he ever signed. As a television personality he appeared with Morecambe and Wise (1971) and Benny Hill. He was also the subject of a This is Your Life programme in 1976. In 1976, he gave a lecture to the Royal Institution titled "Changing Fashions in Gardening", and in 1977 wrote his memoirs, My Lifetime of Gardening. In 1974 the Royal Horticultural Society awarded him their highest honour, the Victoria Medal of Honour and was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 1984. He also became involved in hosting gardening tours in Europe, with travel agent Harold Sleigh. They established the Percy Thrower Floral Tours Company, chartering ships for lecture cruises and he was also involved in English Gardening Weekends. On one of these he was taken ill, and a decline in his health set in. He never fully recovered from a heart bypass operation in 1987 and eventually Hodgkin's disease was diagnosed. He made his last recording for Blue Peter from hospital one week before he died. Personal life Percy and Connie had three daughters: Margaret, born 1944, Susan, born 1948, and Ann, born 1952. They were all involved with the Percy Thrower Garden Centre. Percy had a succession of black labradors, after duck shooting with his maternal grandfather, who had one as a gun dog. He was a fan of West Bromwich Albion Football Club. Death He died in the Royal Hospital, Wolverhampton, on 18 March 1988, aged 75, and his ashes were buried in the churchyard at Leaton, near Bomere Heath, Shropshire, where he had lived. References English gardeners English horticulturists 1913 births 1988 deaths Blue Peter English television presenters British special constables Members of the Order of the British Empire People from Aylesbury Vale 20th-century British botanists