicopter, hand over the money and get back in again.

Not only was this an exhausting and slightly frightening process, but we had probably burned a lot more than £100’s worth of fuel in order to allow me to do the negotiation, get the money and film the sequence.

Memoir of a Medium Man is published by Matador Press and is available to order c/o TZ Productions, 5 Strand on the Green, London W4 3PQ, or online at www.troubador.co.uk/bookshop/autobiography

£10 incl. p&p (£2 from the sale of each book will be donated to the charity Combat Stress.)

ISBN 978-1-78901-738-0

The advertising industry was portraying ever more glamorous impressions of Britain at play. As a parody, I devised a sequence whereby a beautiful young woman would drive a Lotus sports car along an empty beach, pull up beside

the sea and dive in. It was supposed to be apparent that as she got out of the car she was, as was the fashion in advertising at the time, unclothed.

This was to be shot on the emptiest beach we could find, Pendine Sands in south Wales, using a model who agreed to appear without clothes.

When she arrived, the night before the filming, I greeted her and told her roughly what was expected of her. I failed to ask to see her naked – a fatal mistake, as it turned out.

The next morning the beautiful Lotus sports car and the beautiful girl were married up and I took off in the helicopter with Geoff Mulligan, the cameraman. We found precisely the height and angle that would catch her pulling up, getting out of the car and running into the sea.

It wasn’t going to be possible to do more than one take because the car tire marks were going to ruin the pristine stretch of sand. I gave the order for the car to start moving and the helicopter followed. The ground crew signalled for the car to pull up at an agreed point.

As the model got out and ran to the sea it became apparent, even from the air, that she appeared not to be naked. It turned out she had been to the Mediterranean on a previous shoot and the bikini marks from her sunbathing made it look from the air as if she was wearing a white bikini. So the sequence, as I had it in mind, was a failure.

I failed to ask to see her naked – a fatal mistake, as it turned out. Filming a Brecon Beacons

peak from the helicopter.

Paul Bonner (L) with the commentary team for The British Way of Fun and Games: June Whitfield, Garfield Morgan and John le Mesurier.

8

| MEMORIES

IT’S MAGICIt is generally agreed that when two excellent musicians get together, the result is far greater than the sum of the parts – so imagine my delight when the NDO Project received excellent recordings of Nigel Ogden and Johnny Roadhouse at the Playhouse Theatre Manchester, recorded in the early 80s.

The result really is ‘magic’ and the music on CD One is quite unique, embracing the extreme talents of Nigel and Johnny; indeed we know

of no other recordings on CD of Wurlitzer and saxophone duets.

Nigel Ogden celebrates 46 years of broadcasting this year, and for 38 of them was the presenter of Radio 2’s longest running specialist music programme, The Organist Entertains.

He has appeared ‘on the air’ on over 2,000 occasions and he is the only organist ever to have broadcast a Wurlitzer on Radio 3, playing classical items.

Nigel took over as presenter of ‘TOE’ and remained there until the programme was axed in 2018.

Listening to him perform live, usually without any music, is still a magical experience and it is well worth making the effort to hear any Wurlitzer, with him at the keyboard.

John Roadhouse was born in Sheffield in January 1921 and moved to Moss Side, Manchester as a child. He was given an old saxophone by his father, an amateur musician, and was self-taught.

In 1946 Roadhouse joined Teddy Foster’s orchestra. Johnny became a Manchester music legend, having started his BBC music career by joining the Northern Variety Orchestra in 1951, helping choose its musicians, and continuing to be lead saxophone with the Manchester Big Bands until the closure of the Northern Radio Orchestra in 1981.

He was a consummate musician and highly regarded in the Big Band scene, both for his charity work and in his regular performances with many symphony orchestras.

His distinctive warm and musical playing was always a delight. ‘I may be a bit short of technique but I’ve got by on sound and interpretation,’ Roadhouse once said.

In his spare time, he ran a music shop in central Manchester, now run by his family.

The Playhouse was also the home to the third BBC theatre organ. This Wurlitzer was originally in the Tower Ballroom between 1929 and 1935. When Reginald Dixon designed the new organ for the Tower in 1934/1935, the original one was enlarged and moved to the Empress Ballroom where it lived until 1970, when it was bought by the BBC and moved to the Playhouse, Manchester. It provided many inserts to the music shows of the era and was frequently used for various series, such as The Organist Entertains (TOE), I’m Glad, I’m Reg (featuring Reginald Dixon and Mrs Mills), and Meet Us At The Playhouse (Reginald Dixon with the NDO and John Hanson). Sadly, few recordings remain of this Wurlitzer, which makes our CDs somewhat unique.

