Guardian Editor Peter Preston was given a surprising and loving tribute by Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre at the memorial service. The tribute came as a surprise to many and Darcy remembered Preston as a kindred spirit and a great editor who wanted to bring out the newspaper with a zing. Preston who died in last January was described as a Journalists’ journalist, editors’ editor and a very great man of print.

The memorial service which was organized at the journalists’ church, St Bride’s on Fleet Street, was well attended by the journalists’ fraternity including retired editors from the Times, Financial Times, Daily Mirror, Telegraph and other papers. Darce who is the editor of Daily Mail remembered that apart from Peter’s passion for Europe he cannot be categorized as ideological.  Darce also praised him for his innovative feature section G2 which was both serious and salacious.

Dacre pointed out that Peter was a successful person who never thought that his readers should not enjoy ordinary things. He wrote what he felt was best and didn’t have an aversion towards anything. That was his greatness. This will always be remembered as a good soul with extraordinary creativity and ideas.

The former Guardian foreign correspondent Maggie O’Kane read a tribute from the former Sunday Times and Times editor Harold Evans praising Preston’s role in founding the European Press Prize to encourage quality journalism. The Guardian editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner, complemented this with a reading from a Preston article. Liz Forgan, the former Guardian women’s editor and chair of the Scott Trust, also delivered an address, calling Preston a great professional and a person who possesses a good quality of integrity. She also added that he was a modest man. The choir of St Bride’s reflected Preston ’s taste and interest in music, mainly classical but including Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire, which his family insisted as he used to sing along with this song.