Rambling on for 70 Years

Home , BBC South West, Donald Crowhurst, Fyfe Robertson, Wogan House

The newspaper for retired BBC Pension Scheme members • December 2018 • Issue 6 PROSPERO

RAMBLING ON PENSION FOR 70 YEARS SCHEME PAGE 12 | BACK AT THE BBC BBC PENSIONER LIAISON MEETING – 25 OCTOBER 2018

The 2018 BBC Pensioner Liaison Meeting was held on 25 October in the Council Chamber at Broadcasting House.

Prospero is published bi-monthly and sent to around financial crash/sell-off of 2008). The Scheme has 10,000 pensioners. In addition, there are around 1,000 therefore shown strong performance, although it is downloads of the online version. Following feedback unlikely that this will be sustained as markets are challenging the use of unrecyclable polywrap, Jeff currently so high. was pleased to report that from December 2018, Highest funding level in a decade Prospero will be wrapped in a new recyclable material, In March 2018 the Scheme’s asset value was which will come at no additional cost. The only £16.5 billion, and while both assets and liabilities downside is that the magazine will shrink by 18mm, have increased, the deficit has reduced and the but this is a small price to pay given the benefits. funding ratio of assets to liabilities stands at 94% Bill Matthews Catherine Claydon The myPension online service is available to all – the best for ten years. Scheme members. Following an engagement Brexit is a cause for concern for the Investment he meeting began with an introduction and campaign to let members know it is available and Committee and the Trustees, who are all working hard overview by Chair of the Trustee, Bill Matthews, invite them to log on, 30% of pensioners have signed to ensure the portfolio is sufficiently robust to Twho is standing down at the end of the year up for the service, which allows them to view withstand a range of outcomes and to make benefits and being replaced by a new Independent Trustee, and print payslips, P60s and annual pension increase more secure. Asset allocation has changed, and equity Catherine Claydon. letters, all of which are stored for future access if holdings have reduced from well over 40% of the Bill reported that in terms of performance, the needed. Users can also update their records, including portfolio in 2012 to less than 20% today. Scheme is not far from doubling its asset base since contact details, bank details and nominated he was first appointed seven years ago, and there had beneficiaries. There are a number of members with James summarised by saying that assets are at record been a significant increase in the funding ratio of more than one BBC pension, and all the information levels despite market sell-off; the team is planning for assets to liabilities. He also said that, as a result of this can be viewed together on myPension online. Brexit within the context of uncertainty by taking a improvement in the Scheme’s finances, the Pension In addition, active Scheme members can run very long view, making sensible long-term Trust’s dealings with the Pensions Regulator had been calculations to show what their pension is worth investments and not taking more risk than needed. significantly less challenging than other pension today and get pension forecasts at retirement age. As a result, investment policy is now less risky than at schemes have found recently. However, the Scheme Jeff hailed myPension online as a ‘gamechanger’ that any stage in the past, which is appropriate for the still has a deficit of around £1 billion and remains puts the BBC at the forefront of the pensions industry. current circumstances. dependent on a recovery plan that requires the In terms of data protection, he reassured the audience Revised constitution support of the BBC. It is therefore in everyone’s that the online system is accessible only to members Finally, John Cullen, Scheme CEO talked about interests that the BBC continues to perform well. and the staff at the pensions centre in Cardiff; there is changes to the constitution of the BBC Pension Trust. The deficit recovery plan has been timed to run until no access for third-parties. At the beginning of 2017 there was a board of nine just after the end of the current BBC Charter, which The August mailing to all members to build trustees. Bill Matthews (Chair) was appointed by the ends on 31 December 2027. engagement with myPension online included a BBC Trust, four Trustees were appointed by the BBC Finally, there was praise for the pensions admin team branded stylus pen. A member of the audience and four were elected by Scheme members (one in Cardiff who, Bill said, had done an ‘absolutely questioned the cost of this and Jeff reported that the pensioner, three active). wonderful job’ over the past 12 months. He singled out campaign had increased the number of registered As part of the new BBC Charter, the BBC Trust was the rebranding of the Scheme, which was achieved members from 4,000 to 13,500, and therefore should abolished, and it was decided to change the cost effectively and has clarified the differences be seen as an investment to ensure myPension online constitution of the BBC Pension Trust by creating between the sections of the Scheme while giving is used. Jeff reiterated that myPension online is an three new independent professional Trustee positions everything a consistent feel. additional service offered to members, but they can in addition to the four Trustees appointed by the A new era of Scheme communications still deal with the pensions team in Cardiff by phone BBC and the four elected by members. So now there and post if they prefer. Jeff Webley, BBC Pension Scheme Operations and are 11 Trustees in total. Communications Manager, then took the stage and Confirmation of details mailing brought the audience up to date on developments The Pensions Regulator requires that the Scheme in Cardiff. Jeff has day-to-day responsibility for keeps up-to-date records on spouses and dependants. the administration team, the pension service line, In mid-November a letter was sent out with a form the communications team and the volunteer asking members to confirm these details. This can also visiting scheme. be done through myPension online. This request for He spoke first about the recent member survey updated details is nothing sinister, but members carried out in May 2018, which took a slightly different should contact the pension service line with any approach to previous surveys by asking fewer queries they might have. questions and focusing on four specific areas: The next speaker was James Duberly from the myPension online, Scheme branding, Prospero and investment team, which comprises five people who the volunteer visiting scheme. There was a fantastic work alongside external fund managers to look after response with over 4,000 members responding, the Scheme’s investments. James said that the an increase of 76% compared with the last survey objectives of the Scheme are to pay benefits as they in 2015. Some 60% of respondents were pensioners, fall due and to be fully funded by 2028. The current three-quarters of whom said they valued or highly deficit of around £1 billion is being reduced valued the volunteer visiting service and Prospero. through a combination of investment returns and However, only 37% or respondents had noticed the deficit-recovery contributions from the BBC. new Scheme branding, which was revised to give a clearer identity to Scheme communications and Speaking about investment returns, James reported provide comfort in this age of pension scams, and that in 2017/18 the Scheme showed a 7% return. only 56% of people were aware of the myPension For comparison, the five-year average is 11.6% p.a. and online service. the ten-year average is 8.9% p.a. (which includes the

2 The reasoning behind this decision is that the Trustee, Catherine Claydon, from January 2019, management of the Scheme is now more complex leaving a vacancy for another Independent from than ever before in terms of investment, standards of the same date. PROSPERO governance and communications, and it was felt that Bill Matthews, Jeff Webley and James Duberly then the lay Trustees would find it increasingly valuable to returned to the stage to take audience questions on Prospero is provided free of charge to retired Scheme have professional Trustees working alongside them on topics ranging from how the Trustees are paid to life members, or to their spouses and dependants. the Board. As a result, the Trust Deed was changed in expectancy and the Scheme’s investments in large Prospero provides a source of news on former December 2017 and the new constitution came into tech firms that have been criticised for their colleagues, developments at the BBC and pension effect from January 2018. tax-avoidance practices. issues, plus classified adverts. It is available online at Bill Matthews moved into one of the independent John Cullen closed the meeting by thanking bbc.co.uk/mypension Trustee positions and has continued to chair the everyone for attending and assuring them that To advertise in Prospero, please see page 12. Board through this period of change before stepping comments and feedback would be taken on board, down at the end of 2018. He will be replaced as particularly on the issue of member representation Please send your editorial contributions, Chair by the recently appointed Independent on the Board. or comments/feedback, to: Prospero, BBC Pension and Benefits Centre, Broadcasting House, Cardiff CF5 2YQ

Prospero & plastic Email: [email protected] Plastic is an issue that is very much on people’s minds, especially after the Blue Planet II’s uncompromising Please make sure that any digital pictures you send look earlier this year at the impact of human activity on marine life. The BBC pensions team has quickly are scanned at 300dpi. Please also note that the taken on board feedback received during the member survey, that Prospero is contributing to the problem maximum word count for obituaries is 350 words. by being issued in unrecyclable plastic wrap. Prospero is designed as an oversized A3 newsletter, to give it a ‘tabloid’ look and feel – but this means it won’t fit into a normal C4 envelope. Having spoken to our printer and designer, we have shaved a few centimetres off the size so that we can now use envelopes instead of plastic wrap. Contents