The Playhouse theatre in Hulme, Manchester was also the BBC’s home for comedy and light music in the

North West for many years – the music and comedy which were produced there were indeed magic too. Les Dawson and many others performed in radio series there, and it also started the careers of many comedians and performers.

When it was sold in 1986, people were saddened that this was the end of an era, and indeed the end of the ‘Big Bands’ in Manchester too.

It came to pass in the early 80s that my colleague Peter Pilbeam had the pleasurable production task to combine the talents of these two musicians in a very unique way.

Peter had first met Johnny Roadhouse in 1953 when he moved to Manchester as principal sound mixer for the BBC Northern Variety Orchestra. He was soon appointed as a producer and had the privilege of working on the majority of their sessions between 1961 and 1974 when the NDO was disbanded.

He first met Nigel Ogden when the organist started playing regularly on TOE in 1972. Peter produced most of the recording sessions of the NDO at the Playhouse between 1972 and 1980. He can’t remember who first came up with the idea of combining the undoubted talents of these two fine musicians, but suffice it to say that this was a union of talents made for each other; Nigel playing the BBC Playhouse Wurlitzer to perfection, and Johnny playing his well worn alto saxophone with passion. We think that the arrangements were done by Pat Nash, but sadly the scores no longer exist.

The items on the first of this double CD set were recorded in stereo in three sessions between 1982 and 1985, and right from the first note it was obvious that the two soloists were on the same wavelength. We have also included tracks of Johnny with the NDO and solos of Nigel too.

Both musicians went on to have very successful careers, and we are privileged to have these rare stereo recordings of them combining their unique talents.

CD Two – vocalsI had always had it in mind to put on CD a collection of some unheard numbers by the NDO and NRO, and feature some of its excellent vocalists.

Vocals were an important part of the Band’s output, and only the best in the country were used. I think it is fair to say that the NDO certainly had little tolerance for those vocalists who were under-rehearsed, or who were unable to get it right after the second take. So what was recorded was always good, sometimes superb, and invariably the first take.

The material on CD2 goes back to the era of Alyn Ainsworth and forward to Bernard Herrmann, Neil Richardson and Brian Fitzgerald.

On CD Two is the very last recording of ‘Slaughter on 10th Avenue’ with Johnny Roadhouse – this was his ‘sig tune’, and this particular version is incredibly powerful and moving.

A massive thank you to my audio colleagues for providing such wonderful sounds for over 60 years,

and to our late researcher, Rod Cotter, whose knowledge of the history of the NDO was invaluable to us in producing the five NDO double albums we now have available. We have received the relevant permissions to make these available to the public in a strictly limited edition. They will not be available in music shops.

The NDO project CDs are only available direct from us and more details can be had by emailing us at: ndoinfo@tiscali.co.uk, or writing to: NDO MAILBOX, c/o J Roadhouse, 123 Oxford Rd, Manchester M1 7DU.

Please enclose an SAE.

Full details of all our CDs, and track listings can be found on our website: www.northerndanceorchestra.org.uk

Ian C ReedArchivist of all the regional BBC big bands

Johnny Roadhouse.

Nigel Ogden.

Johnny Roadhouse outside his music shop in Manchester.

‘I may be a bit short of technique but I’ve got by on sound and interpretation.’

9PROSPERO APRIL 2019 |

| OBITUARIES

BBC World Service bilingualistJohn Hadley died on 5 January in the St Peter & St James Hospice, Sussex, after a long struggle with cancer.

Born in Paris with dual British/French nationality, he spent the first 12 years of his life there until the outbreak of war in 1939.

Evacuated to his father’s home town, Northampton, he was subsequently re-joined by his British father and French mother and attended the local grammar school until 1945, when he was successful in gaining a place at Oriel College, Oxford to take a BA in Modern Languages.

On graduating in 1948, he was called up for National Service and recruited by Military Intelligence. Posted to Graz in Austria, he formed part of a unit engaged in post-conflict security.

Following ‘demob’, he was employed by the BBC as a bilingual studio manager in 1950, based at Bush House. Until 1960, he was involved in the production of French language news and current affairs broadcasts to France, which included live music sessions recorded with leading lights of the London jazz scene, such as Humphrey Lyttleton and Chris Barber.

From 1960, the remit of the French language service was extended to post-colonial Africa, the Magreb and the Middle East.

John was a broadcast journalist and programme producer from then on, rising to become acting Head of Service. In that capacity, he went on various tours to West and Central Africa and the Lebanon to meet correspondents and listeners.

In 1983 he was invited to do a lecture tour in the USA at the invitation of the State Department, who had an interest in his knowledge of Sub-Saharan Africa. One of those who welcomed him during that tour was one Bill Clinton, at that point Governor of Arkansas.

