Former editor of The Sentinel and Derby Evening Telegraph, Bob Randall, has died at home in Norfolk, aged 81.

Bob, (below), was in charge of The Sentinel when it was based in Hanley from 1973 until he retired in 1987 at the age of 63.

He started at the Evening Telegraph in 1951 as a reporter before becoming chief sub-editor in 1956 and then assistant editor in 1971, spending a year as editor-in-chief in 1979.

He spent his early career working on newspapers in Wiltshire, where he grew up.

He joined the Wiltshire Times in 1940 and volunteered for the RAF in 1942. Called up in 1944, he served as a navigator for three years and then returned to the Wiltshire Times.

Bob worked for the East Midlands Allied Press at King’s Lynn and the Northamptonshire Evening Telegraph before going to work at the Telegraph.

Sentinel managing director Richard Dodd said: “He was a gentle, quiet, unassuming man.

“He had the highest regard for the people of the Potteries – his heart was here and he had a genuine affection for his readers.

“He loved working for The Sentinel. He was a fine, upstanding, genuine and honest man.”

While editor at Derby he once sent a journalist to drive down the M1 in fog to report how dangerous it was.

The unlucky reporter, Bob Maddox, now motoring editor, said: “Bob was deputy editor when I joined the Evening Telegraph from the Matlock Mercury in 1966 but it was not until I returned from a stint at the old Ripley branch office to work in sub-editors in 1972 that I really got to know him.

“He was a man with a great deal of enthusiasm for journalism, who was never short of ideas.”

Former Stoke-on-Trent Lord Mayor Bill Austin, who was also leader of Staffordshire County Council for 20 years, said: “We called him Gentleman Bob. He was a big man both physically and morally – he was a man among men.”

Former Staffordshire Moorlands MP David Knox said: “Bob was a first class newspaperman and an excellent editor.

“During his period at The Sentinel the newspaper’s coverage was always accurate and comment very fair. He was held in the highest respect by the community.”

In his retirement, Bob edited The Grapevine, the Northcliffe magazine for pensioners.

He leaves a wife Audrey, daughter Mary and son Jim.