Hello, grappling fans

Most of us respond positively to a challenge. I don't mean serious, grown-up challenges such as woodworm in your rafters or your wife running off with the milkman, but life-enhancing challenges such as climbing a mountain or collecting matchbox labels. For some people it is pedalling a bike backwards up a very steep hill, for others it is skiing blindfolded down a precipice or walking from Lands' End to John O'Groats; but for me the challenge has always been satisfying my curiosity. I find the unknown both fascinating and irritating. I need to know and the pursuit of knowing is a pleasure in itself, even if the topic is of zero interest to anyone else but me. And, let's be honest, some of the topics that grip me are pretty obscure. Here's a good example.

For some reason, as I was looking at a newspaper archive recently for mention of a family member, my attention was caught by a row of posters. The photograph may be of limited artistic interest, but what it lacks in creativity it more than makes up for its mystery. There are dates on the posters, but no years. And this is where curiosity (and a little spare time) kicks in. What was the year?

 

Dates themselves can be a useful tool in pinning down the exact year. The wrestling poster features a contest between Mick McManus* and Mick McMichael, which, in itself, isn't much use, as they seem to have fought each other on a weekly basis for more than a decade. But if they wrestled on a Wednesday 13th August it must have been either in 1963, 1969 or 1975. The first of those dates is just too early in the career of Mick McManus for him to have top-billing, the last is after the introduction of decimal currency, and therefore we are left with August 1969. Back in February 1971 the world changed, and that transition from 12/6 to 62.5p provides nerds like me with endless pleasure. We can be pretty certain that the photograph predates decimalisation and 1969 is the year in question. 

Validation of the date comes from the next poster. It shows that the qualifying round of the British Speedway Northern Riders Championship at the Halifax Stadium was on the 9th August. And that is the clincher: the detailed records held on the Official Website of British Speedway confirm that the event took place that night in Halifax in 1969 (Eric Boocock was the winner, by the by).

So, there we have it. A completely pointless exercise and now that it's settled, I'm ready for another challenge. How about rock tumbling?

* A footnote for those who have no idea who Mick McManus was. He was a big star of Saturday afternoon wrestling on ITV, a programme hosted by Kent Walton, whose catchphrase was "Hello, grappling fans". My dad loved the programme.