2 days ago
9
My husband, Marshall Stewart, who has died aged 88, worked in broadcasting for 50 years, first within BBC radio and then in independent TV and radio.
In 1970 he took over as editor of the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, transforming it from what its presenter Jack de Manio had described as a “lighthearted miscellany” into a hard-hitting current affairs programme, and introducing the acerbic Robert Robinson as a co-presenter with John Timpson.
In 1974, Marshall took up the role of editor-in-chief of the fledgling London commercial radio station LBC and the Independent Radio News service, taking with him from Today the distinctive-voiced Douglas Cameron and putting Bob Holness in a helicopter to monitor traffic. In his time there the station gained more than 2 million listeners.
Marshall was born in Coventry, the son of Freddie Stewart, a soldier, and his wife, Gwen (nee Bryant). Marshall was four when, during the night of 14 November 1940, a German bomb hit the family home, killing his grandmother and aunt, but sparing Marshall, his mother, and his elder sister, Kathleen.
From an early age Marshall wanted to be a journalist, and left Churchfield high school at 16 to take up a five-year apprenticeship with the weekly Coventry Standard. As a junior reporter he covered all aspects of city life, including writing a sports column which gave him the chance to follow the fortunes of his beloved Coventry City FC. Later, in 1968, he published Miracle in Sky Blue, an account of the club’s resurgence to the First Division.
Marshall’s time at the Standard was interrupted by national service with the RAF (1957-59) where he filled the non-demanding role of typist to the commanding officer, enabling him to carry on filing his football reports. After completing his apprenticeship, he worked for various Midlands newspapers, before joining the BBC in London as a radio news subeditor, later becoming a features producer, then senior editorial assistant and, in 1969, the editor of South East News, before joining Today.
Having put LBC on the path to success, Marshall spent 1977 undertaking a survey of community broadcasting for the Independent Broadcasting Authority. That was the year in which he and I married, having met in 1969 on a press trip. Our first home was in Forest Gate, east London, from where he commuted to central London when he returned to the BBC in 1978 as head of information.
In 1982, Marshall became director of public affairs at Central Television, based in Birmingham, playing a major part in its 1991 licence application. The following year he left to found Harthill Communications and Earlybird Media Analysis with his close friend Peter Rosier. In 2014 he reluctantly wound up Harthill when the effects of the rare disease amyloidosis, with which he was diagnosed in 2008, became debilitating. Marshall occupied himself instead with researching and writing Meltdown, a novella based on climate change but with an intriguing criminal plot, which I hope to be able to publish.
Marshall is survived by me.
