Tag: Andy Crawford

Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Ronnie Frankenberg & The Keele Day Nursery Nurses But Were Afraid To Ask – Plus Other Tales From The End of Spring Term 1985

The Keele Day Nursery, Spring 1985, reimagined with the help of DeepAI

There was a lot going on in the Students’ Union and University life in the first half of March that year. Add to that the fact that Petra got some sort of lurgy that landed her in the health centre and I was intermittently poorly too. My diary entries are not exactly upbeat but they are revealing.

4 t0 10 March 1985 – Meetings & Writings &Workings & Dancings…

Monday, 4 March 1985 – busy day – got some work done – FP [family planning] meeting in the afternoon. Constitutional committee in evening – Petra came over.

The family planning meeting was with Dr Anne Pedrazzini, who was a big cheese in the North Staffordshire family planning world at that time. This was the first of several research meetings that led to my magnum opus, Sexplanations. More on that publication once the ideas conceived in March gestated and came to term…the following term.

Tuesday, 5 March 1985 – union committee in morning – busy day. Did Bust Fund disco in evening – Petra came round after.

I recently published a Bust Fund disco playlist, curated jointly with John White, with whom I DJ’d those events. Click here to listen to the YouTube Music playlist directly or below for the article that contains the list:

A 1984/1985 Keele Students’ Union Bust Fund Disco Playlist

Wednesday, 6 March 1985 – meetings etc. all day. Had a relatively easy evening and early night for once.

Thursday, 7 March 1985 – busy day with meetings etc. all day – cooked Petra a meal in evening – nice, stayed.

Friday, 8 March 1985 – went to DHSS in morning. Busy day – social secretary election and big fuss in evening – went Kate’s briefly in evening – not feeling too good left early and slept well.

I think the DHSS meeting was also connected with research for the nascent idea that became Sexplanations. I don’t recall what the big fuss was over the Social Secretary election that Friday. I was a veteran of big fusses over elections by 1985, especially, it seems, on days when I wasn’t feeling well. The story linked here and below, from two years earlier, is my best story about such an evening:

A Week When Everything At Keele Made Me Feel Sick, Even Smoke-Filled Rooms & Students Union Politics, 6 to 11 February 1983

The March 1985 Social Secretary shenanigans was probably a mere bagatelle compared with the golden era of election shenanigans.

Saturday, 9 March 1985 – shopped etc. today and worked all day in office. Went to Nigerian do for awhile – Petra came over later.

Those Nigerian community events were great fun. I’d got to know that community well the year before my sabbatical. There was a fair smattering of Cameroonian students who also “qualified” and tended to hang with that crowd, so “West African” might be a more accurate description of the events. The parties were lively; there was always music and dancing aplenty.

WAÏPA_FELA_KUTI, MOI MEME, CC BY-SA 3.0

No doubt some seriously funky Fela Kuti music formed part of the scene. The following clip will give you an idea of the Fela Kuti vibe at that time:

Sunday, 10 March 1985 – Rose late. Busy day working today in office etc. Worked till late – stayed at Petra’s.

I was working hard and playing hard that year – no wonder I was poorly a fair bit of the time. I’m feeling a bit run down right now, just thinking about all that activity and typing about it.

Ronnie Frankenberg & The Day Nursery Crisis

Monday, 11 March 1985 – busy day with meetings all day – Petra in Health Centre – UGM in evening – didn’t go too well.

Tuesday, 12 March 1985 – busy all day – union committee and Reading folk up for the day. Day Nursery, hustings, RingRoad rehearsal in the evening. Also visited Petra in evening.

I don’t in truth remember the visit from the Reading folk, but I do very clearly remember the Day Nursery crisis.

RAI 39784 Portrait of Ronnie Frankenberg photographed by Jochen Resch, c. 1990s ©RAI – this picture from the Royal Anthropological Institute site, used on a fair use basis and to provide a link to the RAI’s biographical note on Ronnie – click here or the picture.

As Education & Welfare Officer, I was, ex officio, a Trustee of the Keele Day Nursery, which was a small, non-profit organisation, existing solely to provide day nursery facilities for toddlers of staff and students alike. The Chair of the Day Nursery was Professor Ronnie Frankenberg, a wonderful fellow who had been the initiating energy behind Keele’s highly-regarded Sociology & Social Anthropology department. Here is a link to his Guardian obituary from 2016.

