Members of the St Luke’s 1st West Hartlepool Boys’ Brigade – from the early 1960s – were asked to get in touch to renew old friendships and reminisce about “the good old days”.
Some 19 old friends, their ages ranging from 69 to 89, met in Hartlepool Cricket Club and enjoyed an evening of shared nostalgia, recapturing the friendships formed all those years ago.
Former member Alan Turnbull, who compiles Hartlepool Life’s “Quiz Life with Alan” feature, got the old gang back together.
He said: “We combined the bittersweet joy of fond, cherished memories with the slight sadness of realising that those happy moments are long past, as are a number of our dear old friends from those times.
“We reflected on the absolute privilege of Boys’ Brigade membership we felt we had all received and the genuine benefits of the Brigade’s ethos – the promotion of habits of obedience, reverence, discipline, respect for oneself and others, and all that tends towards a true Christian manliness.”
He added: “In our enjoyment of such a brilliant evening, our first reunion in 65 years, we all raised a glass to ‘absent friends’ and committed to repeat the exercise, though not to leave it so long until the next one.”
