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Lives of the People of Thursley in the 2020s

Thursley History Society has a long tradition of publishing brief biographies of its villagers as you can discover at the end of this post. Thanks to Tricia Horwood, editor of the Thursley Parish Magazine, we are able to reproduce these lives from a series she is running in the magazine called "A Day in the Life of". We shall continue to update this post until the series is finished.


So far we've had the lives:

  • James Giles, Reserve Manager

  • Simon Hall, Arborist & Children's Author

  • Byrony Holloway, Show Jumper

  • Gillian Duke, Fine Art Publisher

  • Dr Peter Clarkson, Cardiologist


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A Day in the Life of a Reserve Manager (published September 2024)

By James Giles



Hello everyone. My name is James Giles and I am the warden/ranger, but my official job title is Reserve Manager for Thursley National Nature Reserve (NNR).  I’m the chap who is responsible for the nature reserve right on your doorstep.


 A little about me then; I was born in November 1967 in Solihull, Warwickshire back then, now a part of the West Midlands. Who would have thought I would be responsible for one thousand acres of beautiful Surrey - I had not even heard of it, let alone knew where it was.


Rolling forward a few years, I moved to Guildford way back in 1994 to attend Merrist Wood College where I studied for three years on a conservation management course. Full of excitement as I had never lived anywhere else before (apart from a brief stint on a college placement in 1995 in North Yorkshire with the National Trust). When my course ended in 1997, I was looking for gainful employment. This hunt led me to Thursley National Nature Reserve where I bumped into a chap (Mark was his name) who was sitting by a pond with a stick, and something dangling from that stick  on a  string (turned out to be a thermometer), looking rather like a gnome I thought. Intrigued I approached him to ask what he was up to (I have never been one to be shy) turned out he was the current warden at the reserve and was measuring water temperature as a part of the Dragonfly mentoring project). We got chatting and I took his details and contact number. (no emails or Facebook back then).


On my return home, wowed by the beauty of Thursley NNR, I duly contacted him to see if they needed help and to offer my services and he said yes please, so we arranged to meet up again and I became their volunteer, back in September 1997, some 27 years ago now.

After a while of volunteering and some short-term contracts elsewhere whilst building up my knowledge and skills I applied for a full-time job at Thursley in 2001 and was successful. That was over twenty-three years ago, and I am still here.


My new life as a warden with English Nature had started — they subsequently became Natural England. So, what is my role, what does it entail? What does a normal day look like? Well, I will answer that when I have one!


My responsibilities range from physical management, letting contacts, managing budgets, health, and safety, establishing and running the wonderful volunteers, physical management of the reserve, chatting to visitors about what wonderous species there are to be seen, and of course, where and how to see them, and how to PLEASE behave.


I do occasional guided walks and talks,   I drive a tractor, I use chainsaws and brush cutters, I enjoy photography when time allows,  I drink tea and eat cake and I plan the work programme to ensure Thursley NNR is properly looked after. I’ve helped fight fires over the years (a huge one  back in 2005, and again back in 2020, and some smaller ones in between). I have been through two outbreaks of Foot and Mouth and of course most recently, the awful Covid pandemic.


I have to say the most rewarding part of my week is the volunteering day on a Thursday. We started the volunteer group because of the devastating fire of 2006. It was very apparent we needed help post this whopper (over 200 hectars were affected) and there was no way it could be done without help, and a lot of it – so the Thursley NNR volunteer group was born.

I remember the first task as clearly as yesterday. I had very few chairs, a very small camp table, only a couple of ordinary flasks, a few tools and no exact idea what to do or where to start. We started anyway, and the need to get the impetus flowing was clear, if only to demonstrate to everyone that we intended to do something, to start making a difference, we cared and wouldn’t let this beat us. A phoenix  rising from the  ashes was the much over-used quote at the time I recall. I remember writing for the very first time in the Thursley and Elstead Parish magazines seeking help. And you came, and many still come to this day. In fact, the last three years post Covid restrictions we’ve averaged around 730 volunteer days.

There are conflicts between the different users that I deal with daily, but in such a popular place it is an inevitability of course. But what I do it is ultimately and primarily for the wildlife and the enjoyment it brings me and other visitors.


