LEAMINGTON LEGENDS TO HAVE PLAQUES UNVEILED

THREE more plaques will be unveiled in Leamington to celebrate three legendary
residents of the town.

Sir Terry Frost, Malcolm Sayer and Randolph Turpin will all have a blue plaque unveiled under their names on Wednesday April 28 at 3pm.

Last week the Times reported that legendary boxer Turpin’s head guard is now on display at the town’s art gallery and museum.

Randolph was born in Leamington on June 1928 and trained along with his brother Dick at the Leamington Boys Club.

Aged 18, he turned professional and achieved a win by a knock out in his first bout. He won the British Middleweight title in 1950 and later that year met European Middleweight champion Luc Van Dam in London, whom he knocked out in the first round to seize the European championship.

The highlight of his career came in July 1951 when he become the first British holder of the World Middleweight title in 60 years.

He was posthumously inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2001.

His plaque will be unveiled in Willes Road where he grew up.

Joining him will be Leamington-born Sir Terry Frost, who was an artist noted for his abstract works.

He lived in Rugby Road before he served in the army during the Second World War and was taught by artist Adrian Heath while he was a prisoner of war.

After he returned to England he attended art schools in Cornwall and then worked as an assistant to sculptor Barbara Hepworth.

Frost had his first one-man exhibition in London at the Leicester Galleries in 1952 and in New York at the Bertha Schaefer Gallery in 1960.

In 1992, he was elected a Royal Academician and was knighted in 1998. He died in September 2003.

His plaque will be unveiled in Stamford Gardens.

The last man to be joining the trio is Malcolm Sayer who lived in Portland Place West, Leamington, which is where his plaque will be mounted.

He was the designer of the E-Type Jaguar.

Sayer joined the company in 1950 where he designed the first post-war British sports and racing car capable of challenging Mercedes and Ferrari.

His C-Type Jaguar won Le Mans first time out and then for three years running.

The events have been organised by the Blue Plaque Group, which manages the blue plaques and historic interest plaques in Leamington.

The group comprises Leamington Town Council, Leamington Building Conservation Trust, Central Leamington Residents’ Association, Leamington Society, Leamington Literary Society and Warwick District Council.