Wilfred Pickles, OBE was an English actor and radio presenter.
16 Facts About Wilfred Pickles
2.
Wilfred Pickles moved to Southport, Lancashire, with his family in 1929, and worked with his father as a builder.
3.
Wilfred Pickles joined an amateur dramatic society, and in a local production there met Mabel Cecilia Myerscough, all of whose family had been connected with the stage.
4.
Wilfred Pickles remained a proud Yorkshireman, and having been selected by the BBC as an announcer for its North Regional radio service, he went on to be an occasional newsreader on the BBC Home Service during the Second World War.
5.
Wilfred Pickles was the first newsreader to speak in an accent other than Received Pronunciation, "a deliberate attempt to make it more difficult for Nazis to impersonate BBC broadcasters", and caused some comment by wishing his fellow northerners "Good neet".
6.
Wilfred Pickles soon became a radio celebrity, and pursued an acting career in London's West End theatre, on television and on film.
7.
Wilfred Pickles appeared in the show with his wife Mabel, whom he had married at Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church, Ainsdale, Southport on 20 September 1930.
8.
In May 1954, he took the show to television with the programme Ask Wilfred Pickles which ran until 1956.
9.
In 1948, a children's board game entitled Ask Wilfred Pickles was published by jigsaw puzzle manufacturer Tower Press.
10.
Wilfred Pickles was the guest castaway on BBC Radio's Desert Island Discs on 2 January 1953; his chosen book was The Oxford Book of English Verse edited by Arthur Quiller-Couch, and his luxury a yellow waistcoat.
11.
Wilfred Pickles was in the play Come Laughing Home by Keith Waterhouse and Willis Hall on BBC Radio 4 in 1970.
12.
In 1955, Wilfred Pickles published an anthology of poetry and prose of the "north counties" of England.
13.
In 1950, Wilfred Pickles was awarded the OBE for services to broadcasting.
14.
Wilfred Pickles appeared, to great credit and dramatic effect, in the film Billy Liar, where he played the titular protagonist's father.
15.
Wilfred Pickles died in Brighton on 27 March 1978, aged 73, and is buried with his wife Mabel in Southern Cemetery, Manchester.
16.
Wilfred Pickles was the uncle of judge James Pickles and actor Christina Pickles, and great-uncle of actress Carolyn Pickles.