The Gentlemen Ranters site is a brilliant compendium of reminiscences of the great days of Fleet Street. – The Times

Issue # 219
November 4, 2011

This Week

Your usual Ranters fix comes in the form of a two-parter, this week.

First, there’s the usual type of fare – an essay and the inevitable obits.

Then Part Two is a special supplement, dedicated to reader reaction to claims being made at the Leveson Inquiry into phone-hacking by people who, as we said last week, either should know better or possibly don’t know at all.

It includes contributions from Revel Barker (with a little help from Paul Callan), Brian Hitchen, Roy Greenslade, Chris Sheridan, John Rodgers and Alan Hart. A total of more than 300 years experience in there, somewhere.

But first…

Tomorrow, November 5, marks the 20th anniversary of the death of Robert Maxwell. To many it was and remains a mystery: Assassinated by a team of frogmen who came on board from a midget submarine and might have represented Mossad, the KGB, the CIA or even MI6? Or fell off the back of the boat while having a pee?

Pick your own conspiracy theory.

Or believe this one, which is closer to the truth, by Revel Barker, who vividly remembers that night and recalls looking out from his then north London eyrie and commentating: ‘I know Maxwell wasn’t universally popular, but fireworks the length and breadth of the land seems like overdoing it a bit.’

Roland Gribben remembers another larger-than-life, but slightly more down to earth character, Tony Conyers who died last month, and reveals along the way how we came to have Indian restaurants in Britain and elsewhere in Europe.

Larger than life, did we say…? How about Sir James Wilson Vincent Savile, disc jockey and (cut-price) newspaper columnist, introduced to the print in the first attempt by the Sunday People to appeal to ‘the youth market’. Colin Henderson and John Rodgers remember their walks on the wild side.

And Ted Graham has an add to the memory of Phil Walker (reported here October 14).

But don’t forget the Leveson Supplement…

#

Drowning

By Revel Barker

They say that when a person is drowning, his entire life passes before his eyes.

Robert Maxwell, clinging to the gunwale of his 180-foot luxury yacht, Lady Ghislaine, somewhere off the Canary Islands, wasn’t actually drowning yet, but his mind seemed concentrated on memories concerned with that particular way of death.

He was five years old, standing on the parapet of a narrow rickety wood and iron bridge over the fast-flowing Tisza river in Solotvino (Ruthenia), shaking with fear but trying not to show it while his slightly older friends dared him to jump.

So he jumped, of course, losing consciousness as the flood tide smashed his head against the rocks below. When he came to they were standing around him, saying what a fool he was, because they knew he couldn’t even swim…

Now he was sitting on the earth floor of his parents’ home, with Uncle Shlomo telling one of his stories in front of the fire. Shlomo had gone with a friend to join the California gold rush and they’d been amazingly successful – they were both bringing home rucksacks filled with gold. But as their ship left San Francisco harbour it was hit by an earthquake and started to flounder. Lifeboats were lowered and the passengers ordered to jump for them. Shlomo threw his bag overboard, then followed it and clambered into one of the boats. His friend refused to be parted from his rucksack and jumped with it still on his back. He sank and was never seen again.

‘I often think about that,’ Shlomo would say, in the firelight. ‘And I wonder, did he get the gold, or did the gold get him?’

Did I get the gold, Maxwell was wondering now as he stared down at his white nightshirt flapping furiously above the even whiter, brighter, swirling 14-knot wake as it reflected the clear November moonlight... Or did the gold get me?

His father, Mechel, had never seen any gold in his life. He’d been a huge man, taller even than his son had grown, powerfully built, a hard-working peasant who scratched out a living buying and re-selling cattle. He also sold hides to leather workers and supplemented his meagre income by working as a woodcutter or farm labourer and, even, dabbling in a bit of cattle rustling, which was fairly common in that part of the world. When the Germans came they took most of the family to concentration camps but his father was put on an old boat loaded with other Jewish prisoners and taken into the Baltic where the Germans scuttled the ship. They all drowned.

But Maxwell wasn’t drowning, yet. Maybe drowning in self-pity. He suddenly shed an unexpected tear for his father’s memory, but he didn’t do self-pity. Except… there’d been that time when he thought – knew for sure – that he was about to die. He had cried when the doctors diagnosed cancer in both lungs and told him he had four weeks to live.

For God’s sake, he was 32, already a father of six children (there’d eventually be nine), and controlled one of the most lucrative markets in scientific publishing. He was on top of the world. He’d cried when he looked at a vase of flowers and realised he’d never taken time to appreciate beauty, nor to spend time with the children. He also cried because he hadn’t known what to believe might happen next, and although he consulted a rabbi, then a Roman Catholic priest, an Anglican vicar, and even somebody from the Christian Scientists, they had offered no comfort that he could comprehend.

If only he could have another chance, he’d thought, he could do everything differently…

That opportunity had come, but only after they had removed one lung (and found the tumour on it to be benign) when his adoring wife Betty had scoured London for a second opinion and found a specialist who knew what he was talking about and who declared that there was absolutely nothing wrong with the remaining lung.

