All Our Yesterdays – a monthly look at Harlow in years gone by.

By Ian Beckett

THIS month’s delve into the Harlow Museum’s newspaper archive takes us into the new millennium and looks at the Harlow Star for April 2000 – complete with red top and full colour photographs.

I’m also going to step outside my comfort zone and begin by looking at the sports stories that were hitting the headlines that month.

I used to enjoy reading the Harlow Star. The stories were interesting. The paper had some really good, personable journalists working for them, many of whom were Harlow-born-and-bred, who had a genuine interest in the town and its community.

I would always start with the front page, nothing novel about that, work my way through the top stories, glance at the Births, Deaths and Marriages page, on the off chance that it might refer to someone I knew, have a closer look at the letters page, which were always entertaining, sometime controversial, and often a window into the diversity of views about the good, bad and occasionally ugly aspects of our town.

Next stop would be the What’s On or Entertainment pages, with news, views and reviews of what was happening, or had happened on Harlow’s vibrant theatre, cinema, music and arts scenes; an occasional glance at the Situations Vacant pages and a cursory glance at the small ads and the property pages if I was bored. However, I never deliberately bothered with the sports pages, nor do I recall finding myself there accidently, it just wasn’t my bag.

I have no doubt that sport has played as big a part in the history of the new town of Harlow, as the arts and politics of the town have, and sports news stories covering boxing, swimming, cricket, table tennis, indoor bowls, rugby and football occupy the last 5 pages of the April 13th, 2000 edition of the Star.

Harlow Star – No. 1036 – Thursday, April 13, 2000 “Murray On Italian Job”

The big news story on the back page, “Murray On Italian Job” refers to Church Langley-based, 24-year-old champion lightweight boxer, Steve Murray, who, not for the first time was set to appear on the same bill as boxing ring legend “Iron” Mike Tyson.

Murray had his “first flirt with Tyson mania” in January 2000 when fought in Manchester at the Tyson-Julius Francis mismatch. Harlow Star sports writer Alan Scott explains that “Boxing promotor Frank Warren announced on Tuesday that Murray will once again box on the undercard of a contest headlined by the American former undisputed heavyweight champion.”

Murray told the Star he was really looking forward to appearing on the same bill as Iron Mike again, this time in the somewhat larger 12,000-seater stadium in Milan on 20th May.

“Sam Swims His Way Into Olympic Trials”
Also hitting the headlines of the Star’s Sports pages that week were Harlow Penguins, the town’s “small but effective club where every member counts” based at the Leisurezone.

The big news story focused on 15-year-old club member Sam Blunt from Sawbridgeworth, who had “made the British Olympic Trials after a stunning performance at the Essex County Championships. Harlow Penguins claimed a total of five gold medals, four of which were thanks to Sam, fours silver medals and one bronze at the county event at Fulwell Cross.

Alongside the story of Sam’s extraordinary achievements, a report states, “Penguins pitted against top opponents.” The article explains that at the beginning of April, Harlow Penguins hosted a second-round gala in the Junior Speedo League at the town pool. It reads “Facing stiff competition from five other teams, the Harlow youngsters came fourth at the event on April 2. Erith Swimming Club won it, but the young penguins were by no means disgraced by their high-calibre opponents and recorded some excellent first and second places, including one superb debut swim.” This debut came in the Under-12 50m breaststroke when Rosa Hanscomb, who had never swum a two-length race before, completely outclassed the field with her smooth, strong stroke, winning with an excellent time of 44.69 seconds.

“Rampant Rams Keep League Hopes Alive”
Sports reporter David Rimmer provides a report on a key London Division One rugby match between Harlow and Thurrock. “Harlow started brightly against Thurrock” writes Rimmer, “but could not translate their domination into points.” They took the lead through a Peter Harries penalty before Thurrock replied with one making it 3-3. Then suddenly Harlow sprang to life scoring three tries in five minutes; South African Zane Ansell scoring two, team skipper the other one which Peter Harries converted, giving the hosts a 20-3 lead at half-time.

“After the break” Rimmer writes, “Thurrock gave the Rams a fright as they scored two penalties and a try to make it 20-14.” But Harlow were soon back in control with another try from Zane Ansell, ably converted by Harries, and a further two tries from winger Lee Smith, bringing the final score to Harlow 37 – Thurrock 14. This was an important game for Harlow and “a giant step” towards securing a place in the new league next season.

Things were on the up and up for Harlow’s Rugby Players. Sadly, same could not be said for Harlow’s footballers.

