Nigel Mansell
Formula One motor racing is one of the fastest, most exciting and dangerous sports on the planet, requiring drivers with lightning-fast reactions, nerves of steel and boundless energy. So it came as something of a surprise when the Formula One racing scene in the 1980s was challenged by a newcomer in the shape of Nigel Mansell, whose famous Brummie monotone led to him being described by some as the most boring man in sport. Even reviewers of his autobiography complained that Mansell had managed to turn an exciting story into an incredibly dull read.
Whenever Mansell was interviewed outside of his racing car, his droopy moustache, caterpillar eyebrows and dreary voice gave the impression of a down-trodden, slow-moving man that you would never in a million years expect to be a racing driver. But once kitted up and strapped into his car, Mansell transformed into a highly competitive and determined racing driver with a killer instinct and a taste for victory.
In fact, he was so competitive and determined that when his Lotus broke down at the end of the 1984 Dallas Grand Prix, just a few hundred yards from the finish line, Mansell sprung out of the car and began to push it hoping to still score a championship point for a sixth place finish. Unfortunately, the race was one of the hottest on record and, having already endured two hours of racing in temperatures of around 104°F, Mansell fainted some way short of the finish line.
Nigel Mansell’s Formula One racing career spanned fifteen seasons and his prowess on the track made him the most successful British Formula One driver of all time: he claimed a total of thirty-one victories and set the record for the most pole positions secured in a single season. He became Britain’s highest paid sportsman and Sports Personality of the Year 1986, and was also the only person ever to become the Formula One World Champion and the Indy Car World Champion simultaneously.
Margaret Thatcher
Born in 1925, the daughter of a grocer, Margaret Thatcher was Britain’s first female prime minister and served three terms in office between 1979 and 1990. Her controversial political philosophy emphasised deregulation, flexible labour markets, reform of the trade unions, privatisation of state-owned utilities and industries, and reduced social expenditure, but while her policies successfully reduced inflation, unemployment increased at an alarming rate.
A decline in popularity in the early 1980s was inevitable amid the backdrop of recession and growing unemployment, but signs of economic recovery and her handling of the 1982 Falklands War resulted in a resurgence of support from the public which contributed to her re-election in 1983.
Appropriately nicknamed ‘the Iron Lady’, Margaret Thatcher was clearly a force to be reckoned with and thanks to her sharp tongue, sizeable shoulder pads and no-nonsense attitude, she comfortably stood her ground in the male-dominated world of politics. She was so tough, in fact, that she seemed to be virtually indestructible, surviving on just four hours of sleep per night and staying awake for the entire three months of the Falklands War, with only twenty-minute catnaps and plenty of whisky to keep her going. She even survived an assassination attempt in 1984 when the IRA planted a bomb at the Grand Hotel in Brighton where she was staying for a conference. The bomb detonated in a nearby room killing five people but leaving Mrs Thatcher and her husband unscathed.
Mrs Thatcher was re-elected for a third term in 1987, but her hard-line implementation of the new Community Charge or ‘Poll Tax’ seriously damaged her popularity with the general public and her views on the European Community led to serious dissension within her cabinet. Following the resignation of the deputy prime minister, Geoffrey Howe, over Mrs Thatcher’s refusal to give a timetable for Britain to join the European single currency, a challenge for the leadership of the Conservative Party was mounted by Michael Heseltine, which resulted in a ballot attracting sufficient support to threaten Mrs Thatcher’s premiership.
Margaret Thatcher in 1981 returning from a visit to the United States. (Public Domain)
On 28 November 1990 a tearful Margaret Thatcher left 10 Downing Street for the last time and made a dignified speech thanking all her staff and wishing John Major ‘all the luck in the world’ as the new prime minister. Behind the scenes she was devastated and felt betrayed by her cabinet, but she immediately continued with her political career as a backbench MP for Finchley.
Kenny Everett
Controversial? Certainly. Loose cannon? Definitely. Kenny Everett was, without doubt, one of the most dangerous and risqué entertainers of the 1980s with a no-holds-barred approach to comedy and a notoriously unpredictable manner. Having been dismissed from Radio London for his outspoken criticism of their religious programming, he moved to Radio One and was dismissed again after making a joke about the British Transport Minister bribing her driving test examiner. He still did not learn his lesson and Kenny was dismissed a third time from Radio 2 after making a rude joke about Margaret Thatcher.
After making something of a name for himself in the world of radio, Kenny was offered his own television show in the late seventies called The Kenny Everett Video Show. This programme introduced us to some of his more memorable characters, including ageing rock star Sid Snot, pervy Frenchman Marcel Wave, and Angry of Mayfair, a middle-class city gent who would complain about the risqué content of the show before turning his back and storming off, only to reveal that he was wearing women’s underwear as the back half of his suit was missing.
Kenny moved to the BBC in 1981 and created The Kenny Everett Television Show which ran for seven years. For this show he included some variations of his old characters plus a number of entirely new characters, including one of his most famous creations, an American B-movie actress called Cupid, whose name was a rude spoonerism that I cannot repeat in full. Cupid had inflatable breasts, made no attempt to hide her beard and would cross her legs with a high kick to ensure her knickers were flashed to comic effect.