The day nursery crisis was caused by an outbreak of pregnancy among several of the handful of nursery nurses who operated the day nursery. I can’t remember how many staff we had (not many), but the team was sufficiently small that having two or three on maternity leave at the same time was going to generate a hugely problematic shortfall of staff. Even in those days, there were strict staff to toddler ratios and it was proving prohibitively expensive to cover multiple maternity leave periods with temporary, qualified staff.

I remember Ronnie making a genuinely interesting and hugely informative speech at the meeting – quite a long speech – explaining the sociological… or perhaps I should say anthropological… phenomena, making it surprisingly likely that a day nursery might be blighted with such “outbreaks” of pregnancy by several members of the team around the same time. Psychological factors, social factors, cultural factors and even biological factors all come into play, we learnt. It was like a mini Foundation Year lecture. I almost found myself making notes and thinking up a really good question for the Q&A at the end of the lecture.

But in reality, my mind was juggling the engrossing complexity behind the causes of our problem with the practical realities that the tiny trust’s coffers were emptying at an alarming and unstoppable rate.

As Ronnie’s extrapolation wound down, I interjected by saying, “this is all absolutely fascinating, Ronnie, but where are we going to find the money to cover the additional costs?” My comment raised a laugh and also refocussed the meeting. I can’t remember what fundraising ideas we came up with, but I suspect that they only partially solved the money problem. A begging bowl in Registrar David Cohen’s direction probably helped to make up the remainder of the shortfall.

That is my favourite (but not only) memory of Ronnie Frankenberg…which is, by the way, pronounced “Ron-knee Frank-en-berg”:

Joking apart, my memory of Ronnie Frankenberg is that he was not only a very impressive Professor in his field, but also an extremely likeable and decent man.

Wednesday 13 March 1985 – loads of meetings all day (including Senate). RingRoad rehearsal. Petra came over after.

Thursday, 14 March 1985 – busyish day – followed by rehearsal and performance of RingRoad – went well. Petra came over after.

Friday 15 March 1985 – horrid mood today – E&W election – v worried – Hayward [Burt] won – hooray – cooked Petra dinner and she stayed.

Me and Hayward

I have no idea why I was so worried about Hayward’s chances in the Education & Welfare election for 1985/86. Presumably there was a candidate competing with him who I thought might win and then undo a lot of the initiatives I had been working towards. While Hayward and I did not see eye to eye politically on all issues, I basically saw Hayward as “one of the good guys”, who would work hard and build on many of the things I was trying to achieve. Indeed I’m sure he did.

Saturday, 16 March 1985 – got up quite early cooked Petra lunch and took her to the station. Had a very early night.

Sunday, 17 March 1985 – Rose quite early – pottered around – cooked Kate lunch – had a lazy day. Had another early night.

Someone sneakily added some unrepeatable graffiti in my appointments diary about that Sunday lunch with Kate. The graffiti is in Petra’s handwriting. I don’t think I could have spotted it at the time – otherwise I’d doubtless have scratched it out – so I suspect that the outrageous mock-diary-entry has sat there, previously unread, for forty years. I must admit it made me smile out loud, all these years later. Private requests only for a copy of that note. Young people, honestly!

Monday, 18 March 1985 – went doctors etc in morning – rather an unproductive day. Ruth and Jackie [Wong] came over – had earlyish night.

Ruth and Jackie were both friends/neighbours of Petra. Lovely lasses, both. I wonder whether Petra is still in touch with either of them?

Tuesday, 19 March 1985 – union committee in morning. Last day of term – hassle over disciplinary hearing etc. Had some wine – earlyish night.

Wednesday, 20 March 1985 – Pady and I took a day off – shopped and cooked meal for Crawfy’s [Andy Crawford’s] birthday. All got drunk.

Me, Pady & Crawfy. As usual, thanks to mark Ellicott for the lovely picture.

Oh dear, that last line: “All got drunk.” Well, I suppose it was the end of term.

What A Relief, New Union Toilets, Concourse Juicy Bits, February 1985 Part Seven

The piece I want to blog about is preceded by a long rant by Robert Coyle about the use of the term “fascists” to describe Conservatives. Good on Krista Cowman for allowing a Wally that much space, while still failing to resist giving the piece a derogatory headline.

