Julia Somerville

Julia Mary Fownes Somerville (born July 14, 1947) is a TV news anchor and reporter, who has worked for BBC News and ITN.

Biography

Julia Somerville was educated at Airthrie Preparatory School in Cheltenham and Headington School, a girls' independent school in Oxford. After graduating from the University of Sussex with a BA degree in English, Somerville joined IPC, working on Homes and Gardens magazine, a Women's Journal, the PR section of Women's Own; and finally two years as editor of a computer group's house magazine.

Somerville joined the BBC in 1973 as a radio production journalist, and then became a reporter in 1978. By 1984 she had become one of the most recognised faces on television, co-presenting the BBC Nine o'clock News.

Somerville transferred to ITN in 1987, where she co-presented the Lunchtime News and also deputised as presenter of News at Ten. In addition she presented 3D, a weekly ITV current affairs programme. She was diagnosed as having a brain tumour in 1993 and after neurosurgery recovered well and was a member of the News at Ten team until it ended a 32-year run in 1999. She remained at ITN until October 2001, presenting the ITV Lunchtime News with John Suchet and shows on the ITN News Channel.

Somerville was the anchor on the news report broadcast on October 23, 1984 that Bob Geldof saw that inspired the Band Aid, and ultimately Live Aid. The broadcast is on the Live Aid DVD.

Between 1999 and 2001 Somerville presented the daily LBC radio show "London Life", a two-hour program devoted to interviews with diverse artists. Somerville has a lifelong interest in art, and was in 2001 a member of the judging panel for the National Portrait Gallery's BP Portrait of the Year; she has also served as a judge for several years on the RIBA Annual Architecture Award Panels. On 18 September 2003, Somerville was appointed Chair of the Advisory Committee of the Government Art Collection.

As part of ITN'S "Famous Five", with Gordon Honeycombe, Martyn Lewis, Selina Scott and Anna Ford, she was brought back to the screen for one week in September 2005 for ITN's 50th Anniversary.

Personal life

Somerville has been married three times: to Stephen Band (1970 - 1975, no children), Ray Gowdridge ( 1984 - 1992, two children), and currently lives in North London with her third husband architect Sir Jeremy Dixon. Somerville and Dixon were interviewed by police in 1996, when concerns were raised by Boots The Chemist staff over photographs of their seven-year-old child in the bath. No caution or charges followed the investigation

She is a patron of the "Different Strokes" charity.

Stalkers

In August 2001, 47 year old David Hughes of North London was convicted of harassment after sending 390 obscene letters and specifically moving close to Somerville over a 12 year period. Somerville left court after a ten-minute appearance in the witness box. Hughes was found guilty of one charge under Section Two of the Harassment Act, and the judge made a hospital order under the Mental Health Act 1983. Hughes told the court he believed he had not been harassing Somerville because she had never told him to stop sending her letters, but admitted he had been cautioned by Greater Manchester Police in 1995. The letters began in 1990, and until 1999 came with a postmark in north Cheshire. Hughes then moved to the same Muswell Hill area as Somerville, claiming it was a coincidence. It was also revealed that in 1995, Somerville took out a court injunction to stop sound engineer Geoffrey Brewis contacting her; he had visited her home, followed her and made nuisance phone calls.

See also

• BBC News
• ITN
• LBC

External links

• Alumni page - Sussex University English Dept
• Article on conviction of David Hughes
• 2003 Announcement of appointment as Chair of the Advisory Committee of the Government Art Collection, 18 September 2003
• Different Strokes charity