by My friend Michael Burns, who died at the age of 87, leaves an important heritage as a cricket historian, both as a filmmaker and author. Cricket was at the heart of his life – whether played for many years for Malden Wanderers or training teams from Surrey youth or being a member of the MCC often skeptical – and he had a deep understanding of the game, generally transcending but not always partisanry.
His films included stories from Surrey and Yorkshire, criticisms of individual seasons, English visits from the 1950s and a particularly evocative portrait of the English cricket in the 1960s. His three books resulted in seven summers (2022), the definitive history of the way Surrey in the 1950s disturbed a record of seven tribes of the consecutive champion.
Mike was in a way a classic product of the 1944 education law, which, by creating free places in high schools, has done so much to shape the post-war meritocracy, all due to the capacity and hard work rather than the connection and the family history. Son of Iris and Philip Burns, he was born and grew up in Tolworth, who is part of the exterior suburbs in southwest London; His father was in the wholesale fish sector, his mother worked as a sales assistant; And Mike attended the grammar of the county of Raynes Park.
After school, a job in a paint spray factory and an unfortunate spell in an office of broker in securities, before in 1960, he began at ATV in Elstree as an intern cameraman. From 1962 to 1974, it was based in Teddington studios, first for ABC Weekend TV then Thames. Avengers, the scene of the armchairs, the opportunity, the soot show – these are just some of the popular programs on which Mike worked.
The turning point in his life took place in 1974. Applying for a grant to take a diploma in social sciences at Ruskin College, Oxford, he was initially refused by the Kingston Council, at a time when higher education subsidies for mature students were discretionary. It would have been that – until his deputy, Norman Lamont, successfully put a word. It was a two -year lesson, which in turn led to a first cycle place at Keble College to study philosophy, politics and economics.
Four decades of largely fulfilling independent work followed, mainly as a filmmaker: not only on cricket, but also as a story of the FA Cup as well as films commanded by Shell, the International Federation of Transport Workers, Princess Alice Hospice and the Royal Star and Garter Home.
Among many others, he directed the New York and London marathons; continued his support for Chelsea (Roy Bentley was his first hero); children of framed primary schools; Read in a voracious way (Dickens above all); And acted as an electoral agent for a Labor candidate, as has happened against Lamont.
Mike’s policy was solidly left. After the 2019 conservative landslide, he noticed that his last remaining ambition was to live to see another Labor government and that the election of last summer made him considerable pleasure. An increasingly man of decency and integrity, with an instinctive love for fair play, Mike was the most faithful of friends as well as totally attached to his family.
In 1965, he married Mary Miller. She survives him, with their children, James, Sally, John and Mark.
