View source for Bob Danvers-Walker

{{Short description|British radio, television and newsreel announcer}}
{{EngvarB|date=December 2017}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2017}}
{{Infobox person
| name          = Bob Danvers-Walker
| image         = Bob-Danvers-Walker-voice--007.jpg
| alt           = <!-- descriptive text for use by the blind and visually impaired's speech synthesis (text-to-speech) software -->
| caption       = 
| birth_name    = Cyril Frederick Danvers-Walker
| birth_date    = {{Birth date|df=y|1906|10|11}}
| birth_place   = [[Cheam]], [[Surrey]], England
| death_date    = {{Death date and age|df=y|1990|05|17|1906|10|11}}
| death_place   = [[Oxford]], [[Oxfordshire]], England
| spouse        = {{Marriage|Vera Nita White|1933}}
| nationality   = 
| other_names   = 
| occupation    = Radio, television and newsreel presenter
| years_active  = 
| known_for     = Voice of [[Pathé News]] 
| notable_works = 
}}

'''Cyril Frederick "Bob" Danvers-Walker''' (11 October 1906{{spaced ndash}}17 May 1990) was a British radio and [[newsreel]] announcer best known as the offscreen voice of [[Pathé News]] cinema newsreels during [[World War II]] and for many years afterwards.

His voice was described as "clear, fruity and rich, with just the suggestion of raffishness".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Andrews |first1=Deborah |last2=Turner |first2=Roland |title=The Annual Obituary 1990 |date=1991 |publisher=St. James Press |location= Chicago and London |page=282}}</ref> [[Kenneth Branagh]] has stated that he was consciously imitating Danvers-Walker's "perky tone" in a cod "newsreel" segment in his 2000 film ''[[Love's Labour's Lost (film)|Love's Labour's Lost]]''.<ref>{{cite web |url= http://72.166.46.24/archives/2000/documents/00523891.htm |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20070930184428/http://72.166.46.24/archives/2000/documents/00523891.htm |archive-date=30 September 2007 |work=The Phoenix Archives |first=Jeffrey |last=Gantz |date=15 June 2000 |title=Kenneth Branagh gets an A-plus for his Labour's |url-status=dead}}</ref>

==Life==
Born in [[Cheam]], [[Surrey]], Danvers-Walker was the son of William Charles Danvers-Walker, an Australian, and his wife Lilian Danvers, daughter of [[Frederick Charles Danvers]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Howard |first1=Joseph Jackson |last2=Crisp |first2=Frederick Arthur |title=Visitation of England and Wales |url=https://archive.org/details/visitationofengl19howa/page/6 |page=6 |volume=19 |publisher=[London] : Priv. printed |date=1917}}</ref> He used the surname '''Walker''' to the 1950s. He spent much of his childhood in [[Tasmania]] and began his radio career in [[Melbourne]], in 1925, moving on briefly to [[ABC Radio National|2FC]] in Sydney, in 1932, before returning to the United Kingdom the same year.<ref name="ODNB">{{cite ODNB|id=70379|first=Anne Pimlott|last=Baker|title=Walker, Cyril Frederick Danvers- (1906–1990)}}</ref>

From 1932 to 1939, Walker worked as a presenter for the [[Leonard Plugge|International Broadcasting Company]] (IBC) network of commercial radio stations broadcasting in English to Britain from the continent.<ref name="ODNB"/> He became Chief Announcer at Radio Normandy. He also helped the IBC to set up radio stations at [[Toulouse]], [[Paris]], [[Lyon]], [[Madrid]], [[Barcelona]], and [[Valencia, Spain|Valencia]], but Radio Normandy was always the company's flagship station,<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/sound-journal/Street19991.html|title = School of Arts}}</ref> and Danvers-Walker was heard regularly over its airwaves until the station was closed down at the start of World War II in 1939.

