Tributes paid to respected former Hartlepool Mail journalist after death aged 80

Paul Screeton worked as a Mail reporter, columnist and deputy chief sub editor for many years.

In retirement, he remained a prolific writer with some 16 books to his name – many based on his fascination with the paranormal.

Paul was also passionate about trains and was the founder of the Friends of Seaton Station (FOSS) group.

His wife Pauline, 79, remembered the many roles he had with the Mail after joining the paper as a cub reporter at 18 in the early 1960s.

"When he was younger he used to do a Disc Date music column,” she said.

"He interviewed the likes of the Stones and The Beatles in his youth.”

Paul was also the paper’s secret Pub Spy columnist, testing many a watering hole’s food, atmosphere and service.

Pauline recalled: “If he had written a good one, the pub would often frame it. Staff used to ask him who the Pub Spy was and he used to say ‘I couldn’t possibly tell you that’.”

He worked for the Mail apart from one year on the Hull Daily Mail in 1968 before returning to the paper the following year.

He and Pauline were married in 1969 and lived in Seaton Carew. They went on to have two children, Kathryn and Ian, and Paul was a much-loved granddad and great-granddad.

Paul was promoted to the role of deputy chief sub editor in the late Eighties, responsible for page layout and headline writing for the Mail’s numerous daily editions.

After taking early retirement, he continued to write including books such as Haunted Hartlepool & East Durham, The Hexham Heads, Ghosts of Hartlepool and Who Hung the Monkey?

Paul did much of his writing in his favourite pub, The Ward Jackson, in Church Square.

"He used to say ‘I’m just going to the office,” said Pauline.

Trains and train travel remained one of his other great loves. Paul stood down as chair of the Friends of Seaton Station only last year due to his worsening health.

His funeral takes place on Monday, April 27, at Stranton Grange Crematorium at 10am.