Bill Heine
Local journalist and radio presenter who famously stuck a fibreglass shark on the roof of his house
BILL HEINE, who has died aged 74, was a campaigning local journalist and radio presenter, an independent cinema entrepreneur and the man who made headlines for sticking a shark on the roof of his house in Headington, Oxford.
The 25ft-long fibreglass fish named Untitled 1986 was installed at 2, New High Street, Headington, in August 1986. Designed by the sculptor John Buckley and erected without planning permission on the 41st anniversary of the dropping of the atom bomb on Nagasaki, it was intended as a protest against the American bombing of Libya and as a statement about nuclear weapons.
The shark, which appeared to have fallen headfirst from the sky and plunged straight through the roof slates up to its pectoral fins, provoked a storm of nimbyish outrage and brought repeated calls from Oxford City Council to remove it. Heine fought a six-year battle with the council which ended in 1992 when the Environment Secretary Michael Heseltine intervened and granted retrospective planning permission.
By that time, the sculpture had become a popular landmark, drawing thousands of tourists to an otherwise unremarkable suburb of Oxford, and eventually the council became reconciled to its existence. Last year council members were reported to have backed a project to protect it as a permanent part of the city’s skyline and Heine was presented with a Special Certificate of Merit in recognition of his contribution to the city.
Heine was gratified when, shortly after
the sculpture’s installation, he heard a visiting American tourist say to his wife, “Come on, Mabel. I want to show you just how crazy the English can be.”
In fact Heine was born on January 9 1945 in the small farming community of Batavia, Illinois, though he never felt he belonged, recalling a sign outside the town which read “‘no steel wheels or lugs’ – and I still don’t know what a lug is.”
After reading American Diplomatic History at Georgetown University, Washington DC, he embarked on a Law degree at Balliol College, Oxford. When war broke out in Vietnam he was sent home, but he avoided military service by volunteering for the Peace Corps in Nicaragua and Peru before returning to Oxford.
A self-described “progressive socialist”, Heine decided to make Oxford his home, later explaining that the “clincher” had been the NHS. “This is a country where the ideals of the people have been enshrined in the way the country organises itself,” he explained. “And that, to me, is incredible.”
After graduation, considering his future, he noticed that though there were three cinemas in Oxford, they only showed films “like Bedknobs and Broomsticks or porn”. In the 1970s he bought a redundant cinema off Cowley Road, and in 1976 with a friend reopened it as the Penultimate Picture Palace or “PPP” (“Penultimate” because his bank manager told him that if it was not the ultimate reckless enterprise it was the next worst thing), revitalising the frontage by installing a sculpture by John Buckley depicting Al Jolson in minstrel make-up reaching out his white-gloved hands in a scene from The Jazz Singer (1927).
Buckley would later create a pair of cancan dancer’s legs for the PPP’S sister venue Not the Moulin Rouge in Headington, as well as the infamous shark.
For the next 15 years under Heine the PPP, run as a members’ club, built its reputation on art house films and films that had been denied a certificate by the censor, often attracting the ire of the city council.
The shark heralded the start of Heine’s media career, as he was constantly being interviewed by television and radio stations. He began writing a column for the Oxford Star (and later the Oxford Mail) and in 1988 BBC Radio Oxford asked him to host a lunchtime phone-in programme, his interviewer assuring him: “This is the beginning of something big. This is why we’re going to pay you peanuts.”
He worked for the station for more than 30 years, becoming known as an opinionated and fearless interviewer willing to tackle anyone, from senior politicians to criminals. His campaigns included an investigation into a paedophile running a child model agency which, he claimed, resulted in an attempt on his life.
Heine was the author of two books about his adventures, Heinstein of the Airwaves and The Hunting of the Shark.
In July 2017 he was diagnosed with a terminal form of leukaemia, but he continued writing until his final days. His most recent Oxford Mail column appeared last Friday.
He is survived by his partner, Jane Hanson, a potter, and by their son.
Bill Heine, born January 9 1945, died April 2 2019