He hadn’t done badly, after that, had he?

True, there’d been setbacks. He’d been cheated out of attempts to buy the News of the World, the Daily Herald and the Observer, and there’d been that temporary hiccup when the Board of Trade described him as being ‘unfit for the stewardship of a public company’ – but he recovered from all that and acquired the jewel in the crown, the Daily Mirror group of newspapers.

Eighty million was all he’d paid for it, not much more than the value of the shares it held in Reuters, and the Holborn building was valued at 500 million, just for the site. But in negotiation he’d worn down the owners, Reed International, and then – without even losing a job – he’d turned a virtual loss-maker into a profit of £80million in his first year. Then he’d bought the Manchester plant for a pound.

Nobody played poker with Robert Maxwell. That’s what he always said. At least, nobody played poker against him and won.

On this day, November 5, 1991, he employed maybe 20,000 people in 26 countries. He owned two Gulfstream jets and his own helicopters, rented the largest council house in England, had interests in newspapers in America, Canada and Kenya, in TV in the US and in Europe… he was the biggest publisher and printer in Europe and the second biggest printer in the United States…

So what had gone wrong?

The very last meeting he’d had in his office, only four days ago, before flying off to Gibraltar to join his yacht, had been to share a drink with a departing aide, and the guy had given him a bit of a character reading (well, he had nothing to lose; he was leaving). And he’d complained that, although he had been theoretically employed as an ‘adviser’ Maxwell had frequently turned a deaf ear to advice.

The aide had reminded him of the disastrous investment in creating ‘the first 24-hour newspaper’, the London Daily News, an experiment that had lasted five months and cost maybe £25million.

Then there’d been The European – ‘the first national newspaper for Europe’ – that had been researched and planned as a daily with a projected circulation of 750,000 but had been launched instead as a weekly and now had more writers than it had readers.

And the staff buy-out he’d offered to the Sunday People. He’d given them a year to prove that they’d be competent to run it and they had done that – putting it into profit for the first time in decades, so he’d changed his mind. ‘Reneged on the deal’ was how they saw it. But it could have been a good idea, especially if he kept the printing.

There was his habit of offering highly paid jobs to journalists who came to interview him, and to anybody who was sacked by Rupert Murdoch, and that Japanese guy who he’d met on a plane and appointed as a finance editor without learning that he didn’t even understand English…

His interference with the editorial staff – sacking or even giving hefty pay rises to journalists without consulting the editors. Bullying and sacking all the other staff, often for stupid reasons (like the security man who had opened the door for him without first asking to see his ID card…)

And his insistence on his own name and photograph appearing regularly on Page One of his papers. Hugh Cudlipp – who he had asked to make himself available as a ‘consultant’ – had warned him that there was too much of that. He’d told Maxwell about a Catholic newspaper that had once carried only two pictures on its front page for the Easter edition: one caption had been Our Lord and the other was Our Editor…

The diatribe had continued for maybe an hour, the aide in full flow while helping himself to the drinks cabinet.

But nobody could say Robert Maxwell was intolerant. He’d listened more or less without interrupting. He’d finally walked the chap out to the lift – something he hadn’t done even when Mother Theresa had come into the office – and told him: ‘You’ve never been anything but a friend to me, and you’ve never given me anything but good advice. Maybe I should have taken more of it.’

He’d probably been most right (damn him) about Rupert Murdoch, ‘that Antipodean Ned Kelly’. While it was true that when they’d ‘played poker’, commercially, Maxwell invariably won, this chap had been telling him that he won only because Murdoch had just kept upping the ante until the prize was over-priced, and then withdrawn from the duel, leaving Maxwell to pay well over the odds in every negotiation. And he’d told him before.

There may have been something in that argument because… look at him now… he was facing bankruptcy for something like 50 million, which would have been pocket money a year ago but was more money than he could find last week. The City had said that his companies were 1.3billion in the red. He disputed that, naturally, nevertheless he’d had to borrow £526million out of the pension fund in an effort to keep himself afloat over the last couple of months.

Afloat…? Ah. That brought him back to the reality of his current predicament.

His fingers were aching with hanging on to the back of the boat and his shoulder muscles were screaming with the torture of bearing his 23-stone weight for so long.

He was hanging there because he’d realised that he had gone too far, this time. He’d become a busted flush. He’d exposed himself to the extent that his only future was one in which nobody – Downing Street, the White House and the Kremlin, not even the Labour Party – would take his calls or ever take him seriously again.

His only option, he’d decided before the weekend, was to vanish totally from the scene. The Atlantic was so vast that he’d disappear, but his body would never be found and he’d be a perpetual mystery, like Lord Lucan. Everybody would talk about him for years to come: Whatever happened to Robert Maxwell? It would be the man, not the money, that they wondered about.

