Soon after my thirteenth birthday, I had earned enough money from a paper round to buy my first bike. It was to change my life ...
I bought a Bike Soon after my thirteenth birthday, I got a job as a paper boy in my native village of Wymeswold in Leicestershire. I was paid twelve shillings a week (60 pence). I worked for about three quarters of an hour in the morning and half an hour in the evening, six days a week. I saved most of the money and the following year I bought a new bike. A Raleigh would have cost over £15. My Uncle George was a blacksmith and had dealings with a firm called Pells of Peterborough, who made bikes. He managed to get me a bike called a Pello at trade price - £13.14 shillings. It was basically a Hercules bike with Pello stamped on it. It was a solid “sit up and beg” touring bike. I applied to go to University If it had been suggested to me at the age of 14 that I would have to go to university, I would have been horrified. I was a shy little boy (hardly big enough to carry the newspaper bag) and I had hardly been out of the area between Loughborough and Nottingham, apart from two trips a year to see my grandparents in Skegness. The thought of living away from home did not appeal to me in the slightest. Only two boys from the village had ever been to University and I didn’t find out about one of them until sixty years later!
I [JM3] was at Loughborough Grammar School. The expectation there was that most boys in the ‘A’ stream, where I was, would go to University. It was no big deal, there: that was what people did. So I drifted into the sixth form. After that, the only questions were: can you get into Oxford? If not, which lesser university can you get into?
In late 1957 I spent a couple of interesting days at Oxford, mixing with posh boys from Winchester and other public schools and having interviews at New College and Worcester College. I remember one of the janitors saying to a colleague how young I looked. This was true anyway, but the whole intake was two years younger than had been the tradition. Unlike most other universities, Oxford and Cambridge had insisted that male students did their National Service before they went to University. However, those, like me, who were born after 30th September 1939 were no longer required to do National Service. (I was born 34 days after that date!) The consequence was that there were two or three times more candidates for Oxford and Cambridge at that time. I didn’t get in!
Lawrence Jackson was vicar of Wymeswold at that time. My father was his churchwarden. Trinity College, Cambridge, owned most of the land in the village and were patrons of the church. Lawrence suggested to me that he might be able to get me into Trinity College, if I wanted to study theology. I declined – I was terrified at the thought of standing up in front of the congregation twice a week delivering a sermon. (My father told me many years later that Lawrence had expressed relief that I didn’t get into Oxford, presumably because he thought I would be out of my depth socially.)
There was no university clearing system in those days. So, we had to apply to each university individually. We were advised to apply to seven. Colin Tivey, the head of French at Loughborough, called a meeting of the six or seven of us, who were thinking of reading French, one day. He said that King’s College, London, and Manchester were the best places for French. Perry and Stevenson should put down King’s College as their first choice and Mackley and Murray should put down Manchester. I wasn’t at all unhappy about that because my father had a cousin who lived in Manchester and I had been to stay with them when I was sixteen. I think Perry did go to King’s. Stevenson went to Leeds and Mackley and Murray went to Manchester.
I don’t remember all the universities I applied to, but I do remember that I applied to Manchester, King’s, Leeds, Newcastle and Hull. I had an interview at King’s, but wasn’t offered a place. I told myself that they were miffed because I had chosen Manchester above them. I also had an interview at Leeds with a German professor or lecturer. I had applied to read Modern Languages (French and German) there. They said they would accept me for French, but not German. In February 1958, I sat an examination (at school) for a Scholarship at Manchester University. I was offered a place at Manchester in the School of French Studies, without interview. So, the first time I set foot in Manchester University was when I arrived as a Fresher in the autumn of 1958.
Continue to Part 2: The University Years
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