Danvers-Walker wanted to join the [[BBC]] as soon as the war started, but was prevented by a BBC rule against employing anyone who had worked on commercial radio. This rule was quietly dropped in 1943, and from then on he was deployed on a variety of morale-boosting wartime [[BBC Radio|BBC radio]] shows, including ''Round and About'' and ''London Calling Europe''. He was the anonymous offscreen commentator for the twice-weekly British Pathé newsreel, a job he held continuously from 1940 to 1970.

Bob Danvers-Walker also worked freelance for many radio and television outlets. He was the announcer on the "rebel" version of the comedy programme ''[[Much-Binding-in-the-Marsh]]'' on [[Radio Luxembourg]] when the show was in temporary exile from the BBC (1950–51), and for the science-fiction series ''[[Dan Dare]], Pilot of the Future'' on the same station (1951–55). He took part in the "stunt" programme ''People are Funny'' on Luxembourg, recorded around the UK and presented by [[Peter Martyn (actor)|Peter Martyn]].

The arrival of [[ITV (TV network)|ITV]] (commercial television) in 1955 brought new opportunities, including as the announcer on [[Michael Miles]]' game show ''[[Take Your Pick!]]'' (1955–68) and its successor programme, ''Wheel of Fortune'' (1969–71). At BBC Radio, Danvers-Walker was one of the regular presenters of ''[[Housewives' Choice]]'' throughout the 1950s, and contributed to many other programmes, including in the 1960s ''Holiday Hour'' and ''Countryside''. For [[BBC Television]], he featured regularly in ''Saturday Night Out''. He also appeared in a number of feature films, often as himself.

Danvers-Walker died of cancer in the [[Churchill Hospital]], [[Oxford]], England, on 17 May 1990, and was survived by his wife Vera Nita White, whom he had married in 1933; they had a son and a daughter.<ref name="ODNB"/> On an audio clip from Radio Normandy, his colleague [[Roy Plomley]] is heard referring to him as "Bob Walker", but he was described as "C. Danvers-Walker" in the station's programme schedules printed in ''Radio Pictorial'' on (for example) 3 May 1935.[https://web.archive.org/web/20070405192429/http://www.sterlingtimes.org/radio_sponsorship.htm] Conversely, a 1962 Pathé News Issue Sheet lists him as "R. Walker".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bufvc.ac.uk/databases/newsreels/learnmore/docs/PN62-103.pdf |title=Archived copy |accessdate=23 April 2007 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927100616/http://www.bufvc.ac.uk/databases/newsreels/learnmore/docs/PN62-103.pdf |archivedate=27 September 2007 }}</ref>

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20070329200424/http://radionormandie.free.fr/Radio_Normandy.htm L'Histoire de Radio Normandie] (website in French)
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20070509203035/http://www.paulplu.demon.co.uk/radio/sound.htm Paul's Radio Museum] (includes a 1930s recording from Radio Normandy presented by Roy Plomley in which "Bob Walker" puts in an appearance)
*[http://www.britishpathe.com/ British Pathe News] (archive of hundreds of newsreel items, many of them commentated by Bob Danvers-Walker)
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20161220070438/http://www.sterlingtimes.co.uk/radio_sponsorship.htm Sponsored English Radio in Europe] (from the ''Sterling Times'' website)
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20071112044529/http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/individual/72627?view=credit  Bob Danvers-Walker filmography at the British Film Institute]
*[http://www.208.justsayweb.de/208/208o/photos/208-dwalker.html A picture of Bob Danvers-Walker, probably in the 1950s] (on a Radio Luxembourg fan website)

==References==
{{reflist}}
*Sean Street, [http://www.kent.ac.uk/sdfva/sound-journal/Street19991.html "Radio For Sale: Sponsored Programming in British Radio during the 1930s"], Bournemouth University, 1999
*George Nobbs, "The Wireless Stars", Norwich, 1972, SBN 903 61900 8

{{DEFAULTSORT:Danvers-Walker, Bob}}
[[Category:British radio personalities]]
[[Category:1906 births]]
[[Category:1990 deaths]]
[[Category:People educated at Launceston Church Grammar School]]
[[Category:People from Surrey (before 1965)]]