Brian Plummer was a Welsh writer. He became famous after an appearance in 1977 on Richard Whiteley

Richard Whiteley

John Richard Whiteley, OBE DL , usually known as Richard Whiteley, was an English broadcaster and journalist. He was famous for his twenty-three years as host of Countdown, a letters and numbers arrangement game show broadcast most weekdays on Channel 4...

's Calendar (News)

Calendar (News)

Calendar is a regional television news and current affairs programme, produced by ITV Yorkshire at its studios in Leeds, serving Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and parts of the North Midlands and North West Norfolk...

 regional news programme, in which a ferret

Ferret

The ferret is a domesticated mammal of the type Mustela putorius furo. Ferrets are sexually dimorphic predators with males being substantially larger than females. They typically have brown, black, white, or mixed fur...

 became 'latched' onto Whiteley's fingers.

Growing up in the austere years around World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Plummer based some of his biographical stories in and around the valley in which he grew up. Some of the stories involve friends, members of the village community, and bizarre members of his own family.

After a stint of National Service, Plummer trained to be a teacher and worked in various areas of the United Kingdom, including Rotherham

Rotherham

Rotherham is a town in South Yorkshire, England. It lies on the River Don, at its confluence with the River Rother, between Sheffield and Doncaster. Rotherham, at from Sheffield City Centre, is surrounded by several smaller settlements, which together form the wider Metropolitan Borough of...

 and Walsall

Walsall

Walsall is a large industrial town in the West Midlands of England. It is located northwest of Birmingham and east of Wolverhampton. Historically a part of Staffordshire, Walsall is a component area of the West Midlands conurbation and part of the Black Country.Walsall is the administrative...

. In his books he hints at various 'episodes' in his life including a couple of abortive spells of self-sufficiency, a period of travel abroad as a gamekeeper in Germany and Eastern Europe, some time as a proffesional boxer in America, and various periods of deep depression.

The UK television documentary maker Barry Cockcroft

Barry Cockcroft

Barry Cockcroft was a UK television documentary director, writer and producer. He is best known for his documentary Too Long A Winter about the spinster Hannah Hauxwell who lived alone on a remote farm in the Pennines.A researcher at Yorkshire Television at its inception in 1968, he was making...

 made several documentaries about Plummer, including A Way Out of Walsall (1985), which is about Plummer's training pupils of the local Forest Comprehensive School

Forest Comprehensive School

Forest Comprehensive School was a secondary school located in Hawbush Road, Harden, Walsall, West Midlands, England.It was built during the 1950s to serve the council housing estates in the Blakenall Heath, Harden, Goscote and Coalpool areas, which had gradually developed since 1920, and was...

 for the world of professional boxing, and Lone Furrow (1987, which looks at the preoccupation of Plummer with his dogs, which have been rat-catcher

Rat-catcher

Rat-catching is the occupation of catching rats as a form of pest control. In developed countries the role may be merged with, or the title inflated to, Pest Control Operative or Pest Technician....

s, and his current wish to cross the Highlands pulled by a pack of German Shepherd Dog

German Shepherd Dog

The German Shepherd Dog , also known as an Alsatian or just the German Shepherd, is a breed of large-sized dog that originated in Germany. The German Shepherd is a relatively new breed of dog, with its origin dating to 1899. As part of the Herding Group, the German Shepherd is a working dog...

s. Another producer, Michael Croucher, made a 1981 documentary entitled Hunting Man about Plummer, formerly a full-time hunter and now a teacher and writer, who at that time still hunted in the fast-disappearing countryside around Birmingham

Birmingham

Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...

.

After suffering a heart attack in 1985, Plummer moved to Caithness

Caithness

Caithness is a registration county, lieutenancy area and historic local government area of Scotland. The name was used also for the earldom of Caithness and the Caithness constituency of the Parliament of the United Kingdom . Boundaries are not identical in all contexts, but the Caithness area is...

 with a plan to breed German Shepherd Dogs, then finally settled in Abington

Abington, South Lanarkshire

Abington is a village in the Scottish council region of South Lanarkshire,close to the M74 motorway, marking the point where it changes name to the A74, following the upgrade of the former A74 road. The West Coast Main Line between Glasgow and London also emerges from the Clyde Valley at this...

, in Lanarkshire

Lanarkshire

Lanarkshire or the County of Lanark ) is a Lieutenancy area, registration county and former local government county in the central Lowlands of Scotland...

. He died on 12 Sept, 2003.

The Plummer Terrier

Plummer Terrier

The Plummer Terrier is a working terrier, and like all working terriers, it is a composite animal.- Origins :The Plummer Terrier is mostly made out of Jack Russell Terrier, with a strong dash of Beagle , and Bull Terrier...

, a breed of dog that he developed, is named after him.

Books

• The Jack Russell Terrier (1976).
• Rogues & Running Dogs (1976).
• Modern Ferreting (1978).
• Tales of a Rat Hunting Man (1978).
• The Working Terrier (1978).
• The Complete Lurcher (1979).
• Adventures of an Artisan Hunter (1979).
• Nathan - A Pit Fighting Dog (1980).
• The Complete Jack Russel Terrier (1980).
• Lepus (1981).
• Diary of a Hunter (1981).
• The Hunters Yearbook (1981).
• The Hunters Yearbook (1982)
• Merle - The Start of a Dynasty (1982).
• The Fell Terrier (1983).
• Omega (1984).
• Practical Lurcher Breeding (1985).
• Hunters All (1986).
• North & North Again (1987).
• Off the Beaten Track (1987).
• Trog (1988).
• The Cottage at the Edge of the World (1990).
• In Pursuit of Coney (1991).
• The Complete Book of Sight-Hounds (1991).
• Secrets of Dog Training (1992)
• The Sporting Terrier (1992).
• Ferrets (1993).
• Lurcher & Longdog Training (1993).
• Plummers Yearbook (Various 1994/95).
• The Development of the Dog (1995).
• The New Complete Lurcher (1998)
• Polly: A White German Shepherd (1999)
• Practical Dog Breeding (2000).