Dickie Davies
Dickie Davies | |
|---|---|
| Born | Richard Davies 30 April 1933 |
| Occupation | television presenter |
| Known for | World of Sport |
Richard "Dickie" Davies (born 30 April 1933 in Wallasey, Cheshire) is a British television presenter, best known for presenting World of Sport from 1968 until 1985.
Davies attended Oldershaw Grammar School after passing his eleven-plus, he then did National Service in the RAF and was a purser on the Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth ocean liners. His first job in broadcasting was as an announcer for Southern Television. In the early stages of his career, Davies was known by his birth name, Richard Davies, but changed to Dickie Davies at the suggestion of his ITV Sport colleague Jimmy Hill. Davies began work on World of Sport (initially called Wide World of Sports) in 1965 as understudy to Eamonn Andrews, taking over the role of presenter in 1968 when Andrews left the show. Davies became known for the white quiff of hair on his forehead and was also much loved by TV comedy impressionists during his years on World of Sport.
In 1983, aged 49, Davies became the very first host of Children's ITV.
After World of Sport ended in 1985, Davies stayed with ITV, presenting boxing and snooker, as well as playing a part in their coverage of the 1988 Seoul Olympics. He left ITV Sport in August 1989.
After leaving ITV, Davies joined the original incarnation of Eurosport, which was then owned by Sky and the EBU. He fronted their snooker coverage, including the one-off 1991 Mita World Masters. He presented sports bulletins from his home for Classic FM in its early days.
In 1995, Davies suffered a stroke, which forced him to give up his work on Classic FM, but eventually made a good recovery, although it was a year or two before his speech fully returned to normal. In the late-1990s, he fronted Dickie Davies' Sporting Heroes and Bobby Charlton's Football Scrapbook for British Sky Broadcasting.
In 2005, he presented a one-off special 50 Years of World of Sport for ITV, as part of the ITV 50 celebrations. He also narrated two DVDs looking back on the years of British wrestling coverage on ITV, a sport he admits he hated.
He is a board member of a frozen food company, and occasionally contributed to ESPN Classic. Davies is also the president of Sandford Springs Golf Club, which is owned by Leaderboard Golf.