SELINA SCOTT

'Selina Scott' (b. 13 May 1951) in Scarborough, Yorkshire, is a British newsreader and television presenter.
Educated in her teen years at the Laurence Jackson School in Guisborough, North Yorkshire where she was head girl, she then continued her education at the University of East Anglia reading English Literature.

Contents

Career

Personal

Trivia

External links

Career

Initially resisting the temptation to continue a family trait working in journalism Selina finally succumbed and went to work on the Sunday Post in Dundee, Scotland for 2 years. She then took up the post of Press Officer for the Tourist Board on the Isle of Bute.
She then cut her teeth in broadcasting as a continuity announcer with Grampian TV in 1978 and progressing to ''Grampian Today'', famously presenting from a North Sea oil platform and at the summit of Cairn Gorm. (A common story among rig-workers at the time was that the unwashed bed-linen from her cabin was auctioned off amongst the crew). She later was one of the launch team for ''North Tonight''.
By 1980 aged just 29, Selina then went national; appearing first as a newsreader on ITV's ''News at Ten''.
She then went on to launch Breakfast Television in the UK joining the BBC's ''Breakfast Time'' programme in January 1983. She presented the show with Frank Bough and Nick Ross.
She later went on to present ''The Clothes Show'', and to be guest host on the popular chat show, ''Wogan'' (named for its regular host Terry Wogan).
1988 saw Selina cross the Atlantic to join the US channel CBS hosting a current affairs programme - West 57th.
Back in the UK she joined Rupert Murdoch's satellite channel Sky, co-anchoring its 1992 Election Night coverage with Sir David Frost.
Selina has also produced highly acclaimed documentaries across two decades on the Royal Heads of Europe including A Prince Among Islands, a profile on Prince Charles, a film with King Juan Carlos of Spain (which achieved record viewing figures for a documentary in Spain) and The Return of the King, which involved traveling with King Constantine of Greece after 25 years of exile.
By 1995 in the US she had her own chat show on NBC. By 1997 she was back in the UK signing a £1 million contract with Sky. She anchored the Breakfast Programme, later switching to anchor the prime-time 5pm News. Latterly she had her own chat show but this was halted after 8 weeks.
In 2001 she relocated from Perthshire, Scotland to her native North Yorkshire after buying a 200-acre farm near Ampleforth to accommodate the 27 Angora Goats she had acquired. The fleeces are washed, spun and dyed producing Mohair wool for her farm business creating luxury socks initially for the gun makers Purdey, growing into her own company designing and creating luxury socks - Selina Scott Country Socks.

October 2006 saw a new departure as Selina was chosen to launch the new Season's fashion campaign for Country Casuals, or CC as it is now known, part of the Austin Reed Clothing Group previously occupied by the high profile model, Erin O'Connor.
In 2007, she appeared as one of the celebrity dog handlers on the BBC Two dog trials series ''The Underdog Show'' screened to highlight the Dogs Trust Charity for rescued dogs. After six weeks of competition, she was voted the winner, beating singer Huey Morgan and actress Julia Sawalha in the final.
July 2007 - Following on from her success of The Underdog Show Selina is currently fronting the BBC's Animal Rescue Live Show daily from Battersea Dog's Home in Central London, co-hosting with presenter Matt Baker. Scheduled to run daily for three weeks, the programme highlights the plight of many animals at the home appealing to the public to consider re-homing. Daily appearances by "celebrity rescuers" help boost the programmes appeal as well as showcasing other rescue centres around the British Isles.

Personal

Selina hails from a family of journalists: her mother Betty was and her grandfather was the editor of the local newspaper in Malton, North Yorkshire.
She is the eldest of five children; she has a younger sister, Fiona, an artist, who has exhibited at the Royal National Portait Gallery in London Summer 2007 with a portrait of her famous sister. Needless to say Selina bought it.
Selina is a huge dog lover; her first memeory of her first pet is that of Toby, a male German Shepherd cross. She has 2 dogs of her own, one of whom is Nip, a female Collie cross and Kiki, a German Shepherd dog she personally rescued from Majorca.
Her grandparents, despite the name, originally came from Aberdeen, Scotland.
Favoured tipple: a dram of Islay malt whisky with water.
She has a home on the island of Majorca nearby the Tramuntana Mountains.

Trivia

★ Scotsman part of ITN's "Famous Five", with Anna Ford, Gordon Honeycombe, Martyn Lewis and Julia Somerville, were bought back to screens for one week in September 2005 for ITN's 50th Anniversary. The 5 presenters were back to anchor the ITV Evening News with either Mark Austin or Mary Nightingale

★ Selina was the subject of Dundee band Saint Andrew and the Woollen Mill's 1980 song ''Selina'', which featured on their album ''The Woollen Mill Story''. According to interview excerpts included on this album, the song was written by the band after learning that Selina was to leave Dundee to take up a position with the UK independent national news network ITN.
Selina Scott is working on a television documentary on the history of Harley-Davidson motorcycles.

External links

★ ''The Observer'' ( Tim Adams) TV go home 27 August 2006

★ ''The Daily Telegraph'' (Elizabeth Grice)

★ Confessions of a lonley goatherd 13 November 2006

★ ''Country Girl Selina returns to UK Television (Hello Magazine)

★ [1] 4 January 2007

★ ''Times Online'' (Emma Cook)

★ [2] [Not Just Anybody: Selina Scott] 13 January 2007

★ ''A Place In The Sun'' Interview - Selina Scott

★ [3]

★ [4] [BBC Animal Rescue Live: Interview: Selina Scott] 9 July 2007

★ Selina Scott at IMDB