William Randolph Heine (9 January 1945 – 2 April 2019) was an American-born British radio broadcaster and writer based in

Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. Heine started working for BBC Radio Oxford in 1983, and was considered by many to be very opinionated and perhaps somewhat controversial in the field of radio presenting. He was not afraid to speak his mind and allowed his listeners to do the same during his former afternoon phone-in show. Heine's last regular broadcast was on 24 April 2016. Born in

Batavia, Illinois Batavia () is a city mainly in Kane County, Illinois, Kane County and partly in DuPage County, Illinois, DuPage County in the U.S. state of Illinois. Located in the Chicago metropolitan area, it was founded in 1833 and is the oldest city in Kan ...

, Heine lived in Oxford since studying for a postgraduate degree at

Balliol College Balliol College () is a constituent college of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1263 by nobleman John I de Balliol, it has a claim to be the oldest college in Oxford and the English-speaking world. With a governing body of a master and ar ...

in the late 1960s. In the 1970s and 1980s, he ran both the Penultimate Picture Palace cinema in East Oxford and the Moulin Rouge Cinema (which he later renamed Not The Moulin Rouge) in

Headington Headington is an eastern suburb of Oxford, in the county of Oxfordshire, England. It is at the top of Headington Hill overlooking the city in the Thames valley below, and bordering Marston, Oxford, Marston to the north-west, Cowley, Oxfordshire ...

. Bill and his friend, the sculptor John Buckley, designed a giant pair of hands to adorn the former, and a giant pair of legs for the latter. Together Heine and Buckley, again, in 1986 came up with the fibreglass sculpture of a shark that appears to be crashing through the roof of the house he lived within, in the

area of Oxford, creating a somewhat controversial local landmark. Heine's book about his radio career, ''Heinstein of the Airwaves'', was published by Chris Andrews Publications on 31 October 2008, and his book about his infamous sculpture, ''The Hunting of the Shark'', was published by Oxfordfolio on 9 August 2011. In November 2017, Heine revealed that he had been diagnosed with terminal

acute myeloid leukaemia Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a cancer of the myeloid line of blood cells, characterized by the rapid growth of abnormal cells that build up in the bone marrow and blood and interfere with normal blood cell production. Symptoms may inclu ...

. He died at home on 2 April 2019.

References

External links

*
BBC My Story with Bill Heine
on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

Interview with Bill Heine
1945 births 2019 deaths American emigrants to England Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford English radio personalities English non-fiction writers Writers from Oxford Mass media people from Oxford English male non-fiction writers Deaths from leukemia in England People from Batavia, Illinois {{England-bio-stub