However… second thoughts, now. If only he could pull himself back on board. He could solve everything. He’d started again when he got a second chance of life and he’d recovered from that setback with the Board of Trade report. If he could only get another ‘second chance’ he could be a different person, a better person, next time round. He’d start listening to advice.

He’d even told the bloke who complained he never listened to advice to come back on Tuesday ‘so we can look again at your figures and round them up a bit’. And today was, what? Monday already.

Oh yes. He’d take more advice and be less of a bully to the staff and much more of a nice guy and would keep his promises. Yes: much more of a nice guy. If only…

A young crew member appeared on deck carrying a mop, checking that everything was shipshape before the boss came out for his early morning stroll. He went to the back of the yacht for a pee and, unbuttoning his shorts, realised that he was pointing his privates at the publisher, who looked up anxiously and sobbed, pathetically: ‘Help me… please.’

The yacht was stopped, the crew called and all eleven of them struggled to prise Maxwell’s chubby fingers from the gunwale and lift his obese frame to safety over the wires and the railing.

Maxwell lay on the deck, in agony.

‘You useless bastards,’ he panted, his one lung retching. ‘How long have I been hanging there, unnoticed? And what’s the first rule of seamanship? A constant watch, all round, that’s what. And you bastards didn’t notice me hanging off the back. You’re all fired!’

And that was when they picked the bugger up and threw him over the side.

Former Daily Mirror reporter Revel Barker worked for the Mirror Group for 27 years, and for all three London titles (Daily and Sunday Mirror and Sunday People) either separately or jointly: on investigations, defence and foreign; then in management as editorial adviser, foreign manager, editorial relations manager, and managing editor; he was also director of Mirror Colour Print and managing director of People Publishing plc.

#

Tony Conyers

By Roland Gribben

The ubiquitous Tony Conyers was never lost for words. The talented, engaging, versatile reporter was capable of holding a conversation or conducting an interview in five or was it six languages? He largely taught himself French, Spanish, Italian, Arabic, Russian, oh yes and studied Chinese in a career that stretched from South London to Moscow and the Commons. Sadly he was bereft of words during the closing days of his life as Alzheimers took its toll at the Journalists' Charity care home in Dorking.

Tony had a zest for life and the tall story but rarely talked about his fascinating pedigree. On his mother's side he was directly descended from Gen William Palmer (1740-1816), one-time confidential secretary to Warren Hastings during the early days of the Raj in India and;the East India Company’s ambassador to the Moghul court. He married Princess Bibi Faise, a descendant of Shah Jahan, who built the Taj Mahal and their now famous family portrait by Zoffany features on the cover of Dalrymple’s book, White Mughals.

The Indian connection extends to London. Tony’s grandfather Edward Palmer founded Veeraswamys in Regent Street, the first Indian restaurant in Europe, in 1926 and the introduction for some of Fleet St's finest to the world of the curry.

Tony’s 59 year partnership with his wife Jean was filled with children and grandchildren and a deep tenderness. Jean was confined to a wheelchair after contracting polio in Spain while five months pregnant with their fourth child but continued to work, dug herself into gardening with an RHS diploma and was responsible for seeing the huge plot at the Dorking home got lots of TLC in between keeping a watchful eye on Tony.

The South London Advertiser, where he met Jean, was Tony's training ground at 16 after leaving school equipped with French and Spanish. National Service found him in the Army Education Corps in Trieste where he took the opportunity to learn Italian and help fellow servicemen overcome their inability to read the sports pages.

He preferred to return to the SLA rather than take up the chance to go to university and moved to the Jersey Morning News, the Isle of Wight County Press and the Romford Times before reaching Fleet St, courtesy of the Sunday Pictorial and the Daily Mirror. The addition of Arabic to his language portfolio made him the ideal candidate for covering the Algerian War while his French connection meant he was frequently assigned to the Paris office. He moved to Spain for the Daily Sketch in 1958, then back to the Mirror where he spent two years in Paris and distinguished himself covering the student riots and de Gaulle's funeral.

He moved from tabloid to broadsheet in 1969, joining the Daily Telegraph team of newsroom based reporters required to carry passports to equip them for sudden forays to foreign crisis. Vietnam, Egypt, Libya, India and other hotspots found their way into the Conyers’ passport before he spent two years – 1973-75 – running the DT Moscow office. His final reporting spell in the Commons lobby was almost peaceful by comparison and a stretch on the newsdesk before retirement provided the opportunity to mentor a new generation.

Retirement in a 14th century cottage in rural Suffolk transformed him into a country lover and gardening enthusiast. He maintained Fleet St and writing links as night news editor on the Sunday Telegraph and editing the parish magazine and found his National Service experience useful as chairman of the local British Legion branch.

The distinctive Conyers chuckle echoed around many hostelries along with his eureka moments. He startled fellow hacks one day while brushing up on Chinese. He shouted: ‘I've discovered the Chinese word for table tennis… It's ping pong.’

#

Now then… now then…

By Colin Henderson

When Nick Lloyd, his missus Eve Pollard and David (the Road Runner ) Montgomery showed up at The People in 1982 they came with a list of features and contributors that were for the axe.

