Peter Donaldson, the longstanding BBC Radio 4 newsreader, has died at the age of 70.
Donaldson’s death was announced on the early morning Radio 4 news, where his voice was once a familiar sound to people waking up across the country – as well as listeners to the shipping forecast and Radio 4 over the Christmas period.
Jamie Angus, current editor of the Today programme, tweeted in tribute: “He was quite simply the voice of Radio 4 for a generation.”
Peter Donaldson has died. He was quite simply the voice of Radio 4 for a generation. #r4today pic.twitter.com/Yx9hbQzTXe
— Jamie Angus (@grvlx001) November 3, 2015
Born in Cairo in 1945 and raised in Cyprus, where he regularly listened to the BBC World Service, Donaldson first came to England to boarding school aged 14.
As a school leaver, he worked in the arts, backstage at Sadler’s Wells and Regents Park Open Air theatre and, briefly, on stage for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
His broadcasting break came for the British Forces Broadcasting Service in 1968, but he left in 1970 to join BBC Radio 2, switching to Radio 4 four years later.
Donaldson became chief announcer for the station in 1988. It was Donaldson’s voice that would have been heard on the pre-recorded warning that a nuclear attack had been launched on Britain during the Cold War - if such an event had ever occurred.
He retired on 31 December 2012, broadcasting the midnight news on New Year’s Eve.
Newsreader Corrie Corfield paid tribute to a “great friend and best boss ever”, calling Donaldson “wonderful, generous, kind, charming”, while BBC cricket correspondent Jonathan Agnew celebrated their mutual love of cricket.
So, so sad about Peter Donaldson. Wonderful, generous, kind, charming PD. Great friend & best boss ever. THE Voice of Radio 4. Such a loss.
— Corrie Corfield (@corrie_corfield) November 3, 2015
Peter Donaldson, the voice of Radio 4 for years has died. Nobody interrupted @bbctms for shipping forecast so mischievously. Loved cricket.
— Jonathan Agnew (@Aggerscricket) November 3, 2015