But the piece “what a relief” made me laugh out loud and did bring back a very faint memory of the “official opening”. Don’t think it would have been Pomagne in my hand, though. I had eschewed cider-type beverages ever since my disastrous evening with cider at the Andorra after show party.

The running headline phrase “juicy bits” does not sit too happily with a story about new union toilets, but I think I should rapidly move on from that line of thought.

Concourse Feb 85 Page 18

Keele (Including A Free January 1985 SU Disco Playlist), Knightsbridge, Kings College Hospital & Multiple Wine Prizes, Mid January 1985

I believe this scribbled note is the playlist from the Real Ale Bar Opening Disco

In the last episode, I described the re-opening of the Ballroom Bar as a Real Ale bar, with John White and I DJ-ing the disco in a less than sober fashion.

Why Oh FY? – My Most Highly Praised Piece Of Statistical Work Ever, Plus Other Keele Happenings Such As Opening The Real Ale Bar, Early In The Spring Term, 1985

I am now pretty sure that the hand-scrawled disco playlist I discovered amongst my papers some years ago, see headline picture, must be the playlist from that gig. It looks like a playlist conceived by committee – it certainly doesn’t remind me of the type of playlist that John and I would (often quite hastily) construct earlier in the evening to give the disco the vibe and shape we wanted. Our personal choice tended to focus more on Motown, Northern Soul and general sixties dance music.

I vaguely remember the discussion with several members of the committee. Pady Jalali insisting that we play the Band Aid song at some point – John and I reluctantly agreeing to open with that song as a clarion call to let people know that the show was starting, as it would empty the dance floor anywhere else in the set. I’m pretty sure Kate Fricker chose the Madonna song and it had to be Pete Wild and/or Hayward Burt who insisted on some ZZ Top.

John and I unquestionably insisted on Police Officer by Smiley Culture, which was high on our list of personal favourites at that time:

Actually, you can hear the entire playlist, which I curated into a 40th anniversary playlist on my YouTube Music account – click here for that playlist – don’t be put off if the link is struck through – anyone can click and listen – you’ll get adverts if you don’t have a YouTube Music account, that’s all. I’ll be surprised f you haven’t had a little bit of a private dance (or in my case at the time of writing, hobble) by the time you hear Neutron Dance by the Pointer Sisters, if not before.

Let’s move on.

A Quick Trip To London, Including A Chance Encounter With Neil & Trish Hyman In Knightsbridge And A Planned Encounter With My Mum In Kings College Hospital

Not Keele: Knightsbridge, London, SW1 by Christine Matthews, CC BY-SA 2.0

Here’s my diary extract from that weekend.

AI systems are now smart enough to read the charred remains of the Herculaneum scrolls…but still have no chance with my handwriting. I’ll have to do this transliteration myself:

Friday, 18 January 1985 – Very busy in office with busts etc. Went to London quite early. Stayed in etc etc

Saturday, 19 January 1985 – Rose lunchtime – drank and had haircut. Went to Chicago Rib [Shack, in Knightsbridge] in evening – Met Neil Hyman and Trish [Hyman] etc – weird. Stopped over.

Sunday, 20 January 1985 – Went home in the morning – lunch at Levinsons [friends in our street]. Went to see mum – then back to Keele. Went to see Petra [Wilson] briefly.

I’ll explain, in a later article, a bit more about my role as Education & Welfare officer helping students who had been busted. No idea why I saw so many on that Friday – I don’t think it was anything to do with our disco a couple of nights before.

I assume I stayed at Bobbie’s place in East Finchley. “Rose lunchtime, drank, had haircut” does not sound like me any more (he says, while writing between 6:00 & 7:00 am), but it does sound like the 22 year old me.

It will have seemed and still seems a strange coincidence to encounter Neil Hyman & his sister Trish, friends from my BBYO days, in the Chicago Rib Shack in Knightsbridge. Firstly, because Neil and Trish were from the Lytham St Annes group, which is some way removed from Knightsbridge . Differently posh, I suppose.

Secondly, the Chicago Rib Shack is not the first place you might think of to encounter, by chance, friends from a Jewish Youth Organisation. Perhaps we were all trying out some seminal vegan options in the place.