In 1986, the French Service was reorganised and John took early retirement. He continued to undertake freelance work; he was well respected as a voice-over artist and frequently translated film commentaries into French prior to recording them.

He lived quietly in East Sussex and is survived by his wife Denise (also originally BBC staff,) two children and two grandchildren.

Marc Hadley

Firm but fairDave Jagger was born in Huddersfield on Christmas Eve, 1926. He was always a proud Yorkshireman! He completed his RAF engineering apprenticeship as a wireless technician and saw active

service in the Middle East, working on Spitfires and Lancasters. He was involved in the Berlin Airlift of 1948/49. After 12 years he left the RAF to join BBC Transmitters.

He worked all over the UK at Rosemarkie, Morecambe Bay, Wenvoe and Selkirk. His last post was as transmitter manager, Winter Hill.

At Wenvoe, Dave was team leader of the Wenvoe Transmitter Maintenance Team (TMT). In its early days, the team, driving a Land Rover, maintained distant stations such as Liverpool, Tywyn, Machynlleth, Haverfordwest, Cardigan etc. Eventually these distant sites were maintained by new local team bases.

The introduction of UHF colour TV meant the Wenvoe team started to maintain the many UHF relay stations needed, particularly in the steep South Wales valleys.

As the WV Team’s ‘boss’, Dave was straightforward, to the point, and did not suffer fools gladly. If he rebuked you, it was probably quite necessary but there was never any bad feeling afterwards. You knew exactly where you were, then all was forgotten. His blunt and ‘tell it as it is’ style did not go down well sometimes with other managers however! He stood up for his team against, sometimes, quite unfair criticism from other managers.

Dave married Jean, whom he met after he was posted to RAF Shawbury, Shropshire. Jean was a nurse. They married and had a son Gareth and daughter Susan; both now live in Devon at opposite ends of the county. Dave was a proud grandfather.

After retirement in 1987, they moved from Horwich to Llanidloes in Mid-Wales. They enjoyed many holidays, usually Tenerife and France. Dave was a wine lover and connoisseur, so long as it was Cote de Rhone Villages! He was a Radio Amateur GW3KAJ who built most of the equipment himself, to a very high standard of workmanship, but he had not been on-air for a while now.

He was a fine man, engineer, manager, great friend and colleague.

Peter Condron

Pebble Mill costume designerThere has never been, nor will there ever be, anyone quite like Kathryn Steventon (nee Ayerst).

However you came to know Kathryn, and whatever role she played in your life, I’m sure that you will never forget her.

She had many qualities and quirks that defined who she was, and kindness, generosity, selflessness, loyalty and an ever-so-slightly fierce nature were all part of what made her the Kathryn you all knew and loved.

Kathryn was born and raised in St Leonards on Sea, the youngest of three girls. After school she studied at Brighton Art College before moving to London

She joined the BBC in 1970, starting in the Costume Workroom at TVC. She worked her way through the Department, becoming a dresser and eventually a costume assistant. She moved to BBC Pebble Mill and assisted on the original Poldark and many other productions, until becoming a designer when she designed Nanny, All Creatures Great and Small, Public Enemy No.1, An Actor’s Life For Me, Nice Work, and many other productions.

After 23 years in the BBC she was made redundant and started her own business doing dressmaking and alterations from home, while bringing up her son Thomas. Nothing was more important to Kathryn than her family and friends, and her love nurtured bonds that would never be broken.

Her creativity was limitless – as well as her flair for costume and design, she did textile printing, jewellery- making, life drawing, photography and was an active member of the WI and a Book Club – which she still went to even when she hadn’t read the books.

Kathryn had a 10-year battle with cancer that eventually took her from us. Throughout her illness she carried on regardless. A force to be reckoned with and a true friend. She died on 22 August 2018, three weeks after her 70th birthday party.

Maggie Harwood

Movie expertKen Locke quit school in Brisbane Australia at 14 and didn’t go back. From the moment he saw a battered print of Battleship Potemkin at the local fleapit, film editing was what he wanted to do, though he trained as an engraver. A modest multiskilled

man with a massive IQ, he read and thought ceaselessly all his life.

He became a BBC trainee film editor in 1964. He worked on a variety of TV programmes like Jeremy Isaac’s ground-breaking Panorama. When, much later, he applied to be Head of Film Examination, Programme Acquisitions, his application contained the unabashed truth: ‘I know a lot about movies.’ The then long-haired Ken was often to be found at late night classics shows at the Electric Cinema in Portobello Road, along with his daughters. Great films are education!

