WHEN Dartmouth Park author Hunter Davies, who has been awarded an OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list, announced this week, heads to the Palace for his investiture it will not be his first visit for such a ceremony.

The writer, who was The Beatles’ official biographer, is one of a number of people in Camden who received a letter from the Cabinet Office saying their work merited a gong.

He told the New Journal of a previous trip under rather different circumstances.

He said: “My brother-in-law, Roger Priestley, was a senior civil servant and about 20 years ago, he was given an OBE. He had Multiple Sclerosis and the Palace said he could have a pass for a chauffeur to take him right up to the Palace steps. At the time, I had a rather smart dark Ford Granada, so I put on a dark suit and a white shirt. There used to be a second-hand shop that sold British Rail remainders behind Euston Station and I had once bought an old BR railwayman’s cap.

“I put it on and we drove down there, and once I’d dropped Roger off, guards sent me to wait in a special little hut where all the drivers of the great and good hung about, drank tea and gossiped. 

“This time round I think I’ll just take the Number 24 bus.”

He recalled he got a column for Punch magazine out of the day’s events – and said that was a prime reason for accepting the OBE himself. Now writing for the New Statesman, he said: “My agent rung me and said a letter had arrived and it said on it: ‘On Her Majesty’s Service’. I said it must be a tax thing, just open it.”

“When he realised it was an honour, his wife, the novelist Margaret Forster, said: ‘You are not going to accept it, are you?’.”

He added: “I said, ‘Of course I am – it’s worth a thousands words for my next column’.” 

Mr Davies has ghost-written autobiographies of footballers Wayne Rooney, Gazza and Dwight Yorke – but has also penned biographies of Lakeland cartographer Alfred Wainwright and poet William Wordsworth. 

He added: “All my family roared with laughter when I told them it was for services to literature.”

Headteacher Kate Frood has been given an OBE for her work over three decades in education. Ms Frood, who is head at Eleanor Palmer school in Kentish Town, started her Camden career working at Fleet Primary in South End Green. She has also taught at Kentish Town C of E primary in Islip Street, and held a post as a maths consultant for Islington. Her current school has been rated “outstanding” by Ofsted.

She said: “Receiving an OBE is both a tremendous honour and extremely humbling. I’m accepting it on behalf of all Camden’s amazing headteachers. I love my job and always have. 

“Headship is extraordinarily busy and challenging but I’m sure what keeps me sane and focused is that I still manage to teach maths twice a week. 

“As well as the day-to-day running of school, I’m also proud to have helped Eleanor Palmer achieve Teaching School status and to therefore bring staff from Camden’s fantastic schools together to pool their expertise, get inspired, keep on learning and keep on growing as teachers.”

Eleanor Palmer chairwoman of governors Sarah Hodgetts said: “Kate has worked in Camden as a dedicated teacher and head for most of her career. She is an influential part of the culture and standards of education across the borough, and spent several years chairing Schools Forum which brings together all of the borough’s heads. She has built Eleanor Palmer into an outstanding school which has achieved Teaching School status – with our school at the centre of a group of schools providing training and support in teaching excellence across the borough and wider. We are honoured to have her as our headteacher.”

Others listed in the Birthday Honours include Tufnell Park-based actor Damian Lewis – the Homeland TV series star was given an OBE, as was West Hampstead-based actress Phyllida Law. 

Alan Rushton, who was a trustee of adoption counselling service PAC based in Kentish Town, has been given an OBE. His colleague Hedi Argent, another trustee, was awarded an MBE.

British Transport police detective Chief Inspector David Shipperlee, based in the force’s Camden Road headquarters, has been awarded the Queen’s Police Medal.

Kentish Town-based feminist internet campaigner Belinda Parmar, founder of website Lady Geek, was given an OBE, while Bloomsbury-based neuroscientist Professor Colin Blakemore has been given a knighthood for his groundbreaking research into vision and the brain, and for his contribution to public policy. 

Maurice Ostro, an entrepreneur who lives in Camden Town, is a founding patron of Faiths Forum for London and has been given an OBE for charity work in entrepreneurship and interfaith relations in London. 

Complicite producer for 21 years Judith Dimant, of Kentish Town, was recognised for services to theatre with an MBE.