Paul Fox

Sir Paul Leonard Fox (27 October 1925 – 8 April 2024) was a British television executive and journalist, who spent much of his broadcasting career working for BBC Television, most prominently as the Controller of BBC1 between 1967 and 1973. Fox was Head of Programmes of the ITV franchise Yorkshire Television (YTV) in 1973 before becoming its managing director from 1977 to 1988. He was chairman of Independent Television News (ITN) and president of the Royal Television Society. Fox returned to the BBC in 1988 and became managing director of BBC Television on a three-year contract that ran until his retirement in 1991. Fox was appointed Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) and was made a Knight Bachelor. He was a recipient of the International Emmy Founders Award and the BAFTA Fellowship.

Early life Paul Leonard Fox was born on 27 October 1925, in Germany to Jewish parents. After the early death of his father Walter, a doctor, to suicide, and the death of his nurse mother and grandmother in a concentration camp during The Holocaust, he came to Parkeston Quay, Harwich on a kindertransport in 1938. He was adopted by a medical family, He was educated at Bournemouth Grammar School, Fox left his foster family when he was 16 to live in a boys hostel in London and seek employment. Fox enrolled on a journalism course at the American Forces University set up by the United States Military in Biarritz in France for six months that equated to one term. He wrote to 100 newspapers enquiring about jobs, This work led to him answering an advertisement to apply for summer relief work with the BBC. He edited the show for six years, brought cameras to Roger Bannister's sub four-minute mile, Fox was responsible for the channel's budget, decided which programmes should be broadcast and the management of entertainers. He came to the conclusion he would not make any more career progression at the BBC, as the replacement for Donald Baverstock and joined YTV's board. organising YTV's flotation on the London Stock Exchange in 1986. He later became a board member at Thames Television. having been a director for nine years from 1977 to 1986. after he did not request an extension to his contract.

Honours Fox was the recipient of the Cyril Bennett Award at the RTS Programme Awards in 1984 "for an outstanding contribution to television programming". He was appointed Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1985 New Year Honours. Fox was presented with the International Emmy Founders Award in 1989, and was awarded the BAFTA Fellowship from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts in 1990. He was made a Knight Bachelor in the 1991 New Year Honours "for services to the TV industry". Fox was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws (LL.D.) by the University of Leeds in 1984, and the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters (D.Litt.) from the University of Bradford in December 1991, and the RTS Gold Medal for Outstanding Services to Television in 1992.