But it is not all doom and gloom. There have been many wonderful days. Filming with non other that Sir David Attenborough, and more recently BBC Countryfile. Patrolling around the boardwalk in early summer looking at the wonderous display of Dragonflies and the abundance of the reserve’s flora. To walk the heathland and see a scuttling bright green Sand Lizard is a thrill. To watch the Hobbies speeding through the skies over the wetland in search of their prey, to hear the spring bird song of Woodlark, Dartford Warbler, Willow Warblers, Chiff Chaffs and Reed Buntings is all a treat. Then on a warm summer’s evening to hold and organise the annual Nightjar survey is truly magical.


I am exceptionally lucky and privileged to call Thursley NNR my place of work, my office. To be able to work with so many great volunteers, the real stalwarts of the NNR and of so much that is good, to know so many people in a great community, in such a beautiful corner of Surrey. I am indeed a lucky man. To have such a depth and broad range of stunning wildlife to look after and be responsible for is an honour. My garden is truly great.


And finally, for me, as mentioned earlier one of the greatest pleasures of looking after a nature reserve is that of running volunteer groups. The group meets on nearly every Thursday and once a month on a Sunday. If this appeals to you simply get in touch via an email to me, we provide tea/coffee/cake and a warm welcome, and during the autumn and winter months a warm fire. No experience necessary and all training and tools provided.


Cheers all!


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A Day in the Life of an Arborist & Children’s Author (published November 2024)

By Simon Hall



 

The working day usually starts with the alarm going off at 5 a.m. and a negotiation with our cat, Harry, who tries to trip me up going down the stairs to make a cup of tea!


I wear many hats these days. I started my life in tree surgery in 1992, doing the ten-week intensive tree course at Merrist Wood College, followed by a one-year apprenticeship for local company Honey Brothers. Having qualified, I moved to Munich, learning how to work in cold winters with lots of snow. Later, I moved to Vancouver and discovered the huge sequoia redwoods.


Moving on to Australia for two years, I worked in various remote outback communities – memorably near a courthouse made entirely of corrugated iron sheets – but also in Sydney and as far north as Darwin on mahogany and giant eucalyptus trees. Biting green and red ants, Huntsman spiders and green snakes were just some of the friendly wildlife you could find when climbing in Australian trees.


In 1998 I moved to New Zealand and worked for a large company based in Christchurch on the South Island. Some work involved being taken up in a crane and lifted into the tree because it was too unstable to climb following a cyclone that had come through, causing immense devastation.


In 2001 I returned home and took a long-distance learning course with the International Society of Arboriculture, gaining my certification as a qualified arborist. I started my own small business, Thursley Tree Services, in 2002, with my main client being Guildford Diocese but also working on trees all over Surrey.


You might have seen me at the end of August perched on top of my Land Rover trimming the hedges around the village hall. I have been maintaining them since 2004. Back then, they had grown into holly trees, and it has taken to the present day to get them back under control.


Returning to South House with my own family in 2013, we began renovating the house so that it could accommodate three generations of Halls under the same roof. Mum's wonderful last years were fulfilled by never having to leave the home she had lived in since arriving in the village in 1957!


As my climbing days started to come to an end, I took further qualifications in consultancy and tree reports. I still keep my hand in alongside a younger climber, but I have learnt that it's just as hard physically working on the ground, and that you have the drawback of gravity: all that is easily dropped from a height has to be picked and moved! Last month, one of my climbers was working on an oak tree in Bowlhead Green, only to find that the hornets from a nest nearby were getting particularly interested in the sap from the tree. Luckily, he managed to finish his work and make a speedy descent without getting a nasty sting. So, even in this country there are critters to avoid in tree surgery!


Despite living in a conservation area, many homeowners are not aware of the responsibilities they have to the trees in their garden. It's always worth considering having a tree report done if you have several trees. It can save you money in the long run!



About eight years ago I started on a very different journey, writing short stories for my own children based on heritage railways around the country. Never could I have imagined then that this would result in five self-published books and a busy schedule of travelling around the country to promote them in wonderful places as far afield as Yorkshire and Cornwall. I have recently finished a book launch at the Cheddar Caves and Shepton Mallet Jail. This year has been the busiest for my writing so far. The books all have an educational element alongside their stories and a portion of the proceeds from each sale goes to the Railway Children charity, which supports vulnerable children on the streets and at transport hubs.


