Caron Keating

Caron Louisa Keating (5 October 1962 – 13 April 2004) was a Northern Irish television presenter.

Caron Keating
Born(1962-10-05)5 October 1962
Fulham, London, England
Died13 April 2004(2004-04-13) (aged 41)
Sevenoaks, Kent, England
OccupationTelevision presenter
Known forBlue Peter presenter
Spouse(s)
Russ Lindsay
(
m. 1991)
Children2
Parent(s)Gloria Hunniford
Don Keating
Websitewww.caronkeating.org

Early life and education

Keating was born in Fulham, west London, to parents from Northern Ireland. When she was three months old her family returned to Northern Ireland where she was raised. Her parents were the television presenter Gloria Hunniford and the BBC producer Donald Keating.[1] Keating attended Methodist College, Belfast, where she gained 8 'O' levels and 3 'A' levels. She was accepted to study at the University of Bristol where she graduated three years later aged 21 with a BA Honours Degree in English and Drama.

Broadcasting career

Keating's television career began in Northern Ireland where she presented The Video Picture Show, Channel One and the music programme Greenrock, but her big break ame when she was selected to join the team of Blue Peter from 13 November 1986.

Keating appeared on the programme with Peter Duncan, Janet Ellis, Mark Curry, Yvette Fielding, and John Leslie. Her Blue Peter career included a trip to Moscow in 1987 during the perestroika period, swimming with sharks, abseiling down skyscrapers and standing strapped to the top of a light aircraft whilst it performed aerial acrobatics. She also interviewed serving prime minister Margaret Thatcher on the programme in 1988.

After four years, Keating left Blue Peter on 22 January 1990. Keating joined BBC Radio 5 where amongst other programmes she co-hosted an early 90s afternoon show with film critic Mark Kermode titled A Game of Two Halves. In his autobiography Kermode described Keating as "The very dictionary definition of Lovely".[2] She presented several other TV programmes including This Morning, before breast cancer was diagnosed in 1997. Keating was the face of Sainsbury's Reward Card from 1996 to 1999 and also appeared in a TV commercial for So Good soya drink in 1999. 1999 also saw her present We Can Work It Out.

Illness and death

Keating was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1997. After undergoing various conventional and alternative treatments, and spending a period away from her family on the Gold Coast, Australia, and at a hospice in Switzerland, she died at the age of 41, on 13 April 2004, at her mother's house in Sevenoaks, Kent.[3]

Family

Keating married Russ Lindsay in Tunbridge Wells, Kent in 1991. Their two sons were born in Hammersmith, London: Charles Jackson Lindsay (born 1994) and Gabriel Don Lindsay (born 1997). Her second son, Gabriel, has the middle name of his maternal grandfather, who died just a few days before he was born. The family settled in Cornwall for a few years at the turn of the century. Russ Lindsay later married television presenter Sally Meen on 4 September 2006.[4]

The Caron Keating Foundation

Set up in Keating's memory, The Caron Keating Foundation is a fund-raising partnership set up to raise money to offer financial support to professional carers, complementary healing practitioners, and support groups dealing with cancer patients, as well as individuals and families who are affected by the disease. It will also financially help a number of cancer charities with their ongoing quest for prevention, early detection and hopefully an ultimate cure. It was set up by her mother, TV presenter Gloria Hunniford, and her two brothers Michael and Paul Keating.[5]

gollark: Or twice maybe, we'll be nice.
gollark: Heavpoot: how about functions with a linear type thing such that they can only be used once.
gollark: You could probably RLE them if it's a huge problem.
gollark: I generally wouldn't agree with vaguely dishonest things like that, and I don't know if anyone actually thinks that's the goal.
gollark: I suppose if you model LGBTQ+ etc. acceptance as some sort of 1D scale ranging from "persecuted heavily" to "worshiped as gods" with "general sensible acceptance" in the middle, and we're somewhere down between "persecuted" and "acceptance", then even if the target is "general sensible acceptance" it may be more effective to... market stuff? slightly more toward the "worshiped as gods" end in order to reach the middle.

References
  1. Daily Express "Gloria Hunniford had no idea she was 'at risk of heart disease'"
  2. Kermode, Mark (2010). It's Only a Movie: Reel Life Adventures of a Film Obsessive. London: Random House. p. [253]. ISBN 1-84794-602-X.
  3. Lesley White (12 September 2004). "A daughter's farewell". The Times.
  4. Caron Keating widower weds weather girl
  5. "The Caron Keating Foundation homepage". The Keating family. Retrieved 18 April 2008.
Preceded by
Janet Ellis		 Blue Peter Presenter No. 16
1986–90		 Succeeded by
Diane-Louise Jordan
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