By Dave Sutherland
A CHAPTER ENDED
It was sometime during the early spring of 2023 that I telephoned Alan Patchett, my friend and one time fellow worker on the vending trays at St James’ Hall, Newcastle upon Tyne for the Saturday night wrestling, over some trivial matter. Going through the usual nebulous conversation starter of asking was he well the result was quite shocking, as he replied that he wasn’t, as he had just been diagnosed with lung cancer. Whatever the intended subject to my phone call was it was soon forgotten as he informed me of the finer details of his diagnosis and the encouraging fact that it had been discovered in the early stages. I promised that I would regularly keep in touch and on one of my subsequent calls he was quite upbeat as the news was that his treatment was working to the extent that his quality of life was improving.
I did call round in September 2023, the day after that year’s Great North Run and found him excellent company for the two or three hours that I could spend with him before departing for Nottingham. Throughout 2024 I contacted him whenever I could, which wasn’t easy as he was spending a lot of time at his daughter’s farm in Ripon which didn’t have a good phone signal, but his normal report was that he had good and bad days. Then at the beginning of September my brother contacted me to say that he had heard that Alan was very poorly, but before I could enquire further I received the telephone call that I was dreading when on 11th September his daughter rang me to say that her dad had passed away that morning.
Our friendship began sometime in 1954 when we both found ourselves at Garnet Infant School, South Shields but our initial meeting was soon to be interrupted by virtue of the fact that we lived opposite ends of a major railway bridge. This meant that he would attend the modern sister school to Garnet Infants, Simonside Juniors, while I was sent to the depressingly archaic Stanhope Road equivalent. It was some four or five years later that we met again in the brand new Brinkburn Secondary School. Soon afterwards my interest in Professional Wrestling was kindled when one of our local cinemas staged an Independent Promotion with The Ghoul versus Sean O’Shea as the headline bout. Patchett being an old hand at the wrestling had, naturally, attended and gave me detailed descriptions of the night’s events. At that same time he was quite a regular attendee at St. James’ so as well as discussing our local football team, South Shields AFC, our conversation centred around wrestling.
Once again education intervened in our friendship as he passed his 13+ and went to South Shields Grammar School for Boys while I trundled on for another year at Brinkburn before going into full time employment in the CWS Offices, Newcastle. Our infrequent meetings were in order to set football or cricket matches against our street teams or for him to try and arrange wrestling promotions me and my friends against his which, fortunately, never took place.
My first foray into the world of live Professional Wrestling was on the night of 23rd November 1963, the night after the assassination of JFK, when I entered St James’ Hall for the first time. The bill that night was Billy Howes v Gwyn Davies, Francis Sullivan v Bob Sweeney, Jim Rawlings v Brian Trevors and Donald Mitchell v Martin Borman; mainly one for the purists but it had a lasting effect on me and the determination to become a regular there.
Then on the train going home I encountered a familiar face; Alan Patchett had been on his weekly visit to the Hall and we fell into earnest discussion over the wrestling all the way home. Naturally with his length of experience watching the sport his appreciation went far beyond the Saturday afternoon TV offerings and he was more inclined to discuss the wrestlers who toured the halls seven nights a week as opposed to the TV stars. I was pleased to learn that we both held Francis Sullivan as our favourite mat man but a bit curious when he sang the praises of Billy Joyce who he described as a “lovely wrestler.” As I grew older and a bit more rational I could accept that you didn’t get to be British Heavyweight Champion for so long without possessing a great deal of skill as well as a decent store of the dark arts!
This was the start of us meeting up at St James’ on a weekly basis; if Newcastle United were at home then I would be at the match in the afternoon while he would be at the family’s pigeon loft. But we would be at the Hall and taking our regular spot in the balcony, and while we were generally quiet and appreciative we did seem to be in the company of a group of wags who could be quite vociferous. Throughout the summer of 1964 this was our routine on a Saturday night and looked to be coasting along until a lad called Rob, who seemed to be the senior among the three guys selling ice cream, peanuts etc singled out Patchett as a likely successor to the chap who had just packed in his job on the trays. The lure of extra cash, plus watching the wrestling for free, proved too much so just before he left school post GCEs he became one of the Hall employees.