In those days when the BBC showed more movies than anyone, Film Exam was the perfect place for a passionate believer in film preservation. Ken sought to honour the colour grading and sound quality as originally intended by DP, film editor and composer, by contacting retired cameramen and film editors in the UK and USA.

One newspaper called him the ‘BBC’s Censor in Chief’, because he had to seamlessly re-edit adult feature films to comply with family TV viewing requirements. He had to reduce or edit out violent/sex scenes and swearing. He had to cope with bizarre US studio euphemisms in their different prints for different markets. ‘Mother-f***er!’ had been turned into ‘Melon-farmer!’

In collaboration with fellow BBC film editor Keith Wilton, Ken talked at British Film Collectors Conventions about film music, camerawork and editing. He wrote his own commentaries for dvds Keith created, celebrating the creativity and skills of feature film technicians and the movies they made. For Ken, almost every movie, however mediocre, had some craftsmanlike moments to admire.

He bubbled with wisecracks from his life and from movies. His entertaining presence will be sadly missed, especially by his loving wife Annette, his daughters and his son.

Julius Hogben & Les Filby

Master of COPPERMichael Crotty passed away on 22 January, aged 82. He used to say, quite proudly, that he was born in Westminster Hospital in central London.

Michael joined the BBC as a ‘tea boy’, as he put, just before he was called up for National Service. He was a touch typist (trained in a technical college). He won the top prize in the RAF typing competition and became a secretary of the Bomber Commander in High Wycombe. He apparently worked in a bunker, day and night, during the Mau Mau uprising and the Suez crisis.

After returning to the Beeb, Michael soon had a post in Salaries, which had just installed a computer system for the first time. He became the operator after some training, but said he was horrified – and somewhat overwhelmed – when he first saw the computer, which was the size of a house.

COPPER (Central Office of Personnel and Pension Electronic Records) was Michael’s last post in the Beeb. It lasted many years and he became the master of it. He, in fact, initiated the COPPER system, which developed into the BBC’s computerised personnel records system. Most people who worked in Staff Records knew how good Michael was, mentioning he was an excellent and delightful trainer with such patience.

10

| OBITUARIES

Sandy MulkeenSandy Mulkeen has died near her home in the village of Taurinya in the foothills of Le Canigou, France.

She graduated with an MA in English Literature and History of Fine Art from Glasgow University, going on to Strathclyde University where she gained a Post-Graduate Diploma in Business Studies and then worked in the Publicity Department of the BBC Transcription Service at Kensington House in Shepherd’s Bush.

On leaving the BBC, she started her own publicity and design business and after living for some years in rural Dorset with her two soul mates, BBC TRU engineers Dave Mulkeen and Pete Freshney (pictured above with her), she turned to writing under the pen name of Mairi Craw.

‘Beyond the Hedge’ was the first of a series of novels inspired by her childhood in Scotland. The three friends, often referred to as ‘The Three Musketeers’, moved to rural France with all their numerous pets, and her second book, ‘Between Two Worlds’ followed. Both books are available on Kindle and as audio books. ‘Beyond the Hedge’ was also adapted for radio and stage.

Sandy had found it hard to cope following the deaths of both Dave and Pete and following an accident earlier in the year, had withdrawn from her previous daily posts on Twitter and Facebook. She is missed by her many former colleagues, friends in France and those that followed her on social media, both as Sandy Mulkeen and Mairi Craw.

Her funeral took place on 12 December 2018 in her adopted village in France.

Martin (Tom) Tranter

Camera supervisor BBC Wales

Leslie George Ager was born in 1924 and brought up in North London. He joined the BBC as a junior maintenance engineer in 1941 and was posted to the Daventry Transmitter. He saw service in the RAF in the latter years of the war and on demob rejoined the BBC at Alexandra Palace

before moving to the OB base at Palace of Arts, Wembley as a cameraman.

He transferred to Cardiff in 1956 as senior cameraman in the fledgling BBC Wales TV Unit and became one of the most well-known and valued members of the region.

Although he did his studio stints, it was on OBs that Les felt most at home and where his flair and instinct in the live and often unrehearsed situations proved their worth.

Les reached the BBC retirement age of 60 in October 1984 – his last day was on a rugby OB from Neath; he was interviewed after the game by commentator David Parry Jones for the weekend rugby programme the following day. At his official farewell party, the speech of Geraint Stanley Jones (Controller, Wales), perfectly illustrated the respect and affection that was felt for Les throughout BBC Wales.

Les and Gill, who was a BBC PBX operator before they married, together with son Christian, then moved to Llandudno and, as there was a shortage of cameramen in BBC Manchester, Les was soon, once again, a BBC cameraman! Not one to sit around, in 1985 Les was also elected to the Council of the Guild of Television Cameramen and became the Sponsor Liaison Officer for the next 25 years. In 2009 he was awarded Fellowship of the Guild, having just turned 85, and retired as he felt the need to start taking things a little easier!

