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This site has been visited 1150 times.Personal Background
This memorial website was created by Phil and Nicky in loving memory of Monty Alexander, and we'd like to offer it to our lovely Ginny to let her know that we are here for her.Monty was born on April 5th, 1926 in Liverpool and passed away peacefully on April 22nd, 2008, on a sunny Norfolk evening, held close by the family he loved.
Planner, thinker and creative strategist for nearly six decades, Monty’s long career followed a true Renaissance path. A Fellow of the IPA, he spent the first forty-five years as an advertising creative director before going into research, including a remarkable spell in India, in the 50s, as Creative Director of Lintas Bombay and the founding of Alexander-Butterfield, one of the first and very best radical boutique agencies.
Then, in his mid-60s, when most marketing men are packing it in, Mont reinvented himself as an accomplished and highly respected market semiotician, guiding an enviable list of blue chip clients into the mysteries of codes, contexts and myths and presenting conference papers that delighted and inspired a whole new generation. Among the many strategic directions he helped to shape was the iconic BT ‘Good To Talk’ campaign, for which he won the coveted Market Research Society’s Best Paper Award.
In the last phase of this remarkable career, after he (mostly) retired from Semiotic Solutions at the age of 79, he went back to his first love, painting and drawing, celebrating his 80th birthday as a student at Norwich City College of Art. His fellow students loved him, as did everyone whose life he touched.
Monty was married to Ginny Valentine for coming up 40 years (his first wife and always good friend, Sonia, died last October) with 3 children- Paul, Kathy and Philip; 8 grandchildren - Salome, Ben, Barney, Toby, Jess, Zak, Simone and Sophie; and great grand-daughters – Ayesha, Sophia and Georgina.
Monty adored art, music, food, drink and travel. And above all he loved people. Please join us in celebrating the life of a wonderful man by adding your own memories. If you have photos, film or anything else you would like to include on this site, please email them to Phil.
Latest Tributes
Monty - It has been a privilege and a pleasure to have known, admired and loved you all my life. You have always been a great older brother. These days, you might be considered as the ideal role model, but I don't recall that I ever considered you as such. You had all the charm, looks and talents, in enviable abundance; designer, artist, writer, salesman and wit - to list but a few.
We were very fortunate to have had such a wonderful Mum and Dad who looked after us through the most difficult of times. With hindsight, it seems that nost of the 70 odd years you and I shared were spent continents apart. But for me the 1940s and 50s, then the late 1990s, are richest in memories of you. I'll touch, here, upon the earlier times because they must be less well known.
An early memory is of one exciting summer morning, finding pieces of shrapnel and bomb fins in a field just yards from our home. (Luckily cluster bombs had yet to be invented). Another time, we peered from our Anderson shelter awed as, high overhead, sunlit Spitfires and Me 109s climbed, banked and spun in deadly combat, to the music of their machine-guns.
You were about 16 and I was watching you working with blade and brush on a broom handle and a cylinder of balsa wood. Before long an impressive baton had emerged, destined for a bandmaster, somewhere. Amazing. Just a few days' later you were leading the ATC band, through Rickmansworth, nonchalantly spinning, lofting and then catching the baton. Miraculous, and all self-taught. Just like your 'party trick' - being able to reel off a score of words or objects in the precise order in which they were given to you!
An ATC was on your chosen career path, to qualify as a fighter pilot. We kids shared your delight when you passed your medical, thanks to a fortuitous interruption that allowed you to use both eyes at a tricky moment. We were miserable, with you, when, at a later time, the flaw came to light and your hopes were dashed. One afternoon, we spotted a Dornier bomber flying at tree-top height, just beyond the end of the garden. We knew that an army unit had moved into the woods there. A few nights later some of the Dornier's comrades returned, unheralded, to drop a stick of bombs. They managed to miss us, and the troops, but killed people living in the house next door to ours. When you returned from the war, Monty, you brought us wonderful gifts from India and Africa but, best of all, of course, a brother undamaged.
In later years, I was lucky to work with Ginny and you, and your splendid son Phil. Lo and behold, yet again you had mastered something new - the application of semiotics to marketing. But this time you didn't need self-tuition, you had Ginny. It was a great day when you met her.
Regrets, I have a few. I failed to show you Israel; it would have blown your mind. I couldn't get over the water to see you at the end. We could only be with you in spirit.
Your ever-loving brother, Neville - from Neville Alexander
What a charmer! - EVERYONE whoever met Mont has a Monty Tale to tell. Here's mine.
Picture the scene, 9am, Monday morning in some cheerless client head office. Monty and I are being introduced to some brand team or other. I'm shaking hands with people who's names I immediately forget. Monty's grinning that grin and saying 'Hi' when he's introduced to a woman who's obviously stressed out, proper irritated actually. She reaches out her hand and instead of taking it he strokes her earlobe and says 'what lovely earings'!!!!!!!! She visibly melts.
Monty is the only man who I've ever known who could charm the birds from the trees in such a way and have them eating out of his hands.
Thank you Monty for for all your patience and guidance. It has been my pleasure. You're a doll.
Love to you and yours,
John x
- from John Nolan
Minty Saab - Stylish,comfortable,chic,fast and thirsty - and that's only his old car,
Henceforth to be known as "The Mont".
It has been all our good fortune to have been touched by this lovely gentle giant.
