MARK HOWELL 1935-2002

Mark Ian Howell,   A bit before his time

'After graduation in 1958 Mark joined the BBC as a trainee sound recordist but as he said, he 'chucked it in' sometime in 1960. A year earlier he had teamed up with an old university friend Tony Morrison to lay the foundations for the Trans-Continental Expedition to encircle the globe overland between 1960 - 61. After more travelling and TV film work with Tony, Mark wrote two books about their adventures. During one of their expeditions he almost drowned in the great rapids of the Urubamba an Amazon tributary in eastern Peru. Saved by Hugo their Peruvian raftsman Mark struggled to the bank to find he was clutching a small Kodak film canister. "It was the only solid thing I could grab mate"  He laughed and lit the proverbial fag.

Bristol Evening Post 1967

From the mid 1960's onwards he devoted his energies to developing a long-before-its-time device for detecting underground features. Old pipes, bodies, buried treasure and much more were the challenge for his inventions. In the early days of development he became involved with the search for King Arthur's Camelot as well as other legendary hoards. Later Mark produced numerous patents and these became the cornerstone for an international company based in Bristol. His ideas have given work for hundreds. During the 1990's the emphysema began to take hold but it did not affect his output of ideas and he was still developing a totally new device until a few weeks before his death. Mark was a Bristolian through and through. He enjoyed the city to its full and is survived by his wife Sally.' TM 2002

The outlines of several of Mark's intricate patents are available online - I suggest you Google using the following keywords> mark ian howell bristol sylvan way patent < or variations. Nonesuch Expeditions does not use links as these often change - so boring.

Below is a link to a Nonesuch Expeditions page where you will find an account of the river Urubamba adventure

Pongo de Mainique, Peru