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Thanks for all your votes in The People's £50
Million Lottery Giveaway.
A disappointing result for the Black Country, but we must wish Sustrans
all the best for winning and hope they spend the money wisely. Thanks
to everyone who voted for us. Also, our thanks to the organisers of
the Black Country bid for their very hard work throughout the campaign.
From Riches to Rags
Geoff
Hill's autobiography describes his rise from a small terrace house
in the back streets of the heavily industrialised Black Country town
of Brierley Hill in the late 1920's, to the running of a highly successful
retail electrical store. This was followed on retirement by his going
back to rags - or the rag trade - when he used his business experience
to open a chain of charity shops for a local hospice which raised
over £1 million in the first ten years. Hence the "From
Riches to Rags". In Geoff's early days he easily obtained a scholarship
for King Edwards V1 school in Stourbridge, but received permission
to leave at fifteen to help support the family income and to further
his passion for cycle racing.
Geoff's working life was composed of some 15 very different
jobs, and then several very different businesses. After working at
the stores at a sanatorium and as an accountant doing audit work he
then acquired a job in a racing cycle shop at Wolverhampton when he
became "British under eighteen Cycling Champion". He also
became the first semi professional road racing cyclist competing in
Britain's first multistage massed start road race from Brighton to
Glasgow. A stint as a "Bevin Boy" down the pit caused permanent
damage to his lower back and a premature end to his cycling career.
However he bounced back with a bewildering variety of jobs, from office
work, supervising a chain of industrial canteens, door to door selling
Betteraware, then Encyclopaedia Britannica and typewriters and office
equipment, followed by a sales and service job with Hoover.
His businesses started with a grocery shop on the riverside
at Bewdley, then tenancy landlord of a large country pub, he even
sold miniature gnomes and brass items around the seaside resorts in
Devon. Finally after opening and running shops for a Kidderminster
electrical retailer, Geoff started his own electrical store in 1960.
From humble beginnings in a small £3 per week shop, in a nondescript
shopping area near Stourbridge he built it up to have the highest
turnover of all sixty stores in the Birmingham and Black Country buying
group that he'd joined. Since retiring, Geoff has wanted to put something
back into the local community and evolved an endless medley of fundraising
events. Notable of these was the hospice lottery, which also raised
£1 million, this time in just 6 years. Ten years ago he started
the "Geoff Hill Charitable Trust" with 10% of his company's
annual profit and now over 600 local needy causes and charities have
received financial assistance. Also he recounts the unbelievable response
of the public in the heart rendering "Robert Parson's Story"
and Geoff and Sue's four visits to Buckingham Palace. He is still
a director of several other charities and although aged 80 in 2007
he still keeps as busy as ever.
Geoff intends to buy the first thousand
copies himself so 100% of the profit will be going to the six local
charities, which are Sunfield Childrens Home at Clent, Stourbridge
Age Concern, Mary Stevens Hospice at Stourbridge, Dudley Hope (a charity
that helps deprived and ill children in our locality) Leukaemia unit
at Russells Hall hospital and Action Heart. After
these books are sold then all the profit and royalties will go into
the Geoff Hill Charitable Trust where all disbursements
are made out constantly, mainly in our locality and usually helping
smaller charities that sometimes get overlooked.
On the subject of Chance
Glassworks, David Encill is writing a book on the subject. Please
visit the page, there is a 1932 advert relating to the subject, as
well as a request for information.

Launched on 7th April 2006 "Foul Deeds and Suspicious Deaths
Around the Black Country". Written by myself (Mike Pearson) and
former Blackcountryman editor David Cox. The book is being distributed
by the Black Country Society. Stan Hill will review the book for the
Summer issue. I am aware that the release to outlets such as Waterstones
and WH Smith will take place on 18th May 2006. The book is available
from the publishers Wharncliffe Books (www.pen-and-sword.co.uk). It
is also available from Amazon.co.uk on the Internet.
New to the site, but familiar to those who read the
magazine is John Taplin's labour of love "Shakespeare's
Granddaughter and the Bagley's of Dudley". A lengthy and
well-researched document. With 136 references; genealogies and photographs
this piece deserves careful reading. I hope you appreciate the depth
John has gone to when producing this article and you find it as illuminating
as I did
New to the Internet is Podcasting - Internet radio that is downloaded
and listened to off-line. The Black Country has it's own "station"
at www.blackcountrypodcasting.com
so go and have a listen. It is a weekly programme and is devoted
to the black Country, what's more it is free. |
New on the website an article from issue 38/4 - with extra
pictures. The article is by Pat Talbot and is titled "A
Hole in the Ground Where a Hole Don't Belong" . Also a piece
about Black Country radical poet John
Cornfield with some addiitonal information - thanks to Paul McDonald
for the article and Alison Gale for the additional material.
New to the site- the Blackcountryman
index is now contained within the main site, Bob
Hart and a different view of how coal was formed. The search page
is now running - both to search this site and the Internet in general.
The link is on the left of this and every page on the site. The book
review page has been updated with material from the Winter issue.
Finally, the first part of my series of articles on researching your
family
history. More entries have been added to the Dudley
Mayors page, and a couple of surname
entries have been added.
I have received the following via email from Stanley Holland:
"In case you have not heard about it, I thought I would let you
know about the continuing story of a historic coal hopper alongside
the Old Main Line of the Birmingham to Wolverhampton Canal in Smethwick.
Back in 2001, there was news that Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council
had applied for funding that would permit the restoration of this large
concrete structure, along with other work. This news was reported in
the waterways press, and it was therefore with great surprise and a
sense of shock that readers realised that British Waterways had issued
a Stoppage
Notice on this length of canal so that the hopper could be demolished
on the grounds that it was unsafe.
In response to complaints, BW convened a hastily-called meeting, which,
owing to the shortness of the notice, was only attended by four people
who were by no means representative of users and other people likely
to be interested. A stay of execution was put on the demolition, and
there was a further meeting in Birmingham on last Tuesday afternoon,
11th April.
It is the last remaining significant reminder of coal mining in the
Smethwick area, and there is no other like it in the whole country".
Anyone who would like to know more about this subject and would like
me to pass on any message or contact details to Stanley please email
me.
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