Mandeville, Manchester — Irreverently jocular, sometimes cantankerous, yet generous to a fault, the late videographer Paul Albert Byfield is also being remembered by media colleagues as a passionate news man who moved mountains to get the story.

Byfield, 54, died last Thursday night after an intense battle with cancer. Just a few weeks ago he was still on the job, telling colleagues his doctor had indicated he had just three weeks left to live.

Married and father to many children, Byfield often seemed to treat his personal life as an afterthought as he drove at breakneck speed through the hills and valleys of central Jamaica to be first with the news for CVM TV.

“Byfield had media in his blood. He loved his work and lived for the adrenalin,” said Nakeshia Tomlinson, who came into close contact with Byfield a few years ago while working as a news correspondent in St Elizabeth.

Similar sentiments came from several journalists in south central Jamaica.

Angelo Lawrence of Mandeville-based Pace TV remembered Byfield as “one of a handful who run up and down to ensure that what happen today is part of the evening news”.

Veteran journalist and broadcaster Glendon Baker recalled a man who “loved his job, always wanting an exclusive, constantly pushing to find that angle that others would have missed”. Baker pointed to Byfield exclusives that had great positive impact in terms of corrective action including a rat infestation in Mandeville a few years ago and another on unhygienic conditions at a leading restaurant.

For Garfield Angus of the Jamaica Information Service (JIS)“Byfield was all about news”. A chuckling Angus recalled a late night bar session a few years ago in a remote Manchester community when Byfield suddenly thought up an angle.

“At 2:00 in the morning, everybody enjoying themselves, Byfield went for his camera and started interviewing people about their lives,” said Angus.

That resourcefulness was an aspect also emphasised by TVJ videographer Courtney Morgan who grew up with Byfield in Hatfield, central Manchester, and was his close friend.

“That was the thing I admired most about him” said Morgan, “that resourcefulness. He had the ability to get the story, by whatever means necessary. He had this tremendous drive to make sure the public became aware.”

Morgan and another TVJ videographer, St Elizabeth-based Bunny Longmore said Byfield was extremely competitive but never allowed the rush for the story to compromise friendship. That competitive streak is something Morgan says he will miss. “We drove each other to get better,” he said.

Byfield, they said, was also very kind. “He would willingly give whatever he had,” said Morgan.

“He was always very kind to me, and always encouraging me to be strong,” said Longmore. He humorously recalled Byfield’s contention that he (Longmore) should spend more time in the bar and his own urgings for his friend to moderate his fast-lane lifestyle.

Morgan spoke of Byfield’s conscious use of his camera “to help poor people”, constantly searching for stories that highlighted the plight of society’s less fortunate and disenfranchised.

It was a trait that ensured Byfield’s enduring popularity at community and grass-roots level throughout south-central Jamaica and beyond.

His colleagues recalled that with Byfield, good humour was never far away.”He brought laughter to whatever space he was in,” said Morgan.

Byfield’s son Owen who worked under his tutelage in recent years, noted that for all his worldliness there was an essential spirituality to his father. “His favourite expression was ‘God a God’ and he loved people,” said the young Byfield.