Colin McIntyre

Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1927, Colin McIntyre left home at the age of 18 to join the British army, and was commissioned in the Black Watch. He saw service with the Lovat Scouts in Greece in 1946, and then with the Parachute Regiment in Palestine. Poems that he wrote during this period were subsequently published by the Salamander Oasis Trust.

After leaving the army, he studied English at Harvard University in the United States, where he met his future wife, Field. Moving to England, Colin joined the BBC World Service in 1952, becoming a chief subeditor. He enlisted in the Territorial Army, where he rose to the rank of major. In 1956, he became a BBC correspondent at the United Nations, where he covered the Suez and Hungary crises. In 1965, he was promoted to chief publicity officer at the BBC.

In 1974, Colin was chosen to become the editor of the BBC's newly-launched Ceefax teletext service. He managed the new service from its infancy, initially running the entire operation almost single-handedly. Under his direction, the Ceefax newsroom later grew to include a staff of 20 people.

In 1982, he took early retirement from the BBC. In retirement, he continued to act as a consultant to other television companies creating their own teletext services, including Britain's Channel 4, as well as a number of other organizations that made use of teletext technology, both in the United Kingdom and abroad.

He claimed to have "forty-two hobbies and interests", and devoted his retirement to working on these. In 1990, his book "Monuments of War: How to Read a War Memorial", a detailed survey of war memorials in the United Kingdom, was published by Robert Hale. Later that year, he published a second book on "World War II at Sea". He later worked on a number of other books, both fiction and non-fiction, and, as a member of the Circle of Wine Writers, wrote short articles about wine and spirits under the pen name of Lovat Stephen.

On the death of Victor Selwyn in 2005, Colin took over as acting editor of the Salamander Oasis Trust, answering correspondence, promoting awareness of the Trust and the Salamander poets, and curating the Salamander Oasis website.

Colin McIntyre is survived by his wife Field, four children, seven grandchildren and a great-grandchild.