New series next week on the Beeb of Who Do You Think You Are?

[Top-of-the-hill]

  I agree with you, Keith, about Alex and the other women in the programme.

  "Former footballer who played 140 times for England, a pundit on BBC and Sky (Match Of The Day etc) and now presenter of Football Focus (BBC Saturday lunchtimes).
Inducted to the English Football Hall of Fame in 2019."

   Sorry, KG, barely watch TV and have no interest in any kind of sport!

[loobylooayr]

  I agree with you, Keith, about Alex and the other women in the programme

   Sorry, KG, barely watch TV and have no interest in any kind of sport!

 

I have to confess I didn't know Alex either - but then I don't watch or follow football and didn't watch much Olympics coverage.
But I thought she came across as a very pleasant and grounded young woman.
Finding the grave of her Coombs ancestor in the undergrowth was intriguing....I wondered who was in the other two graves .

Looby 

[Martin Briscoe]

I thought Alex Scott was perfectly delightful throughout.  I loved the short film of her scoring a goal at the age of 8 (was it?) on the soccer field amongst other girls who seemed rather older.
And the gentle Jamaican women genealogists really took her under their wings as they guided her through her ancestors there. ..
Keith

I like her also, some people tend to be quick to criticise TV presenters.  It is a job that everyone seems to think they can do better but you only have to see any of the poor presenters to see that it is not easy.

You also see a lot moaning about her namesake Alex Jones from The One Show, but the two of them manage to be very natural which is why it looks easy.  There is a male ex-footballer acting as one of the other stand-ins whilst Alex Jones is off at the moment, he is very wooden and shows that it is not as easy as some people think.  Several of the other temporary stand-ins also show it is more difficult that many people think.

[jc26red]

Alex Scott didn't have the same wow factor but I think her history was so complicated they didn't do it justice.

 Apart from everything we saw there was a fleeting mention that her maternal grandfather came from Belfast, nothing else about that and I have to admit that the Russian Pogroms and Slave Owners have been covered before never in the same programme.

Totally agree, if we had Alex's history, then we would be totally engrossed, a researchers dream but probably too much for a 60 minute program to do it justice and for Alex to take in.  Very diverse heritage.

I felt Alex was totally overwhelmed by it all and probably didn't really understand beforehand what could possibly turn up.

[Caw1]

A hard act to follow after the first two wonderful episodes… expectations are always high so anything could have seemed like a let down…
but….
I’d not heard of her either and my OH watches wall to wall sport but not necessarily womens! Or football for that matter.
I too thought she was delightful and her history as diverse as one could get really… the Jamaican folk were humble and imparted the information in a wonderful way…
It was a great deal to take in and digest but she clearly found her roots there…
You could see why she’s turned out to be such a lovely person when you hear about her ancestors history… despite her Coombs x? grandfather owning slaves he made sure that once he’d passed away that they were looked after financially to the extent that all the land was still in the Coombs family which almost slipped out as if by accident… so modest.

I enjoyed this episode almost as much as the previous two… think the Beeb, so far, are doing us proud!

Caroline

[Martin Briscoe]

Someone mentioned the Jamaican genealogists, they have probably seen before descendants being shocked to find that their ancestors owned slaves themselves.

At least her ancestor seemed to have taken care of his children and mistresses when he died.  I don't know how much £15 a year was worth then but probably enough to live comfortably especially with a house provided, perhaps they could have given some idea of what it was worth.

It is actors on WDYTYA who I tend to dislike, many have been very arrogant and thought they knew better than the researcher often because of some family story that had been passed down which had been proved to be untrue but they still believed.

[Martin Briscoe]

I’d not heard of her either and my OH watches wall to wall sport but not necessarily womens! Or football for that matter.

I have often found that I can still enjoy the programme even when I have never heard of the person or even intensely dislike them.  I have watched most of the American series and heard of very few of the people on it! 

I keep hoping the BBC Wales equivalent would be shown on network, I think there are a few of the programmes that I have never managed to catch.  They normally are quite keen recycle programmes so wonder if the BBC do not hold the rights but I cannot imagine it would cost a lot to show them and would fill a few hours of TV.  BBC Scotland tried a short series in a completely different format, I don't think it was very successful as they have never done any more.

[Milliepede]

Me neither but I enjoyed her episode the most so far. 

[Martin Briscoe]

Anyone looking at Jamaica, NLS have just added some early 19th Century maps.

https://geo.nls.uk/maps/innes/