Partner Jonnie Werner Laurie
Queer Places:
Roedean School, Roedean Way, Brighton BN2 5RQ, UK
4 Randolph Gardens, North Maida Vale, London NW6 5EH, UK
Chesney Court, 2 Shirland Rd, London W9 2JN, UK
6 Baker St, Marylebone, London W1U 6AZ, UK
35 Carlyle Square, Chelsea, London SW3, UK
7 Clareville Grove, Kensington, London SW7 5AU, UK
20 William Mews, Belgravia, London SW1X 9HF, UK
Golders Green Crematorium, 62 Hoop Ln, London NW11 7NL, UK
Holy Trinity, Rochester, Newcastle upon Tyne NE19 1RU, UK
Nancy Brooker Spain (13 September 1917 – 21 March 1964) was a prominent
English broadcaster and journalist. She lived with
Joan "Jonnie" Werner Laurie
(Jonny) and had a relationship with Ginette Spainer. Spain had association with
Elizabeth Bowen (around 1950) and
Jackie Forster, amongst others.
Spain dedicated Poison for Teacher (1949), which features a school
called Radclyffe Hall, to Angela
du Maurier and Out Damned Tot (1952) to her lover Joan "Jonnie" Werner Laurie,
"with much love and gratitude." Spain was also friend with
Naomi Jacob.
Spain was a columnist for the Daily
Express, She magazine, and the News of the World in the
1950s and 1960s. She also appeared on many radio broadcasts, particularly on
Woman's Hour and My Word!, and later as a panelist on the
television programmes What's My Line? and Juke Box Jury. Spain
died in a plane crash near Aintree racecourse while travelling to the 1964
Grand National.
Spain was born in Jesmond, Newcastle upon Tyne, the younger of the two
daughters of Lieutenant-Colonel George Spain, a freeman of the city, prominent
figure in local military and antiquarian affairs, and baronet. Her father was
a writer himself and appeared in a number of radio plays as well as
broadcasting commentaries on Newcastle United games. Her mother, Norah Smiles,
was the daughter of Lucy Dorling (a half-sister of Isabella Beeton) and
William Holmes Smiles (son of Samuel Smiles).[1]
As a child, Spain remembered pushing the future eminent journalist William
Hardcastle into the Bull Park Lake on the Town Moor, where she used to learn
to ride at five shillings an hour "with other little bourgeois tots".
Nancy Spain
by Lewis Morley
bromide fibre print, 1963
15 in. x 11 3/8 in. (382 mm x 289 mm)
Given by Lewis Morley, 1989
Photographs Collection
NPG x38915
Spain went to Roedean School (a family tradition) from 1931 to 1935, where
she began wearing "mannish" clothes, and developed the speaking voice which
stood her in such good stead in her eventual media career. She played lacrosse
for Northumberland and Durham, and hockey for the North of England, as well as
playing tennis and cricket. She also acted on BBC radio, where she took over
the star parts vacated by Esther McCracken. She was a sports reporter for the
Newcastle Journal, and had a love affair with local sportswoman
Winifrid Sargeant. During the Second World War, Spain served in the WRNS on
Tyneside, a period covered in her book Thank you, Nelson (1945). She
served as a driver and was then commissioned, and worked in the WRNS press
office in London.[1]
After the war, Spain published several books, including a series of
detective novels set at a girls school, Radcliff Hall, based on Roedean[1]
(the name an obvious allusion to
Radclyffe
Hall, and probably also to Lord Berners'
novel The Girls of Radcliff Hall). This helped her become a star columnist for
the Daily Express, She and the News of the World in the
1950s and 1960s, and made many radio broadcasts, particularly on Woman's
Hour and My Word!. She later appeared as a panellist on BBC TV's
record review programme Juke Box Jury and the panel game What's My
Line?.
In 1962 she performed "The Blaydon Races", the Victorian Tyneside song, at
London's Marquee Club with Alexis Korner and Blues Incorporated. A recording
of the latter was published on the album R&B from the Marquee.
Her column-writing caused the Daily Express to be sued successfully
for libel - twice - by
Evelyn Waugh.[2]
As well as Spain's books of memoirs, including Why I'm Not a Millionaire
(1956), she wrote a biography of her great aunt, Isabella Beeton (original
author of the encyclopaedic Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management),
and a series of detective novels.[3]
Rose Collis wrote a posthumous biography of the broadcaster and journalist in
1997.
Often in the news and tempted to marry to seem respectable - Spain's
name was linked with that of Gilbert Harding - she lived openly with the
editor of She,
Joan "Jonnie" Werner Laurie (Jonny), and was a friend of the famous, including
Noël Coward and
Marlene Dietrich.
She and Laurie were regulars at the Gateways club in Chelsea, London, and were
widely known to be lesbians.[4]
Spain and Laurie lived in an extended household with the rally driver
Sheila van Damm,
and their sons Nicholas (born 1946) and Thomas (born in 1952). Nicholas was
Laurie's son; Thomas was also described as Laurie's youngest son, but may have
been Spain's son after an affair with Philip Youngman Carter, husband of
Margery Allingham.
Spain died, with Laurie and three others, on 21 March 1964. They were
flying in a Piper Apache aeroplane which crashed near Aintree racecourse, near
Liverpool, killing all on board. The aircraft (G-ASHC) had taken off
from Luton Airport and was on approach to land at the racecourse.[5]
Spain was travelling there to cover the 1964 Grand National, which was taking
place that day.[1]
She was cremated with Laurie at Golders Green Crematorium, London, and her
ashes were put in the family grave in Horsley, Northumberland.[1]
Coward summed up in his diary: "It is cruel that all that gaiety,
intelligence and vitality should be snuffed out when so many bores and horrors
are left living."
She is also the inspiration of the famous song 'Nancy Spain' written by
Barney Rushe and made famous by, among others, Christy Moore.[6]
My published books:
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- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Spain