Leila Williams | |
---|---|
Born | 1937 Walsall, England |
Nationality | British |
Known for | Blue Peter |
Spouse | Fred Mudd |
Children | 1 |
Beauty pageant titleholder | |
Title | Miss Great Britain 1957 |
Major competition(s) | Miss Great Britain 1957 (Winner) Miss World 1957 (Unplaced) |
Leila Williams (born 1937) is a British TV host, model and beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss Great Britain 1957 and represented her country at Miss World 1957. She was one of the original presenters of Blue Peter , working on the programme from 1958 to 1962.
In 1957 Williams won the Miss Great Britain title. The following year she became the first female Blue Peter presenter, co-presenting with Christopher Trace. [1]
Williams left Blue Peter at the start of 1962, after being made redundant by Clive Parkhurst, a newly appointed producer, with whom she did not get on. Williams recalled "he could not find anything for me to do", and in October, Williams did not appear for six editions, and was eventually sacked, leaving Trace on his own or with one-off presenters. Parkhurst was replaced by John Furness. [2]
She went on to play small parts in the films Watch Your Stern , Marriage of Convenience and The Beauty Jungle , and returned to Blue Peter for the show's 20th anniversary in 1978 and subsequently the 40th anniversary in 1998 and the 60th in 2018. [1]
Williams married Fred Mudd, lead singer of the popular music group The Mudlarks, [3] and in the 1960s had their only child, Debra.[ citation needed ]
Whilst the Mudlarks were touring in the early 1970s, she worked as an assistant manager at a Dorothy Perkins clothing store in Harrow. Williams and Mudd then ran public houses in Kingston-upon-Thames and Surbiton for many years before retiring to Spain. [1] Fred Mudd died there in 2007.[ citation needed ]
Williams is now[ when? ] living in Wanstead, East London, in sheltered accommodation and is finishing her autobiography.[ citation needed ]
The Sky at Night is a documentary television programme on astronomy produced by the BBC. The show had the same permanent presenter, Sir Patrick Moore, from its first monthly broadcast on 24 April 1957 until 7 January 2013. The latter date was a posthumous broadcast, following Moore's death on 9 December 2012. This made it the longest-running programme with the same presenter in television history. Many early episodes are missing, either because the tapes were wiped or thrown out, or because the episode was broadcast live and never recorded in the first place.
Blue Peter is a British children's television entertainment programme created by John Hunter Blair. It is the longest-running children's TV show in the world, having been broadcast since October 1958 It was broadcast primarily from BBC Television Centre in London until September 2011, when the programme moved to dock10 studios at MediaCityUK in Salford, Greater Manchester. It is currently shown live on the CBBC television channel on Fridays at 5 pm. The show is also repeated on Saturdays at 11:30 am, Sundays at 9:00 am and a BSL version is shown on Tuesdays at 2:00 pm.
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A Blue Peter badge is an award for Blue Peter viewers, given by the BBC children's television programme for those appearing on the show, or in recognition of achievement. They are awarded to children aged 5 to 15, or to adults who have been guests on the programme. Adults can also get a Gold badge if they have done something extraordinary. Approximately 22,000 are distributed annually.
Matthew James Baker is a British television presenter. He co-presented the children's television show Blue Peter from 1999 until 2006, BBC One's Countryfile since 2009 and The One Show from 2011 to 2020, with Alex Jones.
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Christopher Leonard Trace was an English actor and television presenter, notable for his nine years as an original presenter of the BBC children's programme Blue Peter.
Anita West is a British actress and former television presenter.
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Miss Great Britain is a national beauty contest held annually in Britain since 1945. It is Britain's longest-running beauty pageant.
The Mudlarks were an English pop vocal group of the late 1950s and early 1960s. They had two Top 10 UK hit singles in 1958.
The Blue Peter pets are animals that regularly appear on the long-running BBC children's television series Blue Peter. For 27 years, when not on TV, these pets were often looked after by Blue Peter's long-standing pet keeper Edith Menezes, who died in 1994. The exceptions were the dogs Petra, Shep and Goldie, who lived with Peter Purves, John Noakes and Simon Groom, respectively, for which the three presenters were paid a stipend for their upkeep.
Zoe Salmon is a television presenter from Northern Ireland who hosted the children's television programme Blue Peter from 23 December 2004 to 25 June 2008. She also appeared on Dancing on Ice in early 2009. She was the 1999 Miss Northern Ireland.
Richard Marson is an English writer, television producer and director, best known as a former editor-in-chief of the BBC's children's television programme Blue Peter. In September 2007, Marson was sacked from his post for making an editorial decision on the naming of the new Blue Peter cat, thus overriding the results of online vote on the programme in January 2006. Despite this, he remains the programme's "unofficial historian".
Sandra Michaels is an English actress.
Ann Taylor is an English actress, hostess, and singer who appeared on British television in the 1950s and 1960s.
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