Journalist and Stonehaven businessman Freddie Stephen has died aged 79.

Known to many as the proprietor of the town's famous Giulianotti's confectioner's, he had been ill for some time following a stroke, and passed away at Stonehaven's Mowat Court nursing home.

Freddie enjoyed a distinguished career in journalism, which began as a trainee reporter with the Mearns Leader newspaper in Stonehaven.

Travelling around on his motorbike finding stories, he soon became a familiar sight to many in the Mearns.

He later worked as a freelance journalist and photographer for The Courier in Dundee and the Press and Journal and the Evening Express in Aberdeen as well as the national press.

In the late 1950s he and a number of other motorsport enthusiasts launched the Scottish Clubman Magazine, which he remained editor of on a voluntary basis for 30 years.

When the magazine closed in the 1980s because of high printing costs, a complete set of bound volumes was presented to the National Library of Scotland.

He was a career-long member of the National Union of Journalists and earlier this year he had been presented with a certificate awarding him life membership.

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