ERIC LANDER is one of a number of former pupils of Bemrose School, on Uttoxeter Road, Derby, to achieve celebrity through television and the stage. He was a popular actor in the 1960s and was once described as 'the sexiest man on television'. He is most closely identified with the ITV police drama No Hiding Place, one of the first popular 'cop shows' on British television.

Arthur Eric Lander was born in Rugby, Warwickshire, on 27 May 1924, but moved to Derby when his father, the Revd. C. Trevarrow Lander, became minister of Ashbourne Road Methodist Church. They lived first at 6 Vernon Street before moving to Radbourne Street.

In 1935 'Eric' started at the all-boys Bemrose Grammar School, then a state-of-the-art establishment which had been opened only five years earlier. The school took drama seriously, and Eric showed early promise as an actor - in 1936, perhaps because of his rather delicate good looks, he was cast as 'a fairy' in A Midsummer Night's Dream and in the same year played the female heroine Portia in The Merchant of Venice.

On leaving school he served an apprenticeship at Rolls Royce before joining the Royal Marines for the duration of World War Two. After peace was declared he enrolled at RADA set on becoming an actor.

In 1949 he joined a repertory company in Folkestone before moving to Stratford to join the forerunner of the Royal Shakespeare Company. He also made early appearances on the big screen in the war film classics The Colditz Story (1954) and Sink the Bismarck (1959).

But his big break came through Associated Rediffusion's television crime series No Hiding Place (1959-67). Lander played Detective Sergeant Harry Baxter in 141 epiosodes before he left the series in 1964. The role brought him genuine stardom at a time when 'American-style' TV shows were being launched for the first time in Britain. Lander was particularly popular with female viewers and received huge amounts of fan mail.

On the back of his success he was given his own spin-off show - Echo Four Two (1961) - in which he starred as DS Baxter. It achieved high ratings, but only ten episodes were ever made, owing to a strike by the actors' union Equity.

At the height of his fame it was said that Lander received more fan mail than Clint Eastwood, then starring in Gunsmoke, but he became rather typecast. He made countless more television appearances but never rekindled the success he had enjoyed in No Hiding Place.

He played a detective in the children's series Sexton Blake (1967-71) and the part of reformed alcolholic Ron Cooke in Coronation Street (1972-74). He also made many 'guest appearances' in some of the most popular television series of the 1960s and 1970s, including The Avengers, Dixon of Dock Green, and Crossroads.

In 1975 he married Janet Mills, who he had met through the filming of Coronation Street, and in the latter part of his career he returned increasingly to the stage. After suffering a stroke in 1986 he finally retired.

Eric Lander died at Gweek in Cornwall on 26 October 1999, aged 75.

Does anybody remember this Old Bemrosian from his Derby days? Perhaps you were at school with him. To add to this story or make a comment just click on 'edit' or 'discussion' at the top of this page.

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