Tim Kalvis 1966-2024

Tim Kalvis

Image © credit waived

BRANCH MEMBER and former committee member Tim Kalvis passed away at the beginning of December after several decades of living with progressive multiple sclerosis. He will be remembered by many of us as a regular meeting attendant even when he was wheelchair-bound.

Tim was London Freelance Branch Membership Secretary in 2001 and 2002 and new members’ representative before that. Phil Sutcliffe says of Tim’s time on the committee: “I remember him as a calm presence, liked and respected by all, doing whatever he said he’d do – which is the crucial thing you need from every committee member.”

Tim’s journalism career included breaking a security services story in the Observer with Martin Bright, and research work for a Japanese TV company. While at school he produced fanzines about dungeons and dragons, and later he helped out with the production of the free radical newspaper Monochrome (which was produced out of the offices of the old Leveller magazine in Brixton). Like many journalists, he read widely and his relentless curiosity led him to keep countless newspaper cuttings on a wide variety of subjects.

Brought up by a Lithuanian father and a London-born mother in Derbyshire and Bournemouth, he completed a degree by Independent Study at University of East London and spent a further year studying day labourers in Japan.

Tim also worked as a community development officer for Lambeth council. The local community was very important to him and he played an active role on the steering committee for his local community centre in Vauxhall Gardens.

He was increasingly bed-bound in his later years but managed to dictate numerous memories and anecdotes from his extraordinary life which he presented surreptitiously to the world via a website.

Tim is survived by his daughter Millie.