Bernard Adams, a BBC television producer who created more than 20 serialised documentaries from the 1960s to the 1990s, has died at the age of 86. His work, mainly for schools and continuing education programmes, included Better Badminton (1979), a look at a sport in which he had excelled as a national junior champion, and Berliners (1990), on the fall of the Berlin Wall.
A career in broadcasting and writing
Following his retirement from the BBC, Adams wrote five books and two plays. Among these were Fierce Love (2022), a biography of Mary O'Malley, the founder-director of the Lyric Players theatre in Belfast, and The Fall (2013), a play commemorating the 150th anniversary of his local church, Christ Church, East Sheen, in south-west London.
Adams was born in Dublin to Barney, a vet, and Marie (nee Rainsford), a housewife. He was a boarder at Portora Royal school in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland, before studying English and Spanish at Trinity College Dublin in the late 1950s.
From journalism to the BBC
He began his career in 1962 as a reporter on the Belfast Telegraph, where he met Mona Logan, who worked there as a secretary. They married in 1965 and decided to try their luck in London, where Adams got a job writing for the Radio Times magazine, before switching to BBC TV as a producer. He worked in that role until his retirement in 1994, after which he continued with freelance work while pursuing his other writing.
In addition to his warmth, kindness and generosity, Adams had a remarkable wit, according to his friend who penned the obituary.
Family and legacy
In 2018, Mona won a seat on Richmond council in south-west London and became deputy mayor, after which Adams accompanied her at the many events she attended. Mona died in 2019; Adams is survived by their daughters, Polly and Amy, five grandchildren and one great-grandson.