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A Day in the Life of a Show Jumper

By Byrony Holloway


My name is Bryony Holloway and I live with my husband and team of horses at Haybarn. When Tricia asked me to share “a day in the life of a Show Jumper” for the Parish Magazine I felt both honoured and marginally alarmed!



I have come from a totally non-equine background, but my love and fascination for horses has been my constant driving force for as long as I can remember. To follow your passion for your life is a privilege and I have done just that producing horses in and around Thursley (the best place in the world to do this, with it’s fabulous hills and sandy soil) for over 30 years now.


Working with horses is not a job, more a way of life that is 24-7, with never-ending responsibility, people, travel, training, injuries, joy and set-backs.  Though we try to adhere to a strict format with the horses’ routine, no two days are ever the same with animals, so I thought perhaps I’d stretch to “Two days in the August life of” to give you a better insight of the highs and lows!


SUN 18 AUG – The Highs

6am – alarm goes.  I get up feeling sick….pre competition nerves!


I am in Chelsea with my fabulous show Team. We have Piers (AKA The Easter Bunny) and Gravin, my two older horses with us at The Global Champions Tour London Show. This is one of our favourites and the horses love it too. It is held annually at the Site of the Chelsea Flower Show and it always feels odd having the horses in central London.


I dress in my show kit and scooter to the showground. Too nervous for breakfast! The horses stay in temporary stables on site for the week.


Ash and Helen have been up since 5am feeding and mucking out; then hand walking before beautification starts… Gravin is white and often has to have a bath pre class!!  Then they are plaited and polished ready for the ring.


This morning is our last day and so our Grand Prix. I have to walk the course; learning the route and stepping the distances between fences.  It is my responsibility to make their experience in the ring as enjoyable as possible so a plan is paramount.

Space is a premium in Chelsea so, once mounted, there is one strip of concrete to walk up and down (I do this for 20 mins on each horse) then a tiny sand space to have a warm up.


Jumping at the big shows involves just a couple of minutes in the ring jumping on each of three days … however, prep for this is literally years and years of early mornings, fitness regimes and training sessions!


Both the horses jump lovely clear rounds and I have had a fabulous week at the show.  We now have to pack up camp to leave.  Getting the horses out of London is quite a big operation… once the kit is all cleaned and packed in trunks we have to wait until 8pm before I am allowed to bring the truck from Battersea Park, where it has been parked for the week, up to the showground for our 15 min slot to load stuff and horses and be out!


Phew…We drive through the gates at home at 11pm ready to unload, settle horses, unpack and start the big clean ready for Hickstead next week. First load of washing on and to bed 1am!!


WEDNESDAY 21st   The Lows!

7.00am — morning yard starts… my brilliant home team are in to start daily care.


Ihave a few horses to ride today;  The London horses are still having a few quiet days hacking in the village.


9.30am -    I have a training session on Jabab who is set to go to Hickstead next week. Jabab, obviously furious at not being selected for London, decides to have a leap about and deposits me on the bank. 5 mins unconscious then the next thing I know I am surrounded by lots of really helpful people and an ambulance ride to the Royal Surrey.

After an overnight stay I am released with massive nausea, a brain swell and a shattered Scapula.



Two months downtime and a chance to reflect and make new plans!


This has always been the sport.  One minute you’re at the best event of the year and then the following week a few days in Bramshott Ward at the Royal Surrey, but this has never put a dent in my dedication – I still love it to this day and feel very fortunate to have been able to follow my dreams.


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A Day in the Life of a Fine Art Publisher & Print Maker (published December 2024)

By Gillian Duke

 

Tricia asked me to write about a day in my life. Well, I thought, no two days are ever the same and there’s always a surprise lurking. I enjoy variety in what I do and I’m very lucky to work with amazing, multi- talented people. I’ve been involved in arts and culture my entire life, since graduating in the 1980’s.


As managing director of a fine art print publisher and printmaker, CCA Galleries, I’m thrown different challenges every day. With a gallery in Jersey and distribution networks reaching across the UK and worldwide, I’m immersed in the ever-evolving world of fine art.

