Hi -  

Just thought I should record something special - my Dad died a couple of days ago. No - don't get upset for me - he has had a great life - and he had been very ill for a long time. He was 86 and boy had he lived...

My Dad started the original business from which A4e sprung from. He created a company relatively late in his life called the Industrial Training Agency. When I graduated in 1987 as a Mechanical Engineer Dad asked me to come and help him run the company. It was a relatively small outfit - but it was where many of us who still work at A4e cut our teeth.

My Dad was a great character - generous and smart thinking. He mostly brought me and my brothers up because Mum was either very ill or had left!

As kids (before Dad started his business) there was no spare money - what so ever - but my Dad's reaction to this was to find creative ways to make sure we still had opportunity and fun. There was no money for a bike - so Dad took me to the local scrap yard and we built a bike from scrap bikes that others had thrown away. We took in lodgers, I managed the household budgets, we went to auctions and bought the stuff that no one else wanted. My Dad paid £1 for our sofa! Every Friday Dad would come back from his 9-5 job with carrier bags bursting with food. He had been to the Sheffield Castle market - hunted down the bargains - and there was our food for the week.

Our house was a bit like a youthclub - Dad welcomed all my friends - he would provide big blocks of cheese and french bread - warn us not to eat anything from his special cupboard (his favourite tin of salmon and frazzle crisps!) - and let us get on with being teenagers!

School report time was always funny - with Dad claiming that no one could ever beat his record - 2% in French!!!

We were all encouraged to talk, laugh a lot, read, watch Panorama!, learn music, have loads of parties, cook, think, work hard, clean the house, get good at DIY, earn money  and help others.  

The music thing was quite funny - we were not allowed to go to school untill we had done a half hour music practice.  Dad used to write funny poems on the wall that made sure we knew the rules.

When eventually he started his own business and things got a bit better financially - he was very generous. I would ring up from university claiming that I needed money for books! - he would always pop a cheque in the post - knowing full well that I would celebrate my wind fall in the local nightclub and curry house!

I suppose that thinking about it - my Dads special genius was making something from nothing, his creativity and his ability to encourage and support everyone he met. He had words of wisdom - he was strong and very very positive.

I am very very lucky that he was my Dad.