To wonder what people really thought of Jimmy Savile when he was alive?

[BarmyBrunhilde]

I'm a millennial, and was only really vaguely aware of who he was really, so watching the recent Netflix documentary I was fairly bemused to see how popular he seemed to be. Obviously he was beloved by the establishment, including the royals, Thatcher etc but he seemed to have massive following among the public.

Everyone now seems to say 'oh yes I always knew he was creepy' but I have to wonder - for those who grow up in the 60s-80s how was he really seen? In the documentary it seems like he had always had crowds of screaming and adoring fans, and they generally seemed none the wiser? It seemed like industry people and his poor victims were the only ones who really had any idea.

Child of the 1980s. Loved Jim'll fix it, but after that Louis Theroux programme I came to realise that he was a very strange man and I always felt uncomfortable about him thereafter.

I was at school in the 70s when he was a fixture on telly. Always found him creepy, grotesque and off-putting, for reasons I couldn’t then articulate properly.

However, there was a very well established/known understanding around school (I suppose now you’d liken it to a meme) that he 'interfered' with children, which I find interesting - I grew up in the North-West but not Yorkshire, so not anywhere near where he came from. It was a kind of urban myth that spread somehow, mysteriously. But it was actually true, of course.

I wasn’t remotely surprised by what eventually came out - sickened, yes, but not surprised.

Chatting to an older friend about him recently. She was a strong feminist and worked with children who were victims of sexual abuse when he was big on TV. She and most people she worked with recognised how creepy he was, classic groomer and abuser signs but even they couldn't tell what was really going on. He was 'a flirt' or a womaniser.

My Nan was born near Leeds and knew of him then and moved to Manchester in the 70’s. She absolutely detested him and banned my dads siblings - who were in their teens at the time - from going to any of his club events in Manchester. She went nuts when she found out I’d written in to Jim’ll Fix It.

I knew Jimmy Savile was a pervert long before it became public knowledge. My boyfriend at the time told me he'd been groped by him when he was a young boy and had gone on Jim'll Fix It - he said it was common knowledge that he had a go at all the boys and the girls.

Born early 70's. Loved Jim'll fix it. Thought he was great. Obviously horrified when the truth came out.

Born in 1967 in Leeds. We all knew he was a pervert and to avoid him. I still cannot understand how he gained the 'National Treasure' status and the trust of so many establishment senior figures who should have known better.

DS was in the LGI for 5 weeks back in 1995/6. The porters told us to tell him to FO if he ever tried to get near him, although unlikely as DS is male and JS predominantly assaulted girls. We never saw him thankfully.

@jimmyhill

They thought he was creepy, a bit like how people think Justin Fletcher and Ricky Gervais and Chris Tarrant creepy.

Of course none of the above are handsy or nonces.

Absolutely this!

I remember seeing him on the telly when I moved to the UK in the 90s. I thought he was creepy and remember saying so to my British house mates. They shot me down saying ´he's a National treasure!!´

As a child I just wanted to be on Jim'll Fix It. No creepy vibes from just seeing him on TV.

However I met him in my early 20s (1990s) and he really really gave me the creeps. He came into my work and we all discussed it afterwards.

It never crossed my mind though that my "creeps" meant he was a child molester. I imagine that others didn't make the same leap.

I think we are perhaps more aware of these things now and more likely to trust our guts.

I think there was far more innocence, ignorance and snobbery/sexism than active conspiracy tbh.

No.... there was both

I liked Jim'll Fix It but I thought he was odd and too old to present a show for children. He would have been nearly 50 when it started, which was ancient to me.

I worked at Stoke Mandeville before everything came out. The nurses on the wards he frequented most hated him because he was so creepy, in a sexual predator way. They said his conversation was often inappropriate.

I never liked Jim'll fix it - I always refused to watch it when my mum had it on and would leave the room - I didn't know why I disliked it but then I remember reading an interview he'd done in a magazine where they'd asked him why he didn't have kids and he'd replied with something like he didn't like children at all and just couldn't see the point of them - I thought that was a really weird thing to say for someone who fronted a kids TV programme and I felt even more hate for him after that.