Everett’s risqué style and track record made him a dangerous guest for live television and poor old Russell Harty was clearly nervous on his live chat show when Kenny began telling a dirty poem about a boy ‘eating red hot scallops’. Fortunately, Kenny stopped at the crucial point but resumed the poem in the last moments of the show and, as the credits started to roll, shouted out the obscene conclusion.
Despite his reputation, a bizarre set of circumstances resulted in Kenny delivering a ‘speech’ at the 1983 Conservative Party Conference, wearing his trademark giant foam pointing hands. He shouted to the assembled crowds, ‘Let’s bomb Russia!’ and ‘Let’s kick Michael Foot’s stick away!’, to which he received huge cheers from the audience. Everett then posed for photographs with a beaming Margaret Thatcher while still wearing his giant foam hands.
And what better way could there possibly be to close the chapter than with this surreal image in mind?
Eight
WORLD EVENTS
Thanks to John Craven’s Newsround, I’ve got a pretty good recollection of all the major events that happened around the world in the 1980s. The daily, child-friendly news reports kept me up to date with all the most important happenings from around the globe and explained them to me in a way that was simple to understand without being patronising. Newsround was the first British television programme to report the loss of the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1986 and was the first to report the assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II in 1981. But as well as reporting on the tragedies, famines, wars and terrorism, Newsround showed us that good things were happening, too, and making the world a better place. Newsround told us about the fall of the Berlin Wall, the royal wedding between Prince Charles and Lady Diana, the World Land Speed Record attempt by Richard Noble and, for some reason, told us a disproportionately large amount about pandas.
Taking my cue from John Craven and the Newsround team, I have put together a selection of both the good news and the bad news that I remember from the eighties.
The Great Storm of 1987
Poor old Michael Fish – he’s never going to live this one down, is he? On the evenin
g of 15 October 1987 the nation watched Michael Fish deliver a reassuring weather forecast with the opening remark: ‘Earlier on today, apparently, a woman rang the BBC and said she heard there was a hurricane on the way; well, if you’re watching, don’t worry, there isn’t.’
Just a few hours later, Britain was ravaged by the worst storm in nearly 300 years, claiming the lives of at least eighteen people, causing an estimated £7.3 billion worth of damage and serving up a large portion of egg on Michael Fish’s face. While the storm wasn’t technically a hurricane, it certainly had winds of hurricane intensity, with speeds of up to 134mph recorded at its peak.
I remember going to bed that evening and hearing the roof tiles lifting off the roof, the howling of violent winds and the crashing of objects being hurled around outside. The storm continued through the night and in the morning the full extent of the damage was evident. Our house remained largely intact with just a few roof tiles missing, but the garden was decimated with plants flattened and the fences blown down. Nearby, large swathes of trees had been uprooted and the streets were littered with debris. Across the country an estimated 15 million trees were flattened and many cars were crushed by falling branches. Boats were wrecked and run aground, the rail network ground to a halt and electricity supplies were cut off to several hundred thousand people.
The aftermath of the 1987 ‘Great Storm’. Scenes like this covered much of Britain the following morning. (Courtesy of David Wright/Geograph project)
It took some weeks before everything returned to normal but the evidence of the storm can still be seen today in many forests where fallen trees continue to litter the landscape.
Black Monday
Just three days after the Great Storm had abated, an enormous international stock market crash occurred, hitting Hong Kong first then spreading to Europe and eventually the USA. In a very short space of time, the UK stock market fell 26.45 per cent which, although severe, was nothing compared to Hong Kong’s 45.5 per cent crash and New Zealand’s 60 per cent drop. Black Monday heralded the largest one-day percentage decline ever in the Dow Jones.
I won’t attempt to explain the causes of the crash beyond saying that it was most likely caused by something called ‘program trading’, where computers perform rapid stock executions based on external inputs, such as the price of related securities, and the scale of the crash was escalated by mass panic. I don’t pretend to understand the intricacies of the stock market, but I do know that a lot of people lost a lot of money that day, a few people made a lot of money and the repercussions were felt for years to come.
Harrods Bombing
On 17 December 1983 a car bomb exploded outside the Harrods department store in central London, killing six people and injuring ninety others. The bomb contained around 30lb of explosives and was left in a 1972 blue Austin 1300 parked outside the side entrance of Harrods, on Hans Crescent, and was set with a forty-minute timer. At 12:44 a coded warning was given but it took over half an hour for police to arrive on the scene and tragically the bomb detonated just as the police officers approached the car. Three of the officers were killed, along with three passers-by, and ninety other people were injured.
My wife was in London on that fateful day, Christmas shopping with her parents and sister, and they had been into Harrods just a couple of hours previously. After stopping for lunch nearby, they decided to return to Harrods to buy something they had seen earlier. As they walked back along Brompton Road towards the store, they saw a police van speed past and commented to each other on the festive tinsel adorning the radio aerial. Minutes later, as they stood opposite the department store, they heard a tremendous ‘dead’ bang followed by a moment of shocked silence before people began screaming and running from the scene. It wasn’t until later that my wife, aged just 10 at the time, discovered that three of those policemen she had seen race past in their festively decorated van had been killed in the blast.