“Defensive slip-ups bring down Hawks”

Harlow Town Football Club’s manager, Ian Allinson was spitting feathers following their 1 – 3 home defeat to Uxbridge. Allinson, who had played professionally for Arsenal, Stoke City and Luton Town, told Harlow Star’s Sports Writer, Alan Scott, that the three goals the Hawks had conceded were “Terrible, terrible goals – all three of them could have been stopped.” This second consecutive home defeat put the Harlow squad in the relegation zone of Ryman League Division One, and an extremely disappointed Allinson said “We can’t keep giving goals away like that. I felt we went back six weeks today in our performance.”

Uxbridge took the lead after three minutes when a corner kick by James Cleary was flicked on and Chris Moore “fired in a bullet header from two yards.” A terrible mistake from Hawks goalkeeper, Darrell Trigg, “gifted the visitors their second” as he “fumbled an easy clearance” allowing Lee Tunnell to pick up the loose ball and score. Uxbridge could have taken their third after 30 minutes when Danny Cowley’s lunge on Tunnell raised cries for a penalty, but the referee waved play on, leaving things at 2 – 0 at half time.

Harlow Town’s lacklustre performance continued into the second half, with Uxbridge’s dominance paying off when Chris Moore claimed his second in the 69th minute. Harlow’s Martin Samuel was brought down in the box by Bamford in the dying minutes of the game, and Samuel “blasted home the spotkick” securing his third penalty in six games. This last-minute consolation was cold comfort for Allinson who might have been partially concerned for his own future. His predecessor as Hawks manager, Eddie McCluskey, had been sacked 5 months earlier, in December, at a corresponding fixture, when Harlow had lost 6 – 0 to the Middlesex side.

In other news – it’s not cricket! The headline of the front page of the Harlow Star, Thursday, April 13, 2000, reads: “Vandals Jeopardise Charity Scheme”. News Editor, Paul Newman, wrote that a new project by Harlow charity Rainbow Service looked in danger of failing before it even started because of nightly attacks by vandals.

The report is accompanied by a photograph labelled “Broken Dreams” showing Rainbow Services project co-ordinator, Sue Ginn, indicating some of the damage caused by these attacks.

The story reveals that Rainbow Services, at the time based at the Latton Bush Centre, planned to use a lottery grant of £91,000 to open a workshop to compliment its furniture recycling project at Prentice Place, Potter Street.

However, a string of incidents of vandalism had smashed every window in the building and wrecked one of a pair of milk floats used for collections and deliveries of furniture. Rainbow Services director, Jackie Sully, told Mr Newman that so much damage had been done that she feared the repair costs would leave the charity without sufficient funds to start the new project. Jackie appealed to residents to be vigilant for vandals and to alert the police if they saw any suspicious activity. Despite this set back there was still a note of optimism and enthusiasm offered up by Mrs Sully who said, “The workshop will offer new skills to volunteers and to people who are unemployed and we can’t wait to get started.”

I don’t know the outcome of that particular project, but I do know that Rainbow Services has gone from strength to strength over that last 25 years, under Jackle Sully’s stewardship, Jemma Mindham who took the reins when Jackie retired, and more recently the sterling leadership of Sharon Summerfield.

Now based at Wych Elm, Rainbow Services work to alleviate the effects of disadvantage, deprivation and social exclusion through imaginative projects that support, enable, and develop people and organisations in the local community. They deliver for the community of Harlow and beyond and they were recently recognised by the High Sheriff of Essex, David Hurst, for their work to improve community safety.

Every Picture Tells A Story
Finally for this month, I’m going to pay tribute to Harlow’s Photojournalists. I use the word “photojournalist” as a mark of respect. Photojournalists tell the story with their pictures. It is both a skill, and an artform. Harlow Star issue 1036, in April 2000, has two stories that rely very much upon the artistic skills of their photojournalists.

The first story “Thomas’s work chosen for Royal Academy exhibition,” features a young Harlow artist having a piece of his artwork, a charcoal life-drawing, selected for exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Former Brays Grove pupil Thomas Jules-Stock had produced his piece whilst attending a workshop run by the Royal Academy as part of an outreach programme.

Never work with animals or children” is an oft used, but often misunderstood quote attributed to the old-time American comedian, WC Fields. Misunderstood because it wasn’t said to warn against the difficulties of working with animals and children, but to warn against the fact that animals and children always steal the show! Either way, most photojournalists don’t get to choose their assignments, and if your editor asks you to trot along to Harlow’s Pet’s Corner it stands to reason you will encounter animals and most likely children too.

The assignment was to cover the launch a new information pack about the Town Park’s animal attraction and the photo shows Mark the llama, under the affectionate care of Pet’s Corner worker Nicola Pavey, and four children from Broadfields Primary School – Loran Norris, Sian Dosell, Jo Owers and Ben Ruffles, and as we often ask in this feature, twenty-five years later, where are they now?

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Next month we go back to the advent of weekly news in Harlow New Town, and we take look at the first edition of the Harlow Citizen on Friday 1st May 1953.

All photos courtesy of the Harlow Star.