My friend Mike Nally, who has died aged 83, made his name in journalism in the 1960s as a reporter for Granada Television’s Scene at 6.30 news programme and then for the BBC’s Look North. Later he was news editor at Radio Newcastle before returning to his print roots with the Observer, initially in London and then in Manchester as the paper’s northern correspondent until the late 90s.
Mike was born in Crumpsall, Manchester, to Hilda (nee Clarkson), a civil servant, and her husband, Will Nally, a journalist and Labour MP for Bilston in the West Midlands from 1945 to 1955. Mike attended North Manchester grammar school for boys before going on to study politics at Manchester University.