Alongside my team, I oversee fine art print projects at our busy working studios in West London or flying off to oversee contemporary art shows, exhibitions and installations at our gallery in Jersey. Here we are also currently renovating a listed Jersey property to create a boutique style Art Hotel offering art and culturally based experiences and tuition in an eclectic atmosphere.



Once known as Christies Contemporary Art, the company was founded in 1972 by Christies International, the famous auction house and was established with a vision to support and promote contemporary artists, offering a platform to showcase their work through print publication. CCA Galleries London and CCA Galleries International has been privately owned for the last thirty-five years and the ethos remains the same.


Some days, you'll find me heading up the A3 to our studio in West London, formerly Walton Hall Film Studios (incidentally where in 1953, the Oscar-winning film, The African Queen, was filmed and produced). There I will find myself collaborating with talented artists and our expert printmakers.  We're more than just a team. We're a close-knit family, each person bringing years of experience and passion for artistry.


I’m able to bring my own skillset in printmaking, gained from my studies in all techniques and many years in this complex business to strive to produce the highest quality. We thrive on innovation and tradition, merging the old with new technology, whether we're discussing edition sizes, printmaking techniques or artistic intent. Every print we produce is an intricate balance of artistic vision and technical skills in print. In the main, it’s an ancient, handmade process, often underappreciated by those unfamiliar with the intricacies of this unique art form.


In the studio, we're privileged to work with and print for some of the finest artists in the UK, such as Damien Hirst, Sir Peter Blake, Bruce Mclean, Frank Bowling, Rose Wylie, Marina Abramovic, Ai Weiwei, Gavin Turk, Nic Fiddian Green and the King. Past masters include Sir Terry Frost, Donald Hamilton Fraser, Sandra Blow (whom were all Royal Academicians) Storm Thorgerson and John Piper. Also, where music and art meet, we are joined by musicians who produce artwork such as Ronnie Wood, Bob Dylan, and Maxim of The Prodigy.


These special people are multi-talented, and work is hands-on and collaborative, as we discuss techniques, test colours, and make adjustments on the spot. Each project brings its own challenges, whether it's the delicate layering required for lithography, or the precision needed for complex screen printing. The surprises when making prints still amaze me. The processes can be quite technical yet sometimes the results are unexpected. We often enhance the final image with collage, emboss, diamond dust, and layered glazes, each of which brings a new dimension to the one-dimensional image. We have pioneered many such techniques and have embraced 3D printing, adding the 3D elements to some artworks.


When working in Surrey, each day involves a combination of administration, contract negotiations, strategic planning of art shows and exhibitions. We supply many galleries with our own publications and original works and assist them with their own show programs. It’s a dynamic environment where art meets commerce.


One of the most exciting aspects of my role is working with diverse partners across many sectors. We've had the privilege of collaborating with musicians and artists, creating album covers, for bands such as The Who, Madness, Paul Weller, to name a few and working on licensing agreements with corporate brands including Apple Corp, Coca-Cola, and DC Thompson (The Beano). These partnerships have extended the reach of artists we work with and provide them with opportunities in unexpected spaces, from fashion to music.


Our charitable work also plays a central role in our day-to-day operations. We're proud to support causes like Teenage Cancer Trust, The British Heart Foundation (where I was for many years on the committee for fund raising events), Care2Save (Bentley Motorcars), Grenfell Tower, Art for Grenfell and the NHS's 70th anniversary, Comic Relief, the Eve Trust (ovarian cancer).  London Stands Together (The Felix Project) was an interesting challenge. Whilst isolating at home during the pandemic,  the Evening Standard contacted me out of the blue.  Peter Blake had made an artwork which was a pull-out in the paper for everyone to stick in their windows to bring hope and unity. They wanted to take this further and asked us to produce a limited-edition silkscreen signed by Peter to raise money to feed Londoners in need. At the time the studios had closed, we were in lockdown and staff were isolating at home. From the garden, where phone signals are sometimes non-existent and within a tight deadline, two staff members went back to the studio and produced a stunning silkscreen edition,  LONDON STANDS TOGETHER, which then sold out in hours and raised £100,000.  These and many other art projects have raised millions for worthy charities.