Les had a fall about four years ago and suffered a brain haemorrhage which affected his memory and mobility; when his condition deteriorated further, he needed 24-hour care. He died peacefully at the nursing home on 15 December aged 94.

Our condolences are with Gill, son Christian, daughter Beverley and the rest of his family.

John Cavaciuti

Consummate lighting professionalIt is with sadness that I have to report that Tony Escott died on 29 January.

In the early 1950s Tony was an enterprising bobby on the beat in Cardiff until, in the mid-50s, he joined BBC Wales, gaining experience in sound and cameras before finding his niche in TV lighting.

He became a lighting supervisor, later TM1, and for some 30 years worked on a variety of major programmes, excelling in such dramas as The Old Devils, District Nurse and the famous (but controversial) Life and Times of Lloyd George.

He was a consummate professional and his lighting technique was recognised by all who worked with him.

Socially he was the epitome of a ‘Bon Vivant’, a hail fellow well met gregarious character who was never happier than when playing host at a celebration he

Michael Thomas FlynnBorn in Battersea in 1938, Michael Flynn had the good fortune to be educated at Emanuel, satisfying his thirst for knowledge and giving him an enduring passion for social justice. A month-long stay in Tournon on a school exchange

opened his eyes to the world of French cinema, a key influence in his future career choice.

From Exeter University he went to teach English in Saint Raphael, then to Paris for a course in French literature and on to Spain, tour guiding, before joining the BBC as a trainee film editor.

When Alexandra Palace became home to the new BBC Open University Service in 1971, Mike decided to join the pioneers. Here editors, producers, directors, film and studio crews, designers and academics would work and socialise together. The experience cemented in Mike a passion for film-making as a creative collaboration.

Mike returned to mainstream television in 1981, finding a new home at Kensington House. Here he cut some celebrated films: No Ordinary Genius, and The Pleasure of Finding Things Out, with producer Christopher Sykes, exploring the brilliance of Richard Feynman. With Peter Gordon he cut the BBC2 Grierson Award finalist War Grave, and the BBC2 RTS award-winning series and BAFTA-nominated Breaking Point. He also had a BAFTA craft nomination for Airport, one of the early ‘Fly on the Wall’ documentaries.

At his funeral in December, directors, producers and former assistants remembered the magic of Mike’s cutting room. Always deeply engaged, he brought the material to life and greater clarity, searching and testing ideas. And there was the personal pleasure of working with him: his wit, intellect and lack of ego. During inevitable lulls, conversation could touch on contemporary French film, the flight patterns of the goldfinch, problems in the Chelsea midfield, the best novels of Saul Bellow, where to find the greatest fish and chips in central London and family life.

Mike was a rock, strong and stable, reliable and generous, emphatic and caring. Survived by his wife Sally, children Tom and Hannah, and four grandchildren, he will be missed by all who had the good fortune to know him.

Sally Flynn

Edward de Bono‘The only person I have ever met who’d use a word like terpsichore in normal conversation. Somehow that says a lot about the way he was. One-of-a-kind.’ So said a Group 2 radio colleague of Edward de Bono, former studio manager, who died suddenly at his London home in February, aged 67.

Brought up in Philby’s Lebanon, ‘Ted’ was formed by the humour of Spike Milligan and the sound of rock’n’roll, courtesy of the BBC World Service from Cyprus.

Music and radio was his life. So it seemed only natural to follow university with a job at Auntie.

Ted’s first music session in 1974 was with a solo Cliff Richard and guitar: heaven for this lapsed catholic who had every Shadows record.

There followed nearly 30 years of producing and engineering rock, pop, jazz and drama for all the networks and commercial release with artists great and small – Madonna to U2, Andy Williams to

In his free time, Michael enjoyed being a member of the Ruislip Dramatic Society, and they regularly performed in Winston Churchill Hall in Ruislip. He took several major parts in numerous shows, including many of Noel Coward’s plays. He then later took the producer’s role in the Society. Some old members recalled that no other person ever did the job as well as Michael.

Michael was a man of such compassion and would do anything to help a person in need. Apparently, one of his line managers said to him, ‘Your problem is you’re too nice to everyone.’

In his later life, he began to suffer from ill-health; the most recent illnesses eventually took him away.

Yubill C Kang, Michael’s partner

had organised for colleagues or friends. His hospitality was legendary and was lifelong.

Tony retired in 1989 to Italy in the small village of Cima on the shores of Lake Lugano where he bought a beautiful apartment with spectacular views of the lake. He and his wife Mary soon became fluent Italian speakers and they both spent some 25 years teaching English to Italian business people, making many friends in the process.

