Bill Tarmey
English actor and singer (1941–2012)
Bill Tarmey (born William Piddington; 4 April 1941 – 9 November 2012) was an English actor and singer, best known for playing Jack Duckworth in the soap opera Coronation Street. First appearing in the role in November 1979, he played it continuously from 1981 to 2010.
Early life and education
Tarmey was born in Ardwick, Manchester, Lancashire. Shortly after his birth, he moved with his family to live in Bradford, Manchester, where he was also educated. Following the death of his father William in 1944 whilst driving an ambulance at the Battle of Arnhem during the Second World War, his mother Lilian remarried, to Robert Cleworth. Tarmey attended the Bradford Memorial School and the Queens Street School (which became the Philips Park Secondary Modern School). On leaving school, he was apprenticed to his stepfather, who was an asphalt spreader by trade. He also worked in the construction industry for a number of years.
Career
In 1968, Tarmey gave up his job in the building industry to work as a nightclub singer and entertainer. In order to supplement his income, he took on work as an extra on shows such as Coronation Street, amongst others.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Bill Tarmey” is english actor and singer (1941–2012). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Bill, Tarmey and English, not as a finished interpretation.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q36185. VIAF identifies the subject as 164167210. The Library of Congress control number is no2011009734. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1941, 2012, 1979 and 1981.
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This entry incorporates text from “Bill Tarmey” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.