Fownhope’s Heart of Oak Society traces its roots to the age of friendly societies, when communities provided their own safety net. Its anniversary celebrations reveal a tradition still very much alive, says MARK SEDDON
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It is 1969. The young single mum from Leicester was struggling at the bus stop with her three toddlers. Only one, aged five, is old enough to need a ticket and Mum is busy instructing him. “If the conductor asks how old you are, tell him you’re four.”
With just 11 pence in her purse, Mum has enough for her fare into town to join the long fight to collect her dole money, but not the boy’s half fare. When the conductor arrives the lad looks at mum and asks: “Mum, am I four or five?”
That young Leicester mum, eldest of five sisters, left school at 15 destined for dead-end jobs in the town’s hosiery factories, a petrol station or packing fish fingers for Birds Eye.
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