As the summer turned into early autumn and I was sitting in the balcony alone now that my other mates had stopped going I was waiting outside the Hall for the doors opening, and reminding myself that Patchett had an important pigeon race that day and wouldn’t be coming. Suddenly a worried looking Rob approached me as neither Alan or the other salesman had arrived and asked me would I do the trays? Like my pal the lure of extra cash won! When I told him the news the next morning when he called at our house he wasn’t best pleased as he thought that he and Rob would have the Hall to themselves. He soon came round to it especially that after a few weeks Rob himself left and we drafted in a young lad called Terry who did downstairs with me while Alan had the balcony all to himself.
The job, once that you got the hang of it, wasn’t too demanding and could realise anything between 6/- and ten bob commission; all pretty lucrative until the lady who ran the shop in the Hall left and Jackie who sold hot dogs moved up to the shop while I inherited the hot dogs which allowed Alan to do downstairs alone (and earn top money) with Terry increasing his earnings in the balcony.
We endured the ups and downs of the job having to deal with stroppy punters, serial bores who wouldn’t allow you to get on with the job, officious officials both on the side of the Hall owners, the promoters and being careful not to antagonise any of the wrestlers who might not be too happy in defeat. On the other hand we did get on with a fair amount of the wrestlers John Cox, Norman/Sid Cooper, Geoff Portz, Henri Pierlot were among those who were friendly and Chic Purvey who also shared an interest in pigeon racing always sought out Alan. We also enjoyed quite an amicable relationship with the management until in the autumn of 1965 a young lady who had deputised for me on the hot dogs while I was on holiday was offered the job permanently (well who would you rather buy your hot dogs from?) and I was dumped back on the trays. By now the Golden Age of Wrestling was waning and earnings were little more than 6/- a week.
We kept at it until the end of the year and into early 1966 at which time Alan had started working in Local Government in Newcastle and he was enjoying his lunchtimes in the renowned Strawberry where we would spend a little of our commission on a Saturday night. It was during one of these sessions that I suspect that our decision to start singing and break into the folk music scene and make our money there. We agreed that as soon as we were established and doing bookings we would pack in the confectionery trays as £5 a gig between us was a lot more that a ten-bob maximum at St James.’
By April 1966 we secured our first gig and I resigned on the spot agreeing to see out a couple more weeks; Alan was going to continue however. It should be pointed out that our first gig was also our last and we soon realised that we had a lot of hard work to do in order just to get to do a couple of songs around the folk clubs and the only way to make a small fortune out of folk music would be to start out with a very large fortune! A few weeks later after Alan had been on holiday he returned to the Hall and he too resigned. We left without any sentiment in May 1966 never to return, although that was due to the fact that less than eighteen months later St James’ Hall was no longer a venue for Boxing or Wrestling.
Although we were no longer working together or singing together we still got together on regular occasions, mainly around the folk clubs or travelling home from work together. Sometimes we would arrange to go to watch South Shields on a Saturday or on the odd occasion just to meet up for a quick pint. A couple of years later I got him involved with the folk club in South Shields with which I was involved and we needed someone with his financial expertise. He had in the meantime gone into the Timber Trade and was moving up to Company Secretary of his firm.
Our friendship continued through the years as we got quite involved with the new South Shields Mariners AFC and we sat as auditors of the Supporters Club. When I got married he was always welcome round our flat and to go out with my wife and I on a Thursday or Saturday night until the bombshell that I was asked by my firm to relocate to Nottingham early 1978. While the friendship might have been broken it was during this time that he met Val and I was his best man when they married in 1979.
Still having family in South Shields we travelled up as often as we could and I would always inform him of my impending visits when we would meet up as two couples or just him and I depending on who was travelling. Quite often the conversations would dwell on the past but once children and grandchildren came along of course there were different subjects to discuss. However there was never a time when the conversation wouldn’t turn to wrestling and he was always excited to learn which wrestler from the Golden Age had been contacted or more realistically which of their children had been contacted. He was an avid reader of Wrestling Heritage and enjoyed reading about all the guys we watched from the balcony on a Saturday night. Unfortunately, I could never persuade him to write to Heritage as I’m sure that his memories would have been valued.
While a few years ago I had the privilege of contributing a few jottings to Wrestling Heritage regarding our life among the wrestling fraternity of the North East of England sadly this is the end of a chapter.
Dave Sutherland
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Wrestling Heritage 