... HARRY WEBSTER Harry Webster, who has died aged 84 and was a last link with the original Abbey Theatre company, was an Irish actor who spent much of his life in London. Webster was a Dubliner whose father worked for Guinness, and his childhood playmates on the beach at Dalkey included Cyril Cusack and Denis O'Dea. In his youth he even shared a small house in Dalkey with these two noted actors ...

... LOUIS PARKER Louis Parker, who died suddenly at the age of 49 on January 27, was a showman and flamboyant entrepreneur who steered the course of a number of music acts to fame. A familiar figure on the North Wales entertainment scene, he began his career by managing nightclubs and promoting talent shows in the local theatres. In the seventies he ran the famous Stables Nightclub, outside Rhyl, ...

... PHIUP JONES Philip Jones, OBE, CBE died from cancer late on January 17, at the age of 71. A trustee of the Musicians Benevolent Fund for eight years, Philip had been deputy chairman from 1993, succeeding Sir Ian Hunter as chairman in 1996. He was also a member and subse quently chairman of the awards and trusts committee from 1988. During his career as an orchestral musician, Philip held most ...

... HOPE JACKMAN Actress Hope Jackman, a total professional in her work and with a good record of theatrical roles both in the UK and overseas, has died in hospital in London. She was in her mid-seventies. She had appeared in Follies in the West End and was with Harry Secombe in Oliver!, playing Mrs Bumble. She went with Oliver! to the USA, and also worked in London. Known to friends and ...

... JEAN PRITCHARD Jean Pritchard, who died on December 25, aged 72, was a theatre enthusiast in every sense of the word. She loved the company of actors, writers, directors and musicians. Many will have reason to be grateful to her, even though they may have forgotten her name, for it has been almost 30 years since she ran the Little Theatre Club, a tiny attic approached by an outside staircase ...

... HOLLY RODEN Holly Roden, who has died in Nottingham at the age of 79, was an early pupil of Josephine Scott- Matthews who also died recently (In Memoriam, January 13). She and her dear friend, Gladis Robinson, regularly 'cleaned up' at the local drama festivals. Walk- ons with the Court Players and Nottingham Playhouse before the Second World War drew her into the stage as a profession. While ...

... Moira Heath It is particularly sad that Moira Heath's death on January 24, at the age of 89, came less than a year before the band which bears her late husband Ted's name plays its final concert at London's Royal Festival Hall. What a reception she would have received this remarkable woman who has been the driving force and inspiration behind this fine outfit since Heath passed away in 1969. ...

... KAY CAVENDISH Kay Cavendish, who has died aged 89, had a career in radio that was astonishingly varied, and then went into television. She then retired to concentrate on her numerous sporting interests, which included tennis (she played at Wimbledon), fencing (she was an international), lacrosse and golf, which she played off a handicap of six. She was bom in Hong Kong, the daughter of an Army ...

... THELMA ROGERS Actress Thelma Rogers, who for nine years played the leading role of Peggy Archer in BBC radio's long-running serial The Archers, died recently aged 75. Bom and raised in Coventry, Rogers studied to be a teacher before spending four years with the Leicester Repertory Company. In the early fifties she came to the notice of Archers producer Tony Shryane, who cast her first as ...

... BARBARA CAISTER Barbara Caister's many students from the Central School and the Poor School will have been saddened to learn of her death in Swansea on December 27. She had moved to her native Wales after retiring from the Poor School, but during her time there her health deteriorated. She was already an experi enced teacher when she went to the Central School in the early sixties to do a one ...

... IRENE PERKS Sister of the legendary singer Dorothy Squires and herself a variety artist in her early years, Irene Perks has died aged 87. Bom on October 14, 1912, she was a staunch supporter of her sister from the early days of her rise to fame in the mid- thirties through to its peak in the fifties. Perks had a strong stage presence and warm personality that endeared her to audiences, ...

... PRUDENCE SMITH Radio producer and author Prudence Smith, who has died at the age of 76, was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. She studied at the local Witswatersrand University before going to Somerville College, Oxford, where she studied philosophy, Latin and Greek among other subjects. Smith subsequently became a producer in the talks department of the BBC's Third Programme, not long after ...