This tribute to Ron’s life has been written by his family and it is an honour to read it on their behalf.
We are here today to celebrate the life of a remarkable and much-loved man, Ron Newbold.
Ron was a man of great energy, a ‘do-er’, an active man with a great sense of duty and dedication, to others and especially to his family. He was ever-alert and interested in the world and its workings, almost to the end of his days. And his was a long life, spanning almost a century of amazing change. So, Ron would not want us to be too sad or full of sighs today. He and Iris, his wife of almost 70 years, were a couple who filled their marvellous home in Mapperley Nottingham with laughter, above all things. Laughter and the smell of rock cakes baking.
Ronald Albert Newbold was born in September 1921, into a proud working-class family in Basford, Nottingham. He had an older sister Elsie and younger brother, Dennis. Theirs was a very different world, working class really meant ‘working’ – if you didn’t work, you went hungry. Years later, back from work and sat eating his dinner, Ron would tell his own three children that when he was a boy, tea consisted of bread and butter. And only bread and butter. Young Ron would only see jam put on bread when his sister started work and brought in another wage. So, Ron’s dad, William, instilled into his eldest son a work ethic, one that ran deep. Ron only finally retired when he was 80 and he didn’t like it much, either.
Like many of his generation, Ron left school at 14 (unknown to him then, his future wife Iris was in classes literally across the road from his). He went straight into work at Ashwell’s textile dyeing factory hard, repetitive, physical labour. He was still only in his teens when war broke out. When Ron’s call-up came, it was to the RAF to serve in France and Holland.
Even as a very young man, his quick mind and nimble fingers were suited to technical detail and proper procedure. He was given very suitable roles as a wireless operator, and in training pilots to using the newly invented and vital radar system. His attention to detail, and ability to make anything, meant he was able to assemble a crude radio. The parts were sent to him, in France, by his sister’s husband Cliff, a man working on hush-hush projects back in Blighty. This meant Ron and his comrades were able to listen to the BBC news; Ron remembers everyone crowding around his radio set.
Ron remained someone who never lazily discarded potentially useful items. At home, his garage which he built was noticeably fuller of assorted bits of wood than actual cars. To this day, his daughter Pam puts her feet up on a beautiful wooden table Ron made out of oddments; her elderly cat suns herself on the roof of a custom cat-house Ron built; and hundreds of books are safely stowed on sturdy, hurricane-proof shelves that Ron made and fitted.
Young Ron was in France in the days immediately following the historic D-Day landings. Never given to fanciful over-imaginings, he nonetheless never forgot the haunting sight of dead horses scattered across shattered landscapes there, as he and his comrades pushed back the occupying Nazis. More happily, it was in that strange setting that he first met a man who would become one of his lifelong pals, Harry Orriss.
War service kept Ron on in Holland for a year after VE Day. On his return home in 1946, as England rebuilt itself, Ron began building his own career. His skills saw him impress in his first job as a watch-repairer, then at Culvers Optical, based in Castle Gate, Nottingham. Before too long, he would be setting up his own company, Newbold Brothers, with his sibling Dennis, at first in a back alley in The Meadows and later in Fletcher Gate a bold, ambitious and impressive move in that era, for two young men of their background.
In the infamously cold winter of 1947, there was one bright moment: Ron met Iris Alcock at a Christmas party. The smiling pair spent many a happy evening sitting in the ‘one-and-nines’, soaking up films at the Futurist and the Gaumont. You didn’t watch films on your phone in those days. Nobody had phones! Dates were arranged face-to-face. That sense of honour and respectful agreement abided throughout Iris and Ron’s long marriage which began in June 1949 at St Leodegarius in Basford, Nottingham. Of their 69 years as husband and wife, Iris says she never once saw Ron lose his temper. The only cross word was the crossword in the Daily Telegraph, whose compilers Ron jousted with until he was deep into his 90s.
As they began their long-married life, Ron put all his energies into building a good life for his new wife and family; the Newbolds bought their first and only home, in Mapperley, for £1,200 in 1954. Ron worked, long hard hours, but his interests were always many and various. Indeed, you might even say ‘Mini’ and various. Amazingly, he restored and modified three actual, marvellous Mini cars, from scrap and components, for his three children Philip, Pam and Angela, helped by his friend and neighbour Pete. Needless to say, when these custom specials were complete, they shamed and outdid the standard offerings from Austin and Morris.
There was more: Ron built the patio; the coal house; the double garage with an inspection pit. He installed the house’s central heating - and while doing so managed to put his foot through the lounge ceiling, much to the surprise of Iris and Phil sitting below.
When Ron did stop for a minute, he loved listening to Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Rosemary Clooney, Glenn Miller and classical music. It therefore feels rather fitting at this point of his story for us to pause as we listen to one of those favourites of Ron’s, Frank Sinatra.
He loved the warm and generous comedy of people like Morecambe and Wise, the Two Ronnie’s, and Perry and Croft’s Dad’s Army. Sport was important to both Iris and Ron and not just on TV and the wireless. They followed the Nottingham Panthers at the old ice rink in the city, during the days when the puck would often fly out into the crowd. For many years they were season ticket-holders for Notts County Football Club and Notts Cricket club.