Miss you Mont. 9.05.08 - from Mike & Jan Murray
Monty - Written with some totally irrational idea that you may somehow receive this:
Dear Monty
Last night, the night before your funeral, Gloria and I went to a concert by the Alban Berg Quartet.
They played Beethoven's opus l32 string quartet with a particularly passionate and profound performance - producing a prolonged standing ovation. As an encore they then played the Cavatina from opus l30 - well! We were overwhelmed with such emotion at such a time we became convinced that this performance was specifically for us - for Mont, Gin and Glodgerog - as a marker for the wonderful times we have enjoyed together.
Two further memories: Monty - your immense bear-hug of welcome to the family when first we met - and second that tiny squeeze of the hand, gentle smile and unforgettable sparkle of recognition in the eye, despite the haze of painkillers.
Such inspiration, so much love, so much FUN.
Thank you, dear Monty, thank you.
Roger - from Roger
Monty - Monty Alexander - what an inspiration to all who met him - from the first time I went to join Alexander-Butterfield as Monty's P.A in 1964 I knew I had met a most original and extraordinary man. Over the years that I worked with him he became an inspiration to me, both as a human being and as a boss - he was my guide and mentor in my youthful 20's and 30's and a kind friend - although latterly from afar - in my later years. I remember those first years with laughter and tears - mostly laughter - and the moment that Ginny came into his life was one of the happiest for him and all of us at AB - and later when Phil arrived on the scene, he couldn't contain his happiness. Paul and Kathy too were great joys to him as they were growing up, and many was the time that I had to solve 'their' problems for Monty.
I remember too when I decided to get married he advised me not to do it - how right he was!! But then he always was.
One of the greats of his profession - he headed up one of the most forward thinking boutique agencies of the 60's and 70's - and I was proud to have been part of it; many of the greats today went through the doors of Alexander-Butterfield.
Here in Forna, Spain you will always be rememebred for your exuberance and generosity (your house is always called Monty's house - never the new owner's!!) and all the people from the village that knew you send their heartfelt condolences to all of your family.
You will always be here in my heart Monty - as you always have been - and I look forward to meeting up with you again in the future to have a tipple or two. May your future be happy and bright and free of pain and sorrow, wherever you may be now. Love and hugs - your faithful 'Grotty' xxx - from Patricia (Grotty)
Latest Memories
Valerie - Having just come back from spending a few days with Ginny, I am thrilled to let you know I now have an everlasting memory of you - one of your amazing etchings - once it's framed and in place, it will bring back all the wonderful times we spent together. Thank you Gin and Mont for being you.
Dickie - I ran out of space on my first memory so hopefully this will complete the picture.
In 2004 we asked our new neighbours round for a drink and Monty and I talked about our army days.Iwas amazed that he had been at Markeaton and when he mentioned Sergeant Roper my world fell apart!Even then we didn't recognise each other, but 50 years is a long time.
But the bond of friendship we had has not changed.He was a dear friend and a man of many parts.
Cheers Monty, from Dickie and Jean with our love.
Dickie -
I first met Monty when we were both 19.We were in the army in an infantry training camp at Markeaton near Derby.Monty and I were in the same platoon under the command of a Sergeant Roper.His job was to see if any of his raw recruits was officer material.This he did by putting us through a living hell of assault courses,30 mile marches and so on.
In the army you had a mate, who looked after your back while you looked after his.Monty and I were mates.
Phil Alexander - Chicago at 3am - the beggar with the Shakespearean delivery .
Forna in April - "Ay miii corazo-o-n" ringing from El Molino.
Records, brandy and cigarettes at the Grove (just one more tune before bed).
Chitcombe as a toddler ("there were eggs, eggs, walking round on legs...") and San Francisco on my 21st - "barely" old enough to order a drink at Vesuvios.
Ireland when I was six and camping in the yellow Ford Capri not long after. Hampstead Heath on the weekends...
Glenlivet, Edradour, Kingussie and beyond last year.
And then those precious precious final weeks.
Mont, my dad and my friend, the times I have spent with you have been the happiest of my life. And the three of us together...who said we couldn't take on the world??
Your love and your life make me strong. Ever yours, Frisbee Dyke xxx
Ian McIntosh - Monty the gentle giant
I remember Monty mostly from my teens and early twenties. When we met he would always caress both my checks between his hands and smile warmly at me. His greeting was like a cocktail; a kind of infusion which spread a warmth inside me and I suspect to all who imbibed it; it had an uplifting effect and gave out the reassuring signal of a gentle giant with a zest for life and a twinkle in his eyes. The greeting set the tone for the occasion and luckily for me there were several. With George and Val, my dad and step mum, I went to parties at Chitcombe, in Forna, and in St John’s Wood. Ginny, I found you and Monty to be a wonderfully hospitable couple who appreciated people and who knew how to have fun with a wide circle of friends in enthralling surroundings . On other occasions you both made time for me taking a real interest in what I was doing, eager to discuss and debate, to laugh and to share, and to guide with candour and without assumption. You seemed to me a perfect couple.
I am so pleased that I met Monty again last year at Sarah’s wedding. After all those years everything was the same the greeting, the twinkle, the warmth and the infectious enthusiasm and interest in life, its people and their stories.
My thoughts are with you all today, Ginny Phillip, Kathy family and friends
Ian McIntosh
2nd May 2008