(Q61162)

Philip Henry Burton (1904-1995), theatre director and writer, was a teacher at the Port Talbot secondary school attended by Richard Burton (then Jenkins) during the early 1940s. Burton became Jenkins's legal guardian and the boy adopted his mentor's surname as his own. Burton nurtured Richard's theatrical talent and helped launch the younger man's acting career. Their relationship is recorded in Burton's Richard and Philip: The Burtons. A Book of Memories (London, 1992).