Top of the chart, guys 'n' gals – Jimmy Savile.

And so, after almost 20 years, one of the most banal Fleet Street columns ever came to an abrupt end. True, it contained the odd reference to The Beatles, Elvis, Top of the Pops and the like, but Jimmy came up with little of substance. And he resisted the best efforts of the news desk to get him to mark their card about the music scene's bad boys. ‘I know lots but I say nowt,’ said Jimmy, who always feared that the People's own sleuths might turn him over, as several papers did at various times but with little lasting effect.

He did, however, write wryly about his stints as a hospital porter in Leeds and his regular visits to some of the most violent patients at Broadmoor. ‘Trouble is that other visitors who don't know me often take me for one of the inmates,’ he was keen to tell people.

Surprisingly, despite all his TV and radio shows and his wrestling and charity work involving endless motoring in his camper van, which he liked us to believe was a ‘mobile knocking shop for the young ladies’, he never failed to file. Even when on freebies on the Canberra, which he took often, the radio officer got his stuff back.

When in London on a Friday he took great delight in coming into the office in his garish tracksuits and causing a stir among the secretaries as he handed over his copy. Never more than 250 words, it was written in ballpoint, sometimes pencil, on lined paper torn from an exercise book. The writing clear, the spelling good and there was always a narrative.

Sometimes Jimmy would walk in with small, good-looking young men ‘chauffeuring’ him in his white Roller. We always wondered about them.

And we debated endlessly why Bob Edwards and then Geoff Pinnington kept Jimmy on the books. Apparently it was because he was a name and he was cheap. ‘I get peanuts for this but at least I get my name in four million-plus papers every week, which not many other DJs do,’ he said. (The People circulation, 5.8million at its zenith, fell to below 4million shortly before Lloyd succeeded Pinners).

Like many fund-raisers, Jimmy was notoriously tight with his own cash. He liked taking part in the the People's famous though-the-night, 50-mile staff walk from London to Brighton. But it took a lot of hints for him to pay for a round as we nursed our blisters and got pissed the following afternoon in our seafront hotel.

This was nothing compared with the time Jimmy came into the office and confessed. A year earlier he had had a ‘tug’ from the taxman. The Revenue had got wise to his ruse of being paid in kind as often as possible – cigars, jewellery, holidays… It wasn't quite in the Ken Dodd league but the accountants he had been forced to employ had had a hard time helping him. They warned of a possible jail term.

‘I had to see the Revenue's head honcho this morning and he really put me though it,’ said Jimmy. ‘Then he said, “Mr Savile, you are worth far more to this country on the outside than behind bars”.’ The upshot was no court proceedings but a sizeable repayment of tax.

‘Now,’ continued Jimmy, ‘let's celebrate.’

And he sent down to the canteen for packets of crisps all round…

Colin Henderson was on the People for 28 years. Jimmy Savile dubbed him and Man of the People sub Alan Hitchings his ‘Iron Men’ for their Brighton walk exploits and a venture with him on Ben Nevis that led to the Lochaber Mountain Rescue team being called out.

#

By John Rodgers

The death of Sir Jimmy Savile at the age of 84 has me diving once more into my leaking memory tanks. I can't come up with much more than you already know about the former Yorkshire coal miner who made it big on radio and television, instantly recognisable by his catch-phrases, accent, large cigar, track suit attire and yet quietly devoted to his mother and charitable causes.

What I do remember is that he involved me in one of the toughest challenges an armchair sportsman has ever undertaken.

Savile first came to my attention in 1960 when I was working in Yorkshire as a reporter on the Hull Daily Mail. He had gained a reputation as a disc jockey at the Leeds Mecca Locarno dance hall. My wife Margaret and I were still keen on strutting our stuff in those days so we took a coach to the county capital. The thing that impressed me most about that evening was Jimmy's outrageous dyed blond (and sometimes tartan) hair.

In those days, men did not resort to artificial beauty aids. Certainly not in the north of England where they still dressed like Andy Capp in the Daily Mirror cartoon, tie-less, collar-less shirts, baggy trousers held up by braces and big leather belts. It never crossed the mind of a fashion conscious patronising London face that a musical revolution was about to explode in Liverpool, a port town just like Hull but on the other side of the Pennines.

Six years or so later, Jimmy Savile was a big name in show business, hosting television's main popular music show and writing a column for the Sunday People where I was a regular casual reporter. Much to my surprise, I discovered that the blue and white silk track suit was not all show and that man with the large cigar and loud appearance was, in fact, a fitness fanatic. Even more shocking was the discovery that my piss-artist colleagues in the editorial room had been cajoled by Savile into taking part in a Sunday morning hike.

On further thought, a stroll across the Sussex Downs exchanging shop gossip while working up an appetite for a traditional Sunday lunch of roast beef, Yorkshire pud and roast potatoes, washed down by pints of foaming ale, was an appealing concept.

