Ian Monnery

I counted Ian as my best friend at Chippenham grammar ,as it was,
He was a kind friend who pulled me out of several scrapes . Amongst our group of friends he called himself the wild man of Neasden. He was tall and very fit, always organising football teams ( I never played football) and genuinely the best looking bloke in our year . He was always very popular with the girls at the Christmas disco.
We used to travel to various village hall discos ,sometimes on foot . Every village disco seemed to have a drunk kid that wanted to fight as soon as you walked in the door ,but Ian could always point out the error of their ways . One evening walking through Chippenham some drunks had a go at me . I just remember Ian saying “leave him alone “ and the guy landing on his backside. Ian looking out for me is an abiding memory
A story I tell my family is about one day in Physics class. Ian was sitting on the back bench fiddling with the electrical sockets that were used for light box experiments and such like. He suddenly let out a yell and looked proper peculiar . He’d been sticking pins in the holes then put the switch down!
We laughed about that for ages
We liked Clint Eastwood movies , amazingly they were x rated at the time then we would buy small cigars and wander round Chippenham smoking “Clint’s” as we called them. Probably feeling sick.
I must also admit to being an accomplice with Ian on the famous occasion we liberated a box of mint poppets from the school tuck shop after hours. We ate as many as we could and stashed the rest under the hedge of the king Alfred pub. We never went back for them , I think we’d just had too many .
After we left school I gradually lost contact with Ian but often remembered our times listening to David Bowles Aladisane or our obsession we had with whist drives for a while.
I was very sorry to read his obituary and wish his family well .