This month, Sir David Attenborough will be celebrating his 100th birthday, a landmark celebration for one of the nation’s most beloved broadcasters.
Over the course of his career, that spans across seven decades, Attenborough has helped bring the wonders of the natural world into millions of homes worldwide, through a variety of documentaries across the BBC and multiple streamers.
Through landmark series like Life on Earth, The Blue Planet and Planet Earth, Attenborough has remained a constant voice in modern nature broadcasting, while also shaping public awareness around conservation and climate change.
Over the years, Attenborough has graced the cover of Radio Times several times, and to mark his special birthday, we have collated a cover from each decade.
Click through the gallery below.
In celebration of his 100th year, some of TV’s best wildlife experts shared birthday tributes to the man who inspired them, including messages from Chris Packham, Steve Backshall and Martin Dohrn.
Packham wrote: “One hundred years ago there was a new life on earth. If you were strolling through Isleworth in west London, you might have heard the faint crying of a newborn baby, nothing really of note, just another human on the planet about to embark on the trials of life. But as it’s turned out, that precious infant has grown into the most influential advocate for life our little blue planet has ever had – David Frederick Attenborough.
“I can trot out a long and miserable list of individual humans who have changed, indeed are changing, the world for the worse. Horror and suffering tattoo their infamy onto our history. But how about those who have made the world a better place, and not just for us but for every other species that creeps, crawls, slithers and slimes? Only one truly holds that accolade. A man whose passion and enthusiasm for life, and an infectious desire to communicate that to us all, has grown to command a global audience and enrapture young and old alike.
“In 100 years a lot changes, humans leave our living planet and journey into space, we discover distant galaxies, develop antibiotics and organ transplants, compose symphonies and paint great art, invent television and artificial intelligence. Along the way we fight and kill each other, but despite this our population quadruples to 8 billion. And this comes at a terrible cost for the rest of life, which has declined or been destroyed. We have even broken our climate. So amid the celebrations, consider the sadness this causes the man who has travelled to every corner of the earth and tried to protect it all and us.
“But without the world’s greatest ambassador for life, where we would be? Worse off, for sure. Somewhere in a jungle is a fly that still buzzes, due only to the energy and efforts of our wonderful birthday boy. Happy Birthday Dave, the world loves you!”
You can read the rest of the messages here.
Check out more of our Documentaries coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what’s on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
