Jill Summers

Who was Jill Summers?

Honour Margaret Rosell Santoi Fuller, better known as Jill Summers, was a British music hall performer and comedienne born in Eccles, Lancashire. In later life she achieved stardom as Phyllis Pearce, in Granada Television's long-running soap opera Coronation Street.

She first appeared in the soap in 1972, playing Bessie Proctor, a cleaner with Hilda Ogden. In 1982, she reappeared as Phyllis Pearce, a blue rinsed pensioner, forever lusting after pompous ex-serviceman Percy Sugden. She starred in the series until her death in 1997.

Her career in entertainment lasted eighty years. She first performed on stage aged six, in a comedy double act with her brother Tom. When her mother died when she was only 13, she went to work in a Cotton Mill. Later she ran a combined hairdressers and newsagents with her first husband. He died only a few years into their marriage.

During World War II, she entertained troops as part of ENSA, and was known as Lancashire Comedienne Jill Summers, the Pin-Up Girl of British Railways. Most of her variety material was written by her second husband, Dr Clifford Simpson-Smith, with whom she stayed married until his death in 1986. She became a comedian when she tripped up on stage and swore, which the audience lapped up.