Being a freelance can be a lonely business. Still building up my London press agency, I had little occasion for pastimes. I worked every day of the week for as many hours as I could stay awake. On Saturdays I would dash from my agency desk to the Odhams plant in Long Acre, Covent Garden, where Britain's second largest circulation newspaper was published, to start an evening reporting shift which rarely ended before 1 am.

The information I gained during my shift was worth more than the £7 I was paid. It gave me a jump start on most of my competitors the following day. But just as important was the chance to network with other journalists – freelances and newspaper staff men hired by the People to help out on publication day. By taking part in the hike, I would prove my worth as a man and bond to some extent with those peers who were usually my rivals.

I'm sure it was only after I agreed to take part that Fred Boulden, a large cuddly man, gave me the full SP. We were not driving to the countryside for some leafy five mile tramp over hill and dale. Instead we had a dawn start for a 50 mile slog on paving and tarmac from London to the sea side town of Brighton. Gulp.

To withdraw now would show me up as a total flake, never to be trusted again. I would have to tough it out. I even turned down my wife's offer to tag along by car to offer encouragement and supply sustenance. I did not want her to see my humiliation if I failed to complete the journey.

I still had about 15 miles to go and was staggering along the highway on my own, in deep agony and envious at the thought of Jimmy Savile entertaining fitter participants at a stupendous finishing party when a car drew up. Fred Boulden got out, put a friendly arm around me and dissolved any remaining resolution to complete the task.

‘You were so out of it, staggering from side to side, that you looked as though any minute you would fall under a passing vehicle,’ Fred told me later when I claimed I would have achieved the distance but for his intervention.

I don't remember any celebrations in Brighton. My feet were too blistered to take part or even take the train home. Instead I gladly accepted the humiliation of having my gleeful wife collect me by car.

#

Phil Walker (contd.)

By Ted Graham

Your obit, may I say, does not do justice to Phil Walker, who was one of the last great characters of Fleet Street.

I joined him on the subs table at the Daily Mirror in January 1971 and his first words to me were: ‘Hello fuckface’. I had arrived with a reputation that I would go places, and Phil already had his mind set on going further. And he did always remain one step ahead. I was deputy to him as chief sub and deputy to him as night editor. When the Molloy/Stott axis saw him forced to leave, he happily acquired a home at the Express.

But it was his ability to drink and work that impressed even his enemies, and he had few of those. In those far-off days when your ‘break’ on the subs table was meant to be an hour, Phil would sometimes return three days later. I remember vividly trying to get him back to work after one ‘short’ break of three hours, but, even with the help of Phil Bunton, he ran us three times through the revolving doors at the Mirror Holborn office before escaping to another drinking haunt.

One Saturday night, having finished his Saturday shift, his first wife was told that he had fallen down the escalator and was seriously hurt. She rushed to the hospital only to find him sitting up in bed gabbling to the nurses. Stella was so incensed that she probably inflicted more damage than caused by the fall down the escalator.

He was a great mate, and found lasting happiness with Sharon with whom he lived in harmony in Norfolk.

He was also a great journalist, producing headlines such as the great wally of china, inspired by Prince Phillip´s description of the Chinese as having slitty eyes. goodbye america on the picture of a disgraced Richard Nixon leaving the White House. My own favourite was what kenneth does to get a little more. Very simply, the veteran actor Kenneth More was having problems with fertility and his doctors advised him to rest his testicles in cold water before intercourse. Not bad for the Mirror´s trade mark Page 3 with two lines of 72pt across seven columns, 16 characters a line.

His spells at the Star were often disrupted by his booze problem, but with only a few exceptions he was a well loved man.

When he left the Mirror, I threw a dinner for him at the Savoy attended by the back bench and several subs. It was a great success because of the easy charm the little man could exude.

I still have his notes on the special menu of the evening: ‘Ted and Phil, we´re like Clough and Taylor’. And we were.

Our paths crossed many time during the late 80s and early 90s but sadly we lost touch.

However, to reach the age of 67 with only one lung and probably liver and kidneys shot to pieces is no mean feat. So another one bites the dust.

#

###

supplement – part two, november 4 2011

The Leveson Inquiry

So… it’s been the topic of conversation all week, not only in our in-box but wherever journalists have been gathering or emailing and on hack-related websites all over the place: Did reporters and photographers steal photographs from (mainly) bereaved families, or did they only say that they did?

Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre had told a high court judge that when he started in newspapers in the 70s ‘it was not uncommon for reporters to steal photographs from homes.’ Industry guru Roy Greenslade and Bob Satchwell from the Society of Editors agreed with Dacre that, prior to the setting up of the Press Council and the Editors’ Code, journalists’ behaviour had been ‘scandalous’.

So last week we asked whether they knew this sort of thing happened, or had only been told that it happened. John Dale, reporting their claims before the Leveson Inquiry into phone-hacking, threw out the challenge – if you ever did it, or saw it happen, tell us who, where and when.