Whether it is limited edition prints or exclusive collaborations, we've seen firsthand how art can raise awareness and funds for causes close to our hearts. This gives our work a greater sense of purpose, knowing that each piece sold contributes to life-saving initiatives, to assist people in need with long-standing conditions or to alleviate human suffering. 


I’ve had the privilege of collaborating with non-profit organizations to support a variety of causes, from community outreach to international aid. It is incredibly fulfilling to be part of projects where the artwork isn't just admired, it helps make a tangible impact for the benefit of many others.


In 2012, during the London Olympics, we had the amazing opportunity to contribute to the cultural landscape by being selected to install artwork at Gatwick Airport, created by Sir Peter Blake and produced at our West London studios. This was a high-profile project that showcased the power of art in public space, emphasizing our multicultural society. Our printmaking arrived to a global stage as the world and its athletes and supporters came to London.



One of my roles for the past decade has been to source and produce the image to advertise the City of London Lord Mayor’s Show. We've created the CCA Art Bus for such events to promote art as a fun…inclusive experience for all ages, cultures, and beliefs. As is the power of art therapy to comfort and heal. I have the joy of working with an exceptional autistic artist whose work we publish and promote. Art is her window to the world and being a part of her journey inspires me every day.


I feel incredibly fortunate I found my home Badgers.  What I never realized at the time was the magic of Thursley. I originally chose this location as the central point within my constantly moving triangle between London, Surrey and the Channel Islands. Little did I know I would embrace the amazing social life here, with many great friends. Many of whom have also shared this unique experience of Lord Mayor’s Show procession (see photo opposite), may that tradition continue for years to come.


As they say, find a job you truly love, and you’ll never work another day in your life… well I can say, the artworld is truly ore inspiring, embracing and diverse, on so many levels. It fills my days, well most days…. aside from walking the dog, riding, various building and restoration projects and now, learning and turning a potter’s wheel.


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A Day in the Life of a Cardiologist (published January 2025)

By Peter Clarkson

 

Peter was brought up in East Sussex and went to medical school at UCL and undertook the majority of his training, in London. His first cardiology registrar job was at Frimley Park Hospital in 1991 where he met his wife Pam, who was also working there (in between ski seasons!). He returned to Frimley Park Hospital as a Consultant Cardiologist in 2001 and was Clinical Lead for 23 years, developing the department from 2 to 10 consultants and establishing invasive and interventional (coronary stenting and pacing) services.


On moving out of London, Peter and Pam first lived in Pirbright, later moving into Guildford to be closer to the schools attended by their three children-Abby, Will and Lydia.  As the kids moved on to university, they were keen to find a more rural property with some land for the animals and, by chance, were sent some details of a bungalow requiring some work on Highfield Lane (and we love it!). 



Most working weeks combine outpatients (both NHS and Private), operating in the cardiac catheterisation laboratory (Cath Lab) and a variety of multidisciplinary team meetings (MDTs) where patient management is discussed and plans agreed.  Every 8 weeks I am Consultant of the week (COW) dedicated to caring for the inpatients, including those cardiology patients admitted through the emergency department. The variety provided by clinics, MDTs, COW and operating, makes the weeks to fly by.

 

Tuesday is a very varied day, starting with an Outpatient Clinic where I see patients with a wide variety of conditions including chest pain, breathlessness and palpitations. Unfortunately, following the COVID pandemic (where we undertook very little non-emergency work) and the junior doctor strikes (where consultants covered ED and the ward resulting in a cancellation of huge amounts of elective work), the wait to be seen in outpatients is more than 40 weeks. As a result, the patient's condition has often changed since the original referral (by the GP) and we find that the first few minutes of each consultation is taken up with apologies and explanation. Patients’ frustration is further exacerbated by the clinics being significantly overbooked, both to try and bring down the waiting times (also giving us the opportunity to see patients with urgent problems), but frequently leaving clinics running late. 


Although there is a trend to offer telephone consultations, much is lost to the patient and doctor. Many of us believe that face-to-face consultations have a therapeutic benefit, up and beyond a diagnosis and management plan, and allow a nuance of interaction that is often much more satisfactory (and fun!). 


