Timeline

1947

Born in Middlesbrough, an industrial frontier town four miles from the working class town of South Bank, once a small ironworks town where my father came into this world and left this world.

1960 - 1968

Survived disturbing times at home and during the first few reckless years after leaving home at the age of sixteen.

1968 - 1972

Middlesbrough College of Art by the back door. Acquired a passion for photography and, with almost a lifetime of selfless help from my wife Joyce, was guided well away from what otherwise may have been a desperate future.

1972 - 1974

Royal College of Art, London, with help from my close friend, David Mulholland, painter and pub dependant, who was also known in later years as Dying Dave until sadly, his colourful life ended a few pints short of closing time. I will not forget his influence on my work, therefore my life.

1974 - 1981

Sixth and last founding member to join Amber films, an independent film and photographic group whose philosophy was to document working class culture, my culture. Recently deceased Murray Martin, originator of Amber, showed me an alternative way of life, one that I have lived ever since. I thanked him some years ago for his influence on my life, therefore my work.

1981 - 1990

With a sense of urgency and often a disregard for my wife and children, I continued photographing in Middlesbrough and South Bank, nowhere else. Early 1988, I accepted an invitation by Bill Buford, editor of Granta. The published piece later that year was titled 'The Pub' and ended with a paradox touching on why I photographed for more than twenty years in the steelworks, streets, but mostly in the pubs of two small communities four miles apart. - 'The truth might be that the camera is just an extension of my drinking arm.' - Two years later, taking such photographs stopped.

1990 - 2009

Working with and writing about years of pictures, of memory, has become a priority, a natural progression in my now sober obsession to understand more the values I live by.