 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
LAST WORD
|
![]() |
|
![]() |
MISSED A PROGRAMME?
Go to the Listen Again page |
![]() |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 Friday16:00-16:30
Sunday20:30-21:00(rpt)
Radio 4's weekly obituaries programme |
|
|
|
Contact us |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
This week |
Friday25thApril 2008
(Rpt) Sunday27th April
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
Professor Edward Lorenz
Meteorologist and mathematician who has died aged 90
Edward Lorenz was the father of modern chaos theory. He was a Professor at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology – M.I.T. and was born in Connecticut and educated at Dartmouth College and Harvard University.
As a child Ed Lorenz was fascinated by the weather and natural phenomena – an interest which he retained throughout his life. Hefirst published his work on chaos in the early 1960s, but it was a talk he gave in 1972 that brought him to wider attention. Its title was Predictability: Does The Flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?
Matthew Bannister talks totwo eminent Professors, Lord Robert May of Oxford University and Sir Michael Berry of the University of Bristol.
Professor Edward Lorenz was born May 23rd 1917. He died April 16th 2008.
|
|
|
Hazel Court
Actress who has died aged 82
Hazel Court was born in Sutton Coldfield in the West Midlands and studied drama at the London Academy of Dramatic Art and to many horror movie fans, she was one of the top “scream queens” – actresses known for their ability to react with terror when the monster or the madman appeared.She was best known for her starring roles in a number of successful Hammer horror films including The Curse of Frankenstein and Masque of the Red Death,.
Matthew Bannister talks to the film historian Ian Christie.
Hazel Court was born February 10th 1926. She died April 15th 2008. |
|
|
Nikolai Baibakov
Former Soviet minister who has died aged 97
In 1942, as the Nazis advanced on the Soviet Union, Josef Stalin realised that the oilfields of Baku were vital to military success. He called in his twenty-nine year old deputy oil minister, Nikolai Baibakov. Stalin told Baibakov, “If Hitler captures a single drop of oil, you’ll be shot. But if you destroy the wells unnecessarily and we’re left without oil, you’ll also be shot.” Baibakov replied “Comrade Stalin, what am I supposed to do?” Stalin pointed at his head and said: “Use your brains, you’re a young man. Fly down there and decide what’s best”.
Nikolai Baibakov’s other great wartime achievement was building a pipeline under the ice to deliver oil to the besieged city of Leningrad. For the twenty years from 1965, he was in charge of the Soviet Union’s vast central planning organisation Gosplan. He presided over a system in which the copious and detailed reports produced at the centre were increasingly out of touch with reality and the economy was stagnating.However, he will best be remembered for his success as architect of the country’s oil and gas industry.
Matthew Bannister talks to Professor Paul Gregory of the Hoover Institution at the University of Stamford and to Professor Michael Economides author of The Colour of Oil .
Nikolai Baibakov was born March 6th 1911. He died March 3st, 2008.
|
|
|
Aime Cesaire
Poet and politician who has died aged 94
Aime Cesaire was a man of contradictions. The poet and essayist from Martinique created the negritude movement which celebrated black culture and angrily denounced colonialism. But as a politician representing Martinique in the National Assembly in Paris, he was a leading advocate of departmentalisation – the policy that made four former colonies fully fledged departments of France.
On news of his death, the French President Nicholas Sarkozy described Cesaire as a “great poet” and a “great humanist”. He led thousands of mourners at Cesaire’s state funeral last weekend.
Cesaire’s most powerful work was the Cahier D’Un Retour Au Pays Natal first published in 1939 and translated into English as “Return to my Native Land”.
Matthew Bannister talks to the actor Cy Grant, author of Blackness and the Dreaming Soul , who was strongly influenced by Cesaire’s “Cahier”. He turned it into a one man show which he performed at the National Theatre, the Royal Court Upstairs and on tour.
Aime Cesaire was born on June 26th 1913. He died April 17th 2008.
|
|
|
Sam Toy
Chairman and managing director of Ford UK 1980-86 who has died aged 84
Sam Toy was chairman and managing director of the Ford motor company in the UK at one of its most successful periods. Between 1980 and 1986, against the backdrop of high inflation, industrial turbulence and government subsidies to British Leyland, Toy introduced new models and built sales at Ford.
Hewas born in Cornwall, one of seven children of a builder. He was educated at Falmouth Grammar School and Selwyn College Cambridge before serving in the RAF during the war. Having completed his studies, Sam Toy joined Ford as a graduate trainee and rose through the ranks.
Matthew Bannister talks to the ѿý’s Nick Jones who was Industrial Correspondent when Toy became Chairman and to the Managing Director of Ford, David Galway, whowas a close friend and colleague.
Sam Toy OBE was born August 21st 1923. He died March 24th 2008.
|
|
|
The ѿý is not responsible for the content of external sites |
|
|
See AlsoThe ѿý is not responsible for the content of external sites |
|