Several ex-colleagues visited them in Cima, enjoying the continuing renowned hospitality but Tony and Mary also travelled the length and breadth of the continent to share holidays with friends. In our case they joined us in Umbria, Switzerland, Alassio, Stresa and Rapallo with all the usual bonhomie and camaraderie.

Retirement also allowed Tony to pursue his passion for painting, in particular his penchant for intricate pen and ink sketches of quaint Italian locations. Sadly it all came to a sudden end on 29 January, just 11 days short of his 90th birthday, and our thoughts are now with Mary and his family as we pay homage to someone who was so influential to us all, both professionally and socially.

Oliver Dyer

11PROSPERO APRIL 2019 |

Gentleman engineer Ops & Project PlanningClive Rickerby, who passed away in September 2018, was born in Devon in 1950. He is best described in the words of a colleague as ‘a gentleman engineer who derived satisfaction from carrying out any given task to the highest possible professional standard’.

Clive started work at the BBC in London in 1969 and spent the whole of his career working on BBC communications in both Operations and Project Planning. Implementation of projects involved close contact with other BBC departments and British Telecom, so Clive’s tact, polite and friendly manner, and good understanding of the subject was a great benefit to both the BBC and BT.

Initially Clive worked mainly on audio systems but later became a telephone specialist responsible for the installation of telephone exchanges and other telephone requirements around the UK. In turn he was based at London BH, then Warwick and finally at Wood Norton for Siemens when telephone work was sub-contracted out by the BBC.

When talking to Clive, it often seemed a long time before he responded to a question or comment but with good cause, as when his answer came it was always well thought out and backed up with reason.

Clive was a railway enthusiast but also a member of the BBC Staff Club, through which he enjoyed rambling and canal boat activities. This widened his circle of friends in other parts of the BBC. After retirement, Clive made a point of staying in touch with his many friends and attending reunions with ex BBC colleagues despite the increasing difficulty caused by illness.

Some years ago Clive suffered from cancer and although it was dealt with at the time, it returned several years later. Despite increasing difficulties and pain, Clive maintained a positive outlook and undertook much travelling to take pleasure in his interests and visiting family members.

As his illness progressed his wife Debbie was a tower of strength and great help in giving Clive the opportunity to continue enjoying his interest in these activities. Our condolences go to Debbie and Barbara, their daughter.

Chris Dale, Martin Ellen, Ken Turner

Peter BalePeter joined the BBC in Bristol in 1943 as a Youth in Training with, in his words ‘all the will in the world to discover the true magic of broadcasting’. He was called up in 1946 and within six months he was posted as Officer Commanding Radio Trieste for British Forces Broadcasting. At last he was close to the microphone.

Following demob, Peter rejoined the BBC as a junior programme engineer in London, transferring back to Bristol a year later and being appointed the mobile topicality radio reporter. In this capacity he reported from the top of the Devonport Column on the return of HMS Amethyst to Plymouth in November 1949 and Truro Cathedral spire – climbing up the outside to get an interview with the steeplejack. Whilst a reporter he married Mary Ashdown, with whom he had four children.

With the arrival of the first television OB unit in Bristol, Peter was appointed as the stage manager and January 1954 saw the first live OB from Slimbridge. Thus began Peter’s enthusiasm for the use of electronic cameras to bring the immediacy of animal behaviour to the viewer. In 1955 he was appointed Television OB producer West Region and for 20 years he covered all sport, Morning Service, Songs of Praise, Come Dancing and major events such as Sir Francis Chichester’s return to Plymouth in 1967, Concorde 002 maiden flight and the Review of the Fleet in July 1969.

Peter also made films for the Natural History Unit and in 1975 he pioneered the use of infrared cameras for Badgerwatch, the forerunner of today’s Winterwatch. He subsequently produced the first Birdwatch programmes from Slimbridge and Minsmere and was editor of the BBC1 series Wildlife on One, always encouraging young directors to fulfil their potential.

Peter retired in 1983 and with Mary moved to live on the edge of Exmoor. He moved back to Bristol when Mary died and we married in 2006. Peter died peacefully in his sleep on 19 January 2019 aged 91. He leaves a large family and will be remembered with great affection by all who knew him.

Liz Bale

A man of many talentsAnybody who worked with Stanley Morcom, a man of many talents, will remember him for his immaculate appearance, precise and positive manner and his good-humoured nature. They will also recall his critical ear when it came

to television sound and the high standard of his work.