The evidence is in. We have established that it happened. Just once, so far as we know. But that single instance was perhaps enshrined in the journos’ (and maybe the public’s) subconscious for ever more.

That’s not to say that impressionable reporters and photographers didn’t thereafter assume that nicking photos was what they were supposed to do. But we still haven’t found anybody who did it, or saw anybody else do it. All we know is that everybody knows that people did it. They think.

Revel Barker, with help from an old friend, reports on what might – with a single concrete instance – be the origin of a myth.

Brian Hitchen, on the other hand, remembers that the Daily Mirror employed a chap whose job was Picture Snatcher (and snatcher, in this instance doesn’t mean cleverly snatching pictures on the fly, but ‘collecting’ them). Hitch colourfully describes the operators’ ‘sleight of hand’… which may be why even he doesn’t actually say he saw it happen…

Roy Greenslade was quick to confess that he had ‘no personal knowledge of picture theft though I recall hearing about it many times.’

Quite.

Chris Sheridan says that the practice wasn’t necessary because bereaved families were generally relieved to talk to anybody, and happy to be helpful.

John Rodgers (Fleet Street News Agency) has more experience than most and he says you could beg, borrow or even buy a ‘collect’ pic. But what you didn’t do was steal it.

Alan Hart says that yes, there have been changes since the editors’ code was introduced. But they were not all for the better. And photo-stealing wasn’t part of the picture.

And as usual Rudge has the last word.

#

Moving pictures

By Revel Barker

In the end, of course, all that was needed was a good old fashioned reporter – one with a good memory, good contacts, and an unswerving eye for accuracy.

Step forward (some of you may need to sit down at this point) my old chum and long-term colleague, Mr Paul Callan, late of the Daily Mirror – but never late into El Vino – and still scribbling occasionally for the Daily Express...

He remembers The Angry Silence, a 1960 black and white movie starring Richard Attenborough as Tom, a factory worker who is sent to Coventry by his workmates for refusing to join an unofficial strike.

‘There is a telling scene,’ says Paul, ‘in which a Daily Express reporter, played by Bryan Forbes, steals a picture from Tom's mantelpiece and slips it into his pocket. Forbes, who also wrote the screenplay, had clearly done his homework and even his conversation with the newsdesk has a familiar ring of authenticity.’

Then, he recalls, ‘the picture, of the character played by Attenborough, appears on the front page of the next day's Express.’

In 1960, remember, the Express was The World’s Greatest Newspaper, and was a star (excuse the expression) in its own right. The following year another movie, The Day The Earth Caught Fire, revolved around that newspaper and its reporters, with editor Arthur Christiansen appearing as himself. In 1960 and 1961 ITV ran 39 episodes of Deadline Midnight, based on the exploits of journalists on a thinly disguised Express newspaper.

Was this then, half a century ago, where some of the myths and the ‘traditions’ of the game started?

Where did Forbes get the idea?

Callan delved into his tattered contacts book, found an ex-directory number, and made the enquiry.

And Forbes, now 85, told him that it had actually happened to him and his wife, Nanette Newman. Some reporter (not from the Express) interviewed him and stole a picture.

He said: ‘I thought it would just give an extra edge to the scene in The Angry Silence when the reporter, played by me, conned his way into the house and took the picture. So I wrote it into the script.’

It doesn’t require much of a stretch of the imagination to work out what happened next. Some wide-eyed civilian asks: ‘Is that the way you reporters work?’ – Oh yes. We’ve all done that sort of thing.

But have we?

Apparently not.

#

Snatch team

By Brian Hitchen

Picture snatching? Of course it happened. Only those inexperienced in light-fingered newspaper practices could possibly be unaware of it.

It's probably stopped now, simply because reporters don't go out doing any reporting any more. And most of the pictures in newspapers and magazines, come from agencies.

Well into the late 60s, the Daily Mirror had a man on its photographic staff whose job description was Picture Snatcher. His name was Sidney Brock, and he was the brother of the Queen's gynaecologist.

For most of the year Sid Brock wore a bowler hat and a riding mac over a well-cut, pin-striped suit. He carried a Gladstone bag, similar to those in which doctors and surgeons carried their instruments.

Because he was so well dressed, and comfortable in a council house or a castle, Sid Brock could get in anywhere. His speed of hand was legendary. He could make a picture of a loved-one leave its frame on the mantelpiece or grand piano, and disappear into his Gladstone bag in a blink of the eye.

But Sid was a gentleman, as were so many newspapermen. Their antics would these days cause the quango amateurs on the PCC to choke on their chocolate biscuits.

After having the pictures copied in the Mirror darkroom Sid, and the rest of his gang, would always return the originals, sometimes enclosing extra copies, with a hand-written thank-you note.

I knew of two Mirror photographers whose sleight of hand would have put stage magicians to shame.

While one sweet-talked and photographed the ‘client’, the other glanced through the family photo album, lifting any pictures he thought might be useful.

These pictures were always known as ‘collects’. Neither photographers nor reporters looked upon the practice as stealing, because, after copying, all the originals were immediately returned to their owners.

