14 Facts About Huw Wheldon

Huw Wheldon was born on 7 May 1916 in Prestatyn, Flintshire, Wales.

Huw Wheldon was educated at Friars School, Bangor, at the time an all-boys grammar school, and graduated with a BS degree from the London School of Economics in 1938.

Huw Wheldon's father, Sir Wynn Wheldon, was a prominent educationalist who had been awarded the DSO for gallantry in the First World War.

Huw Wheldon was commissioned into the Royal Welch Fusiliers in 1940, but subsequently volunteered for the airborne forces and joined the Royal Ulster Rifles, with whom he flew into Normandy.

Huw Wheldon was awarded the Military Cross for an act of bravery on D-Day + 1.

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Huw Wheldon began to produce and present adult programmes, such as Men in Battle with Sir Brian Horrocks, and Portraits of Power with Robert McKenzie.

Huw Wheldon was the editor of the programme – in the sense in which a newspaper has an editor – and he set about moulding a team of exceptional talents, including John Schlesinger, Ken Russell, Humphrey Burton, and Melvyn Bragg.

Huw Wheldon's Monitor lasted until he had "interviewed everyone I am interested in interviewing"; he was succeeded by Jonathan Miller for the series' last season.

Huw Wheldon then entered BBC management, becoming by turns Head of Documentaries.

Huw Wheldon disarmed potential sponsors of the school by eschewing flattery and opening negotiations with the bald statement that what he was after was their cash.

Huw Wheldon was a formidable and active President of the Royal Television Society.

Sir Huw Wheldon's lasting influence, other than as a programme maker, which was considerable, probably lies in the ways in which he articulated the needs and requirements of public service broadcasting.

Huw Wheldon's ashes were spread anonymously in the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, where he had served as a Trustee, and which he had loved.

Sir Huw Wheldon was highly regarded in the United States, where he had many friends, one of whom, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, caused Norman Podhoretz's obituary of his friend Wheldon, a version of which had first appeared in Podhoretz's syndicated column, to be entered into the Congressional Record.