Jean Mahy
Carl's grandfather · Archaeologist and art historian · "Monsieur Randonnée" on RTBF
Charline Mahy's father. An archaeologist and art historian by training, a tool exporter for a living, a surveyor of Belgium by vocation. RTBF turned him into "Monsieur Randonnée", the guide who, in "Sous les pavés, la plage", led viewers along routes nobody had seen before him. "He has two hats, one for exporting, one for rambling," wrote Pourquoi Pas ? in 1979.
Chapters
Curriculum
The key dates of Jean Mahy's journey, year by year.
10 milestone(s) · Open the chapter
A Man with Wind in His Soles
"An odd fellow, there is no other word. This teenager in his sixties has wind in his soles." That is how Pourquoi Pas ? introduced Jean Mahy in September 1979, on the eve of his first RTBF broadcasts. For years he had been walking the country's thirty thousand square kilometres, discovering everything others had passed by without seeing.
2 document(s) · Open the chapter
North Cape, August 1952: The Travel Notebook
A school copybook, eighteen pages in pen, and ten days on the road: from 1 to 10 August 1952, Jean Mahy drove alone from Brussels up towards the North Cape, through Holland, a Germany still in ruins, Denmark, southern Sweden, Lapland, Finland and finally Norway.
Open the chapterRTBF, "Sous les pavés... la plage"
The archive films of the RTBF (Studio 4) series in which Jean Mahy, "Monsieur Randonnée", took viewers along the routes he had drawn up. Copies kept in the family archives.
Open the chapterRTBF, "Les chemins racontent"
The archive films of the second RTBF (Studio 4) series devoted to Jean Mahy's walks. Copies kept in the family archives.
Open the chapterBlack, Red, Green: The Method
The bohemian was a stickler for order. He filed, sorted, annotated maps, built up dossiers, expanded his documentation. His method came down to five steps he never departed from: plotting the route on the map, reading the encyclopaedic literature, listing the monuments and sites along the way, scouting on the ground with a recorder, then writing up the notes.
Open the chapterMonsieur Randonnée, on Radio then Television
As early as 1975 he was recounting his walks in the Pays des Collines and the Payottenland on "Point de mire", Gérard Valet's programme. Pierre De Greef turned this into a radio series following in Monsieur Randonnée's footsteps, whose success led to the idea of continuing on television.
Open the chapterWhat He Passed On
There is what is handed down through papers, and what is handed down without anyone noticing. Among the Mahys as among the De Rijcks, two generations later, the same gestures recur: go and see for yourself, take notes, sort, keep.
Open the chapterPress
Press articles related to this portrait and to Carl's family heritage.
4 article(s) · Read the article