Chapter 5. Karate, an alternative story.
The ugly face of violence in an industrial midland town.
photo by Edu Lauton on Unsplash
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In this chapter:
Fight training.
The dark and nasty side of Mansfield’s nightlife (and tragic violent deaths).
My own unavoidable encounters with brutal assaults.
Lifestyle issues.
Sparring workshops
By the end of 1976 and into 1977 I had rattled through the brown belt grades; with only that one small stumble, but I had picked myself up by my bootstraps sufficiently for Sakagami Sensei to award me with second class passes in my licence; I was on a roll, all good preparation for Dan grade.
Add to that the atmosphere at the club; everything was still buzzing; beginners were still packing through the doors and the seniors were ramping up the training. We’d taken to doing an unofficial Saturday afternoon training session; this was Rocky Ainsworth’s initiative, young Dave was involved, Mick Morrison, Geoff Fisher and others who dropped in. It was a lot of stretching and exercises, then some work with loose weights followed by a run and ending with a lot of sparring. I think we felt a need to do this as the club was getting too crowded, we were training before class and after class and also taking on some teaching responsibilities.
I seemed to spend all my waking hours at the Dojo on Westhill Drive Mansfield; I am sure it was not the case but it certainly felt like it. I often wondered what the casual passer-by would have thought seeing the lights on at all hours and people trooping in and out. There were classes and informal training going on seven days a week.
Urban violence.
For me there was always the long walk home; which wasn’t without its hazards. This was the A60 going north, (Woodhouse Road or Mansfield Road depending on which end you were on). An unremarkable stretch of urban banality, a nowhereland populated by dentist surgeries, seedy B&B’s with the occasional residential homes which were set back behind overgrown ‘mature’ gardens and out-of-control shrubberies.
At a later date somebody dubbed this same stretch ‘murder mile’ even though it was more than a mile it did have couple of tragic incidents happen along its length during those years.
It was on that particular route in January of 1976, a teenage girl, someone I vaguely knew at school, was stabbed by a sixteen year old boy who propositioned her, mistakenly assuming she was a prostitute. She was left to bleed to death slumped in a shop doorway. Passers-by just thought she was drunk and walked on, unaware of the fact that her life was ebbing away. All so very tragic.