In some ways more coincidentally, on the back of a subsequent conversation, I discovered that Bobbie’s mum was Greta Spector’s sister. Her sons, Martin Spector and the late, great Jeffrey Spector were mainstays of BBYO in St Annes and indeed nationally. Neil and I served together on Jeffrey’s National Executive for a while in 1979.

Jeff Spector, Spring 1979

On the Sunday I went over to Streatham for lunch with my dad at Norman & Marjorie Levinson’s house. Presumably they were taking pity on dad and feeding him while my mum was in hospital. Very kind people they were – to me as a child and great friends to my parents for the rest of their lives.

Norman up front, my dad to the right

Mum was in hospital having her second hip replaced in Kings College Hospital. She had the first one replaced there in February 1975 and then needed the second one done 10 years later. Don’t know what it is about the start of years with a five in them, but I need to have one of my hips replaced and shall do so in a couple of week’s time (as I write in January 2025).

Back To Keele, Where Wednesday’s Wine Win & Waffles Needs Explaining

What do you mean, you can’t read or understand that? Oh, all right then:

Monday 21 January 1985 – Union Committee in morning – very busy rest of day. Const [itutional Committee] in evening – drink after. Petra came over later.

Tuesday 22 January 1985 – Busy day today – meetings etc. Cheap drink in evening. Petra came over later.

Wednesday, 23 January 1985 -Lots to do and meetings etc. Won wine today. Stayed in in eve – went for Waffles at Ben’s [Benita Wishart] later.

Thursday, 24 January 1985 – Busy and productive day. Lots of meetings in early evening. Petra came over later.

“Cheap drink” presumably means one of those promotion evenings in the Union, when one of the suppliers would try to encourage students towards their brand with infeasibly cheap offerings. I remember being put off Pernod for life with one of those earlier in my time at Keele. Sadly, with my diary being unspecific about the brand involved on 22 January 1985, unless a reader chimes in with a detailed memory, we’ll never know which particular tipple was cheap that night.

Clearly I didn’t over-indulge as my diary for the next day reads very industrious and perky. And who wouldn’t be perky when they had “won wine”. A whole case of Henri Maire wine at that.

Photo by Marianne Casamance, CC BY-SA 4.0

Here’s the story of how I won it.

While I was with my parents for Christmas, my dad showed me some vouchers and forms he had collected for an Henri Maire wine prize competition. He had bought enough of the wine for two entries. You had to answer a few quite simple questions about Henri Maire wine and then provide a slogan. Top prize, a case of Henri Maire wine. Several other prizes were also on offer. Dad had no clue on the slogans and asked me to help.

My entry – i.e. the one in my name, which ended up winning the case of wine that was sent to me at Keele, was:

Whatever the fare, drink Henri Maire.

Simple and to the point, I thought it might pick up a consolation prize. Dad preferred my other, more baroque idea for a slogan:

Tous les “Hooray Henris” boivent Henri Maire

The arrival of the winning case of “more than half decent” wine caused quite a stir in the Students’ Union that morning. Not exactly an every day event at Keele, that.

I remember excitedly calling my dad to let him know then news. He excitedly told me that my other slogan had also won a prize.

Screw you, Henri Maire. (That wasn’t the slogan). That prize, forty years on.

Dad was absolutely insistent that I keep the corkscrew. I still have it, although, as you can see, it has seen better days. I did keep back a couple of bottles of the prize-winning wine for dad, which I took down on my next visit to my folks.

For some strange reason I became tremendously popular at Keele, for a short while, after that case of wine arrived.

I don’t really understand the diary reference that says that I stayed in that evening but then went over to Benita’s place for waffles. It can only mean, I think, that my intention had been to stay in and that I had sunk into an evening off mode, before Petra (who was very friendly with Benita at that time) persuaded me to join the waffle party…

…possibly with one of those bottles of wine in hand.

Lovely lass, Benita. I think I have tracked her down on the net so we’ll see if she has anything to add to the memory of waffles or even other matters in this series of articles forty years on.

The Keele Students’ Union Tribunal Ends And A New Year Begins, Late December 1984 To 3 January 1985

With thanks to Dave Lee for the “loan” of this frosty Horwood picture.

For those who haven’t been avidly following this saga, the Shrewsbury Industrial Tribunal relating to our Union Committee’s dismissal of the Students’ Union bar managers was supposed to conclude 19 December…

“Just Doing My Keele Students’ Union Sabbatical Job”: Two Gruelling Days At The Industrial Tribunal In Shrewsbury And Post Mortem, 18 to 20 December 1984

…but required two additional days, which were set as Friday 28th and Monday 31st December.