Letters 4-5 Crospero devised and compiled by Jim Palm Memories 6-8 1 2 Complete the square by using the clues (across words only). Then take these words - From Nazis to the Lamb Bank 3 4 5 in numerical order and extract the letter - BBC hostels & the Summer of Love indicated by a dot from each (take two - Berkshire pensioners get-together 6 7 8 from 12 and 13). If correct, you will reveal someone who is always around at this time 9 10 of year. Back at the BBC 9 11 CLUES 1. Oblong block (3); 2. Squeeze (5); - On set with Father Brown 12 13 3. Copy recording (3); 4. Plaything (3); - BBC consults on licence fee concessions 5. Trail behind (3); 6. International alphabet - BBC team develops fix for ‘streaming latency’ 14 (3); 7. Implement (3); 8. Consumed (3); 9. Russian building (5); 10. Wager (3); 15 16 11. Spoil (3); 12. Marshy grass (5); 13. Enrich with gift (5); 14. Total (3); Obituaries 10-11 17 18 19 15. Stitch (4); 16. Dwelling place (5); 17. Formerly (3); 18. Period (3); 19. Drink (3); 20 21 22 20. Equal quantities (3); 21. Tot up (3); 23 24 22. Conducted (3); 23. Take on board (5); Odds and ends 12 24. Expose to moisture (3) - BBC Rambling Club – 70 years - Caption competition Please send your answers in an envelope marked ‘Crospero’ to The Editor, Prospero, WIN - Classifieds BBC Pension and Benefits Centre, Broadcasting House, Cardiff CF5 2YQ, £10 by Monday, 7 January 2019. The winner will receive a £10 voucher.

Mystery Sudoku L P A E Complete the grid so that every row, column and M 3x3 box contains the letters AEGLMOPRT in some order. One row or column contains a five or more M R L O Prospero December 2018 letter word, title or name with a BBC connection. The next issue of Prospero will appear Solve the Sudoku to discover what it is and send T G in February 2019. The copy deadline your answer to: The Editor, Prospero, BBC Pension is Monday, 7 January 2019. and Benefits Centre, Broadcasting House, Cardiff O L T E CF5 2YQ by Monday, 7 January 2019. M G The winner gets a £10 voucher. Many thanks to Neil Somerville for providing this puzzle. L E G T The Sudoku winner in December A was Mrs Brenda Bedggood. WIN G T O R £10

PROSPERO DECEMBER 2018 | 3 | LETTERS

Retirement books: previous memories Your reports on retirement books in old age. Working for World Service in criticism but respected the BBC and year aged 99, universally respected prompted me to find mine after Parliament and abroad, I also received its correspondents as he told me in for his bravery as a wartime tank 28 years, only to be disappointed farewell messages from MPs, his message in my retirement book commander and his integrity as a that I can no longer decipher my Government Ministers, NATO military and tape, praising our honesty and politician, which makes his message colleagues’ messages or names. commanders and many Falkland objectivity. He told me personally, to me in his own voice all the more So I suggest that signatures also Islanders grateful for BBC broadcasts ‘We had a long association for many poignant and treasured, as are all the be printed. during the 1982 war in contrast to years in all corners of the world. other messages in my retirement Margaret Thatcher’s depiction of the In good times and bad, we never book and on tape. Retirement books I was fortunate that my colleagues BBC as a ‘traitor aiding the enemy’. had a bad word.’ reflect not just sentiment but also also compiled a cassette of recorded momentous events. messages in their voices which I Lord Carrington, who resigned as I treasure those words in his own appreciate as I now suffer sight loss Foreign Secretary, did not join in this voice more than ever as he died this Harold Briley

BBC Scottish Orchestras The pen is Records are never straight. They are Latterly in my time with the BBC I Scottish National Orchestra which always seen from different angles. worked in the Scottish Department of could happily meet the needs of mightier than Mr Hall’s ‘putting the record straight Religion where you definitely juggled Radio 3. Scottish Management the sword on Scottish orchestras’ proves imagination and money. The cheapest were surely doing their jobs in the point. His angle is very much solution was not necessarily the best. proposing alternatives. The resultant I was going through security south of the border – the Anglo/ So it is the attitude reflected in the last debacle was perhaps more to at Luton Airport this September, and was asked Scottish border. two paragraphs which finally lit my fuse: do with perceptions of power... if I had a razor blade in The tone of his piece is, to my ‘The grapevine had preceded us… a which are always different from my hand luggage. mind, typical of attitudes which different plan had even been hatched’. different angles. Interesting juxtaposition of metaphors... On close inspection, the frequently colour the prejudices I admit to insider information: the had this curious northern bird perhaps official had to apologise to London experiences even north of agile mind of one of the bloody- Watford. He tells us that as Senior produced a bottle of wine or even me. The culprit was the metal minded hatchers still watches from Accountant he was sent round the whisky for these pedlars of doom whose clip on the BBC Pension the wings and was understandably regions, including Scotland, to judgement of Scottish Management’s Scheme pen that was sent perplexed at Mr Hall’s interpretation ‘advise’ Heads of Radio of the right to consider the ‘proposition’ was to us by BBC Pensions! of these ancient events! ‘proposed’ disbandment of all that they were ‘bloody minded’? I wonder if any other retired staff regional light orchestras. A lot was ‘subsequently disbanded’ Scotland used the Light Orchestra in have been challenged in this way? in Scotland. I always appreciated the need for many OPT OUT radio and television Keith Knight financial juggling in broadcasting. programmes. There was an independent May Bowie Something else GEOFF HALL’S PIECE about the The tragedy, as I recall, was that I’m afraid it began in London. But Scottish Symphony Orchestra members of the Radio Orchestra thank goodness the Proms in England that grates (October, Prospero) contains a most bravely manned the picket lines to save ‘went ahead’. You can imagine how It is also becoming the norm on unfortunate error. the SSO, while some members of the upset we would have been here in the BBC to say ‘sat’ instead of ‘sitting’. I have no idea who the ‘Scottish SSO, to their eternal shame, Scotland if London folk had been This misuse of the words can be heard Secretary’ was, but the Head of Music subsequently didn’t feel the need to inconvenienced – especially as they daily on all channels. was a gentle, intelligent man called had tried to sack the only BBC make the same effort when their SRO Kathleen Murray Martin Dalby. Martin, rather than colleagues were sacked in their place. symphony orchestra in Scotland. propose the disbanding of his By the way, your readers might precious orchestra, put his job on the Mr Hall’s London point of view may be be amused to know that Charles line to defend the SSO. Many of the correct in some respects, but I cannot let Christine Cooke Beardsall was known in Scotland rest of us working with the orchestra the name of Martin Dalby be associated (and London where the anagram nee Brettel made massive efforts to save it, with the sacking of his own orchestra! gleefully originated) as ‘Clasher’. Christine, whose letter about her including putting on a gala concert at Unlike Mr Hall I wasn’t ‘there’ – I was The full anagram of his name is leaving book was published in the the Theatre Royal. I can’t imagine here, in Glasgow! I saw for myself the Clasher A. Redballs. October issue, was delighted to that we made such efforts because distress that the SSO management have been contacted by a former we were mistaken! suffered. As for bloody mindedness, Tony Kime colleague through Prospero. She would love to catch up with others – please email her direct at: Remembering the Manchester Woolworths fire [email protected] This coming May will see the 40th contact Bob Bonner of the Greater Firefighters were hampered by bars anniversary of the Woolworth’s fire Manchester Fire Service Museum, on the upper windows which needed Light disaster in Manchester in which ten who would like to arrange recordings specialist cutting gear to remove them. people died. of people’s memories of the day There were also no water sprinklers. Entertainment to add to the museum’s archive. It was the worst fire disaster in the After a campaign led by Assistant A commemorative plaque is also being Television Reunion city since WWII, and BBC staff will Chief Officer Bob Graham of the planned in conjunction with the city Open to all who have worked in remember this tragedy not only for Greater Manchester Fire Service, council, and BBC staff, both present and and for Light Entertainment its dreadful loss of life but because legislation was introduced some years former, would be among those welcome Television in any capacity. of those colleagues who were later forcing furniture manufacturers to attend the unveiling. An opportunity to meet up with uncomfortably close to the fire itself. to use safer fillings and covers. There will also be media coverage of former colleagues. To be held at The regional television newsroom was the anniversary events, and that could David Hulme the BBC Club, Wogan House, 99 only separated from Woolworth’s – and include your story of the evacuation. If you are interested in contributing, Great Portland Street, WA1 1AA the raging fire – by an internal wall, In the fire, toxic fumes from burning please email Bob Bonner on Wednesday 16 January 2019 which was beginning to heat up. furniture were to prove fatal, with ([email protected]) from noon onwards. The decision was then made to most of the deaths occurring in the and copy in David Hulme RSVP Tony Newman (07717 682027 evacuate the building. restaurant on the second floor, as ([email protected]). or [email protected]) or Former BBC staff who remember the people desperately tried to find the Lesley Begley (l.begley2012@ events of that day are being asked to exits through thick smoke. btinternet.com).

