The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Dundee United hotshot who became an Oscar winner
Neil Paterson’s success with Room At The Top prevented Ben Hur winning record number of statues
He was the Oscar-winning screenplay writer and novelist whose personal career highlight was leading Dundee United.
With tomorrow’s Academy Awards on the horizon, Neil Paterson’s former club and university have paid fond tributes to a man whose name they always recall at this time of year.
Mr Paterson was hailed as the best storyteller Scotland had produced since Robert Louis Stevenson and his screenplay Room At The Top stopped Ben Hur from taking a recordbreaking 12th Oscar.
A Dundee United spokesman said: “It is not everyone who will win an Oscar or captain Dundee United. Neil uniquely managed to achieve both.
“He scored 10 goals in his 27 appearances for the club and we are proud to say we have an Oscar-winning ex-captain in Neil.”
Born in Greenock in 1915, Mr Paterson grew up in Banff and went to Edinburgh University to follow in his father’s footsteps as a solicitor.
After joining Edinburgh University AFC he quickly realised his passion lay with football, and after graduation a brief but successful career in the game ensued.
A spokeswoman for Edinburgh University said: “We are very proud to count an Oscar-winner among our alumni. Neil Paterson’s varied and highly successful career reads like a film script itself, and now is a fitting time to remember him.”
He joined Dundee United after spells with Buckie Thistle and Leith Athletic, skippering United in the 1936–37 season.
After his football career was over Mr Paterson joined DC Thomson as a sportswriter for the company’s newspapers. He took up freelance writing after the war and won awards for his books and short stories.
His first novel, The China Run, was dubbed book of the year in the New York Times by W Somerset Maugham.
A 1951 short story called Scotch Settlement transferred to the big screen as The Kidnappers and became the tearjerker of 1953.
The film was a box office success and won honorary Oscars for child stars Jon Whiteley and Vincent Winter.
In 1960 Mr Paterson was awarded the Oscar for the screenplay of Room At The Top, beating competition from Some Like it Hot and Ben Hur.
He spent long periods working in Hollywood but was never tempted to move away from his home in Crieff. He died in 1995, aged 79.