Forty years ago (he says, writing in March 2024), while I was at Keele, my relationship with the City of London was rather different from the way it is now:
Returning to March 1984 – following the election fever of the previous week…
…the next couple of weeks were relatively sedate.
Sunday, 18 March 1984 – Got up quite early – did very little today – visited people etc. Evening – went union and left late!
Monday, 19 March 1984 – Busyish day – shopped etc. Went union etc. Wrote essay – went to visit Bobbie for a while.
Tuesday, 20 March 1984 – Rose quite early – several visitors (Malcolm [Cornelius], Simon [probably Legg at that time], Bobbie [Scully, to be sure] etc) – sluggish day – shopped, washed, then cooked a big meal in evening. Very pleasant.
Wednesday, 21st of March 1984- Rose quite late – came home in afternoon – lazy eve and spoke to friends etc.
“Came home” meant returned to my parents’ house in Streatham. In order to try and catch up with my preparation for finals, I decided to retreat to London for a few days for private study. How well did that work?
Thursday, 22 March 1984 – Did a little work today – shopped etc. Stayed in evening – did a little work.
Friday, 23 March 1984 – Lazyish day – did a little work etc. Fairly lazy evening in.
Saturday, 24 March 1984 – Easyish day – did some work – Paul came over in afternoon – did some work evening.
Hmm, not bad. What about the next few days?
Sunday, 25 March 1984 – Did little work – rowed with mother – went to Surbiton to see Grandma Jenny and Uncle Louis. Had a Chinese dinner. Met [guess… Jimmy Bateman] in the eve at R&C [Rose & Crown – Jimmy liked that place] – early night.
Monday, 26 March 1984 – Got up quite early – worked hard both day and evening. Little hive of industry.
Tuesday, 27 March 1984 – Busy day – rose early, met Caroline [Freeman, now Curtis] for lunch – went on to Newman Harris in afternoon , and went on to Andrea [Dean]’s for dinner etc – late night.
Wednesday, 28 March 1984– left Teddington quite early – had lunch – left London – rotten journey (no LT) to Keele, went Thorns and union to sort out tomorrow
“Rowed with mother” would undoubtedly have been about the sabbatical. We hadn’t been on the best of terms since “Liza-gate” the previous year…
… and now mum had become convinced that I was hell-bent on becoming a perpetual student who would never, in her terms, start earning a proper living. Worse yet, I was going to turn into a “union man”, like her brother Harry, whom she considered to be a person who would always choose armchair-agitating over actually working. (I paraphrase).
“Went to Newman Harris” would have been a simple and satisfactory expedient to explain what I was doing and keep my job offer there open for an additional 12 months, which they were more than happy to do.
Not only a City of London connection across forty years, but also a National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in Teddington connection. Andrea lived in Bushy House at that time, as her dad, Paul, was Director of the NPL. Forty years later, I was hoity-toitying with the NPL crowd in Horizon 22:
Returning to late March 1984:
29 March 1984
Thursday, 29 March 1984 – Got up at 7 am – went to Silverdale for Stop The City lines – played Risk and Scrabble, and got pissed on home brew! Got home pretty late.
I remember this day very clearly. “Silverdale” meant Simon [Legg] and Theo’s place. I was drafted in to help them act as logistics co-ordinators and a helpline for those students who went to London to join in the Stop the City protest – this being, I believe the second of them.
I was asked to help because I was studying civil liberties law and there was a train of thought that the police might over-exert their authority and be open to challenge during the protest.
In practice, especially in those days without mobile phones, the reality was that the protesters were “on their own” down in London, with insufficient access to phones to enable any co-ordination or requests for on-the-fly legal advice.
I don’t think Simon & Theo’s phone rang once during the whole day. Hence, despite the crack of dawn start, all we did was play Risk and Scrabble while ploughing through a fair chunk of Simon’s most recent batch of home brewed beer.
Simon’s theory was that his home brew did not give you a hangover, however much of it you drank, because it entirely lacked the hangover-inducing additives that come with the deal in mass produced beer. In my case, only up to a point, Mr Legg. But then we did drink rather a lot of home brew that day.
Despite my more-or-less-non-existent involvement, it is quite possible that I remain guilty of a capital crime in the City of London for even offering to assist such a protest from afar. Cruel, unusual and bizarre medieval laws have a dreadful tendency to crawl out of the woodwork in the square mile. Whether or not the Lord Mayor could or would grant me clemency in such circumstances I have no idea, but, as I am Freeman of the City, I am entitled to be hanged with a silken rope rather than a cheap and scratchy one, which is a very reassuring thought.
Returning to the end of March 1984 – the rest of that week was tame:
Friday, 30 March 1984 – Got up quite early – went union – and library. Bobbie arrived – cooked meal for B, Malc. and Ruth – early night.
Saturday, 31 March 1984 – Lazy day – Rose late – shopped. Lazed around – had nice meal in eve after quick visit to union.
Not exactly finals overdrive then. I don’t think I ever made it to overdrive, to be honest, as the next few weeks of diaries will attest.