4 Dick and Sheila Perceval Radio Durham Twenty years ago, I found a box of old notebooks that had been left in a pile It was good to see Kay Ennals’ letter in October’s issue but since some may of rubbish by the side of a road in Brighton. These notebooks were the journals regard Prospero as a newspaper of record, I feel I should point out that of John Richard (Dick) Perceval, who worked at BBC Monitoring Service from Maurice Ennals was not the manager at the time BBC Radio Durham was 1949-1964. He married Sheila Blackton in 1961 – she also worked at BBC Monitoring closed. The first manager, Kenneth Brown, was appointed Head of Service. Is there anyone reading this who remembers them? Administration, North, in Manchester about a year after Durham opened. I am a filmmaker and I am adapting Dick Perceval’s journals into a series of short As Kay said, Maurice opened Radio Leicester as the first BBC Local Radio station films that will be released online in 2020, alongside a website that will give in 1967. Durham was the last of the eight experimental stations and went on the historical context to his extraordinary life. air on 3 July 1968 to serve not only the city of Durham but the whole county. Maurice came to Durham on attachment in 1969 following Mr Brown’s move. The diaries start in 1925, when Dick was 16 years old and a pupil at Charterhouse Maurice was an able and likeable manager. We at Durham were sorry to see him School. From there, they vividly record a life lived in Berlin in the late 20s, and in move south in 1970 to open BBC Radio Solent at the end of that year. London in the 30s, as a struggling journalist and frustrated author. They document the extraordinary events that brought him to Bletchley Park in WW2, and to BBC Radio Durham continued on the air until 25 August 1972, by which time post-war Germany in the late 40s. They record his time with the BBC Monitoring stations had been opened in both Newcastle and Middlesborough. Given that Service and his retirement to Brighton in the 1970s, where he lived until his death the Conservative Government would not allow the BBC to increase the in 1997. number of its stations, the middle of the three in the North East was effectively relocated across the Pennines in Carlisle. I recently visited the archive at Caversham Park to view Dick’s staff file – I was Tim Pitt was appointed manager of Durham after Maurice left and closed the amazed that it had survived so long. station, opening BBC Radio Carlisle (now Cumbria) the following year. Any further information about either Dick or Sheila would be very much Nigel Holmes appreciated. Please drop me a line at [email protected] or for more information about the project, please visit www.tobecontinued.online I WAS DISAPPOINTED to read the headline ‘The County Durham dream – or nightmare’ above Kay Ennals’ letter in your last issue. Becky Edmunds Yes, our small and dedicated band of BBC local radio pioneers were sad at the leaving of Durham Town (to paraphrase Roger Whittaker’s hit at the time). But in no way had we ‘not succeeded’. On the contrary, the station honed the talents of many gifted youngsters who were to go on to broadcasting acclaim, including, of course, Kate Adie. Brian Johnson and the birth of ENG Radio Durham was never envisaged as one of the eight embryo town and city I was sad to learn of the death of TV producer Brian Johnson in your August stations. In fact, had the newly-elected city council not decided at the last obituaries. One of the highlights of BBC history his daughter didn’t mention minute to withdraw its financial support we would have been Radio was the very first ever use of ENG. Manchester, managed by the BBC’s northern representative, Kenneth Brown. I was producing the live OB coverage of the Grosvenor Square riots with our Instead, he was invited to manage an experimental county station. cameras half-concealed, so as not to encourage the violence, but I was aware In spite of only transmitting on 94.5 VHF and being located in a former mine that much of the visual activity was taking place on the march along Oxford manager’s house on the outskirts of Durham City, we established a loyal Street. I borrowed from Sony a brand-new handheld camera with its attached listenership from the Tyne to the Tees. So much so that, on having to make reel-to-reel video recorder, asked Brian to strap this on and sent him off to join way for two new stations in Newcastle and Teesside, we were cautioned by the newsreel film cameramen on the march – knowing that the rival film our local radio bosses to withdraw as quietly as possible to avoid upsetting material could not get on the air for some hours. the county. Even so, we received many messages of regret at our departure. When the procession reached Oxford Circus, Brian peeled off and ran up to BH Radio Durham’s demise was to be Radio Carlisle’s (as it was then) gift, for many where the little news studio was waiting for him. The engineers took one look of the lessons learned in those four experimental years were decisive in getting at our Sony recording and ruled that the sync pulses were inadequate to be fed the future Radio Cumbria, covering a huge patch of north-west England, off to a to our public broadcast. We had half anticipated some such problem and so flying start. played the Sony tape onto its own picture monitor with the BBC camera focused on that. As soon as the subsequent BH signal appeared on preview in It may have been the shortest life of any BBC local radio station, but for the the OB scanner, I cut to it. Thus Electronic News Gathering began. pace-setters of Radio Durham they were four of the best years of our lives.

Stuart Campbell Willy Cave

BBC Sports Team Further to the enquiry from Kay Ennals, I’m writing on behalf of John Tidmarsh OBE to let you know that he is the person seated sixth from the left on the front row in the top picture. He was working for BBC South East at the time. Shortly after that he became a presenter of the ‘Outlook’ programme on the World Service.

Anne Lount (partner)

Musical mysteries Can I please be given the definitions (and the differences between) ‘Philharmonic Orchestras’ and ‘Symphonic Orchestras’? I have been listening to and enjoying both for decades now, but still don’t know!

Barry Raynaud

PROSPERO DECEMBER 2018 | 5 | MEMORIES FROM NAZIS TO THE LAMB BANK In a new book just published, retired BBC Scotland television producer Arthur Anderson looks back over a career spanning more than four decades, of which 23 years were spent on Landward, BBC Scotland’s farming and rural affairs series. In this article, Arthur shares some excerpts from his book with Prospero.

