Former Argus reporter Sylvia Hounsome has died, aged 81.

Born Sylvia Heise, she belonged to a generation of working class women who had to fight for career opportunities.

The chance to fulfill her ambition of becoming a reporter came in the Second World War as male journalists were drafted into the Army.

Her future husband Robert Hounsome, who she married in 1943, introduced her to the editor of the then Evening Argus and she reported wartime events and wrote the gossip column.

She also wrote the women's page Feminine Front for the Brighton and Hove Gazette.

She left at 28 to raise her family and later returned to work at the Salisbury Journal and the Bournemouth Times and Poole Herald.

During her career she interviewed many politicians and celebrities, such as Margaret Thatcher, Harold Wilson, Vera Lynn and Barbara Windsor.

Mrs Hounsome, who died in Poole, Dorset, on December 18, studied at the old Brighton Intermediate School.

She is survived by her husband, three daughters, six grandchildren and two great-grandsons.