Stan was from Ottery St Mary in Devon. His full and varied BBC career commenced as a youth in training on a small transmitter in the Exeter area. Following this he moved to London and Alexandra Palace to join those who worked on the resumption of the Television Service after the war. With the expansion of television he continued his career at Lime Grove, applying his skills in the days of live light entertainment programmes and ambitious music programmes.

Then, leaving studios behind him, he transferred to the Film Unit as a sound recordist working on locations as diverse as football stadiums or the streets of Paris

A woman of PropertyJane Macfarlane, who joined the BBC’s Architect’s Department in 1988, and left BBC Property in 2006, died in July 2018 aged 65.

Following her Convent School education at Woldingham, Jane

read History of Art and Italian at Trinity College, Dublin, which she loved. She started a second degree in Architecture at Cardiff University, which she did not enjoy, spent two years working in Hong Kong and travelling around SE Asia, and at last completed her second degree, followed by a Master’s at the Bartlett School of Architecture.

At the BBC, Jane was chiefly based within BBC Property. Major projects included the development of a second extension to Broadcasting House known as BHXX (the first home of Radio Five Live), new studios for BBC Radio Training, and the development and restoration of the listed parts of Television Centre. Jane’s passion for all things artistic meant that she always encouraged the inclusion of art in building projects.

Jane was a consummate professional, meticulous, hard-working and talented. Articulate and independently minded, she was for many years a rare female in BBC Property.

Endlessly fascinated by new experiences, places and people, immediately after leaving the BBC Jane completed an intensive TEFL course and headed for Buenos Aires in Argentina, where she lived for two happy years.

A keen sportswoman, Jane was unusually fearless and this enabled her to enjoy activities like parachute-jumping. Her love of the theatre, ballet and the arts generally culminated in her becoming a Trustee of the Unicorn Theatre for 10 years, helping to fundraise for and oversee the construction of its new theatre on the South Bank.

Jane’s battle with breast cancer began in 1994. After major surgery she was given the all-clear, but it returned in 2015. She met each hurdle with courage and grace, refusing to be self-pitying. Unafraid of dying, she was simultaneously determined to fight the disease, and yet almost matter of fact about her condition and the probable outcome.

Jane loved life and lived it to the full to the last. She died peacefully at home in Chiswick surrounded by all four of her siblings.

Rebecca Tippetts

Terry Wogan, B.B. King to Carl Perkins, Philip Glass to the Fall and two decades-worth of John Peel sessions.

‘Ted was the person I most wanted to work with,’ said Alec Reid, award-winning producer of cutting-edge drama.

‘He was always so kind and patient with me in our endless hours at Maida Vale when I had no idea what I was doing, really,’ agreed producer/presenter Mark Radcliffe.

‘A sweet and elegant man…with the most exceptional level of skill and attention to minute sonic detail,’ wrote Annie Lennox of Eurythmics.

For SM James Birtwistle, the ‘Ted de Bono BBC tuna sandwich modification’ lives on: when he discovered that a shot of Lea & Perrins sauce had a positive effect on the edibility of this boring canteen staple, ‘…Ted felt it was his duty to impart this knowledge to as many of our colleagues as possible over the years.’

Ted was a surround-sound and digital pioneer; had an encyclopaedic knowledge; a generous nature, and a mischievous sense of humour, remembered by all who met him.

He is survived by his younger brother John de Bono, a TV producer.

John de Bono

filming episodes of Maigret. The next move was as a sound mixer in film dubbing, where he made his mark working on many prestigious programmes, including Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Ken Russell’s The Debussy Film and editions of Omnibus and Monitor.

Taking early retirement in 1980, Stan turned his interest to antiques, where he applied his skills to restoration and to the study and appreciation of oriental works of art. His single-minded devotion to a project was a quality envied by many.

Stan, who died in his 91st year, much enjoyed family life. Married to Sue, a former make-up artist for 59 years, they spent many holidays cruising together. They had two daughters, Deborah and Sarah, four grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

Up until recently, he still enjoyed the daily challenge of solving the Telegraph crossword in the comfort of their Ealing home which, over the years, he’d lovingly restored.

He’ll be greatly missed by his family and friends.

Brian Hawkins

We received a large number of obituaries for this issue so we have had to hold the following back, to appear in the June issue: Anne Catchpole, Rowland Warne, Terence ‘Tex’ Childs, Charles Hutchison, Tony Newbery, Geoff Sherlock, Harry Ransome-Rose and Dennis Dick.

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| ODDS & ENDS

CLASSIFIEDS

Prospero Classifieds, BBC Pension and Benefits Centre, Broadcasting House, Cardiff CF5 2YQ.

Please enclose a cheque made payable to: BBC Central Directorate. Rate: £6 for 20 words. In a covering letter, please include your pension number.