Keele was bitterly cold when I returned to the campus on 27 December and remained so until we left on 31 December. It also felt incredibly bleak too, with almost nobody around.

The diary barely tells the tale, but let me translate my scrawl:

Thursday 27 December – Got up quite early [at parents’ house] – came back to Keele. Kate came over for a while.

I recall that Kate (now Susan) Fricker and I were a little spooked by the bleakness and the fact that Ralph was wandering around the campus. I don’t think he intended to spook or intimidate us, I think more likely Ralph was struggling to come to terms with what was happening to him and was walking a lot, as people with heavy weights on their minds often do.

In my (I now think false) memory, Kate asked to stay at the flat and I slept on the floor, but the diary says “came over for a while”, so on reflection I think the idea of her staying was mooted, but Kate decided in the end to spare me the floor and returned to her own flat for the night.

Friday 28 December – went to Tribunal – seemed to go OK – lazy evening in.

Saturday 29 December – shopped and read in day. Went to Koh-I-Noor with John & co in eve.

I think we sensed that Friday, perhaps for the first time, that the Tribunal was going our way. It was mostly Kate under the cosh that day, plus summing up from both sides, if I remember correctly. I certainly got the impression that Kate was fending off the cross-examination questions well and that the members of the panel were getting more than a little frustrated with interrogation by cross-examination that wasn’t really getting anywhere.

Would you believe the Koh-I-Noor restaurant is still there, forty years later, in Newcastle-Under-Lyme – click here. “John & co” suggests that Kate didn’t opt to join us that evening but that some other members of the committee were with us. Pady and Andy I’d guess. Perhaps also Pete & Melissa. The Koh-I-Noor was a good choice when we had vegetarians with us, as, in those days, Indian restaurants tended to be the only type of meat-serving restaurant that really “got” vegetarianism.

Sunday 30 December – Lazy day in reading etc. Kate & I went to see Ghostbusters in eve. Latish night.

Ghostbusters was THE movie to see in December 1984. I remembered that I had seen it “around the time the movie came out”, but did not remember, until I saw this diary entry, that I had seen it with Kate on the night before the tribunal judgment.

Forty years on, I have “cog. dis.” as to whether that particular movie on that particular evening was especially appropriate or especially inappropriate in the circumstances.

Great movie. The theme song had charted at the end of that summer, so John & I had been playing it at regular discos (i.e. not our 60s/Motown/Northern Soul ones) for some months. It charted again over Christmas when the movie came out. You know you want to hear it…and maybe even shimmy around your living room to that infectious rhythm:

When we returned to Shrewsbury on the Monday morning, we were given the judgment quite quickly, in summary form, with the promise of a full judgment to follow in writing. Basically the tribunal had unanimously found in our favour.

The Evening Sentinel summarised that oral judgement the next (publishing) day:

Sentinel Tribunal Report from 31 December 1984Sentinel Tribunal Report from 31 December 1984 02 Jan 1985, Wed Evening Sentinel (Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England) Newspapers.com

Of course we were all relieved, not least Tony Derricott, the Permanent Secretary, who must have felt especially exposed – as to a great extent did I – if the judgment had gone against us.

When we got back to the Students’ Union late morning/early afternoon, I remember Tony getting out cigars and offering them to us, which felt inappropriate to us student reps. We were relieved but not celebratory.

John and I had arranged to meet Annalisa de Mercur and Petra Wilson in London for New Years Eve, so we were also in a hurry to head down to London.

Rushed back to London with John to meet Annalisa and Petra…

…says the diary.

I remember far more than the diary tells. John might remember yet more or other details.

We had arranged to meet the girls at the Albert Memorial. No idea why there, other than it being a well-known landmark which all of us felt reasonably able to find easily and which we felt wouldn’t be a crowded place early evening on New Years Eve. It wasn’t.

John and I had a drink or two (or in John’s case possibly more than two) on the train down. Perhaps we can explain John’s, previously undisclosed, identification blooper as, at least partially, a result of the drink.

