I WANT to express real sadness at the news of the death of Mel Horrocks (former news editor of The Bolton Evening News).

I didn’t know him well, but during the mid 1970s, along with others, I had contact with him during the establishment of Bolton Newstalk, the “talking” version of Bolton Evening News for visually impaired people and others with disabilities experiencing difficulty handling a conventional newspaper.

Mel was incredibly helpful in, not only selecting the local stories for inclusion in the then fortnightly audio tape production, but in formating the news items in a way which made them easily readable and easily listened to by the users of the service. It was a task he didn’t need to do, and the relatively small increase in the “listenership” of the BEN would probably have had little direct benefit to the newspaper, but it was a task he carried out efficiently and regularly as a commitment to a community who might otherwise have had difficulty in staying in touch with local news.

I’m no longer involved with Bolton Newstalk, but the fact that it continues and has developed is to a very large extent down to the input Mel gave to this voluntary activity at its beginning.

He made many people’s lives much more interesting though this contribution.

Bob Bradley Shrewsbury Road Bolton