Biography

James Herriot

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Alf Wight ("James Herriot") was born on 3 October 1916 in Sunderland, near Newcastle. However the family moved to Yoker, a suburb of Glasgow, when Alf was three weeks old. He attended Glasgow Veterinary School. He moved to Thirsk, North Yorkshire, in 1940, to work for Donald Sinclair ("Siegfried Farnon") at his practice at 23 Kirkgate. He married Joan Danbury ("Helen Alderson") on 5 November 1941 at St Mary Magdalene church in Thirsk. They had two children, Jim (born 1943) and Rosie (born 1947): Jim is a vet who used to work in the Sinclair/Wight practice and Rosie is a General Practitioner (family doctor). Alf died on 23 February 1995 of prostate cancer at his house, "Mirebeck", in the village of Thirlby near the town of Thirsk that became famous in his books as "Darrowby".
- IMDb mini biography by: Anonymous

Professional ethics and rules of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons ban advertising, and hence Alf Wight could not publish his books under his real name because he was still a practising vet at the time. Required to use a pseudonym, he chose the name of the Birmingham City football club goalkeeper after watching a cup tie on TV between them and Manchester United in February 1969. His son's biography contains a photograph of Alf and the real James Herriot kicking a football about on the lawn of "Skeldale House".
His final honour was to have the new library at Glasgow Veterinary School named The James Herriot Library in recognition of his services to the profession. Sadly he died the day before he was due to attend the official opening, so his son Jim attended in his place.
He adjusted the chronology of his books slightly compared with his real-life experiences. In the books, James Herriot arrived at Darrowby in the mid 1930s and one book describes the events leading up to the outbreak of World War II. In real life, Alf arrived in Thirsk in 1940, by which time the war had been in progress for several months.
In 1939 he graduated from Glasgow Veterinary College.
Began writing in 1966 but his first book, If Only They Could Talk, was not published until 1970. This book and the next in the series, It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet, were released in the USA in 1972 as All Creatures Great and Small.

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