Brian Connell

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Brian Reginald Connell (born April 12, 1916 in Hertford , † August 7, 1999 in Brighton , East Sussex ) was a British journalist , writer and television presenter .

Life and activity

After attending a grammar school in Brighton and extended language trips to Spain and Germany, Connell became an employee of the Reuter news agency . During the Second World War he was in the service of the British naval intelligence service.

From 1945 to 1950 Connell reported from occupied Germany as a correspondent for the Daily Mail . He then moved to the News Chronicle newspaper .

Since the 1950s Connell published a number of non-fiction books, including a biography of the actor Douglas Fairbanks junior and a study of the political development of (West) Germany in the first decade since the end of World War II. As a ghostwriter , he also took on the task of writing down the memoirs of various prominent personalities on the basis of communications and documents that they made available to him, with the finished books appearing under the names of his clients: This is how the third volume of memoirs of the British Prime Minister Harold Wilson (The Making of a Prime Minister. 1916-64) from Connell's pen. Furthermore, the autobiographies of the Austrian Federal President Kurt Waldheim and the Duke of Bedford are said to have been written by Connell.

Since 1958 Connell worked for the television station ITN. For this he reported, among other things, on the coronation of Pope John XXIII, on the return of Charles de Gaulle to political life. In 1965 he presented ITN's obituary for Winston Churchill . He also commented on the live report during Churchill's funeral ceremonies.

In addition to his work for ITN, Connell became a presenter for the station ITV in 1960, for which he took over the moderation of the program This Week, a news magazine that dealt with current issues of politics and society. In 1963 he left ITV again due to journalistic differences with the broadcasting line there. Instead, he moved to Anglia Television as a political program advisor.

Publications

Under his own name:

  • Knight Errant. A Biography of Douglas Fairbanks, Jr, Garden City 1955.
  • A watcher on the Rhine. An Appraisal of Germany today, 1957.
  • The Savage Years, New York 1959.
  • The Plains of Abraham, London 1959.
  • Introduction to: Ernst Hanfstaengl : Hitler. The Missing Years, Little, Brown, New York 1994.

Books ghosted by Connell:

  • Harold Wilson: Memoirs. The Making of a Prime Minister 1916–1964, London 1986.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ben Pimlott: Harold Wilson, 1992, p. 733.
personal data
SURNAME Connell, Brian
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Connell, Brian Reginald (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British journalist, writer and television presenter
DATE OF BIRTH April 12, 1916
PLACE OF BIRTH Hertford
DATE OF DEATH August 7, 1999
Place of death Brighton , East Sussex