Brian Whittle collapsed and died on 9 December at an event dubbed A Farewell to Ancoats, to mark the departure of the Daily, Sunday Express and the Daily Star from Manchester. He would have been 60 in January.

It was fitting that he was in the company of journalists, for tabloid ink ran through Brian's veins. A consummate reporter and feature writer, in latter years he was principal of one of the few remaining great freelance agencies, Cavendish Press. He was also the author, with Jean Ritchie, of the definitive book on the murderous doctor, Harold Shipman.

This extraordinary career began with a childhood in Yorkshire, although he was born in Stockton on Tees, and an initial desire to be either a journalist or an artist. Mystery, as they say, surrounds the good fortune that led him to a trainee reporter's job at the Harrogate Advertiser before spells at the Northern Echo in Darlington and the Morning Telegraph in Sheffield.

In 1967 Brian moved to the Sketch in Manchester during the dizzy years before it merged with the Daily Mail. Then as a reporter with the Sunday People, showbiz editor of the Daily Star when its HQ was Manchester, and as news editor of Eddie Shah's ground-breaking Post in Warrington, his gravelled voice was heard at every major story emanating from the north of England: the Moors Murders, the young rapscallion George Best, Marjorie Wallace and the Miss World Diaries, John Stalker and the Northern Ireland 'shoot to kill' investigation, the race-riots in Moss Side, the siege of Strangeways.

Extracting plot-lines from Coronation Street and recording the love-lives of its stars was bread and butter to Brian, who also travelled to America in pursuit of trans-Atlantic soaps like Dallas. It was there that he persuaded the delectable Dolly Parton to be pictured sitting on his knee, as a memento for a friend in Manchester - a picture that finished up on page one of the Star.

Brian formed Manchester News Service with two friends, Peter Reece and photographer Brian Taylor. Among their greatest coups was to discover a banner-waving student called Wendy Henry and launch her on a stellar career that led her to become Fleet Street's first woman editor.

He spent a short time at the National Enquirer but Green Card restrictions scuppered his plans for a life in Florida with his young wife Maureen, whom he met when she was news desk secretary at the Sketch.

Back in Manchester, Brian set up Cavendish Press in 1979 with just a telephone on a window-sill of their house overlooking the eponymous suburban Cavendish Road. Brian developed not only one of the most respected agencies in Europe, but trained a string of young reporters for success in Fleet Street. The agency continues under the leadership of Jon Harris.

As the freelance business became tougher, Brian always embraced new ideas and technology. As a member of the National Association of Press Agencies (NAPA) he was a vociferous champion of fair treatment for freelances. He took Cavendish Press into association with media group 2DayUK.

Chris Johnson, head of Mercury Press, Liverpool and chairman of NAPA, recalls: "Whether it was a sensational news story, his authoritative book on Shipman or the latest joke he wanted to share, Brian enjoyed nothing more than telling a rollicking good story.

"For him, laughter was a vital release valve and totally disarming, He could give you a stern piece of his mind one minute and have you in pleats a moment later with some rib-tickling yarn. He will be remembered with great affection by hundreds of colleagues."

Brian also had a rich and varied life outside work, indulging his passion for movies, securing friendships on the golf course and badminton court and, most of all with Maureen seeing their sons Mark, Chris and Peter grow into talented young men: Mark is media relations manager at the Football Association, Chris a photographer with Splash agency in California and Peter is also a photographer with his Cavendish Press.

In recent years, two stories were particularly important to him. Cavendish Press were responsible for the first pictures of little Kirsty Howard, the little girl born with a back-to-front heart, who has helped raise almost £5 million for the children's hospice, Francis House. It was Brian who persuaded the Sunday People to take the campaign on board, giving the charity national coverage. The British public took the inspirational girl to their hearts and she helped open the Commonwealth Games with David Beckham.

Mass-murderer Harold Shipman was the other. Brian had the foresight to spot very early both that it was a huge human tragedy but the political implications of how Shipman got away with it for so long. He devoted hundreds of hours of his own time to digging into the Dr Death's background in Hyde, near Manchester, and became the expert on the subject, interviewed by newspapers and radio and TV stations around the world.

The story also enabled him to fulfil an ambition. He recalled: "I decided I would have to work out of Hyde for a few months and found a pub landlord who would rent me a room. It was every journalist's dream - having a key to let yourself into the pub."

Brian was a cracking reporter, a lovely writer, a spinner of unlikely yarns, a loving husband and father and the warmest of friends. He will be deeply missed.