Alistair Cooke, KBE (né Alfred Cooke; 20 November 1908 – 30 March 2004) was a British-American writer whose work as a journalist, television personality and radio broadcaster was done primarily in the United States. Outside his journalistic output, which included Letter from America and America: A Personal History of the United States, he was well known in the United States as the host of PBS Masterpiece Theatre from 1971 to 1992. After holding the job for 22 years, and having worked in television for 42 years, Cooke retired in 1992, although he continued to present Letter from America until shortly before his death. He was the father of author and folk singer John Byrne Cooke.
He was born Alfred Cooke in Salford, England, the son of Mary Elizabeth (Byrne) and Samuel Cooke. His father was a Methodist lay preacher and metalsmith by trade; his mother’s family were of Irish Protestant origin. His family moved from Salford to No 10 Vance Road, Blackpool in 1917. He was educated at Blackpool Grammar School, and won a scholarship to Jesus College, Cambridge, where he gained an honours degree (2:1) in English. He was heavily involved in the arts, was editor of Granta, and set up the Mummers, Cambridge’s first theatre group open to both sexes, from which he notably rejected a young James Mason, telling him to stick to architecture. Cooke changed his name to Alistair when he was 22, in 1930.
Alistair Cooke in interview 18 March 1974
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