An obituary fro Welsh broadcaster Julian Brinkworth from Ariel and two for
Simon Cumbers which list members may not have seen.

Ariel 15.06.04 week 24  - Obituary
Julian Brinkworth
Julian Brinkworth, a familiar voice to listeners of BBC Radio Wales, has
died.
Radio was a strong theme throughout Julian’s life, and his earliest
memories are of listening to Uncle Mac on his parents’ big Cossor valve
radio.
He trained as a radio officer in the Merchant Navy in the 1970s until
student politics intervened and he became a local student leader in
Cardiff. After several years working in the voluntary sector he resumed
his interest in radio in 1987 by setting up the Rookwood Sound Hospital
Radio station at Cardiff’s spinal injuries hospital. Julian and his team
raised more than £30,000 to finance the project and their fundraising
efforts included hiring Concorde for the day. The station thrives to this
day with many of its volunteers graduating to professional broadcasting.
Julian joined the presentation department at Radio Wales in 1990 and
became a familiar voice reading the news and making continuity
announcements as well as presenting a variety of programmes over the years.
He also had a keen interest in transport and buses, in particular. In 1994
he established a guided open-top bus tour of Cardiff using fellow
broadcasters as tour guides. The tour continues today under the worldwide
City Sightseeing banner. With fellow broadcaster Roy Noble he acquired and
restored a former Aberdare Council single deck bus, which has attended
numerous transport rallies throughout the country.
Julian was 48 and fought cancer for a number of years. He leaves wife Lyn
and teenage children Lisa and Matthew.



Simon Cumbers
tribute by: Orla Guerin
In the dark hours after Simon’s death I sat down to write an obituary,
trying to find the words that might capture the man. An email went out,
asking colleagues for their experiences with him. For hours the tributes
came in from BBC correspondents around the globe – in Brussels,
Johannesburg, Moscow and Jersualem. There were stories of skill,
dedication and unfailing good humour in the toughest of situations – on
assignments from Iraq to Afghanistan.
Simon had a gift for turning his colleagues into his friends. In the words
of one correspondent: ‘With Simon, you almost forgot you were working.’
In the small world of foreign news, there is a huge sense of loss. He was
a member of our family.
Simon spoke often and with fondness of his own close family, in the Irish
town of Navan. But his love of reporting brought him to London, where he
began a journey to the top of the profession. He was a gifted journalist –
in front of the camera and later, behind it.
In the early years of his career he worked for Channel 4 Daily, ITN and
APTN as a reporter and producer. Rachel Attwell, deputy head of BBC
television news, hired him for the Channel 4 job. She remembers his
compelling performance at interview. ‘He was so excited as he talked, that
he literally moved himself and his chair across the room,’ she said.
Among Simon’s friends at Channel 4 was John Schofield, who also lost his
life doing the job he loved – on assignment for the BBC in Croatia in 1995.
Simon moved successfully from words to pictures. He fell in love with the
art of camerawork and editing, and he excelled. He was in demand with the
BBC and others. And risk came with the territory. But Simon was addicted
to the story, not the danger. He was concerned about safety and made sure
that anyone working for his production company had the right training.
His technical skills were outclassed only by his humour. One colleague
remembers him turning ‘a wretched trip to the Falklands, Chile and
Argentina into a thoroughly enjoyable adventure. I always seemed to be
with him when things were frustrating,’ he says. ‘And he was always
chatting, in that inimitable way, keeping us all entertained.’ When I look
back on my own time working with him, I realise how much of it was spent
laughing.
Simon had an Irish approach to conversation – it was crucial, and it was
continuous, when the pressure of work permitted. Even though I was a
country woman, he beat me hands down.
He was devoted to his wife Louise Bevan, who shared his passion for
reporting, and also freelances for the BBC. On trips abroad, he spoke of
her often, taking pride in her work, and seeming to take comfort in the
saying of her name.
It was Hemingway who defined courage as grace under pressure. Our friend
and colleague Simon Cumbers was courage personified.
He’s survived by Louise, and by his parents, one brother and two sisters
in Ireland.



26:  Simon Cumbers
From Irish Times - 15/06/2004 (481 words)

My first memory of Simon Cumbers was of this tall, smiling, warm kid
approaching me in the corridors of St Patrick's Classical School in Navan,
to ask me to contribute to his new school magazine Tuairim. Next time we
met, he gave me a copy of U2's album War which he knew I liked, and asked
for advice about his show on the local pirate radio station Royal County
Radio. The rest of us may have been preoccupied with exams, the Meath
football team or sex, but Simon had been bitten by the media bug in his
early teens. It was to prove to be his life - and, tragically, his death.
I was not surprised when I heard that, after school, Simon went to work
with a provincial newspaper. We lost touch until October 1990 when I got
caught up with a nightmare of a row over Brian Lenihan. At the resulting
press conference, to my amazement and amusement, Simon, now chief reporter
for Capitol Radio in Dublin, popped up in the front row, giving me that
cheesy grin and joking: "If Liam Murphy (our old headmaster) could see us
now!" Not surprisingly, it was Simon alone who got an exclusive interview
that day.
Roll on to 1994. Albert Reynolds's FF-PD government was collapsing. I had
been writing about the events for the Irish Independent. Suddenly on the
plinth outside the Dail, that familiar grinning face appeared, as Simon,
now a producer with Associated Press TV, arrived straight from London with
a camera crew in tow. He saw me there, grinned and had me under siege with
questions - typically, the right questions that went to the heart of the
story. It was no wonder that all the organisations he worked for - APTV,
Sky News, ITN, BBC and others - admired his work so much and were so
disappointed when Simon, ever hungry for new experience, moved constantly
to different media outlets to broaden his skill base, becoming a top-class
reporter, excellent producer and talented cameraman.
That hunt for new skills saw him work closely with Kate Adie during the
Afghanistan war, accompany the British foreign secretary Jack Straw (and
deeply impress him) and produce a new career path as a cameraman. Simon
never stopped learning and was an inspiration to those who came in contact
with him.
Everyone who knew Simon admired him as a colleague and loved him as a
friend. That is why an ITN anchorman struggled to control his emotions
when speaking about his death, why his BBC colleagues were so emotional,
why his many friends were dumbfounded by his murder. Quite simply Simon
Cumbers showed people, in an era of dumbed down tabloidese, what real
journalism was. I certainly will miss that grinning charm, that passion
and that intensity that made Simon Cumbers one of the finest human beings
I ever met.
J.D.
Copyright 2004 The Irish Times
Date: 15/06/2004
Publication: Irish Times