John was born in Bosham, West Sussex, the son of a farmer. After taking an interest in the weather from the age of four, he studied geography at the University of Salford, followed by meteorology at the University of Birmingham.
…Allan, David
Born Gordon Allan in Manchester, David is a broadcaster with over 50 years’ experience and, for people of a certain generation, is a very recognisable voice. Certainly one of the great broadcast voices of all time.
…Aspel, Michael
Michael was born in London. He was evacuated during World War II, for four-and-a-half years, to Chard in Somerset. He worked as a tea boy at William Collins publishers and completed his National Service in the ranks of the King’s Royal Rifle Corps (1951 – 1953).
…Balshaw, Samantha
(Formerly Samantha Howkins). Samantha was a TSW in-vision continuity announcer and assistant transmission controller. She moved to London to work for Carlton in 1993 and then for Meridian in Southampton. In 2003, eight years after joining Meridian, Samantha took some time off to look after her children. In 2006, she joined Sky as a transmission controller, working on the movie channels.
Thompsett, Glen
Glen was a TVS announcer who later joined LWT just as in-vision announcing was being phased out in the early 1980s. Glen remained with LWT until October 2002. From 2002 to 2004, he was a freelance announcer at ITV 1. He has also presented for Meridian News in the south east, Sky Television, and on several satellite travel and shopping channels.
Glen has worked at a number of radio stations: he was a member of the launch team at Severn Sound in Gloucester in 1980; GWR in Wiltshire; Mercia Sound in Coventry; host of the breakfast show on Kent’s Invicta FM during the late-1980s and early 1990s, gaining some of the highest audience figures in the station’s history.
Glen runs his own audio production studio in Kent and produces work for a variety of independent companies and corporate clients.
Ashe, Anna-Maria
Anna-Maria Ashe was a continuity announcer at BBC Scotland, TVS and Grampian Television in the mid-1980s. She also presented lunchtime news bulletins in-vision during her time with BBC Scotland (1986). She later moved to the TVS nightly news magazine Coast to Coast where she did a stint at presenting/newsreading for the Southampton edition, before moving to the Maidstone programme.
Anna-Maria was replaced at Maidstone by Liz Wickham when she moved to LWT as the main anchor of LWT News and LWT News Weekend. She was one of the main presenters on the London Tonight programme on ITV until February 2004.
Bannerman, Graham
Graham has a wealth of live broadcast experience.
…Anders, Ruth
Ruth was an LWT announcer/newsreader (1982 – 1994).
…Alexander, Lucy
Lucy’s journalistic career began as a reporter with BBC local radio – BBC Radio Solent, BBC Radio Hereford and Worcester and BBC Greater London Radio. Her first TV job was with Anglia TV as a producer. She soon moved on to reporting and presenting on Anglia News.
She later became a regular face on the ITV London regional news programme London Today and was soon co-anchoring the early evening London Tonight with Alastair Stewart.
Lucy later co-anchored the breakfast programme on the ITV News Channel with Andrew Harvey. In 2006, she joined Sky News.