As I recall...how it all began...
Well there we all were sat there in the Station
Hotel in Castleford in the county of West Yorkshire, and it was the Wednesday quiz night in the summer of 1991 as I tend
to remember. There were six of us sat round that table: myself (Simon Curtis - the Official), the Archbishop himself
Harry Sledmore, Harry "can't read me own writing" Beevers the cleverest blind chap you'll ever meet,
the Dude of course, David Woodward, colloquially known as Diddy, and my best mate Shaun Flanagan. We were in a mood
for foundling behaviour.
It was the Wednesday quiz night, set by that master of disaster, the Gadge-Dude himself aka Steven Scott esq, and
not content with having handed out a further thrashing to those who became the Junction team, our smalltown minds turned towards
the fact there was now no quiz league in the district, what with the John Smith's League just having gone defunct.
I'm sure
it was Harry Beevers who did most of the bemoaning the now lack of a quiz league due to J Smith's QL going bonkety bonk,
and so an idea came into my head. I remember it well...I piped up "Well I'll tell you what Harry, I'll
tell you what then...we'll start one, we'll start a new quiz league for the Pontefract and Castleford area, me and
you Harry. I'll sort it all out and you can do the questions. How about that!"
Well I could
tell he was sceptical, but he sort of nodded his head in vague agreement and so me, being the addictive personality I am,
and as Shaun used to put it, getting another hare-brained scheme in my head and taking it to the nth point of conclusion,
I did it again. I went out, I found nineteen teams, put an inaugural meeting together, held at the Parkside Inne
in Pontefract, they all attended and then Harry had to believe it, the Five Towns Quiz League was born and he'd blinking
well better get started on some questions!
Fast forward to eighteen and a bit years later and here we are, in our nineteenth
season of the FTQL. Amazing when you think about it. But in the end all it takes is a bit of passion, a bit of
enthusiasm, and even my most sternest critics would have to admit that I when I get an idea in my head that I've
got those qualities in abundance.
We did it. We did it and got it started all those years ago, and here we
are again, let's go quizzers...the Five Towns Quiz League...founded 1991 and still bloody going! Proud or what!