At the time the town was not marked The reason the estates were He returned about 7.30 in the evening on the map. It once had 25,000 appropriated by the Nazis was because with two rabbits and his small shotgun inhabitants but in 1992 it had been the Count’s father, Ulrich-Wilhelm Graf over his arm to find a car outside the deserted overnight when the Russian von Schwerin von Schwanenfeld, had family mansion. He knew it was unusual Red Army left. This was a chilling allegedly been part of the plot to because in those days nobody other reminder of the Cold War because assassinate Hitler on 20 July 1944. than the police or the Gestapo had cars. Borne Solinowo had been the Russian It was the Gestapo. He was told to pack Called up as a reserve officer on the frontline, with its nuclear arsenals a small case with some clothes. Also outbreak of war, he worked on the staff pointing out over the Baltic to the arrested were his mother and his two of Field Marshall and Commander-in- capital cities of the West. When we brothers, the youngest of whom was Chief Erwin von Witzleben from 1939, filmed, the buildings and the tenement only six weeks old. The family nurse the same year he was to hear of mass blocks lay empty and exposed – a ghost told the Gestapo that if the baby was shootings of Polish Christians and town serving only to remind us of the arrested then she would go to prison Jews in a gravel pit on his Polish deep political divisions that once also. So the Gestapo took her too. estate of Sartowitz. destroyed the lives of millions. Having earlier witnessed the Hitler Although originally part of Poland, the putsch in Munich in 1923, Von Schwerin area around Borne Solinowo became erhaps the most memorable of found Nazism loathsome to his German territory in the 18th century and the special documentaries the Christian social convictions and these in 1933 the German authorities began Landward team produced over convictions must have been recognised P the construction of a large military the years with presenter-reporter at the highest level because in 1942 he base. Most of the local inhabitants were Eric Robson was Eastern Approaches, was transferred from Paris to Utrecht as resettled and their homes levelled to which in 1998 was to take us to many ‘politically unreliable’. the ground. The new facilities were parts of Europe. opened by Adolf Hitler on 18 August After a transfer to Berlin in 1943 he As Scotland prepared for the challenge 1938. Soon afterwards the Artillery became involved in the preparations for of devolution, it was inevitable that School of the Wehrmacht moved to the coup against Adolf Hitler as a such an important political Borne Solinowo and during the later member of the group led by Colonel development would be seen as a step stages of World War II an artificial Claus von Stauffenberg. on the road to independence. There desert was built there for training units When von Stauffenberg’s briefcase were those who believed that nothing of Erwin Rommel’s Afrika Korps. bomb failed to kill Hitler on 20 July less than complete self-determination Nazi anti-Semitism was evident from 1944, the conspirators, including von Radio interview with a farmer, 1973. and a full expression of national identity the point that the Germans began Schwerin, were arrested the following would do. But others feared that the construction. Gravestones from local day within the Bendler Block, the liberation of such nationalist sentiments cemeteries were used as paving flags headquarters of the Army High would lead inevitably to the division on the site and those with Jewish Command. In a public trial at the …when he tried to and xenophobia that stalked many inscriptions or symbols were laid face Volksgerichtshof, the Nazi Peoples’ explain that he and his parts of an expanding Europe. Court, von Schwerin was sentenced to up, an expression of contempt by brother had bought Our ambitious aim in making the walking on the memory of the death on 21 August and later hung with programmes was to examine the quest Jewish dead. piano wire at the Plötzensee Prison in their own tickets to jail, for national identity that sprang from Berlin on 8 September 1944. After the war, Borne Solinowo was nobody believed him… the land in Scotland, Poland, the Czech In a further chilling reminder of the taken over by the Red Army where the There was a strange twist to the arrest Republic, Romania and Germany. event, I later discovered dramatic Soviet military established a huge of the von Schwerin family. There was archive film of the show trial in Berlin It was a memorable series to be military camp. The town was excluded no room in the car for the two eldest and was able to include it in our involved in, filming with pioneering from Polish jurisdiction and erased from brothers so the Gestapo told the boys BBC programme. Scots like Aberdeenshire farmer Jack all maps. In official documents the to buy a rail ticket to a nearby town Lind, who had taken the lease of a surrounding land was called forest area The storks come home to roost where they would be met by Gestapo thousand hectares of a former state and remained a secret for 50 years. His son, Count Wilhelm von Schwerin, officers and then imprisoned with their farm in Poland to grow cereals and Under Russian control, a 20-kilometre could recall with absolute clarity mother and baby brother. Wilhelm von seed potatoes, and Doug Niven from exclusion zone was imposed around the the day of his father’s arrest. He was Schwerin admitted to us on camera that Berwickshire with his ambitious plans town. Anyone trying to leave without seven years old and had been out when he tried to explain over the for developing his agricultural permission was shot. on the family estate shooting. coming years that he and his brother enterprise in the Czech Republic. Nazi traitors had bought their own tickets to jail, But, as so often is the case, it was the There was emotion too when we filmed nobody believed him. stories and images encountered along with Count Wilhelm von Schwerin in the way that are likely to stay longest in what had been part of East Germany the memory. before reunification in 1990.

Borne Solinowo: the hidden town For more than half a century, the We began our filming in Gdansk in Count’s family had been dispossessed Northern Poland. It was here that the when the Nazis commandeered the Second World War began when the Schwerin estates of Göhren in German cruiser Schleswig-Holstein Mecklenburg-Strelitz and Sartowitz in opened fire on the Polish garrison on then Polish West Prussia. Later, after the 1 September 1939. Thereafter we made war, the land was once again our way to Borne Solinowo in the confiscated – this time by the East woods near the German border. German Communist Party. Directing in the Western Isles with the late (great) Fyfe Robertson.

6 When we filmed with the Count in 1998, it was clear that his bond with the family land was as strong as ever. As he stood with Eric Robson and surveyed the abandoned and ruined buildings that had once been part of a great estate, Count Wilhelm von Schwerin pointed to a family of storks nesting on top of a nearby tall brick chimney. He said that Christmas Radio Times when he was a boy the storks had Club members can collect their always nested there but since the family Christmas and New Year double lands had been forfeited the storks had edition of the Radio Times from BBC abandoned the chimney. But now the Club W1 in Wogan (formerly Western) von Schwerin family were back home, House from the week commencing the storks were too. 17 December. There will be a dedicated Lamb Bank desk for collections every morning There is one particular aspect of my work during this week to speed things up. that will live long in the memory – the Why not combine this with a morning Lamb Bank. In a rich agricultural area coffee and mince pie or pastry? where livestock production was central to Lottery the rural economy, the annual lambing BBC Club Extra is proud to announce season was a highlight of the year – I then went back to the radio station the return of THE BIG ONE! Our as I knew only too well from my own to collect the pool car to drive to £10,000 jackpot is back in December. background at the May Farm in Galloway. ...it would be worth a Newcastle to find an urgent message We are also giving away a set of And like any farming community few brownie points waiting for me. Very sorry but a BEATS Studio 3 wireless headphones, anywhere in the country, lambing time within the family for stronger story had come up, it said. an Apple series 3 iWatch or an Apple held its own share of problems for the They would get back to me another iPhone x5!* This is in addition to the good rural folk of Cumbria. Despite the me to be seen on time. They never did. My debut on other £1,000 and 10 x £100 prizes. highest standards of husbandry and national television… television would have to be put To be in with a chance of winning, join years of experience, things can and do on hold. via the website: [email protected], I agreed in an instant – not only would go wrong. select Club Extra, Lottery and click it be great publicity for BBC Radio Yet while BBC Television left me in the ‘join the Lottery’ or call the club on Ewes with plenty of milk can give birth Carlisle, it would be worth a few lurch – at least on that occasion – 020 8752 6666. Minimum entry is £5 to dead lambs. Ewes can die during brownie points within the family for me editorial policy at Radio Carlisle was per month. lambing, leaving healthy lambs without to be seen on national television. made of sterner stuff. The Lamb Bank mothers. Both can represent an became a regular part of the station’s *if you prefer you can choose £100 At lunchtime I rushed home, showered, expensive headache for the farmer. programme schedule and more than instead of the additional prizes. changed into my best suit and left 40 years later is still broadcasting its I wondered if local radio could offer a Andrea to phone around our relations in Prospero Society important service to the rural service here that would be impossible in Scotland to ensure that they would be The Prospero Society is BBC Club’s communities of the region. other sections of the media. Could we, tuned to Nationwide that night. Connect group for retired members. for example, offer a special service It is totally separate from this during lambing time when, several Prospero newspaper! Prospero times a day at specific times, we would Society newsletters are emailed or broadcast details of farmers who had Wheels Rolling at Eight posted to Prospero Society members lambs without mothers and of other Wheels Rolling at Eight follows Arthur Anderson’s and can be emailed to retired Club farmers who had ewes without lambs. early life growing up on the family farm in South- members. They can also be viewed on We would broadcast the names of the West Scotland to his first job as a 16-year-old copy the Prospero Home page of the BBC farmers involved and give out on air boy on The Scotsman newspaper in Edinburgh and Club website: bbcclub.com/connect/ their telephone numbers. It would then then into the world of broadcasting. prospero be up to the farming community to Events contact each other and come to their Arthur’s broadcasting career began with BBC local Retired Club members continue to own private commercial agreements. radio in Carlisle but for most of his nearly 30 years benefit from a range of trips and with the Corporation he was based in Aberdeen, My bosses agreed that we should try it. events. In November we tried first as a radio producer and then moving to I was delighted. It began slowly at first something new and scheduled a trip television, where he spent 23 years as producer but as word spread through the farming to Wigmore Hall on a Sunday. of Landward. community the numbers of calls into This was a lunchtime concert the station multiplied rapidly. By the In his autobiography, he looks back over his featuring pieces by Mozart and Ravel. end of the lambing season the Cumbria years as a producer, during which he filmed in every corner of On 2 December, the whole of Club W1 Farming Lamb Bank was judged to have Scotland, many parts of the UK and in 27 countries around the world. was reserved until 5pm for a Retired been a success and a shining example His stories include being up the creek without a paddle (almost) in Papua Members’ Christmas lunch, giving our of the kind of beneficial public service New Guinea; being presenting with a sheep’s nose and a silver drinking cup members the opportunity for some broadcasting that local radio can do in Kabardino-Balkarskaya; playing snooker with one member of the British West End shopping, a relaxed lunch so well. Cabinet and infuriating another; dancing with horses on the Hungarian plains; and afternoon in the club with old chasing whales in Newfoundland; a personal tour of Dachau concentration News of the Lamb Bank spread to the friends and colleagues (and a chance camp; and receiving a hair tonic from the Chinese – by mouth! wider media. Articles were carried in to meet some new!) and perhaps a the local papers, the Newcastle Journal, The book is published by Grosvenor House Publishing and is available to order glance at the Christmas lights in and the northern editions of the in all good bookshops and via Amazon (paperback and Kindle edition). Regents Street and Oxford Street on Daily Mail and the Daily Express. the way home! ISBN 978-1-78623-304-2 One morning, shortly after finishing my The Club would like to wish you shift on the breakfast programme, my You can contact Arthur Anderson at [email protected] all a very Merry Christmas and news editor Stuart Campbell asked if I a Happy New Year. would phone the BBC in Newcastle who wanted a word.