I spend about half my week operating; performing procedures which include coronary angiography and stenting and pacemaker or ICD (defibrillator) implantation. Coronary angiography involves inserting a fine tube into the main artery of the wrist, allowing the injection dye into the heart arteries to identify narrowing and blockages. These x-ray images allow us to plan stent treatment—here a fine wire  through a tube is inserted down through the narrowed segment of the artery, and over this wire a balloon is passed which is inflated to stretch up the narrowing. A stent is then inserted, which is a tube of wire mesh which is pressed into the wall of the artery to hold it wide open. Sometimes a stent procedure is not suitable, and the patient will be referred on for coronary artery bypass grafting.  


During each operating session I undertake a variety of procedures, some elective and some urgent inpatient procedures. On Tuesday afternoons I often insert cardiac pacemakers, which prevents the heart stopping or going too slowly (and sometimes gets the heart to contract more efficiently) and Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator (ICD's), which can detect dangerous, and sometimes fatal, abnormal rhythms and automatically deliver an electric shock to terminate them and save the patient. 


One of the nice aspects of the procedures we perform is that they are all conducted under local anaesthetic (with or without a little sedation). This allows me to talk to patients whilst performing the procedures, which often very proves very interesting (although not always!) and helps keep the patient calm. 



Most Tuesday nights (and one is six weekends) since 2007 (when we opened our Cath Labs with money raised, from amongst other things, a charity fashion show in which I forced strut along a catwalk in Camberley M&S, I was advised to stick with the day job!), I have been on-call for heart attacks. If you live within a 25 mile radius of Frimley Park Hospital (this includes Thursley) and have an acute severe heart attack you will be ‘blue lighted’ to the hospital  where we will use the balloon treatment and stenting to unblock your heart artery, restoring blood flow and preventing heart muscle damage or death.  


Patients suffering significant chest pain will (hopefully) call 999, and an ambulance will be dispatched. The paramedics will make an assessment and perform an ECG which is then transmitted to the coronary care unit (CCU) at Frimley Park Hospital. The CCU staff will call me and transmit the ECG and if the patient is having an acute severe heart attack  we will arrange an emergency transfer to the cardiac catheter laboratories and call in the‘ Primary Angioplasty’ on-call staff, which includes a cardiac nurse, physiologist and radiographer (a tight knit team due to the severity of the illness being treated; one in twenty patients do not survive).  


Arriving in the hospital within 30 minutes, the stent treatment is rapidly performed, re-opening the blocked heart artery, relieving pain, reducing damage to the heart muscle and in some cases, saving the life of the patient. Although we are often called at night, the procedure is generally quick and tends to be very gratifying, rapidly improving patient's symptoms and allowing us to immediately reassure the patient's relatives and friends. 


Although I consider it a privilege to have the skill and experience to be able to perform these procedures, like many doctors, the week in week out on-call commitment has significantly impacted on my family life. Missed Christmas parties, Pam sat alone in restaurants, abandoned supermarket shopping and children sat alone waiting in the Cath Lab coffee room (although this has resulted in some success with choosing medical based careers). 


The NHS has provided with me with  a wonderful career and the opportunity to make a living doing something I love (although it not been without its sacrifices!). Over the past 35 years I've worked through many changes and reorganisations but, previously, there has always been ‘light at the of the tunnel’. Sadly, it is now the NHS that is in need of resuscitation, although given the resilience of the workforce there is always hope. 


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A Day in the Life of a book publisher (published in February 2025)

By David Young

 

Unlike others in the village contributing to this column, mine will be less in the present and more a retrospective – I am old, Father William, and my working life is largely behind me. Still, I am happy to write a little about a career I have so thoroughly enjoyed that I can scarcely remember a handful of bad days in more than half a century.

 

I had a notably underwhelming and undistinguished school career in the 1950s and 60s, but in a life I consider to have been full of good fortune, one of the very luckiest things was a family firm prepared to take me on if I proved I had something other than my name to offer.

 

The family firm was a Mind, Body and Spirit publishing company called Thorsons.  It had been started by my maternal grandfather in 1930.  He was evangelical about bringing alternative medicine to wider public attention after my grandmother, gravely ill with dry pleurisy, was restored to health by the Champneys cure, just down the road, using such therapies.

