Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
The most fun you can have in a jumper
He’s famed for his sensible knitwear, but as this extract from his memoirs reveals, John Craven’s always been game for a laugh
For nearly 50 years now I haven’t had to put on a suit to go to work. For Newsround it was always jumpers and shirts, and for Countryfile I switched to jumpers and anoraks. But on the light-hearted Saturday morning children’s show Multi-Coloured Swap Shop, my knitwear went stellar. Noel Edmonds, the main presenter, persuaded me to attempt an unofficial world record for the number of jumpers worn by one person.
With his help I managed to get on more than 20 and ended up looking like a very hot Michelin Man. I happened to mention on one show that it would be nice to have my name knitted into a jumper so the director needn’t put it in a caption, and one viewer knitted me a jumper with my name stitched into it dozens of times, covering every inch.
Jumpers had become my trademark on Newsround, the first real TV bulletin aimed at children. The last thing I wanted when the show launched in April 1972 was for children to think a boring grown-up bulletin had popped up in the middle of their favourite shows. I took the decision not to sit behind a desk like other newsreaders. Instead, I perched on a stool and dressed casually, either in shirtsleeves or pullovers. My attire quickly made headlines, with angry letters to the newspapers about falling standards.
My involvement with the news goes back to adolescence. For my 13th birthday my parents gave me a microphone, which I wired to the kitchen radio so that my voice issued from the speaker. Then my mum, dad
and sister Jean would sit and listen in our house in Leeds as I read the news to them – from the evening paper.
In my teens I became the editor of the youth club newspaper, The Parader, and from these beginnings I found myself 30 years later welcoming the prime minister to Television Centre to face a bunch of junior Robin Days. Mrs Thatcher faced a barrage of questions from the children. Some were easy – one boy asked what her most important decision had been (‘To stand up to people who threaten you,’ she replied). Some were tricky, like the question about whether she ever discussed politics with her family (‘When you’re down in the dumps, families are marvellous – they say, “Come on, Mum, cheer up.” It’s what I often say to my Cabinet at the end of a particularly difficult meeting, “Come on, cheer up. Life goes on.”’)
But there was a bombshell coming: 14-year- old Alison Standfast asked in a clear and determined voice, ‘In the event of a nuclear war, where will you be?’ There were gasps around the studio. Mrs T said, ‘My goodness me. Now look – the whole point of having nuclear weapons is to stop a war of any kind.’
Alison persisted, ‘But if there is one, where will you be? Have you got your own bunker or something?’
Mrs Thatcher moved on to the next question, and at the end she insisted she had enjoyed every minute. But her husband Denis was less delighted, cornering me backstage and accusing
me and the BBC of ‘setting up’ Maggie. ‘That question was deliberately planted,’ he fumed. ‘My wife was tricked!’ I told him that was most certainly not the case. All the questions were genuine.
That encounter in 1987 happened on Saturday Superstore, the follow-up to Swap Shop. Our star guests loved the show too. I was flattered to hear that Paul McCartney knew who I was. I was standing in the wings when he arrived in the studio with his young son and one of the floor assistants heard him say, ‘Look, James, there’s John Craven!’
By the late 1980s I was aware the other presenters on children’s TV were starting to look noticeably younger, and I’d been doing Newsround for so long my hair was showing signs of grey. It was time to move on. The day after the Sunday papers announced my departure, BBC Birmingham offered me work. Little did I know it would lead to an even longer stint than on Newsround when I became presenter of a new rural affairs show called Countryfile.
It hasn’t always been dignified. Falling over is a hazard of life for Countryfile presenters, especially when walking through thick undergrowth while looking at the camera instead of your feet. I’ve been dragged across a field by one of Adam Henson’s oxen and upended by
a Highland bullock that got its horns under my anorak (no harm done, fortunately).
Part of Countryfile’s appeal is that it doesn’t change too much. You could say the same about my wardrobe. For the 20th anniversary special, I was wearing my red anorak, going over my script, when I became aware that someone was repeating my words – in my voice. I turned to see my own mirror image... or rather, the brilliant impressionist Jon Culshaw. In a red anorak, of course!
‘I was dragged across a field by one of Adam Henson’s oxen’