Brian McConnell, 1928-2004

Brian McConnell was born on 27 December 1928 on Tyneside but spent most of his childhood in and around London. After a checkered schooling, he started work at the age of fourteen on the Municipal Journal, the beginning of a life-long association with the press. Among the many roles he fulfilled were court reporter and crime reporter for the Daily Mirror and, for a short time, news editor of The Sun. When he died on 10 July 2004, obituaries in The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian and The Times naturally focused on his life as a journalist and author. His interest in folklore was largely overlooked.

Although he did not join The Folklore Society until 1981, his interest in the subject had developed earlier. He had attended a meeting of the Society as a journalist in the 1960s. As a crime reporter, he had become aware of the many legends that grow up around notorious cases. Under the pseudonym "Old Codgers," he edited the "Live Letters" column in the popular newspaper the Daily Mirror. There he often had to try to disentangle reality and "myths." One question posed by a reader was "Are there or are there not alligators in the sewers of New York?" Brian gave a balanced and knowledgeable answer.

From the 1980s, Brian regularly attended meetings of The Folklore Society. He also participated in the conferences of the International Society for Contemporary Legend Research held on both sides of the Atlantic, frequently accompanied by his wife, Margaret. His papers included "The Killing of a Murder Legend" (College Station, 1989), "Hey, Judge, Tell Me Another!" (Boulder, 1997) and "Tales That Wagged The Dog" (Sheffield, 2002).

Brian wrote several books, mostly dealing with some aspect of crime. They included Assassination (1969) covering killings from antiquity to the Kennedys, The Neilson File (1983) dealing with the mass murderer Dennis Neilson, The Possessed, True Tales of Demonic Possession (1995), and Holy Killers (1995), which was concerned with religious leaders who were also murderers. His writings on folklore topics were numerous but in the main brief. He contributed regularly to newsletters such as FLS News, FOAFtale News and Letters to Ambrose Merton. The range was wide, covering subjects such as baptismal customs, remembrance notices in the press, Essex girl jokes, modern witches, cauls and the puns in the names of hairdressing establishments. One of his most substantial publications on contemporary lore was his chapter "The Corporate Folk-Legend: Marketing Invention or Consumer Response?" in Gillian Bennett and Paul Smith's The Questing Beast (Sheffield Academic Press, 1989). His articles for the British Journalism Review, South London Press and New Law Journal also often dealt with folkloric themes.

Perhaps his most characteristic contributions were oral. Although at the annual seminars "Perspectives on Contemporary Legend" he often gave papers, it is probably as a frequent and enthusiastic contributor to the discussions that followed other peoples' papers that he will be particularly remembered. He was also a tireless storyteller in the evenings. To meetings where most of the participants were from academic backgrounds, Brian brought the distinctive and welcome perspective of the journalist.

Brian had planned to present a paper on "The Pretty Nun's Kiss" at the Perspectives on Contemporary Legend conference held at Aberystwyth in July 2004. His death robbed delegates of the chance to hear him one more time. Instead he featured in the many reminiscences that his friends shared. Although the stories Brian told frequently featured himself, there was one story that many of his friends discovered for the first time when they read the press obituaries. In 1974, in The Mall, London, an armed man crashed his car into a limousine carrying the Queen's daughter, Princess Anne, and her husband Captain Mark Phillips. Her bodyguard and chauffeur were both shot. Brian happened to be in a taxi near the scene. Hearing the shots, he got out and tried to persuade the man to give up his weapon. Brian was also shot. For his actions, he was awarded the Queen's Gallantry Medal. It was characteristic of this essentially modest man that this was a story he did not tell to his many friends in folklore circles.

Students of contemporary folklore have lost a man of boundless curiosity, who had an encyclopaedic knowledge he was always willing to share.

School of Social Sciences, University of Paisley, UK

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