Queries For benefit and pension payroll queries, call the Service Line on 029 2032 2811 or email mypension@bbc.co.uk.

Prospero To remove a name from the distribution list, ring the Service Line on 029 2032 2811. Prospero is provided free of charge to retired BBC Scheme members only. Prospero is also available on audio disc for those with sight impairment. To register, please ring the Service Line. Alternatively, it is also available online at bbc.co.uk/mypension, under ‘Documents’.

BBC Club The BBC Club in London has a retired membership costing £3 per month or £36 per year. Members can also add friends and family to their membership for a small additional cost. Regional clubs may have different arrangements. Please call the BBC Club London office on 020 8752 6666 or email bbc.club@bbc.co.uk for details, or to join.

Benevolent Fund This is funded by voluntary contributions from the BBC and its purpose is to protect the welfare of staff, pensioners and their families.

Grants are made at the discretion of the Trustees. They may provide assistance in cases of unforeseen financial hardship, for which help from other sources is not available. Tel: 029 2032 2811

Prospero Society Prospero Society is the only section of the BBC Club run by and for retired BBC staff and their spouses. Its aim is to enable BBC pensioners to meet on a social basis for theatre visits, luncheons, coach outings, etc.

Prospero Society is supported by BBC Club funds so as to make events affordable. If you would like an application form, please contact:

Gayner Leach, BBC Club, BC2 B3 Broadcast Centre, 201 Wood Lane, London W12 7TP

Tel: 020 8752 6666

Email: bbc.club@bbc.co.uk.

BBCPA The BBCPA was founded in 1988 to promote and safeguard the interests of BBC pensioners. It is independent of the BBC. For details of how to join, see the panel below or download a membership form at bbcpa.org.uk.

CONTACTS

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Venice, Giudecca. Beautiful apartment in private, quiet courtyard, sleeps 5, fully equipped. Experience the real Venice. Tel: 07513 455655 Email: maggieharwood1@btinternet.com

Menorca. Lovely detached villa in Es Castell. Sleeps 2-7. Private swimming pool. Air conditioned. Close amenities. Brochure: 01621 741810. Or visit www.menorcaholidayvilla.co.uk

Paper boats, The Burning of Teignmouth and Shaldon, 1690BBC pensioner Sheila Aldous, who worked at the Advertising Department of the Radio Times when it was based at Marylebone High Street, recently completed her MA in Creative Writing, and has just published her first poetry collection.

Paper Boats, The Burning of Teignmouth and Shaldon, 1690 is based on the last invasion on English soil. The event occurred in 1690 when over 1,000 French sailors invaded Teignmouth and Shaldon in Devon. These villages were completely razed to the ground and all livestock, along with the inhabitants’ cottages, churches, fishing boats and their shipbuilding industry were destroyed. Sheila leant about this event during her research for her MA. Intrigued by the history, she found that few people today are aware of it, and this inspired her to write her collection.

The poetry in the collection is written in contemporary style with some use of modern and traditional forms. It uses the natural world of sea and riverscape to permeate the poems with tales of terror and destruction. Paper Boats is written from the perspective of characters moving through time within the haunting landscape of the Teign valley. It moves from the present day with people who have discovered the event and are imagining what happened, to characters actually living through the fire, the effects on them and the aftermath, which delivers a ‘cry from the past’.

BBC Bristol Retired Staff Christmas PartyAround 40 retired staff enjoyed a celebration dinner at Whiteladies Road on Thursday 13 December, which was hosted by Rob Jones and Kate Chaney.

John Adams

Caption competitionThe winner of a £10 shopping voucher is retired film editor, Alan Avery: ‘Didn’t you see the warning on the bottle about the possible side effects of using banana essence shampoo?’

Post your entry to Prospero by Tuesday, 7 May 2019.

Or, you can email your entry to prospero@bbc.co.uk, with ‘caption competition 2’ in the subject line.

Please include your BBC pension number. Good luck!

WIN£10

The picture shows Bruce Forsyth and Sylvia Sims on the Generation Game.

Paper Boats, The Burning of Teignmouth and Shaldon, 1690 (ISBN: 978-1-910834-97-8) is available to purchase from Waterstones, Indigo Dreams, or direct from Sheila Aldous - PaperBoatsTeignmouth@gmail.com

Yorkshire pensioners: save the date The Reunion/Pensioners’ Lunch for the Yorkshire Region will once again be held at the very popular Dower House Hotel, Knaresborough on Thursday 15 August, 12.30 for 1pm.

Come along and catch up with your former colleagues and meet new acquaintances. Enjoy good food and good company!

Please will you pass on this information to any colleagues who may not know about this popular get together. For any further information please contact Sue Pagdin 0113 2612613 or email spagdin1@aol.com