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A Tribute
Curator of this Archive 2004-2021
When Jim Farron passed away in 2004, Paul Howarth stepped forward as the next Curator of the Gilbert and Sullivan Archive, updating and modernizing the website's coding and adding graphics to many pages He was especially interested in Sullivan, indeed, as he once said himself, he had originally become involved with the Archive in order to "explore Sullivan's non-Gilbert works." He added much of the Archive's Sullivan-without-Gilbert material. Under his watch, too, contemporary and later reviews of the operas were added to the Archive, as were scans of assorted G&S memorabilia.
In 2016, Boise State University severed its ties with the Archive. After a brief period of confusion, the Archive's files were moved to a commercial host in January, 2017, and from then until his death Paul paid its not inconsiderable hosting fees. (The Archive's cost is currently borne by Marc Shepherd.) In 2017, he integrated Colin M. Johnson's Victorian Musicals website into the Archive, in three subsections: Curtain Raisers (the short plays that appeared on bills with G&S operettas), British Musical Theatre and American Musical Theatre, In 2018, Paul also took over the hosting and maintenance of David Trutt's Haddon Hall site. Sam Silvers wrote of Paul Howarth's work:
Paul wrote new introductions for hundreds (thousands?) of pages on the G&S Archive. If you don't see attribution to another author at the bottom of a page, then in most cases Paul wrote the text, in addition to formatting the page, organizing all the links and integrating everyone's contributions of content. Over the years he re-formatted much of the Archive. He greatly improved the pages for theSavoy Operas of the 1890s and many other Sullivan works. He also added numerous midi files and photos. He improved and reformatted many of the G&S and other libretti. Not only did he add all of Colin M. Johnson's material to the Archive, he substantially added to it. He also created pages that organize content, like the Index of Works.
Tributes from Subscribers to Savoynet
Though I never met Paul, as with so many other Savoynetters, I felt I had. Not only was he a wonderful curator for the Gilbert and Sullivan Archive, which is a tremendous resource for research (or just reading for fun); Paul was generous and helpful with those of us who submitted material. I particularly appreciated his patience with my technological ignorance, and his useful suggestions when I was struggling with my first (and by today’s standards primitive) overhead scanner. I don’t know how long it must have taken him to deal with all the links for our projectof linking to Gilbert’s contributions to Fun.
He always will be missed.
Arthur Robinson
This is a sad day. Although I never met Paul in person, I consider him a great friend. His efforts have made the G&S Archive an invaluable resource and a huge contribution to G&S scholarship. He will be sorely missed throughout the G&S community. His good humor and willingness to assist the tech-challenged contributors such as myself were much appreciated.
David Stone
I too must add my sadness at Paul Howarth's passing. He was a nice bloke, a good curator of the G&S Archive, and where shall we find another?.... I only met Paul once, in Bradford, at a performance of a play written by Andrew Crowther. I had several email exchanges with him, always pleasant.
David Cookson
I used to meet up with Paul over coffee at the Theatre Royal cafe whenever I visited York.... Paul was a fount of knowledge and because he had a good memory I would sometimes speak to him about research (having written the DOC book, “Backdrop to a Legend”) where I needed background on some of the singers.... Paul was a modest guy; he enjoyed a pipe and was deft on the keyboard..
Raymond Walker
[Paul] did a fabulous job with the archive for which we are all most grateful.
Stan DeOrsey
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Page updated November 12, 2021