The call turned out to be from a 2 course – £18.95 3 course – £23.95 Newcastle-based researcher for Christmas Nationwide, the early evening news and current affairs programme broadcast at the Club BBC Club Broadcast Centre, BC2 B3, from London presented by Frank Bough. Serving 29 November - 21 December 201 Wood Lane, London W12 7TP Would I, the researcher asked, be To request a menu or make a booking contact: prepared to go through to Newcastle Club W1 Club Elstree 020 8752 6666 and be interviewed live by Frank Bough Contact [email protected] Contact [email protected] 0207 765 0971 / 0207 765 3620 0208 228 7159 about the Lamb Bank, its origins and [email protected] its success? bbcclub.com/christmas

PROSPERO DECEMBER 2018 | 7 | MEMORIES BBC HOSTELS & THE SUMMER OF LOVE A recent telephone conversation with a former BBC colleague Kyle Mackay (aka Mack) saw us reminiscing about our early days in London during the so-called ‘summer of love’ of 1967.

e recalled the BBC Club then lectured part-time in broadcast Do please get in touch with updates groups we enjoyed then – journalism on several Scottish university and reminiscences if you know the Wthe Studio Amateur Dramatic courses whilst serving as board whereabouts of or ARE one of Group (SADG) and the Folk Song member and accreditations leader for these people! Society, which began in The Langham Scotland/Northern Ireland for the Bob Wood (then home of a handful of radio studios, Broadcast Journalism Training Council. [email protected] BBC Radio Training and the BBC Club). I often wonder what became of the The Folk Song Society later met weekly dozens of good friends and as ‘Clanfolk’ at The Marquis of acquaintances made at the Redbourne, Clanricarde, a pub in Southwick Street Clanfolk and SADG during the latter near Sussex Gardens in Paddington. part of the sixties. I’d love to hear from Clanfolk, along with Bunjies Folk Cellar, The Troubadour and Les Cousins were anyone who remembers me from those the places to be on the London folk days, or can enlighten me regarding our scene of the late sixties! contemporaries. Many will have married and have different surnames now, and sadly one or two may no longer be with us. I could mention many dozens of The Redbourne had ceased operating as a hostel by the early seventies, and is names, but here’s just a few both Kyle now apparently a mix of business units and I recall: John Sparrow (now in Isle and luxury apartments known as of Wight), Keith Waugh (still in touch, Fitzbourne. From the outside, it appears also in Glasgow), Lynne Drummond, to have changed little. The Beaumont Rod Pearson, David Jones, Jane continued as a conference centre well ‘Granny’ Rumble, John and Pauline into the nineties. Belton, Rosemary Howes, Maureen Saunders, David Rider, Mike Tritton, Sue I was an active member of Clanfolk and Tebby, Peter Jefferson, Phil Hull, David SADG during my time in London, and Luddy, Brian Empringham (last met at was on the editorial team of the retirement seminar in 1998!), Diana magazines of both. Harman, Jack Willis, Lisa Scicluna, Tim At Clanfolk, I regularly performed Sayer, Jim Atkinson, Jenny Walton, poetry (well enough to later broadcast Roger Noel, Barry Mitchell, Mary Anne some on John Peel’s Radio 1 & 2 Night Macfarlane-Reid, Ann Aronsohn, Martyn Left to right: Kyle Mackay, Monica Ride in 1968, my first live broadcast, and Mackeness and Denise Butler. Douglas, Lorna Dodd, Peter Novis, and later on Radios 3 and 4), and songs to a scores more – you know who you are! guitar (very badly!). Kyle and I particularly recalled our time at the BBC Redbourne Hostel, where we At SADG, I learnt to be a radio studio first met. I had joined the BBC in manager and producer, eventually London in March 1966, initially as a clerk becoming their technical training officer BBC pensioners in Berkshire in Publications Circulation, Publicity and and winning a technical trophy. School Orders Distribution departments enjoy a September get-together In 1970, after successfully completing at 35 Marylebone High Street, before Around 30 BBC pensioners attended a gathering at Caversham Court the POA/SM training course, I left moving to BH Radio Production Gardens, Reading on 6 September 2018, organised by their local BBC visitors, London and moved to Glasgow as a Services Current Recordings Retention Vickie Able and Mojtaba Safavi-Hemami. Vicki and Mo wanted to find a way radio studio manager at BBC Scotland, Unit as Senior Clerk. of promoting the BBC’s Volunteer Visiting Scheme to their local group of eventually becoming an audio pensioners – and this successful event was the outcome! The BBC during the sixties had supervisor, radio producer and As well as having the chance to share memories with each other, the two ‘hostels’ offering ‘temporary’ production training manager, before pensioners also enjoyed a tour of gardens, which are located next to the River accommodation to new staff from taking early retirement in 1998. overseas or from outside greater London Thames just outside Reading town centre. I continued to produce, train and whilst they acclimatised to London life in broadcast as a freelance for some years, Mojtaba says, ‘We were extremely lucky with the weather as the sun was the BBC and hopefully found more shining and the gardens were lovely at that time of the year. I really enjoyed permanent accommodation. These were meeting the pensioners who could make it and talking with them in person. The Redbourne at 91 New Cavendish Street, Fitzrovia, a stone’s throw from ‘Many people remembered the previous gathering at Caversham Park, and BH, and the Beaumont at 17-19 Princes many have asked for this gathering to be made an annual event.’ Square, Bayswater.

The Redbourne was greatly enjoyed for offering its residents the much-prized opportunity of boasting a London W1 postal address, albeit for a limited period of time, although ‘temporary’ proved to be of greatly varying duration for some residents, despite frequent opining by Miss Ballantine, the kindly hostel supervisor, that it was ‘probably time to look for a flat’!

8 | BACK AT THE BBC ON SET WITH FATHER BROWN

The hugely successful BBC Daytime drama Father Brown prepares to return for a seventh series in January 2019. Ariel Networker, Stephanie Kent went behind the scenes on set.

ather Brown, produced by BBC Studios in he’d be making all eight films and he said no; you just ‘It’s so quintessentially English. People think it’s all Birmingham, first hit our screens in 2013. Based set out with hope.’ cream teas and cricket on the greens, so that’s the pull on the stories by GK Chesterton, the drama of it,’ says John Burton who plays Sergeant Goodfellow. F We sit outside The Church of St Peter and St Paul as follows eponymous crime-solving Roman Catholic Mark catches a moment in between takes. He’s very ‘Today we have lots of supporting actors and these priest, Father Brown, played by Mark Williams. calm and approachable. I’ve been told they’re filming a guys make the Kembleford village what it is. The wedding, but whose it was remained a secret. When beauty is that this is filmed in 2018, but we can get pressed for any ‘golden nuggets’, Mark stayed tight transported back 60 years. The setting, costumes and lipped – clearly a professional when preserving spoilers. art department really make it what it is.’

As for the rest of the series, ‘We’ll see the return of lots He’s right: Claire Collins, Head of Costume, has certainly of people, one’s a spoiler so I can’t tell you that, but I done an incredible job. Watching men and women mill can tell you that Lady Felicia comes back for some outside the church suited and booted in pristine retro episodes. There’s lot of good writing and we’re really gear, really does make you feel like you’ve stepped pleased with the different stories.’ back into the 1950’s.

