Cecil Taylor, pioneering BBC broadcaster, dies aged 96
He was BBC News Northern Ireland's first TV reporter.
BBC newsreader Cecil Taylor has died at the age of 96, it has been announced.
Taylor was BBC News Northern Ireland's first TV reporter, and developed a number of shows for the BBC, including Newsline.
Over the course of his career, Taylor covered historic events including the beginning of the Troubles, the civil rights movement and the IRA campaign of the 1950s.
According to the Belfast Telegraph, Taylor began his career in newspapers and joined the BBC as a reporter in 1955, with his entire career with the BBC being spent in Northern Ireland.
Tributes from former colleagues have poured in for the journalist, with those who knew him describing him as "valued".
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Don Anderson, who worked alongside Taylor over the years, said (as per BBC News): "He used to say that when he arrived at the BBC the news from the Belfast newsroom sounded as if it had been written in Stormont Castle, and he did something to change that, which was highly important.
"You knew what was expected - fair and accurate reporting. Anything else and he came down on top of you like a ton of bricks."
Outside of journalism, Taylor commissioned a number of TV dramas including Graham Reid's The Billy plays, which starred Kenneth Branagh.
"He was one of the men who began television drama here - when we see all the studios here now, all the series, he began all that," Anderson continued.
Former BBC News editor Robin Walsh said Taylor had a "fine-tuned editorial mind" and will be "sadly missed".
Walsh told BBC News: "He told you what he thought and there were no airs and graces about it.
"He had a fine-tuned editorial mind, but I tell you what he also had, he had an open door – sadly, sadly to be missed."
Taylor is survived by his wife Doreen, his daughter Olwyn, son-in-law Ian and grandchild Matty.
