Education
He was educated at the City of London School.
He was educated at the City of London School.
He was the third of nine children of the Rev R. South. Fleming, a Scottish Baptist minister of Pitlochry and later Beckenham in Kent. After a fall as a child, he became deaf in his right ear. He saw fighting in France during World War I with the Royal West Kent Regiment, notably the Battle of the Somme, and was wounded three times – a shrapnel wound to the head, a bayonet wound in the knee and gas injuries, which left him with a cough for the rest of his life.
He was awarded the Freedom of the City of London.
After the War, he abandoned a career with the Bank of England for the stage, appearing in a number of Whitehall farces and dramas on British Broadcasting Corporation television at Alexandra Palace. He starred in People Like Us at The Strand in 1929.
Their son Robert Atholl Fleming (later a British television director and producer and Doctor of Medicine of Argo Productions,) was born in 1933. Fleming appeared in a number of British films throughout the 1930s most notably as Bulldog Drummond in the Jack Hulbert comedy thriller.
Before the outbreak of the Second World War he volunteered for duty, but was rejected because of his age and WW1 injuries.
He joined East.J Tait"s touring company, then the Australian Broadcasting Commission as actor and drama producer. He was active in the British Drama League and acted as adjudicator for its annual competitions. Foreign a time, he was co-producer (with Richard Parry) for Kathleen Robinson"s "Whitehall Institute of Dramatic Art", a competitor of Doris Fitton"s Independent Theatre.
He notably appeared as Gloucester in John Alden"s 1951 production of King Lear at Street James" Hall in Phillip Street.
He was called upon to adjudicate at major drama festivals. As "Mac" he became the central figure in the Australian Broadcasting Commission"s "Children"s Session" and, as "Jason", became the leader, to children all over Australia, of the hugely popular Argonaut"s Club for most of its 31-year run, from 7 January 1941 until 2 April 1972.
He became a figure much loved by generations of Australian children. He was awarded an Administration Member of the Order of the British Empire on 14 June 1969 for his contribution to broadcasting and his work with children.
Fleming loved sport. He started the Stage and Radio Cricket Club in Sydney.
He was a useful bat, a good slip field and a Machiavellian captain. He was one of the best loved and most respected figures in Australian broadcasting.
He toured Australia in 1932 with Dame Sybil Thorndike and Sir Lewis Casson, (playing Dunois in Street Joan and Macduff in the Scottish play) and while in Sydney married fellow company member, Phyllis Best, daughter of Sir Robert Best, a former member of the Australian parliament from Hawthorn, Victoria. In 1946 he was a member of the "Radio Players", who performed Max Catto"s They Walk Alone and Philip Johnson"s Lover"s Leap to outstanding reviews.