Olive Shapley

Olive Mary Shapley (10 April 1910 in Peckham, London – 13 March 1999 in Powys, Wales) was a British radio producer and broadcaster.

Early life Olive Shapley was born Peckham, south London, into a Unitarian family. Her parents named her after the South African author Olive Schreiner.

In 1929 Shapley went to read history at St Hugh's College, Oxford. There she met her lifelong friend Barbara Betts, the future Labour politician Barbara Castle; the two women spent their holidays together and shared an interest in politics. Shapley was attracted to communism, prompted by a probable relationship with fellow student Sajjad Zaheer, and she joined the communist student organisation the October Club. Although her involvement in communist politics was short-lived, it attracted the interest of the security services, who continued to monitor her for most of her life. Shapley had to use placards requesting Durham miners "not say bugger or bloody", one incident of several which persuaded BBC Director General Sir John Reith to insist on broadcasts being scripted.

Using a recording van, weighing "seven tons when fully loaded", Shapley recorded actuality, which was innovative at the time, but the broadcast of swear words could now be avoided. which compared the social conditions of the day with those observed a century earlier by Friedrich Engels. Decades later, Shapley thought it "probably the most unfair and biased programme ever put out by the BBC". Other programmes from this period included the features Steel (1937), Cotton and Wool (both 1939).

New York

In 1939, Shapley married John Salt, the BBC's programme director in the North region; at the time, the BBC did not permit married couples to work together at the corporation, and so Shapley resigned. However, she continued to work for the BBC as a freelancer. In 1941, Salt was appointed deputy North American director by the BBC, meaning Shapley and her husband lived in New York for much of the war. They rented an apartment on Fifth Avenue from fellow broadcaster Alistair Cooke and employed a maid named Mabel, who lived in Harlem. She and Olive formed a friendship, and this connection enabled Olive to gain access to the Black community in Harlem. She began to record interviews with Mabel's neighbours and produced radio programmes about the lives of black people in America. She also started to produce a "newsletter" programme which was sent back to Britain and broadcast fortnightly on the BBC's Children's Hour; among her interviewees were Eleanor Roosevelt and Paul Robeson. Shapley's "newsletter" programme format has been credited as an inspiration for Alistair Cooke's long-running programme for adult listeners, Letter from America.

Woman's Hour Shapley returned to London and lived in Hampstead. She became a regular presenter of Woman's Hour, a programme with which she was associated ("on and off") for over twenty years, introducing the programme between 1949 and July 21, 1950. She is credited with introducing some formerly taboo subjects to the programme, such as discussions about the menopause and women living independently of men. Shapley also wrote articles for Modern Woman magazine. In 1958, she began working in television, presenting Women of Today and narrating a children's programme, Olive Shapley Tells a Story, on BBC Television.

After her death, a street in Didsbury was named after her, Olive Shapley Avenue.

Olive Shapley was longlisted in 2015 for the WoManchester Statue. Although Emmeline Pankhurst was decisively selected, Shapley's innovative broadcasting work was brought to the attention of a new generation. The Pankhurst statue now sits in St Peter's Square, Manchester. A book published to as part of the statue campaign, First in the Fight, dedicates a chapter to Olive Shapley along with the other nineteen women considered for the statue.

Publication Olive Shapley's autobiography, Broadcasting a Life, was published in 1996.