Former This Day Tonight presenter Bill Peach dies

Updated

Bill Peach, the former presenter of trail-blazing ABC current affairs program This Day Tonight (TDT), has died.

Peach died of cancer in a Sydney hospital early this morning aged 78.

The award-winning journalist began hosting TDT when it launched in 1967, fronting the ground-breaking current affairs show for its first eight years.

Peach worked on the show alongside journalists including Richard Carleton, George Negus and Gerald Stone.

Negus says Peach was Australia's first true news and current affairs anchor.

"In a way, quite strangely actually, [anchor] was a word that fitted Bill in more ways than one," Mr Negus said.

"Not only was he anchored to the desk most of the time ... but he was an anchor to the program as a bloke.

"He was very calm, very composed, very together and very sensible when he was surrounded by a bunch of cowboys like myself at the time."

From current affairs to documentaries

After TDT, Peach went on to film a string of documentaries, including the series Peach's Australia.

He made 27 programs in two years, filming in every part of Australia.

He was also known for Holiday with Bill Peach, and The Explorers.

Sorry, this video has expired Video: George Negus reflects on life of Bill Peach (ABC News)

The ABC estimated he and his team travelled the equivalent of five times around the world without leaving Australia.

"I was lucky to see much of Australia while making programs such as Peach's Australia, Holiday with Bill Peach, and The Explorers," he told Women's Weekly in 2008.

Peach was born in Lockhart in New South Wales in 1935 and began a cadetship with ABC Radio in 1958.

He attributed his taste for travel and sense of humour to his father, who was a stock agent. His mother's family were graziers.

Peach said he had "good parents and you couldn't get a better start than that".

Life after journalism

After retiring from journalism he founded the Bill Peach Journeys travel company in 1983.

A spokesman for Bill Peach Journeys has confirmed the broadcaster's death, saying he had been diagnosed with cancer several months ago.

The travel company's website says Peach also wrote 10 books on Australian history, as well as many magazine stories and newspaper columns.

Sorry, this video has expired Video: Bill Peach on Landline in 2008 (ABC News)

He received many awards across his journalism career including a special Logie for Outstanding Personal Contribution to Australian Television.

He was also awarded the Order of Australia (AM) for his services to Australian media and tourism.

ABC managing director Mark Scott says the corporation and the nation owes Mr Peach a great debt.

"He was a presence in millions of Australian's homes for many, many years," he said.

"He was a presence in my home growing up and we owe a lot to his integrity, to his energy and to his love of the country, and the ABC owes him a lot as well for his pioneering work in forging a new pathway for journalism."

Peach was a 'natural presenter'

Peter Luck, who worked with Peach on This Day Tonight, says Peach was "a natural choice for that pioneering (presenter) role".

Luck says he saw Peach in hospital a few days ago and it had "just been hard. A tough time".

I adored Bill. We had a life-long friendship. He was very sophisticated, very erudite, gentle, well-read. Former TDT journalist Peter Luck

"He was very sophisticated, very erudite, gentle, well-read," he said.

"He took to TV like a duck to water."

Luck says none of the TDT team really knew what they were doing and muddled through the first episode, which he called "a disaster".

But he says by the second night, they had it right.

"There was no autocue back then," he said.

Topics: journalism, information-and-communication, death, community-and-society, australia

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