Averaging over 2.3 million viewers last year, it’s fair to In charge of rallying the supporting actors for the day say it’s not just the great writing and storytelling which is Second Assistant Director Matthew Whatton. has made Father Brown such a success. Father Brown’s ‘We use two acting agencies’ he told me. ‘One for quiet humour and empathetic nature sees viewers villagers to ensure there’s continuity and another for hooked on his quest of bringing the guilty to justice. specialist scenes. ‘He’s a good, non-judgemental man who’s interested in Set in the stunning Cotswolds, I join the cast on set in lots of things, but mostly people, and that works for ‘In my role, you need to be organised and flexible with the quaint village of Blockley. Once renowned as a me,’ says Mark. an ability to work under pressure, but I wouldn’t trade it secluded, peaceful parish, it has now become a for the world. Every day is different, and that’s what Unbeknown to many, Father Brown has also bustling hotspot for fans thanks to our beloved makes it so exciting.’ received global success with audiences in over 150 Father Brown. countries. Two onlookers on the day turned out to be My tour comes to an end and I’m transported back to ‘I would have never imaged we’d be filming the seventh American tourists, eager to get a sneak peek behind the 21st Century. Already I’m looking forward to series,’ Mark told me. ‘I remember asking David the scenes, and joining me at interviews were several reuniting with Father Brown next year and finally Heyman, the producer of Harry Potter if he thought Italian journalists. uncovering my own mystery – who’s getting married?

BBC consultation on TV licence fee concession It’s a goal...or is it?

The BBC has launched its public consultation on We’ve all experienced the problem of the time-lag Chris Poole, has involved working with partners what, if any, TV licence fee concession should be when streaming programmes online. The cheers across the industry to create open standards that in place for older people from June 2020. from next door when a goal is scored in the all content providers can use.’ World Cup or match point clinched at Wimbledon As Scheme pensioners will know, the BBC Chris Poole, Lead R&D Engineer in Broadcast & while you are still watching several passes or is an important British public service. It is Connected Systems and his team had been working points behind. used by nearly everyone in the UK every week. for the last two years with various industry standards It provides trusted, impartial news, and Colleagues from R&D recently trialled their fix for organisations, network and content providers and television, radio and online services that inform, this so-called ‘streaming latency’ at an industry device manufacturers. educate and entertain. These services are showcase in Amsterdam, and were recognised for Last month Chris and his team were ready to show paid for by households in the UK that buy their work by the judges of a ‘What Caught their prototype in Amsterdam. a television licence. My Eye’ feature on innovation. He said: ‘Our demonstration showed several At the moment, all households with someone The teams have been putting building blocks in techniques we’ve been working on. We showed a aged over 75 are entitled to receive a free TV place to solve the time lag problem since the 2014 live demonstration of BBC News Channel being licence. The cost of this scheme has been paid for World Cup, says Phil Layton, Head of Broadcast and encoded in London and distributed over the internet by the UK Government. The Government decided Connection: ‘Part of R&D’s work is to anticipate and and next to it BBC News Channel broadcast via to stop paying for the concession and in 2020 the find solutions for problems coming down the line. satellite, and there was no significant time delay current scheme is set to come to an end. To help deliver the vision of our Chief Technology between them – indeed the internet stream was and Product Officer Matthew Postgate, to make The Digital Economy Act 2017 gave the BBC the actually ahead. responsibility to consult on and decide how best the internet better than broadcast for watching ‘We were one of eight demos featured in the to implement any TV concession licence scheme BBC programmes, we knew early on we needed innovation section of ‘What Caught My Eye’ out of (if at all) for older age groups – and to then meet a solution to streaming latency.’ around 1,700 exhibitors at the show.’ the cost for any such scheme. Phil’s team participated in the BBC Ultra HD According to Chris, the success of the demo showed The BBC commissioned the economics streaming trial through the BBC iPlayer for 29 games ‘proof of concept’, but rolling this out to a wider consultancy, Frontier Economics, to provide from this year’s World Cup and the whole two weeks audience is still a few years away. detailed analysis on the changing landscape of Wimbledon for selected households. since 2000 and possible ways to approach the The audience feedback on the picture quality was Phil Layton said: ‘If we have a solution by the 2022 decision the BBC has to make. You can read positive, but as expected, nobody liked hearing World Cup that content providers and device them at bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/ their neighbours cheering up to 60 seconds before manufacturers will pick up and use, that would be latestnews/2018/frontier-over-75s. they saw the goal scored or the point won or lost our goal. No pun intended! for themselves. If you would like to respond to the consultation ‘In the meantime, there is still potential to you can now do so at bbc.co.uk/yoursay. ‘This is part of a wider piece of work looking at how reduce latencies from current levels and others For alternative formats (e.g. Braille and audio), we can best deliver our services over the internet at in the BBC are looking at what can be done in the consultation can be accessed by calling scale in future,’ said Phil. ‘The work on latency, led by the interim.’ 0800 232 1382.

