Citizens of the Year

It was my privilege to present the club's 'Citizen of the Year' award at our latest meeting.  We'd invited the recipients along to the meeting as our guests but hadn't divulged the accolade we where to bestow upon them.

I felt a  little like the late Eamonn Andrews with his famous big red book when I declared to our guests, Eric and Doreen Allcock that we'd invited them along under false pretenses and that the real purpose of their invitation was to present to them our 'Citizen of the Year' award in recognition of their tremendous and self-less devotion to service in our local community through the Hucknall & Linby branch of the St John’s Ambulance organisation.

Eric’s involvement began in 1964 when he was assigned to St. Johns for training whilst commencing work at Linby Pit.  The following year, he travelled to London, and was on duty for St John’s at the State Funeral of Sir Winston Churchill.  It was also through the St John’s organisation that Eric and Doreen met.  Together, they spearheaded a successful appeal to raise £ 50,000 to fund an ambulance for the Hucknall & Linby branch and have been on duty whenever a local event or activity has needed the first aid services of St. Johns.