| Description | An interview with John GLYNN, a married man with one son, one daughter, who is a retired Assistant Chief Constable, WM, born in Birmingham and now living in Water Orton. John GLYNN’s father was a Clerk/accountant, born in England and his mother a Housewife, gown-shop attendant born in England. In the interview, he talks about …
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I was born in April 1934…. In the district of Small Heath, Birmingham.
Very caring and friendly community. Self-contained. Remembers street bookmaker with affection. Parents fairly poor. House sparsely furnished.
2.55 Catholic household, strong discipline but very loving.
3.26 Reveals mother’s family background. How mother has influenced him.
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53” Father worked for Co-Operative Society, responsible for accounts. Story about shopping at the Co-Op.
2.51 Father was Chairman of the Co-Op. Society Sports. Anecdote about father’s funeral in 1966.
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Continues to describe parents.
1.06 I’ve been enormously fortunate in living in an age, from 1934 onwards, in which there has been tremendous social and technological change….
2.17 If there’s anything today that upsets me more than anything else, it’s the predominance of people who don’t seem to have any basic standards upon which to fall back….
3.01 Story about bombed houses during the Blitz and the attitude towards law and order.
4.12 School days. Strict discipline. There was never any question in those days that one should enjoy learning, that the learning experience should be a pleasure or enjoyable…. Physical punishment was commonplace….. but I’m not aware that it did me any damage, certainly not emotional damage.
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Story about corporal punishment at school.
2.30 Remembers skating on pond with father and the cold winters during the war. The central heating and boilers used to break down and the school would become ice cold. There was never a question of children being sent home. We were marched out to the playground in classes and made to run circuits until our faces were pink and we were nice and sweaty, and therefore were warm enough to go back into the classroom…
4.17 Passed 11+ to go Catholic Grammar School.
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Taught Classics. Describes various teachers. Particular fondness for art master, who had served in the RAF.
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Continues to describe punishments at school, and headmaster whose mere presence was enough to drive any knowledge from your mind.
3.40 I was until recently, a school governor, and was gravely disturbed about standards of discipline, about the manacling of our teachers….
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Discusses religious upbringing. Father born Catholic, mother was a convert and more devout.
Story about Catholic priest who visited the family.
2.30 Describes aspects of Catholic mass.
4.16 I’ve always mourned the passing of the Catholic Mass, as a piece of theatre.
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Story about street confrontations between the Catholics and Non-Catholics at school.
1.20 Difficulty going to confession and explaining adolescent urges. I can’t cheat God ‘cause I know he is listening, but somehow I’ve got to get past this obstacle of the priest.
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Makes analogy of policing and decision making/ Catholic education.
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I left school in 1950 at the age of 16. Good standard of schooling, especially talented at art. Decided to get a job rather than go to university.
2.10 Got a job at James Upton Ltd. 5 year apprenticeship. Printing industry.
4.35 Day release course at Birmingham Arts and Crafts College.
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Contrasts the training he received at work and that of the full-time students.
1.42 Anecdote about first job designing labels for ‘Princes’ products. Big spelling mistake.
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Met wife at work, but social life was limited. At 21, called up to do National Service.
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Recruited to Royal Engineers. Physically and psychologically hard.
3.26 Posted to the School of Military Survey- Printing section. Promoted to Lance Corporal, then to Corporal.
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Continues to discuss experience in military service.
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Returned to Uptons. Technical changes in printing industry.
1.02 Anecdote about dreaming of becoming a policeman. Where I was working I could look out of the window. And I looked out to Barford Street…. And right opposite my window to the other side of the road was Barford Street Police Garage. And in these hours of boredom I used to sit there with my chin in my hand, looking out of the window at lovely, shiny , black police cars…. And I used to hear laughter coming from the garage, the laughter of men’s voices…. I found myself very attracted to the idea of becoming a police officer.
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Went to police training college in 1958. Had to learn the law by rote. Qualified as a constable after 13 weeks. We never walked past an offence…
4.03 Illustrates the type of situations that could be considered as offences.
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Training took place on the streets of Aston at the old Victoria Road Police Station…we were led out by the sergeant down the front steps… we marched in a line along the road for a full ¾ of a mile, behind the sergeant. I well remember it because our particular sergeant was a wonderful old character called George Bowker, and of huge physical proportions, and he’d got a squeaky boot. I’ll carry the memory to my grave….
