Bill Oddie

William Edgar "Bill" Oddie OBE^[1] (born July 7, 1941^[2]) is an English author, actor, comedian, artist, naturalist and musician, who became famous as one of The Goodies. Bill makes a guest appearance as Winston, one of the local townspeople of Lower Uncton, a small village in England, the onetime home of Al Bundy's ancestor, Seamus McBundy, who concoct a plot to lure the Bundys to their village with the intent of killing the last male Bundys alive, meaning Al and Bud, in the three episode story in Season 6 titled "The England Show".

Biography[]

Born in Rochdale, Lancaashire, England to Harry Oddie and Lillian (née Clegg). Bill also had also had a sister, Margaret Jean Oddie, who died when 5 days old on 21 January 1940 a year before his own birth. Oddie lived at Oak Tree Crescent, Quinton, Birmingham, England from about age 6 to 15, brought up by his father, Harry, and his father's mother, Emily. Oddie has no memory of his mother, Lilian, living at home.

As a child, Bill's mother Lillian worked in cotton mill under harsh conditions. She suffered from a chronic mental illness, perhaps bipolar disorder or schizophrenia, and abandoned Oddie while he was at an early age. She was a long-term inpatient in Barnsley Hall Hospital, Bromsgrove, for more than 20 years, having been first admitted as a voluntary patient at the age of 36 years.

When Bill's father, Harry, was 17 years old, his father, Wilkinson Oddie, died of heart failure on 23 February 1927, a post-operative death, after an operation for carcinoma of the left tonsil, which used chloroform as an anaesthetic. Oddie developed a hobby first in egg collecting (which was then legal) then birdwatching, and his father encouraged school education.

A |birdwatcher since his childhood in Quinton, Birmingham,^[3] Oddie has now established a reputation as an ornithologist, conservationist and television presenter on wildlife issues. Some of his books are illustrated with his own paintings and drawings.^[4]

Oddie's wildlife programmes for the BBC include: Springwatch/Autumnwatch, How to Watch Wildlife, Wild In Your Garden]], Birding with Bill Oddie, Britain Goes Wild with Bill Oddie and Bill Oddie Goes Wild.

Family[]

Oddie is married to Laura Beaumont (Beaumont-Gilles), with whom he has worked on a variety of projects for children, including film scripts, drama and comedy series, puppet shows and books. They have a daughter, Rosie (b. October 30, 1985), and live in Hampstead, London.

Oddie also has two daughters from his first marriage (1967 to Jean Hart): Bonnie, and the actress Kate Hardie, plus three grandchildren, Lyle, Ella, and Gracie.