As John & I strode along Kensington Gore, John and I had a conversation along the following lines:

JOHN: (excitedly) I think that’s Annalisa in the distance, standing in front of the railings…

ME: (unconvinced)…I don’t think so…(even less convinced)…whatever it is, it’s not moving…

JOHN: (embarrassedly)…oh gawd, it’s not Annalisa. It’s a large pile of bin bags.

ME: Don’t worry, John, I won’t tell her.

Now let me be crystal clear on this point. Annalisa doesn’t and never did resemble a pile of bin bags. John’s excited outburst was no doubt enthusiasm for the anticipated evening with the girls. We were at a ridiculous distance to try to identify anyone – or to distinguish between objects and people.

Also in John’s defence, his optical delusion might have been born of eagerly looking forward to telling Annalisa and Petra that we had won our case. In those pre-mobile-phone days, there was no sensible way to get messages out ahead of meeting up – hence the pre-arrangement to meet at the Albert Memorial.

In fact, John & I had arrived at the Albert Memorial well ahead of the girls, leaving us quite literally in the cold for a good few minutes.

In the February 1985 issue of Concourse, in H Ackgrass’s final/parting newspaper column, I…or rather, better to say, H Ackgrass…wrote:

It’s all coming back to me. John will no doubt claim that he was simply finding imaginative ways to try and keep warm.

Soon enough Annalisa and Petra joined and the mood soon lightened once they learnt that the tribunal judgment had gone our way.

I am 99% sure that we ate at Melati in Great Windmill Street that evening, which was one of my/our favourite places at that time, although the diary is silent on that detail.

Melati, long since gone, this photo from 2014 by Sharjil “borrowed” from Yelp

I’m pretty sure we then ventured in the cold to get as close to Trafalgar Square as we could – which in those days I think meant so darn close that we were actually in the square. For sure we could hear Big Ben striking loud and clear. For sure we celebrated the New Year with the crowds. I vaguely remember hugging and kissing rather a lot of strangers on that occasion. In those days, such conduct was not micro-aggressive or inappropriate – it was simply doing what everyone else was doing in those circumstances.

Petra had arranged for the two of us to stay in a flat in Kennington – her brother, Christian had friends there – they were away and were happy for us to stay. Christian had sensibly advised Petra that we would want to be walking distance from wherever we were going to stay if we were going to do the “midnight in Trafalgar Square” thing. Kennington fitted that bill.

I’m not sure it was the Brandon Estate, but for sure it was down that way. This photo by Reading Tom from Reading, UK, CC BY 2.0

It was actually quite a long walk in the cold after such a long day. I also recall clearly a long cold night at that flat as well. Either the heating in the flat didn’t work or we couldn’t work out how to make it work…we found imaginative ways to try and keep warm. We just about managed to avoid hypothermia.

Tuesday 1 January 1985 – went home mid morning. Lunch. Lazy day at home.

Wednesday 2 January 1985 – went to town – met Caroline lunch. Went NH [Newman Harris] then shopping then met Pete Roberts for dinner.

Thursday 3 January 1985 – rose late. Went Junction [Dad’s shop] in afternoon after taping etc. Lazy evening in taping etc.

I’ll talk some more about the taping in a separate piece about music.

I often met Caroline Freeman (now Curtis) for lunch in those days. I’m intrigued that I visited Newman Harris that day. I sense that I had told someone (Stanley Bloom, presumably, by then) that if the tribunal went against us, I would resign from the Students’ Union and be looking for work in January. I’m just guessing that this visit was to tell them that we had won and to arrange a start date in September.

The only other possibility is that I was already, by then, helping dad keep his shop’s books, in order to help keep his costs down (goodness knows, dad wasn’t doing much business by that time). This visit might have been to deliver or collect something pertained to dad’s accounts, which might explain me visiting the shop the next day.

Dinner with the Pete Roberts will have been fun and interesting. Pete was my predecessor’s predecessor’s predecessor Education & Welfare Officer (in other words 1981/1982). He had become a friend and mentor before he left Keele, and we met up/kept in touch for several years after we both left. I think he was living in Parsons Green by this time or perhaps he was still around Pimlico.

Pete will no doubt have helped me to reorient my thinking about my role post Tribunal. I remember bouncing ideas off him and really valuing his experience and wisdom in matters E&W. He was also reliably good company with an interesting and often amusing take on most subjects.

I thought he’d gone quiet on Facebook of late and was saddened to learn that he died in December 2023.