Wherever he went, Ron was kind, even-tempered, calm, measured, to the end he was, in the truest sense, a gentleman. But don’t get the idea that he held no strong views, like any man, there were things he hated as well as loved. And in Ron’s case, he hated onions and fish. And curry, curry especially, after he was forced to eat various, dubious curried items slopped out by RAF cooks during his service years.
More seriously, Ron was passionate about the rights and needs of ordinary, hardworking families. He would lambaste every Prime Minister, of any political hue, especially when he watched Prime Minister’s Questions on TV, politics was something he was fully engaged with into his nineties. Seven decades on from seeing his own father, William, treated shabbily by his bosses, ironically, for working harder than his colleagues, Ron hated injustice; like his work ethic, this feeling was wrapped up in remembrance of his dad’s struggle.
Ron also felt very strongly about sugar. His sweet tooth was keen and almost legendary; when his grown-up children full of the latest medical advice insisted too much sugar might not be a good thing, he stood up strongly for the sweet stuff. Perhaps he remembered the days when a spoonful of strawberry jam seemed an impossible luxury. Perhaps, as an active man, he appreciated sugar’s energy-giving properties. Perhaps he never forgot its magical ability to make even NAAFI tea palatable. The discussion was fun, there was never a sour taste left in the mouth but Ron meant it: no one should dictate how he should behave (or take his tea).
A measured man, with an eye for detail, Ron respected the value of regularity, reliability and routine. At its most happy and domestic level, this meant he made the coal fire each day, and made Iris her first cup of tea every morning of their married life, taking it to her in bed. And the great pragmatist was a romantic at heart: he also bought Iris red carnations on the anniversary of their wedding, the bouquet one bloom greater in number for every year they enjoyed together.
Because enjoy it they did. It is hard to say what ‘the secret’ of a long, happy marriage is; but whatever it is, they had it. Theirs was a true, strong partnership, a golden bond connecting two people, completely dedicated to each other, for 69 laughter-filled, fun-filled, rich and colourful years. For example, Ron’s business was in fact a true family affair: Iris delivered the spectacles Ron made for the opticians dotted around the county, driving the carefully wrought cargo out to wild and woolly parts of Notts like Retford and Kirkby-in-Ashfield.
And of course, as we’ve seen, at the same time Iris and Ron raised a family and were always determined to do the best for their three kids, Philip, Pam and Angela, better known to their mum and dad by the easy, all-inclusive moniker of “PhilPamAnge”. (Looks like it needs a #hashtag!)
Ron helped shape his children into strong, self-willed characters, which sometimes made sparks fly over the years but there was never friction for long. What there was, was deep, unending love, support and understanding, however much the world changed. When Ron’s children, in fact, when anyone thinks or speaks of Ron, the word people offer up, again and again, unprompted and with a smile, is ‘kindness’: simple, decent, genuine and abiding kindness. Ron was a big figure, in every sense, and used all his intelligence and energy to make things better for people, over the course of almost a century. It’s really something to think about, the next time you think your patience is running a bit thin.
This kindness he carried with him to the last, when he moved from Mapperley, after 62 happy years, to a care home. Young staff members there, many born in this century when Ron was already almost 80 responded instinctively to his gentle aura. ‘Ron is lovely,’ they’d say. Ron would be immensely pleased and terribly embarrassed about it too. Natural modesty was another of his many qualities.
Everyone here will miss Ron, his loving family and heartbroken children most of all, of course. Ron wouldn’t like to hear about their sadness today. He’d probably try and do something about it but in his later years, Ron had begun to understand that even he couldn’t fix absolutely everything; and anyway, he’d respect his children’s wish to do it their way, as he always did.
It’s hard to imagine a figure of such vigour, energy and answers ever really being ‘gone’ so let’s not. For many of us, it feels like he is still close, a voice inside telling us to keep thinking, keep going and keep doing. And doing it right.
To the gentlemen among you: next time you’re thinking, ‘Shall I bother with a tie today?’ the answer is ‘Yes’, do so, please. Next time you’re thinking of smashing up a piece of faulty technology, don’t. Be calm. Pick up a screwdriver and take the back off and try and fix it. The next time you think, ‘Oh, I can’t be bothered’, do please be bothered. Being bothered makes for good things that last, like friendships, and marriages, and bookshelves that will stand until the end of recorded time.
And if you ever have a chance to be kind, but you can’t be bothered with all that well, I’d say think again. Ron’s loving kindness is something that will really last, in the hearts and minds of people in here today and out there, too. Despite everything you hear, love and kindness does keep working; it keeps doing good, it makes things better and since Ron spent decades showing us how he thinks that works, the least we can do is try and remember the main points.
As you’ll all know, Ron didn’t like fuss. So, let’s simply say a goodbye for now. We’ll remember you later with a cup of tea just as you liked it: fresh tea leaves, just-boiled water and brewed for exactly 4 minutes. Hopefully served with rock cakes!