On every previous visit to London, my wife and her family had always parked their car right outside Harrods in the exact same spot where the bomb had exploded, but on this occasion my wife’s mother, a born-again Christian, had said she strongly felt the Lord was telling her not to park there. Not knowing the reason why, but being obedient to their faith, they parked near Hyde Park instead and were spared the disastrous consequences.
Fall of the Berlin Wall
I remember being delighted when the news reports showed the first images of East and West German citizens joining forces to tear down the Berlin Wall in November 1989. As a 12-year-old child I had no real idea what the Berlin Wall was, why it was there, and why it was being torn down, but everyone else seemed to be excited about it so I joined in the celebration.
It wasn’t until some time later that I learned the Berlin Wall had been erected in 1961 as a way to completely separate the German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany) from the reputedly fascist elements of West Germany. In reality, the wall served to prevent the mass emigration and defection that had seen over 3.5 million East Germans flee into West Berlin during the post-Second World War period.
The tall concrete wall was 96 miles long and heavily guarded with over 300 watchtowers and bunkers; along with the much longer Inner German Border, the wall came to symbolise the Iron Curtain that separated Western Europe and the Eastern bloc during the cold war.
The fall of the Berlin Wall, November 1989. An East German guard speaks to a West German through a broken seam in the wall. (Courtesy of Sharon Emerson/Wikimedia Commons)
In 1989 a series of radical political changes occurred in the Eastern bloc and after several weeks of civil unrest, the East German government finally announced that all GDR citizens were free to visit West Germany. Crowds of ecstatic East Germans climbed onto the wall and crossed over, joined by West Germans on the other side, and members of the public began to chip away parts of the wall with hammers. The governments later removed most of the rest of the wall and within the space of a year German reunification was formally concluded on 3 October 1990.
Live Aid
It is impossible to forget those haunting images of the starving Ethiopian people reported on BBC News by Michael Buerk in 1984. The devastating Ethiopian famine was claiming the lives of hundreds of thousands of men, women and children and many people felt moved to do something to help alleviate the suffering.
Boomtown Rats singer Bob Geldof was one of those people moved by the news reports and after calling in support from Ultravox front man Midge Ure, the pair penned the now-famous song Do They Know It’s Christmas?. Geldof created a group called Band Aid to record the track which featured many of the most popular British and Irish musicians of the time and when the single was released it shot to number one in the charts, where it stayed for five weeks, generating around £8 million for Ethiopian famine relief.
Following the success of the Band Aid single, Geldof conceived the idea of staging an enormous concert with all the biggest acts in the music business at the time. Although faced with numerous, seemingly impossible obstacles to staging a concert of this magnitude, Geldof managed to persuade dozens of acts to perform for free, and he arranged a live television broadcast that was watched by an estimated 1.9 billion people around the world.
Live Aid at JFK Stadium, Philadelphia, 1985. (Courtesy of Squelle/Wikimedia Commons)
Two concerts were held simultaneously on 13 July 1985, one in Wembley Stadium and the other in the JFK Stadium in Philadelphia. Phil Collins famously performed at both concerts: starting with a gig at Wembley, he was then flown to Heathrow airport by Noel Edmonds in his helicopter to board Concorde. Thanks to the supersonic passenger jet, Collins crossed the Atlantic in time to perform at the Philadelphia concert as well.
Throughout the concerts, television viewers were urged to donate money via the Live Aid phone lines and seven hours into the concert, Geldof asked how much money had been raised. The answer was £1.2 million which reportedly disappointed and angered him and led to him marching to the BBC commentary b
ox to make an appeal. Here he was interviewed by BBC presenter David Hepworth, who attempted to provide a list of addresses to which cheques could be sent, but the passionate Geldof interrupted him in mid-flow and shouted, ‘F**k the address, let’s get the numbers!’
By the time Live Aid was concluded, around £150 million had been raised and Geldof received an honorary knighthood for his efforts.
Blue Peter Garden Vandalised
In November 1983 children across the UK sat and watched Blue Peter in cross-legged horror as Janet Ellis mournfully confirmed that vandals had broken into the Blue Peter garden and wrought terrible destruction. When you consider the magnitude of some of the tragedies that occurred in the eighties, you would be forgiven for thinking that the vandalism of the Blue Peter garden was relatively inconsequential, but for the children of our nation this was a tragedy that was very personal to them and was one for which they felt a sense of real outrage.
The vandals, who remain unidentified to this day, broke into the Blue Peter compound at Television Centre and smashed the ornamental urn (given to them by Mrs Taylor from Barnett, apparently) and callously threw the sundial into the fish pond, along with some fuel oil which killed a number of the fish. As if that wasn’t enough, they also trampled on the bedding plants and tipped over a garden bench.
A 1980s Childhood Page 12