1974

Graham's house was down the hill for the Horse and Jockey. So we gathered there first for a few drinks. Not all of us were yet eighteen, but in any case we had got used to going into pubs by then. The Zetland, in town opposite the Poly, was where we normally met. It was a cellar bar and all the young things from Huddersfield gathered there on Friday nights to meet up with friends or chat up girls. Not tonight though. Tonight we had gone out to Lindley for a party.

1974 was a year rather like this year. We had had a general election which, by the way, had politicised many of us. Ted Heath had called it in the hope of gaining a stronger majority, banking on public sympathy for the government against the unions. Anyway it backfired with the result that we had a hung parliament. Only this time it was a Labour Prime Minister, with the Liberals propping him up. I couldn't vote yet, but some of my friends did. The sixth form common room had been a hotbed of political debate.

It was also a world cup year. England had failed before it even got going, they hadn't qualified. Holland lost in the final, this time to West Germany, the hosts. The team of Johan Cruyff and total football fluffed their lines in the last game, and missed their place in history.

1974 was also the year when streaking first came to public attention, as it were. Who can remember Michael O'Brien? No? Well he was the first known streaker at a major sporting event when on April 20, 1974, he ran out naked onto the ground of an England vs. France game at Twickenham. You think it was Erica Roe, but she wasn't until 1982 and it was against Australia at cricket.

The Bay City Rollers had four songs in the charts, along with Marc Boland, David Bowie, The Chi-Lites, Cockney Rebel, Eric Clapton, Showaddywaddy and so many others. These were the soundtrack of our sixth form and of our youth. We danced to them every Friday night at the Tennis Club disco.

Tonight was to mark the end of that carefree life, the end of school. So we were out to enjoy it, and to make it last as long as possible. Everyone who was anyone was there, except I don't remember Maria being there. Soon we would be doing summer jobs, then dispersing to universities, and although we would pledge to be friends for ever, it didn't happen like that.