 

My father, quite rightly, wouldn’t let me join until and unless I had learnt a useful skill, and so, after a year at a newspaper where I learned the invaluable skill of touch typing, and turned 17,  I took a Diploma in Printing Management at Watford College of Technology, and subsequently joined Thorsons as Production Manager in 1970.

 

It was an exciting time to be publishing in our field:  we went into full colour covers, sold into mainstream shops as well as health food stores and via direct mail, and with books such as E for Additives and Food Combining for Health (still one of the Top 100 nonfiction books published since records were kept), we caught a wave of public interest and rode it.  I worked with my father, my brother-in-law, and my best friend from college, along with a loyal and enthusiastic staff, and those years were such fun.

 

We sold Thorsons to HarperCollins Publishers in 1989, and so I have spent the last 35+ years working in general Trade publishing, at HC, Time Warner, and Hachette Books USA, where I was the CEO for eight extraordinary years living and working in New York City.  I was also Chairman of the Association of American Publishers for two years.

 

I am not, and never have been, on the editorial side – I don’t commission or buy books.  My interest has always been on the business side of the business, and in the people working within publishing.  It’s a wonderfully creative, collaborative process, full of imagination, courage, risk and reward.  I’ve always loved the fact that I have had a hand in producing a tangible object.  I am in the process of weeding my own enormous collection of books ahead of our downsize into the village this year, and each one holds a host of memories.




 I’ve been lucky enough to work with authors such as Nelson Mandela – presenting him with the one millionth copy of The Long Walk to Freedom in South Africa House, once a bastion of the apartheid movement.  That is probably still the most proud and humbling moment of my whole career.  Others include Stirling Moss, a personal hero; Carole King (an absolute delight); Edward Kennedy; the historian Antony Beevor, Keith Richards (the audiobook of his autobiography Life won an Emmy) and the wonderful J K Rowling (we published her adult titles) and other novelists such as Michael Connelly, David Baldacci, James Patterson, Val McDermid and Sarah Dunant to name but a few.  I’ve been involved with publishing phenomenon, such as the Twilight series in the USA in the early 00s, where we were selling so many copies our software wasn’t equipped to print royalty cheques with so many zeroes!

 

My American adventure was exactly that.  We had a warehouse in Indiana where staff were allowed to be armed at work (bear in mind that temperatures often exceeded 40C with high humidity, and tempers ran short), and there were very necessary tornado shelters.  I worked with TV evangelists through the company’s Nashville based Religious Division, and that was, shall we say, eye opening. I even had lunch with Donald Trump, who was suing my company for libel (we won!), to try to smooth the waters but failed.

 



I semi-retired in 2013, but as the cliché goes, when you love what you do, you never work a day in your life, and since then I have been on the boards of Scholastic books, the largest children’s educational publisher in the world, Canongate Books, a boutique literary house, the Raymond Chandler Literary Estate, Portland Literary, and, pro bono, Tate Enterprises, and the Book Trade Benevolent Society.  The common theme is always books and book people.


 Approaching the age of 75, I will shortly give up almost all of the roles that keep my hand in with an industry I love.  I leave it in pretty good shape, I think – rumours circulating a couple of decades ago that the book was dead were very wrong.  But it has transformed across the 50+ years of my career.  The end of the Net Book Agreement, which had price-maintained books, was a huge challenge and change.  The move to digital, with Kindles and audio books, not to mention the vast new array of other entertainments available, have all caused sea changes within the industry.  Jeff Bezos started Amazon using books, because ISBNs, the numbers on the bar codes on every book, made books the only international product numbering system at the time, and also because he could ship them from his garage!  Bezos is a brilliant but very strange man, not at all warm unlike Steve Jobs who was such an enthusiast about his products.  We helped to open the iBook store which was an experience and one that also led to litigation, but that’s another whole story.

 

Publishing faces challenges, of course.  AI is both an extraordinary opportunity and an existential threat.  And I believe strongly that WFH is potentially incredibly detrimental to the creative process which makes the magic happen at a publishing house.  But those challenges are for younger men and women than I to rise to.  I shall read about them from my armchair.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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