| When I heard on August 30th the news of John’s death while playing tennis the previous evening, I could not believe that he had gone. He was a good mate for all the years he was in VT, and, after I left he kept in touch, and was a regular, but late, attendee at the Oldboys Lunches. Fascinated by everything, I can remember standing out side the perimeter fence of Farnborough Airfield during the show (in the days when you could) taking photographs - I had just run out of film when a voice behind me said "Allo mate!" (see below) and there was John, and he had a spare roll of film! It is through his contacts at Wood Norton (see below) that the majority of the group photos in our ETD section were sourced. He will be sadly missed by us all. At his funeral, Dave Rixon gave a very good appreciation of John - he has allowed us to reproduce it below. |
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| Chris Booth | |
| A is for Allo mate! Johns cheerful greeting to all his buddies B is for Blue jeans mostly smart – always casual C is Career a very distinguished and respected time with BBC Television D – Dursley the Cotswold town he came from. His voice still had the hint of a Gloucester accent E is for Editor, right from the beginning he had a real talent for the job. F - Friends, there are a lot of us that will miss him G is for generous he was always lending or giving things to friends (I think I have returned all I’ve had) H is Helpful, always ready to help I is for Internet a handy source for most of Johns collectibles J is for Jim, the son he adored, a very proud dad right from the start! K Keys He always seem to leave his keys lying around on the table, maybe wasn’t enough room in his jeans pocket L is for Luck it suddenly ran out for John 2 weeks ago |
M for MGB his blue hardtop N – Nice, he simply was just a very nice man O – is for Oracle. In his specialised field of television he always had an answer. P – Project each time we would meet up he would have a new profit making scheme on the go Q is Quest for the ultimate Ebay bargain (see “I” for internet) R – is for Risk I remember (quite a few years ago now) us launching paper aeroplanes off the roof of Television Centre S - is for Supportive T – is Teacher, not content with being a master of his trade, he turned his hand to teaching others U – Unshaven, I don’t think I have ever seen him with stubble V - is for Versatile I believe he could probably have turned his hand to almost anything W - Wood Norton, the BBC training centre where we met over 40 years ago. Interesting that he still worked there until quite recently X – is for Expenditure, a familiar subject for John Y – Why did this have to happen so soon? Z – John didn’t do anything beginning with Z |