1.46 Description of police uniform and regular activities.
2.42 I cannot recall a single incident that one could call vicious.There were plenty of fist fights, plenty of pub fights, and that sort of thing, but nothing was vicious about it…
3.34 you were there on your own, no-one to call upon for assistance, apart from your public. They, without exception, would come to your aid if you got out of your depth because you served them on a daily basis….
It was a way of life I loved very dearly…
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I was eventually posted to Erdington…still as a constable.
Anecdote about meeting the Superintendent.
1.53 While I was there in admin. I passed my Sergeant’s exam…. And was selected for assessment for higher police training.
3.10 Spent a year at the police college. General course.
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I was posted to Handsworth Police Station, the C Division… in the early 1960s….
Highlights the cultural differences between the various communities. Thinks the police were sensitive to the issues this raised.
1.16 From a police point of view , although we were criticised heavily for it, and still are to this day, very unfairly criticised for it, the police made, to my certain knowledge, huge efforts, not always successful, but huge efforts. Not only to engage with the immigrant community, but to understand and be sensitive towards their particular culture…
2.08 It would be naïve of me to suggest that there were no people in the police force, as in every other society, who were not racist. They obviously had racist ideas, but they were usually people of low intellect…
Anecdote about a particular policeman who worked hard to forge links between the police and the immigrant community.
3.26 It was a two way problem, because in their home countries, many of these people had learned to distrust the police, their own police, they saw us as an arm of the government and of authority….
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Anecdote about working alongside a black policeman. There was never any question of racism or anything else. Part of that was due to his own efforts to conform with what police life was….
1.06 Life as an Inspector in Birmingham City Police at that time was extremely interesting, especially in the City Centre Division. This is where things tended to happen…I was involved in policing scores of demonstrations…
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I was promoted to the rank of Chief Inspector, F Division, in Kings Heath, in the 1970s…. management of local affairs.
Describes dealing with demonstrations.
45” Stechford National Front demonstration, which had a racial aspect to them. The Nat. Front were renowned for that. Interestingly, the Nat. Front were always perfectly behaved. That was their technique, they incited other people to riot wherever they could….
1.38 Opinion about the Handsworth Riots. Thinks the media coverage was grossly damaging.
1.48 There is no doubt that there were troubles in local communities….(of West Indians) as a group they tended, looking at it from a simplistic point of view, to be happy-go-lucky, pleasure-seeking people, as distinct from hard working people…. These were stereotypes of course…and it did cause friction….
3.30 There are reasons for riots, but they are very often not the reason people attribute to them and they can destroy social judgement….
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Thinks Birmingham people are rather insular when it comes to accepting newcomers.
1.06 I can see black people moving into good quality white estates, being accepted and being happily absorbed into society, for no better reason than they keep the front garden nice…it very often is as simple as that….
1.47 Birmingham people, I’ve found, are a pretty tolerant, good-natured lot. A bit rough round the edges at times…I’ve met very rarely with people who hold a strong resentment against immigrant people, and that includes the police as well.
2.17 Eventually I was fortunate to be promoted to Chief Super-Intendant ….
3.10 Accompanied lower ranks on the beat.
4.00 I’ve known what it’s like to police the touchlines of professional football matches….I bcame to loathe the game of professional football. I loathed the behaviour of the fans…. the fears I had for the safety of my officers….I hate the lawlessness about it.
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Became Chief Super in Coventry. Then moved back to Birmingham because appointed Asst. Chief Constable of West Midlands Police.
Describes the role of Asst. Chief Constable. Not a happy time. Took early retirement.
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Expresses overall value of being in the police force.
1.35 The police are in trouble today, because their senior officers have lost touch with what it’s like to be a policeman on the street….
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Retirement years. Took up painting again. Gave talks at Handsworth Technical College….life’s underachievers…. Society stopped them from achieving it…
3.25 I don’t like the use of the word ‘Brum’….I’m a Birmingham man… and particularly I’ve loved its people…
Memories of the Blitz.
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Irish heritage. My Catholicism became entwined with my readings of philosophy… and I went through a long period of Atheism…a positive Atheism, where I knew what it was like to exist without a belief in God, and it has its benefits because one tends in those circumstances not to be resentful when injustices occur… In brief I’ve got Catholicism in perspective…
Story about guardian angel as a child.
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Happily married and parents of 2 adopted children, who now have children of their own.
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Story about being evacuated during the Blitz.
ENDS |