In June 2006 a man was wrenched from his employment and forced to accept a (albeit generous) redundancy package, having served the same company for some 41 years.

That man was Hilary Francis Fortnum. I am that aforementioned person.

Despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary it is clear to me that I have led an amazing life. From discovering an ants' nest in my mother's back garden in 1954, to seeing Tommy Cannon at the Elvington Air Show in 1989, my life has been a rollercoaster of experiences, emotions, challenges and team bonding exercises. That is why I have chosen to write it all down and, at the beginning of 2007 I started to write my autobiography, provisionally titled - Hilary Fortnum - The Autobiography. I am currently less than a third of the way through.

In the meantime I have spent my retirement doing jobs in the garden, going to the pub with my best friend Terry Corbett and sending emails to the great and the good, and the rubbish. It started when I tried to get the national press (and Max Clifford) interested in a story about a wasps' nest and has taken me on a journey that has seen me have my heart broken by Calum Best, failed to break the world press up record, been reassured that there is nothing extraordinary about having four poos in one day and, ultimately, be crowned King of Wetherby (and surrounding areas) and the WBA Heavyweight Champion of the World (both in the same week). More recently I have become a campaigner on behalf of dead animals (even foxes) seeking to outlaw the shocking practice of necro-bestiality.

I have also guest edited Heat magazine (kind of), advised the British Medical Association on how to tackle obesity and tried to avoid hell by wearing a wristband.   

Much of all of this is charted in this website (what started as a mini-project on MySpace has ballooned into a slightly larger one on my own website) and anything that doesn't appear on the website will be in the book which I hope to self-publish before I die (unless any book publishers want to take a chance on my story).

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy the website. You might be best placed reading the "News" section first, it contains all my notes, communications and scrawlings. If you like what you read, why not join the Hilary Army - just send me an email to    This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it    to receive regular updates.