I don't remember anyone complaining, and sometimes the picture desk received notes, thanking them for sending additional copies of the loved one.

Life was more fun in those days, and newspapers had news in them. How different from the celebrity stodge they now dish out daily, to simple-minded readers who think the characters on East Enders, Emmerdale and Coronation Street, are real people. Poor saps!

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Veteran reporter stands up for his old colleagues

By Roy Greenslade

My old friend and colleague, John Dale, has taken issue with me (along with Paul Dacre and Bob Satchwell) for daring to suggest that journalistic ethics in the past were virtually non-existent.

In a gentlemenranters rant [last week], he argues that our views of past reporting sins have been wildly exaggerated. In essence, he accuses us of myth-making.

Older, and departed, journalists ‘are being slagged off by their younger counterparts’ at the Leveson inquiry. He writes:

‘The current generation is sacrificing the reputation of their predecessors in order to rescue their own... We were not angels, just as today's reporters are not angels, but we were probably no worse and – yes, I'll say it – perhaps better.’

Where's the proof that family photos were stolen from the home of the bereaved, that harassment and subterfuge were common, and that people's privacy was regular invaded?

Well, I concede that I've no personal knowledge of picture theft though I recall hearing about it many times in the past. It isn't something the culprits are likely to admit nowadays.

As for the other abuses, I point to the memoirs of Harry Procter, Hugh Cudlipp, Cyril Kersh, Duncan Webb, Gerry Brown and many more – most especially including the more recent book by Sharon Marshall (Tabloid Girl) – plus a variety of contributors to the esteemed gentlemenranters site itself.

These contain anecdotes in which there is no attempt to conceal unethical practices. There may be some boasting. But the picture that emerges is one of cavalier behaviour by reporters in the pursuit of stories.

John seems to believe that there is a Greenslade-Dacre-Satchwell ‘party line’ to ‘smear our history’ as part of a strategy to bolster self-regulation.

For my part at least, I can say that isn't so. I was simply keen to place the current situation in context. Reporting, particularly in newspapers that rely on human interest stories for the majority of their content, has always had its dodgy side.

The editors' code of practice, in existence since 1991, did undoubtedly improve matters in certain areas. But it did not prevent the rise, only in certain papers, of even darker arts – routine subterfuge, covert filming, gross intrusions of privacy, the use of agents provocateurs and, of course, phone hacking.

That said, there is much wisdom in John's piece, which deserves to be read in full. And given his long pedigree in the business (including a lengthy spell at the Daily Mail), his unilateral decision to report on the Leveson inquiry is welcome. See his website, johndalejournalist.co.uk, which is dedicated to the inquiry.

Meanwhile, perhaps there are people willing to prove John wrong by going on the record about ancient misbehaviour, including the theft of pictures.

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The death knock

By Chris Sheridan

Once upon a time, I remember when reporting for the Daily Mirror from Newcastle being sent to York late one afternoon. News editor Leo White wanted the reactions of a couple whose daughter's body had been found that afternoon on moors above Pately Bridge in north Yorkshire. The girl had been missing for some time.

Being a non-driver at the time, I took the train. Although somewhat worried about how I would handle the doorstep bit, I was also worried that the journey might be slow, that I would be late, too late for anything useful. However, I was able to counteract this pressure by use of a beer or two.

It was after dark by the time I got to York, grabbed a cab and trundled out to the target. The street was deserted so I assumed the competition had all been and gone. To my amazement, however, as I got out of the cab, a police car pulled up outside the house and two got out – a male and a female. Well, I'd watched enough Z-Cars to work out that these were bringing the poor parents the bad news. Luckily for me, I had not quite beaten them to it.

So I loitered nearby until they re-emerged and, after an appropriate pause, I took a deep breath and knocked on the door.

To my amazement again, the couple, though clearly distressed, seemed pleased to see, me, invited me in and produced tea and a useful chat.

They even offered pictures, so no need to do anything sneaky as in tales of yore. No distracting, no shinning up drainpipes, no sleeving of a trophy. In fact pictures were unnecessary because the earlier stories of the girl's disappearance had produced all those.

As I suspect in many, many other such cases, the nearest and dearest just wanted the opportunity to talk it over with someone. Anyone.

Whether they did so with my erstwhile colleagues who may have appeared later I do not know.

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Beg, borrow, or buy… but don’t steal

By John Rodgers

Picture snatching? It all depends on what you mean by snatching, or come to that, stealing. I collected countless photographs and frequently made more money from them than from my own snaps or the stories I wrote.

I never found it necessary to physically take a print without consent. Sweet talking usually did the trick. If that didn’t work, the promise of money often did. If I had the opportunity, I would always look at the back of prints for the name and address of the photographer. Should the owner not part with the print, I would then approach the photographer.

Theft of information, possibly. Sneaky, certainly.

