Simon Townsend (born 27 November 1945) is an Australian journalist who became a popular television host during the 1980s. He is now retired.
Vietnam War conscientious objector
In the mid-1960s whilst living in
Woy Woy
Woy Woy is a coastal town in the Central Coast region of New South Wales, Australia, located on the southern reaches of Brisbane Water north of Sydney. It is a population centre within the local government area.
Woy Woy is located in the no ...
and working as a
columnist for a
community paper
Community paper is a term used by publishers, advertisers and readers to describe a range of publications that share a common service to their local community and commerce. Their predominant medium being newsprint, often free and published at regul ...
he became a
conscientious objector against the
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...
.
He gained national prominence on his anti-conscription stance, he said, "I suddenly decided to be a . . . objector to the Vietnam War. I then went to Sydney, I met people, I joined the groups and I read. And suddenly I had an intellectual basis for my objection to the Vietnam War. And that was when I got very busy, objecting, going to court and I ended up in
Long Bay Gaol for a month. And in 1968 I ended up in the army prison for a month. I was court-martialled while I was there."
Television Host
Townsend is best remembered in Australia as the host and producer of the popular children's show, ''
Simon Townsend's Wonder World''.
In 1993, he hosted a show on the
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is the national broadcaster of Australia. It is principally funded by direct grants from the Australian Government and is administered by a government-appointed board. The ABC is a publicly-own ...
called ''TVTV''. It contained a mixture of interviews with television personalities promoting their shows and reviews of television shows new to the screen. Presenters of this show were
Edith Bliss (who worked previously on ''Wonder World''), and musician
James Valentine formerly of the band,
Models and Townsend.
He has also appeared on a celebrity version of ''
Sale of the Century
''Sale of the Century'' (stylized as ''$ale of the Century'') is an American television game show that originally debuted on September 29, 1969, on NBC daytime. It was one of three NBC game shows to premiere on that date, the other two being th ...
''.
Personal life
Townsend has suffered three
strokes. In August 2005, he told
ABC TV he feared the next stroke might kill him.
Townsend is the father of actress
Nadia Townsend, who appeared on Channel 7's ''
City Homicide''.
Further reading
* Scates, Bob (10 October 2022).
Draftmen go free : A history of the Anti-Conscription Movement in Australia Book review. Simon is mentioned in the book. Commons Social Change Library. Retrieved 2 November 2022.
References
External links
*
*
Australian television presenters
Australian journalists
Australian conscientious objectors
Living people
1945 births
{{Australia-journalist-stub