This is a really pleasing photo of Pete from 2011. I’m sure Rosie won’t mind me “borrowing” it from his Facebook page.

My time in London was short yet again, as I shortly returned to Keele ahead of a Union Committee team bonding long weekend in the Somerset countryside. What could possibly go wrong with that sort of idea?

A Political Rally With Death Threats: Arthur, The Miner’s Strike & Keele, 22 September 1984

Arthur Scargill, Pit Closure Rally, Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums

While the Keele Students’ Union bars saga was the largest internal issue that subsisted for the first six months of our sabbatical year 1984/85…

When The Keele Students’ Union Bars (aka Tommy And Ralph) Saga Came To A Head, Early August 1984

…the 1984-85 miners’ strike was far and away the biggest UK political/news story of that time.

The dispute had been running for some six months before this day, in September 1984, when Arthur Scargill held a rally outside the pit in Silverdale, which might be described as “Keele’s local” in the matter of coal pits back then. Indeed I think it was that pit that did for my first Barnes flat, in M block, which needed to be demolished in late 1982:

Switching To A Cracking Good Flat In Barnes, Keele, Mid February To Early March 1982

But I digress.

Here is a transcript of my diary note from the day that Arthur Scargill came to town:

Saturday, 22 September 1984 – Got up early. Went to Shelton – Kathy [North Staffs Poly, President? I think], Cath [Coughlin], Andy [Crawford] and I went to Rumours and on to Scargill [Arthur Scargill rally at a closing colliery]. Shopped in afternoon – visited Kevin [“the Guinness”?], Helen [Ross] etc. Went to Union in evening.

Obviously it was a big rally…a very, very big rally – in contrast with the comparatively small rallies (by his own standards) that Donald Trump holds in the USA these days (2024). Joking apart, there were several hundred of us who attended that 1984 Potteries event.

I discover, though, by delving into The Evening Sentinel archive, that Arthur Scargill 1984 did share something in common with Trump 2024: death threats. Indeed, had I known what I now learn from the Evening Sentinel 40 years later, I might have been a little reluctant to attend:

Scargill Rally 22 September 1984 SentinelScargill Rally 22 September 1984 Sentinel 22 Sep 1984, Sat Evening Sentinel (Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England) Newspapers.com

In truth I don’t remember a great deal about the rally. I wasn’t a political sabbatical, by which I mean that I wanted to focus on running the Union and my portfolio, Education and Welfare, rather than national or international events. But I do remember that sense of history and wanting to be there when the “show” came to our town.

Arthur Scargill was a charismatic speaker and certainly carried his crowd with him. Thatcher-bashing/Tory-bashing was low hanging fruit for speeches in places like the Potteries at that time. I do remember Scargill’s mantra:

There’s no such thing as an uneconomic pit…

…failing to pass my personal economics test at that time. It was clear to me even then that the coal industry was on its way out, for economic and environmental reasons. The issue, for me, was the way that the Tory Government was going about its industrial policy, like a bull in a China shop, for ideological reasons, rather than a measured, planned approach to industrial change, which might have been achieved with more net benefit and less resulting hardship.

But it wasn’t about me, it was about Arthur. Here’s a video of a similar speech to the one we would have heard at the end of our rally:

Mercifully there was no assassination attempt on Arthur Scargill at the event we attended nor, as far as I know, at any other event during those heady days in the mid 1980s.

But just a few year’s later, comedy writer and performer Brian Jordan …

…to whom I shall always be grateful for premiering my comedy material in Edinburgh, in his wonderfully-named show, Whoops Vicar Is that Your Dick…

The Ultimate Love Song, Whoops Vicar, NewsRevue, Ben Murphy…, 29 February 1992

…assassinated Arthur Scargill’s character in the following lyric which ran and ran in NewsRevue in the early 1990s, reproduced here with Brian’s kind permission. I especially like the couplet:

He may not be to everybody’s liking,

But as a union leader…he’s striking.

Anyway, the September 1984 rally was not to be the last of the Students’ Union’s involvement in the miners’ strike, as the issue found its way onto the UGM agenda several times during our year – on at least one occasion with quite incendiary results.

Ashley Fletcher will help me to pick up on that aspect of the story in the coming months, as he has been busy recently (2024) writing up his own memories of the miners’ strike.