Just as important as collecting a photograph was to get permission to publish. This is where many reporters and their monkeys slipped up in the haste to get back to the office with their trophies. I found it best to write a receipt for the goods promising to return them as soon as I was finished with them. The wording demanded a signature attesting to the donor's ownership and, incidentally, gave me and my agency all rights. And, naturally, I would not be finished with the photographs until there was no chance of anyone else getting their sticky fingers on them.

Morally reprehensible, probably.

There were several occasions when we were beaten to the collect picture but not to that all important document giving us the rights to negotiate a payment on behalf of the copyright owner. Among the most valuable was a video of a man being attacked by a lion at London Zoo which was in the possession of BBC TV. Among the most memorable was an iconic image of the bearded Ripper which a rival freelance was also flogging. Fortunately, my agency had possession of the photographer's negative and sole publication rights from the commissioner.

One of my reporters asked me to reimburse £50 he said he paid a porter to snatch a photograph from a murder victim's flat. Despite the temptation, I ordered him to return the photograph because I did not want to be involved in theft.

I have suffered the inconvenience of having Scotland Yard detectives raid my library and confiscate photographs to which I did not have clear title. The pix of super snouts slipped to me by the Yard’s own intelligence section proved particularly embarrassing. But that's another story.

What I did learn in my years of ‘snatching’ photos is that I could not rely on newspapers to protect me as a source. So it paid to take great care.

Occasionally we came unstuck. The father of Michael Fagan, the young man who broke into Buckingham Palace and woke up the Queen, threatened to sue us for selling photographs of his son which we had bought from his wife. He claimed he was the true copyright owner and as he had legal aid he could pursue us endlessly without cost. He suffered a heart attack before we got to court which brought an end to months of hassle.

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I didn’t want to do it…

By Alan Hart

My hearty thanks to John Dale for redressing the balance on behalf of journalists of a certain age (last week’s Ranters). Like many scribblers of my generation, I had heard stories of photographers who removed family photographs from mantelpieces while the backs of grieving relatives were turned.

I had always assumed them to be apocryphal. How could it be otherwise? The danger of the theft being noticed while the snapper was still in the house would have been enormous. And if the photographer made good his escape with the stolen photo, his larceny would have been obvious when the photo appeared in his newspaper. Either way it would surely have led to a complaint and the danger of being sacked.

It seems extraordinary to me that journalists of the stature of Paul Dacre and Bob Satchwell should take these old scribes’ tales seriously. I was a staff reporter on a weekly, an evening and, ultimately, a national tabloid, and never once saw or heard of it actually happening.

There have, of course, been some dramatic changes in press freedom during my career. It may be hard for younger journalists to believe that there was a time when it was possible to sign up key witnesses in major court cases. Long before the trial, and before they gave evidence, these people would have signed contracts to tell their exclusive stories at the end of the case in return for large sums of money.

It was also possible to name and publish photographs of rape victims. I well remember how the law was changed to prevent this happening as a result of specific cases that caused outcries at the time.

When Ian Brady and Myra Hindley were arrested for the Moors Murders, the main witness against them was David Smith, who had been present when they killed their last victim.

Smith was a hot property and he agreed to a deal with the News of the World for £1,000 – a huge sum in the mid-60s. Smith had been signed up by Manchester-based staffers George McIntosh and Nick Pritchard, who then had the job of ‘minding’ him in the months leading up to the trial.

After Smith had given evidence for the prosecution, the first question posed by the defence lawyer was: ‘Is it true you are being paid a substantial sum by the News of the World for your story?’ Smith told the QC it was none of his business. At this stage Nick Pritchard, sitting in the press benches at Chester Crown Court, was trying to make himself invisible.

The eminent judge then intervened and told Smith he must answer the question. Smith then scoured the packed gallery where the reporter was trying to slide out of sight. ‘Shall I tell him Nick?’ asked Smith. A law banning the paying of witnesses prior to trials was brought in shortly afterwards.

When I joined the News of the World in 1971, the paper carried a huge number of lengthy court cases, many of them involving rape or indecent assault. In those days the victims could be named and their photos published – with or without their consent.

This changed in the mid-70s after a prominent case in which a policeman was charged with the rape of a performer with the Black and White Minstrels. (This was a group of white singers and dancers who blacked their faces. Don’t ask me why).

Newspapers decided it was shocking that this pretty young woman, whom they named and pictured, should have her identity revealed. They campaigned successfully to change the law. But not before they had one last story about the lady in question.

After her attacker had been convicted and jailed, she was due to appear in Morecambe in a stage version of the Black and White Minstrel Show. I was among the reporters and photographers who were allowed to take seats in the theatre as they rehearsed the show. When the rape victim finally took the stage, we could hardly believe our ears as she sang her opening song. It was...

‘You made me love you, I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t want to do it.’

And they say the press are insensitive.

Alan Hart was a staff reporter on the News of the World from 1971-2000. A book he ghost-wrote for a Coronation Street legend, entitled Jack Duckworth And Me, by Bill Tarmey with Alan Hart, is now available in paperback.

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Rudge

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