Today’s quick post is about Alfred Alan Curthoys (A. A. Curthoys), one of several broadcasters who delivered talks about Zoo animals in the first decade of the BBC’s existence. Elsewhere in my book I write about David Seth-Smith, who as the ‘Zoo Man’ of Children’s Hour became a household name, but there were also regional variations of this character, and Curthoys was one of them.
Alfred Alan Curthoys was a journalist based in Bristol. His father, Alfred Curthoys, was also a journalist and edited the popular illustrated newspaper The Daily Sketch between 1928 and 1936. It was common for print journalists to try their hand at the microphone. For instance Leslie Mainland, the original London ‘Zoo Man’ of the BBC, was a Daily Mail journalist.
Edit: Many thanks to the kind reader who pointed out that the A. A. Curthoys in question was not the editor of the Daily Sketch (as I originally believed), but in fact his son!
Secrets of Nature 