Joan Young

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Joan Young was a British character actress who worked on stage, radio, film and television from the 1930s to 1980. Born Joan Cecilia Frances Wragge on 1 February 1900 in Newcastle upon Tyne, she was the daughter of music-hall performers. She has said that, with her parents often on tour, most of her motherly care came from her grandmother. She was educated at convents in Bournemouth and France, and at 15 she appeared in A Crown of Sorrows in Bournemouth to help Belgian refugees. Young is best remembered for playing Lady Chesapeake in Big Bad Mouse and for the wartime radio series Navy Mixture. She also took on numerous radio and stage roles, including the 1961 revival of Heartbreak House and the 1962 London production of Semi-Detached.

She married journalist John Young in 1923, and they had one daughter, April Young, who became a London talent agent representing actors including June Whitfield, Joe Gladwin, John Blythe, and even her mother Joan Young. In 1980, Young reprised her Big Bad Mouse role and appeared in two episodes of All Creatures Great and Small as Miss Westerman. Joan Young died after a short illness on 9 October 1984 in London, aged 84, survived by her husband and daughter.