On the other hand I didn't mind Rolf Harris too much - I thought he was a bit weird but basically harmless

Can we really believe his producer of over 20 years on JFI had no idea this was going on when children were being warned about going with him by other celebs and by cameramen as said up thread. He said he didn’t know anything on the documentary but that is so hard to believe. Equally the secretary if all the nurses knew about him.

I was born in early 1957. I remember him from around 1964 and I thought he was a fucking cunt from day one.

@Fandangofran

I never liked Jim'll fix it - I always refused to watch it when my mum had it on and would leave the room - I didn't know why I disliked it but then I remember reading an interview he'd done in a magazine where they'd asked him why he didn't have kids and he'd replied with something like he didn't like children at all and just couldn't see the point of them - I thought that was a really weird thing to say for someone who fronted a kids TV programme and I felt even more hate for him after that.

On the other hand I didn't mind Rolf Harris too much - I thought he was a bit weird but basically harmless

Can only say I thought Harris was a creepy cunt from the first time I saw him, back in the early 1960s.

Creepy and annoying.

I was born in the 70's. I can remember not liking him on TOTP's. I think I did like Jim will fix it because I thought the chair with the hidden drawer thing was cool. As a young teenager I can remember my Grandfather getting really cross about how much he hated him. Which was unusual as my Grandfather was a lovely kind man. My Grandfather had lived in Yorkshire for a few years and I now wonder if he heard something.

It's hard to convey what celebrity was like back then. It was different. There was more control of what people knew about famous people's private lives. It was much more unusual to have been on TV at all, and only a few channels. Jim'll Fix It ran for almost 20 years and at one point apparently had 20 million viewers, even at the end it was said to have 7 million. He was on that, and on Top of the Pops, and on the radio, and loads of other programmes, and adverts for healthy good things like trains and seatbelts, and charity appeals (I hear now he was actually paid for fronting those!) He was everywhere, apparently using his fame 'for good'. And the horrible sexist jokes and comments were much more 'normal', we sort of expected it, you were supposed to be polite and pleasant about it and thank the nice gentleman for the compliment; you weren't supposed to really like them but you weren't supposed to call the police either.

This is so true. Growing up in the 70s was very different. In the early 1980s as a teenager I thought he was desperately uncool, but he was just part of the furniture, like Wogan. And I am one of the many 70s children who wrote in to Jim'll Fix It.

We lived in Leeds and my 13 year old daughter went to a Radio 1 road show locally that he presented.
She was quite well developed and he sought her out and pushed his tongue down her throat and touched her breasts.
When she came home and told us we said what a filthy old man he was and found it hard to think that this was the same person from
Jim'll Fix It.
Now, of course, we would have reported him. It's hard to explain how different the culture was in those days. I wouldn't allow a 13 year old to go to that sort of thing now but then it was very different.

My Mum found him odd and wouldn't let us Jim will fix it. I was upset at the time, all the kids at school watched it - or so it seemed.

Another 60's & 70's child who enjoyed watching Jim'll Fix It and Rolf Harris. Very sheltered upbringing so wouldn't have had the slightest inkling of child abuse or dodgy blokes.

@Buddywoo ah your poor daughter!!

You are right though, I remember (not Jimmy Savile) sexual assaults on myself as a teenager in the 90s even and telling peers / parents and it was more ‘yuk what a horrible person’ than ‘let’s report it’ very different times.

Very true about the general attitudes of the time. Just look at the TV 'comedy' - utterly grim. 'On the Buses' as an example….superannuated Reg Varney and his pal fnarr-fnarring over 'dolly-birds' and 'crumpet' while pouring endless scorn and ridicule on another character , Olive, for being 'plain' but 'sex-mad'. Oh how we roared. JFC.

In the 70s and into the early 80s, Leeds was the centre of Peter Sutcliffe's murderous activities, and the police waved many of the attacks away because they weren’t happening to 'innocent' women. That tells you all you need to know about the thinking.
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