PROSPERO DECEMBER 2018 | 9 | OBITUARIES

supplied the sailor Donald Crowhurst with BBC film Editor, Tomorrow’s World cameras. In 1970 he became regional television Classical music producer David Filkin’s early career manager for BBC North East in Newcastle. To have been a producer centred on general interest From Newcastle he was seconded by the BBC to privileged to make classical programmes, including Man Radio Television Hong Kong in 1974 and became the music programmes for the Alive, the pioneering satellite Director of Broadcasting in charge of the Hong Kong Third Programme and for broadcast Our World, Holiday government’s radio and television stations. Radio 3 was the proudest and Brass Tacks, but he boast of Leo Black, who died In 1980 he returned to the UK and took over as Head will be best remembered on 14 September. of Programme Planning and then Head of Costume for programmes which Department before heading to Merseyside in Leo took on a variety of popularised science. September 1981, where he became the station different tasks and roles during He focused on science from 1980 after a colleague manager at BBC Radio Merseyside. his 28 years with the BBC, but asked him to apply for editor, Tomorrow’s World. he was at his happiest and most fulfilled when allowed In 1986 he was made Head of Local TV and Radio for David responded that he knew little of science; his to indulge his twin passions of chamber music and BBC North West in Manchester until his retirement colleague replied, ‘I know, nor does the audience, by German lieder. from the BBC in late 1988. and large.’ Always a fine pianist himself, he had the acutest of He was a passionate sailor – and raced and cruised all David immediately set about sharpening the strand’s ears, not just for matters of technique but for over the world with his family. journalistic values, ensuring the layman could sympathetic performance too. He relished in particular understand everything said on air. The live show Donald was loved and admired by friends and BBC nurturing the broadcasting careers of many singers to captivated viewers, such as when one presenter was colleagues wherever he went and his great leadership, whose voice and musical insights he felt drawn as if superglued to something, to test a glue-neutralising energy and passion for broadcasting, as well as his instinctively: Janet Baker, Elizabeth Harwood, Robert solvent. David judged his audience perfectly; under his great humour in a career that spanned over 40 years, Tear…the list is long. will be sorely missed. leadership Tomorrow’s World was regularly watched Leo profited from the trust and freedom enjoyed by by over nine million people. He is survived by his sons Neil and Andrew Kerr, music producers of his generation; a Reithian sense of his first wife Elizabeth Kerr and his second wife In the late 1980s David achieved further success as the mission underlay all his work, and unsurprisingly Margaret Kerr. editor of documentary series Q.E.D., the audience perhaps, he was not always sympathetic to the latest peaking at 14 million, and launched two more populist Andrew Kerr developments either in broadcasting or even in music. science strands, Bodymatters and Brainstorm, before Nor was he always a comfortable companion: a becoming Head of Science and Features, Television in certain awkwardness of manner, allied to plain 1991. David was remembered by colleagues for taking Multi-talented Bush speaking, did not make him easy to get close to. an early lead in promoting and recruiting women. But he found happiness in a late marriage to the cellist House duty officer Felicity Vincent, while away from work, sport was an David left the BBC in the mid-1990s, sensing he was abiding interest. increasingly out of step with his senior colleagues led In his 80th year, Roger by director general, John Birt. They felt that the Pearce, former studio When Leo left the BBC in 1988, he revealed a further Corporation had to compete on all fronts in a rapidly manager and duty officer, talent, as a skilful and engaging writer. A searching expanding media market, while David believed that died in France in early study of Schubert’s sacred music revealed an the BBC should confine itself to what it could uniquely September after a openness to spiritual values. This was followed by an do, which he saw as the guardian of media culture in prolonged and brave equally remarkable homage to one of his old Oxford Britain, focusing on quality and public service, and struggle with cancer. teachers, the composer Edmund Rubbra. Lastly in 2010 came a wonderfully personal eyewitness account programmes for which the BBC is celebrated like Roger, with his dignified of BBC music under Sir William Glock: by turns natural history, impartial current affairs and drama. bearing and infinite amusing and witty, full of sometimes bizarre politeness, was on the David subsequently enjoyed a collaboration with a anecdotes, but also abounding with wisdom, it is outside a traditional BBC former university colleague, Stephen Hawking, to make essential reading. the series Stephen Hawking’s Universe and write the being. (On the inside he had all the normal The last year of Leo’s life was harshly blighted by accompanying book; both achieved great success all enthusiasms – jazz, beer, food.) blindness, but those who rubbed shoulders with him around the world. He retired from full-time work in 1997. He won an early scholarship to Clifton College, and at Radio 3, and the many who listened to his began his career at a major oil company (which he Former BBC RFC colleagues will remember his programmes, have every reason to remember him hated) before joining the BBC. After an early life-long passion for Rugby Union, while others shared with gratitude. administrative spell in Programme Operations at BH enjoyable rounds of golf. He died on 12 May 2018 aged he joined the multifarious, multi-talented ranks of the Piers Burton-Page 75, from Parkinson’s and dementia. He is survived by studio managers at Bush House where he was a three sons and eight grandchildren. stalwart for many years. Neil Filkin Ultimately he returned to BH as duty officer, a role A meticulous very much of its period: shifts over 24 hours, an office behind BH reception, a drinks cabinet and little idea at perfectionist A career spanning radio the beginning of the day whether he would be A most genial host, entertaining a rock star or a government minister as competent musician, and television they marked time before their broadcast. Or handling experienced sailor and Donald Kerr was born in phone calls (not always polite) from listeners. Or dedicated craftsman. Barrow in Furness, on dealing with transport problems. An empathic listener These are just a few of the 5 November 1931. An avid and efficient fixer, he was ideal for the job. But the life-enhancing qualities we cyclist as a young man, Donald job was phased out and in his fifties Roger took admired in John Dobson, started his career in journalism early retirement. who we affectionately at the Matlock Mercury knew as ‘Dobbie’. His ambition was to retire to France with his wife newspaper in 1948 and went on Wendie, and when she died far too early (again with John Dobson, who died in October, was 90. He joined to work as a journalist in other cancer) he decided to follow his dream in her honour. the BBC after National Service in the Royal Navy, and provincial newspapers as well He bought a smallholding near Thiviers, with vines, the early days of his career in journalism. In the BBC as the Brighton Evening Argus. pigsties and moles. The vines produced some wine, he made his name directing outside broadcasts from In 1957 he worked as a parliamentary reporter for the pigsties were never filled and the moles multiplied. the days of the original West of England region. The Times newspaper until 1959 when he joined Roger made many friends, and until his illness he These included many editions of Songs of Praise. Granada TV, working on Granada reports under travelled widely and always kept in touch with British He continued to originate and produce a number of the leadership of David Plowright. and European politics. He went to Finland and Further Education series, which included Swim, Canoe In 1961 he was part of the pioneering team that opened managed to lock himself out of the sauna, naked in and also a series on gymnastics. up the West Country to television with BBC South West the snow and enjoyed laughing about it later. He went on to use his expertise to use live outside in Plymouth, with his lifelong friend, John Tanton. He We miss his regular phone calls and always interesting broadcast facilities to observe wildlife when he produced the nightly programme, Spotlight South West. views. Thank you for your friendship, Roger. We send pioneered Bird Watch for the Natural History Unit In 1965 he went from Plymouth to BBC Bristol as condolences to his sister Sharleen, her husband Frank in Bristol. the area news editor. In 1968 he covered the and Roger’s nephew Edward. single-handed round-the-world yacht race and Ian and Pam Gillham 10 In his spare time he was a dedicated Chairman of the She read and translated news bulletins, and political BBC Bristol Club, and also enjoyed flotilla sailing Film buff who worked analysis, and produced listeners’ letters and music amongst the Greek Islands, where he was a mentor to in film operations request programmes. (Most important at Christmas many inexperienced sailors. time as Slovene listeners could not get anything My father, , Alan Richardson religious at home on the radio in Communist times.) John was a stickler for accuracy and expected died on 28 October 2018. At one point Dora interviewed Miss Yugoslavia, the accuracy from the people who worked with him. first Miss World contestant from a Communist country He always said what he thought and not what others From an early age Alan was when the event was held in London in 1966. wanted to hear. fascinated by the cinema. He kept a journal of all the A football fanatic, she also covered sport, mentioning He was someone who relished a project, which he films he had seen and her beloved Manchester United whenever possible pursued single-mindedly until its fruition. An example dreamed of working in film. and planting out her garden in red and white when of this was his skilfully converted mews cottage in they won the treble. Bristol, and in his retirement, the model he made of After demob in 1946, he did the Mathematical Bridge which spans the Cam a course in cinematography Dora was a wonderful hostess and cook, as many adjacent to Queen’s College, Cambridge. John’s at Regent Street Polytechnic. David Lean wanted to friends can testify. She and Karl were overjoyed when replica was suitably scaled down to span the fishpond take him on as a trainee film editor in his Cineguild Slovenia re-emerged as an independent country after in his courtyard. at Pinewood. Unfortunately, there was a dispute with the break-up of Yugoslavia in 1991 and they were the ACT union and he ended up working in television. honoured guests when Pope John Paul II visited John was a meticulous perfectionist who will be Perhaps it was fortunate as he enjoyed many Maribor a few years later. greatly missed by those of us who enjoyed his years there. friendship and generous hospitality. Dora continued work long after her official retirement. Alan joined the BBC in 1949 as assistant film librarian. She was always full of life, following politics closely Brian Hawkins During the next five years, he was instrumental in and liking nothing better than a good argument, building up the infrastructure that eventually became holding very strong opinions which she defended the largest film library in the world. There was no tenaciously to the end. Costume assistant demarcation of work and everyone mucked in. Mary Raine He worked on the Newsreel late nights and early and designer morning rushes (there were only a dozen or so Barry Simmons, the eldest technicians working in Film Department then). He of three children, was born worked on the Coronation and ensured that a copy Original Radio One DJ on 19 October 1951 in went by helicopter from Alexandra Palace onto Duncan Johnson had a long Eastbourne to Frank and London Airport and by Canberra to New York. He then and illustrious career in Jean Simmons. He was became telerecording manager – recording broadcasting and was one educated at Hampden Park programmes before the invention of videotape. Seven of the original Radio One DJs Infants, Highfield Juniors hectic years followed, overseeing Nation to Nation, back in 1967. then Ratton Senior School. Eurovision and the wedding of Grace Kelly, and A Canadian, he was born on A quiet, sensitive boy who transmitting the Cannes Film Festival from Marseille. 17 August 1938 in Fergus, loved art, music and Then he became FOM (film operations manager) for Ontario. He left school at 14, anything to do with the Light Entertainment. The programmes he oversaw commencing work in a variety theatre, Barry played Fagin in Ratton’s production of have become classics – Dad’s Army, Some mothers of occupations, including assisting lumberjacks on Oliver in December 1967. Following this performance do have ‘em, Tony Hancock etc. Vancouver Island. It took until 1960 before he began he was approached to join the Eastbourne Operatic He worked as a FOM until 1976. The last job he working in radio in Saskatchewan, then moving on to and Dramatic Society and became very involved with did at the BBC was write the history of the BBC Alberta, followed by Bermuda, before finally sailing this group for the next couple of years, also working Film Department. for England in 1963. as a dresser at The Congress Theatre. He took early retirement and retired to Salisbury, Again he took on a variety of jobs until 1965, when In 1969 Barry followed his adored sister Lesley to where he led a successful campaign to save the news of pirate radio ship Radio London became the London where he began working as a wardrobe Odeon cinema from demolition as well as fundraising lure. It was then that we began to hear that wonderful assistant at Covent Garden. He transferred to BBC TV for the theatre and editing the Cathedral News. resonant voice, initially standing in for any of the in the early 1970s as a dresser, then costume assistant He also received The Legion d’Honneur from the regular DJs who were on shore leave. He had many for many years, before a brief promotion as acting French government for his contribution to the other interests, including photography, and in 1966 costume designer. liberation of France at the D Day landings at established a new studio in London where he His natural lively sense of humour made him popular Sword Beach on 6 June 1944. produced radio and television commercials. as a colleague, while his knowledge of art and culture Louise Mclean October 1967 found him with BBC Radio One were well suited to many period productions, presenting Midday Spin and the thrice daily Crack a including Fanny by Gaslight, Portrait of a Marriage and Clue. He later worked for EMI Records (1971); the the Jonathan Miller production of Cosi Fan Tutte. Stalwart of Bush House, Dutch Radio Northsea International (1972); Radio In 1993, when the BBC implemented mass Luxembourg (1973); Capital (1976); and Invicta Radio redundancies, Barry worked for a time as a freelance Slovene Section (1984 to 1988). His final job was as financial controller costume assistant. Dora Lavrencic, who died for a London-based advertising company, from which Following the devastating loss of his partner Ian, in on 10 July aged 96, was the he retired in 2004. 1994 Barry started his own gentleman’s period last surviving member of In 1968 he had married Lynne Grout and they opened accessories hire business called ‘Fine and Dandy’. a remarkable family trio in a ladies’ clothes business in Epsom, which they jointly Despite his natural flair and talent, he found it hard to Bush House. With her husband ran until their divorce in 1988. His home was on the make ends meet. He dabbled as a freelance journalist Karl (Drago) and sister, Anka, edge of a golf course in Otford, Kent but, by 2011 for a couple of tourism magazines, and worked for the they were the mainstay of the with failing health, he decided to go into care at Geffrye Museum in East London before moving to Slovene Section for many years. Brinsworth House, the Variety Artist’s Residential Leominster to take over a well-established business. Dora came from a prominent Slovene political and Home in Twickenham, where he soon became a ‘Border Books’. journalistic family. Her father was a Yugoslav MP much-loved and ever-memorable member of its Once again Barry had abundant enthusiasm but the and acting mayor of her home town Maribor. residential community. recession hit hard, he floundered and with regret She studied law, intending to become her country’s A few old friends – myself included – visited him last abandoned that enterprise too. At his funeral in the first woman judge, but the war put paid to that. year and found him working in the gardens, happily beautiful Priory Church, the eulogies by friends and First the Nazi invasion of her country, followed tending the rose bushes. He died in West Middlesex the local mayor heaped great affection and praise by the Communist takeover. Hospital on the morning of 12 October, aged 80. upon Barry as a wonderful asset to Leominster, the Dora escaped across the mountains to a refugee Although his cremation took place, he had chosen not museum, the library and various societies, through his camp in Austria where she interpreted for the British to have a funeral, and his ashes were sent to his tireless commitment to research and organising. Army. Soon after the war she came to Britain and ex-wife for their disposal. Barry’s heart failed him: 19/10/1951-23/08/2018. resumed her studies before joining the Slovene part Brian Willey Maggie Partington Smith of the Yugoslav Service. It was a small section so Dora had to be ready to turn her hand to everything.

