Tim Black Former Chief Executive of Marie Stopes International

OBITUARIES Tim Black Former chief executive of Marie Stopes International Timothy Reuben Ladbroke Black cheap, and there was extensive advertising—and After marrying Jean, his childhood sweetheart, (b 1937; q University of London 1962; Black proved that providing contraceptives on the he and his new wife immediately left for Zimbabwe, CBE, MRCS Eng, MRCP Lond), died from open market was possible. where Black spent a year as a house officer. At the a heart attack on 11 December 2014. He returned to the UK in 1974, and he and end of that post the couple took three months leave Jean set up the UK branch of Population Services and returned to the UK by jeep, driving through Tim Black’s career was driven by his desire to International. In 1976 the Marie Stopes Memorial Africa and Europe. broaden access to family planning services Foundation went into liquidation, and the Blacks throughout the world. He founded Marie Stopes and Harvey bought the lease of the clinic in central No publicity is bad publicity International in the mid-1970s, and pioneered a London where Marie Stopes had opened up her Black worked as a house officer and registrar while non-medicalised approach to family planning, put- Mothers’ Clinic in 1925. Marie Stopes International studying for his membership of the Royal College ting services in the hands of nurses and midwives, was born, with the idea that UK services such as of Physicians at Croydon General and Harefield and, later, community health workers. vasectomies, carried out by Black himself, would Hospitals, while Jean worked as a medical secre- Black’s epiphany came as a young doctor in a subsidise the overseas services. The first inter- tary. In 1966 the couple left for another adventure, remote part of Papua New Guinea in the mid- national programme was launched in Ireland, and driving to India through Europe, the Middle East, 1960s, when he proudly handed a child whose followed by Kenya and Sri Lanka. Afghanistan, and Pakistan. They then travelled by life he had saved back to its mother. She was a sex Black’s forward thinking techniques ensured boat to Australia, where their first daughter, Jane, worker who had several other children to feed, and that the organisation grew from one that reached was born, before going on to Papua New Guinea. he realised by the look of despair on her face that 150 000 women in the 1970s to one that served Their second daughter, Julia, was born on their he had handed her a problem. 15.6 million in 2013. return to the UK. Recalling the event years later, he said: “I sud- Black was born in Lower Beeding, West Sussex, Black was a mixture of irascibility, persistence, denly realised that I had presented her not just and lived in the same house all his life. He worked and great charm. He was also a man of action and with her baby, but with another mouth to feed— three days a week from a shed in his g arden, and preferred doing to talking: he invented a type of for- another dependent human being to whom she two days at the Stopes HQ in London. He was ceps with rounded ends to cause less discomfort to could offer nothing—merely the cruel ritual of her educated at Dartington Hall school in Devon and women. As his US condom venture proved, he did bare s urvival.” Brighton Technical College and qualified as a not shy away from controversy, and he would hand He returned to the UK and completed a diploma d octor from St George’s Hospital in 1962. out biscuits to protesters picketing Marie Stopes’s in tropical medicine and hygiene at the Liverpool abortion clinics. Black believed in the maxim that Black was an entrepreneur as well as School of Tropical Medicine. He then went to the no publicity is bad publicity. University of North Carolina as a Ford fellow, where an iconoclast, and he believed in using In 1997 Marie Stopes—and Black—caused a he gained a masters degree in population dynamics modern business, management, and storm when the charity launched its lunchtime in 1969. It was there that he met fellow student Phil marketing techniques, to build what abortion service. Black said that women “don’t Harvey, in whom he found a kindred spirit, and the was not a charity in the traditional lease their bodies from the state or even from the pair began to discuss the non-medical delivery of sense but a social enterprise Church. They own them,” and he condemned those contraceptives. Their ultimate target market was the who wanted women to “climb over fences and do developing world, but as they were in the middle backflips” to exercise their legal rights. of their masters they turned their focus to the US. Black had been aware for a long time that the They decided to sell