Richard Whiteley

John Richard Whiteley, a staunchly proud Yorkshireman, was a much-loved television presenter and journalist, born in Bradford, West Yorkshire in 1943. He was best known for being the presenter of the long running UK Channel 4 television show Countdown (1982). However, prior to this he was primarily a journalist, working as a reporter for Yorkshire Television, one of whose claims to fame being that he had interviewed every British Prime Minister since Harold Macmillan. He was also the first journalist to interview the then British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher after the IRA bombing of the Grand Hotel in Brighton during the Conservative Party conference week in 1984. Countdown was originally scheduled to run for only five weeks when it began in 1982 as an inception show for the then brand new UK television channel Channel 4, but the show went on to run for 23 years under his presentation, averaging four million viewers per week. Whiteley will also be remembered for his taste in cl