PROSPERO DECEMBER 2018 | 11 | ODDS & ENDS

Rambling on for 70 years CONTACTS (or more?) Visiting Scheme Benevolent Fund Available to BBC pensioners over 70, This is funded by voluntary those recently bereaved, and anyone contributions from the BBC and its Are there any Prospero readers in poor health, the scheme is a purpose is to protect the welfare of method of keeping in touch and staff, pensioners and their families. who used to belong to the BBC operates throughout the UK. Visitors Grants are made at the discretion of are BBC pensioners themselves. If you the Trustees. They may provide Rambling Club? A chance look at want to be visited, receive a phone assistance in cases of unforeseen call or meet up somewhere mutually financial hardship, for which help from our constitution recently led to an convenient, call 029 2032 2811. The other sources is not available. contact is the same if you would like Tel: 029 2032 2811. interesting discovery – the Rambling to become a visitor. Prospero Society Club was officially founded in March Queries Prospero Society is the only section For benefit and pension payroll of the BBC Club run by and for retired 1950, so we will soon be celebrating queries, call the Service Line on BBC staff and their spouses. Its aim 029 2032 2811 or email is to enable BBC pensioners to meet our 70th birthday! [email protected]. on a social basis for theatre visits, luncheons, coach outings, etc. Prospero To delete a name from the distribution Prospero Society is supported by hat said, it seems that the roots A little research did bring to light one list, ring the Service Line on BBC Club funds so as to make events may actually be much earlier. interesting fact – that if it hadn’t been 029 2032 2811. Prospero is provided affordable. If you would like an In his book published just after for the Rambling Section, the now T free of charge to retired BBC Scheme application form, please contact: World War 2, The BBC and All That, famous Test Card F would never have members only. Prospero is also Roger Eckersley says, ‘(before the existed in the form it did! According to Gayner Leach, BBC Club, BC2 B3 available on audio disc for those with war)…there were rambling clubs, his biography, the engineer George Broadcast Centre, 201 Wood Lane, sight impairment. To register, please motoring societies, debating societies, Hersee married his wife Audrey in 1957. London W12 7TP ring the Service Line. Alternatively, it in fact, practically every kind of social They had met via the BBC Rambling Tel: 020 8752 6666 is also available online at bbc.co.uk/ activity had its members, and this, not Club, and it was an image of one of Email: [email protected] mypension, under ‘Documents’. only in London, but throughout the their two daughters whom George BBCPA BBC Club Regions, where there were similar club used in the centre of the test card, The BBCPA was founded in 1988 to The BBC Club in London has a retired premises and facilities.’ and who provided a flesh tone promote and safeguard the interests membership costing £3 per month or reference to countless BBC engineers of BBC pensioners. It is independent £36 per year. Members can also add for many years! of the BBC. For details of how to friends and family to their membership We do have circulars from walks and join, see the panel on page 5 for a small additional cost. Regional weekends away as far back as 1979, and or download a membership form clubs may have different arrangements. recently repeated a weekend from 1982 at bbcpa.org.uk. Please call the BBC Club London along the coast from Aldeburgh – even office on 020 8752 6666 or email using the same pub for lunch! However, [email protected] for details, it was unfortunately no longer possible or to join. to buy chicken in a basket there for £1.70, or a far more reasonable homemade pie and chips for 92p! (The chicken has now become “Cajun butterfly chicken, with salad and chips” It is felt that the occasion should not be Caption and costs about ten times as much as it allowed to go unmarked, and at the last did in 1982!) Does anybody have any AGM proposals were made to try to paperwork of the Club – circulars etc – competition arrange some sort of reunion, especially from earlier than that? The winner of a £10 shopping voucher geared to ex-members. We’re still in is Terry Smith: ‘He does have cold touch with many, but through the pages Whether you were a member in the hands, doesn’t he Vicar?’ of Prospero it would be great to get in past or not, new members are always touch with anybody else who was a welcome, so if anyone would wish to member in the past. If so, do please come out for a walk with us, then again, contact us via our current secretary, please do get in touch with Paula for Paula Cowin, at [email protected]. more details. Post your entry to Prospero by Monday, It would be great if you could make Walks often include a pub for lunch, and WIN 7 January 2019. the celebrations, or even just share are of varying lengths, sometimes with £10 Or, you can email a few memories. Details are still the possibility of leaving or joining part your entry to being decided! way. No need to join at first – but if, [email protected], after a couple of ‘tasters’ you wish to We believe one of our members (now with ‘caption competition 1’ in the become a member, we also organise retired from the BBC, it has to be said!) subject line. Please include your weekends away and often a week’s who joined in 1964 holds the record for Picture shows the Two Ronnies. BBC pension number. Good luck! holiday, as well as various social events. our ‘earliest’ member still in the Club. Can anybody go back further than that? David Heath (Chairman) CLASSIFIEDS

Venice, Giudecca. Beautiful apartment in private, quiet courtyard, sleeps 5, fully equipped. Experience the real Venice. Tel: 07513 455655. Email: [email protected]

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.

Designed and produced by Wordshop - 810091 12