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Freda Margaret Kelsall (born April 1938 in Southport, Lancashire, England)^[1]^[2] is a British writer, theatre director and former teacher who is best known as the main writer (1975–1996; occasionally also a presenter in the last few of those years) of the schools television series How We Used To Live.^[3]

Early career

In the 1960s, she was a schoolteacher in London and had a novel published.^[4] In this period she appeared in epilogues for Rediffusion, the then ITV franchise holder; in October 1967, when she was "just starting a teaching career", she contributed to a series of epilogues on religious education^[2]^[5] and also discussed a number of books in similar epilogues under the title 'Outlook and Insight',^[2] for example William Mayne's Earthfasts,^[6] Ivan Southall's To the Wild Sky^[7] and Mollie Hunter's The Kelpie's Pearls.^[8]

Later career

In 1970, she moved to Alresford, Hampshire, where she initially continued her teaching career, also inspiring Colin Firth to begin his acting career.^[4] In 1980, heavily committed to work for Yorkshire Television,^[4] she briefly moved to Leeds and then in 1982, to Heptonstall, just outside Hebden Bridge^[2] where she founded the Bridge Theatre Company in 1987, and ran it for many years.^[2]^[9] She continued to direct plays for this company until at least 2006.^[10] On 31 March 1981, her play The Reason of Things, produced by YTV, was networked by ITV.^[11] She had two further plays networked in 1984, Sweet Echo on 22 January, produced by Yorkshire,^[12] and Grand Duo on 29 July, produced by LWT.^[13] Her play The Index Has Gone Fishing, made by Central Television and filmed in Pershore, Worcestershire,^[4] was networked by ITV on 28 June 1987.^[14] In 1987 she wrote an episode of the BBC drama series One by One.^[15] She also wrote six episodes of Emmerdale Farm in the spring of 1981, and six further episodes that autumn.^[16] Her most recent television work credited by the British Film Institute consists of three episodes of Heartbeat in the mid-1990s.^[17]

She is also the author of a number of books based around How We Used to Live, and of a number of stage plays which have appeared in print.^[18] In 2010, she presented a retrospective of the How We Used to Live series at Hebden Bridge's 500th anniversary festival.^[19] In December 2017, she spoke to a local history society on the history of her home.^[20]

References

^ "Search Results for Civil Births in Birth, Death, Marriage and Parish Records". Find My Past. Retrieved 26 September 2018.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e "Wildrose Arts - Tag results". 17 November 2015. Archived from the original on 17 November 2015. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
^ The Kaleidoscope British Independent Television Drama Research Guide, pages 2194–2206, Kaleidoscope Publishing, 2010
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Kelsall, Freda. "Alresford Remembered". Alresford.org. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
^ The Times, p. 16, 17 October 1967
^ The Times, p. 12, 12 January 1968
^ The Times, p. 14, 25 March 1968
^ The Times, p. 14, 24 June 1968
^ "Bridge Theatre Company - A History". 17 November 2015. Archived from the original on 17 November 2015. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
^ "Amanda Howard, Actor, West Yorkshire". Mandy.com. Retrieved 26 September 2018.
^ The Times, p. 29, 31 March 1981
^ The Times, p. 23, 21 January 1984
^ The Times, p. 31, 28 July 1984
^ The Times, p. 23, 27 June 1987
^ "One by One - BBC One London - 18 April 1987 - BBC Genome". Genome.ch.bbc.co.uk. 18 April 1987. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
^ The Kaleidoscope British Independent Television Drama Research Guide, pages 1700 & 1701, Kaleidoscope Publishing, 2010
^ "Freda Kelsall". Explore.bfi.org.uk. Archived from the original on 17 November 2015. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
^ "Amazon.co.uk: freda kelsall: Books". Amazon.co.uk. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
^ "Hebden Bridge 500". Hebden500.co.uk. Retrieved 13 September 2018.
^ "From Crime Scene to Holiday Camp: Stories of Hawdon Hall". hebdenbridge.co.uk. Retrieved 26 September 2018.