condoms by mail order, a needs of women during crisis situations were being practice that was illegal but which the pair pursued overlooked, so when he took a call in the mid- despite discouraging legal advice. Black’s strong 1990s from the UK government asking for help in conviction was typical of a man who was never dealing with the rape and resulting pregnancies of afraid to challenge something he felt was wrong. women during the Bosnian war he leapt into action. Black’s wife, Jean, gave him her blessing—later Within two hours he had written a proposal to pro- telling Harvey that she knew he would have gone vide reproductive health and psychosocial coun- ahead with the venture anyway. selling services to women, and within a year 67 The business proved a success. The pair put centres had opened. He also designed a reproduc- advertisements in around 300 college newspa- tive health kit and sent this to the country. pers, using copy such as: “What will you get her Black retired as chief executive of Marie Stopes in this Christmas—pregnant?” The orders began to 2006, but he remained on the board and was on the flood in, and the pair did not face any legal action. phone to colleagues the day before he unexpectedly Bolstered by this success, Black and Harvey set died, after a walk in the woods around his home. up Population Services International, and—using He was awarded a CBE for services to international the money raised by the sale of condoms in the family planning in developing countries in 1994. US and with funding from USAID—Black went to He leaves his wife, Jean; and two daughters. Kenya, where he set up one of the world’s first con- Anne Gulland, London traceptive social marketing programmes. Condoms [email protected] were made available in shops and kiosks, they were Cite this as: BMJ 2015;350:h459 the bmj | 14 March 2015 25 OBITUARIES he accepted his condition, and the hobbies included books on politics Anthony Valentine Barford future that lay ahead of him. We and history. He was an excellent Consultant geriatrician remember his resolve to maintain his cook and loved football, especially Birmingham (b 1928; q Cardiff independence, his dry humour, his Manchester United Football Club. The 1956; FRCP Edin), died from colon passion for football and Tottenham only programme he never missed cancer on 28 October 2014. Hotspur FC, and his interest in new on television was Songs of Praise. Anthony Valentine Barford (“Tony”) technologies and how they might be He leaves his wife, children, and was educated at Winchester applied to help him in everyday life. grandchildren. College. After junior appointments Gillian Holdsworth Michael John Gilkes was ship’s Henry Annan at Morriston Hospital, Swansea, Cite this as: BMJ 2015;350:h157 surgeon to South Georgia Island Cite this as: BMJ 2015;350:h550 he trained in geriatric medicine in and the Antarctic Whaling Fleet Oxford, a centre of innovative ideas Kenneth Graham before returning to the UK to train at Peter Loy de Villiers Hart in elderly care. He was appointed Moorfields Eye Hospital. He worked consultant at East Birmingham (now with the Medical Research Council Former physician Brunei (b 1923; Heartlands) Hospital in 1969 and on trachoma under Sir Stewart Duke- q St Bartholomew’s Hospital was soon involved in developing two Elder and with Sir Harold Ridley at 1945; FRCP), died from new purpose built units. A staunch St Thomas’ Hospital, pioneering complications following a hip supporter of the West Midland intraocular lenses. He was a fracture. Institute of Geriatric Medicine, as consultant in Brighton from 1957, for Peter Hart worked as a consultant secretary and editor of its house 30 years, an examiner for the Royal physician—initially in Kuala Lumpur, journal, Tripod, he was involved in College of Ophthalmologists, and Malacca, and Malawi—before joining undergraduate and postgraduate Former general practitioner an ardent supporter of the BMA, as the Brunei General Hospital in 1962. teaching. After retiring to Salcombe, Teddington (b 1919; q 1943; member of council. He also sat on the Starting as sole physician for the he and his wife became involved in MRCS Eng), d 15 July 2014. General Optical Council. A passionate whole of medicine and paediatrics, local activities. He later had a stroke Kenneth Graham was a popular model engineer and yachtsman, he he led the modernisation of the and also underwent colonic surgery. family doctor, who worked in completed a transatlantic race. He country’s health service. He went to He leaves his wife, Veronica, and a Teddington for 35 years after moving leaves his second wife, Audrey; a son; the Royal Free Hospital in London to stepson.

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