El Vino Fleet Street wine bar to host reunion party on Wednesday 12 February, marking platinum anniversary of Hayters; Reg Hayter started up the agency in 1955 and it remains a major player in sports broadcasting, video and social media journalism…
By the SJA
More than 150 successful sports journalists started their careers under the guidance, wisdom and fair-minded journalistic principles of the formidable Reg Hayter, the founder of Fleet Street’s finest sports reporting agency, Hayters, which marks its 70th anniversary this month.
The Hayter principles were also strongly instilled in the company’s present directors, Nick Callow and Gerry Cox, who along with Reg’s son, former Mail on Sunday cricket correspondent Peter Hayter, will be hosting a 70th anniversary reunion party on Wednesday, February 12 at El Vino.
Some of the finest sports journalists of any era started their careers with Reg, who ran the agency with relentless energy right up to his death in 1994.
Graduates of the Hayters Academy include SJA award-winning writers Martin Samuel, Henry Winter, Mike Calvin and Alan Lee, as well as John Dillon, Malcolm Folley, Des Kelly, Richard Keys, ITV’s Mark Demuth, Gary Newbon, Steve Rider, Peter Drury and former BBC statistician “Ask Albert” Sewell.
Hayter left Pardons, then the Press Association’s cricket and football reporting section, to launch his own agency in February 1955 because he saw an opportunity to supply national and provincial newspapers with coverage of matches, events, feature writing, statistics and results, and telephones and telephonists in the press boxes of all the main football and cricket grounds in and around London.
Hayter expanded his offering to act as agent, advisor and confidant to some of the biggest names in sport including Denis Compton, Bill Edrich, Keith Miller, Godfrey Evans, Ian Botham, Basil D’Oliveira, Henry Cooper and Bob Wilson.
The trusty Underwood typewriters have been replaced by state-of-the art video equipment and cutting-edge computers as the 21st-century Hayters serves the traditional and modern print media, as well as being a leading player in broadcast, video and social media journalism.
Callow and Cox, however, still carry a trademark Hayter red notebook for those business meetings when memory cannot always be relied upon.
And this could well be one such event, having promised staff past and present a bumper landmark event to look forward to when the pandemic lockdown was imposed a month after the marking of their 65th anniversary on these pages.
As Reg himself would often remark, ‘facts are sacred, comment is free and there is no such thing as an old story’ (nor an old joke, it would seem).
Any Hayters men or women who would like to share a toast to this unique editorial and sporting institution should contact Nick (nick.callow@hayters.com) or Gerry (gerry.cox@hayters.com)
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