Caron Keating

Caron Keating
Caron Louisa Keating (5 October 1962 – 13 April 2004) was a British television presenter.
Early life and education
Keating was born on 5 October 1962 in Fulham, south-west London, to an English father with Irish roots and a Northern Irish mother. When she was three months old her family relocated to Northern Ireland where she was raised. Her parents were the television presenter Gloria Hunniford and the BBC producer Donald Keating (d. 1997). Keating attended Harmony Hill Primary School, Lisburn and Methodist College, Belfast, where she gained 8 'O' levels and 3 'A' levels. She was accepted to study at the University of Bristol where she graduated three years later aged 21 with a BA Honours Degree in English and Drama.
Broadcasting career
Keating's television career began in Northern Ireland where she presented The Video Picture Show, Channel One and the music programme Greenrock, but her big break came when she was selected to join the team of Blue Peter from 13 November 1986.
Keating appeared on the programme with Peter Duncan, Janet Ellis, Mark Curry, Yvette Fielding, and John Leslie. Her Blue Peter career included a trip to Moscow in 1987 during the perestroika period, swimming with sharks, abseiling down skyscrapers and standing strapped to the top of a light aircraft whilst it performed aerial acrobatics. She also interviewed serving prime minister Margaret Thatcher on the programme in 1988.
After four years, Keating left Blue Peter on 22 January 1990. Keating joined BBC Radio 5 where amongst other programmes she co-hosted an early 90s afternoon show with film critic Mark Kermode titled A Game of Two Halves. In his autobiography Kermode described Keating as "The very dictionary definition of Lovely". She presented several other TV programmes including This Morning, before breast cancer was diagnosed in 1997. Keating was the face of Sainsbury's Reward Card from 1996 to 1997, before Edita Brychta took over towards the end of 1997, and also appeared in a TV commercial for So Good soya drink in 1999. In 1999 she presented We Can Work It Out.
Personal life, illness and death
Keating married Russ Lindsay in Tunbridge Wells, Kent in 1991. Their two sons were born in Hammersmith, London. The family settled in Cornwall for a few years at the turn of the century.
Keating was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1997. After undergoing conventional and alternative treatments, and spending a period away from her family on the Gold Coast, Australia, and at a hospice care in Switzerland, she died at the age of 41, on 13 April 2004, at her mother's house in Sevenoaks, Kent.
The Caron Keating Foundation
Set up in Keating's memory, The Caron Keating Foundation is a fund-raising partnership set up to raise money to offer financial support to professional carers, complementary healing practitioners, and support groups dealing with cancer patients, as well as individuals and families who are affected by the disease. It will also financially help a number of cancer charities with their ongoing quest for prevention, early detection and hopefully an ultimate cure. It was set up by her mother, TV presenter Gloria Hunniford, and her two brothers Michael and Paul Keating.
See also
List of Blue Peter presenters
References
External links
The Caron Keating Foundation official site
Caron Keating presenter biography
Blue Peter's Caron Keating dies – BBC obituary
Caron Keating – The Times obituary
'Blue Peter' presenter Caron Keating dies of breast cancer, aged 41 – The Independent obituary
Interview with mother Gloria re Caron and the Foundation
Alumni of the University of Bristol
Blue Peter presenters
Deaths from cancer in England
Deaths from breast cancer
British television presenters
People from Fulham
1962 births
2004 deaths
People educated at Methodist College Belfast
British people of Irish descent