Hazel Freeman talks about the influence of religion on her father’s philanthropic activities

Resource Type: Audio | Posted on 18th July 2011 by Liam Physick

Hazel Freeman reveals how her father was a “practical Christian” (in his own words), albeit not a churchgoer, and one day, when in a long traffic queue in a tunnel, he had time to think, and came up with the idea that everybody should do something for everybody else

Interviewee: Hazel Freeman

Interviewee Gender: Female

Date of Interview: 19th February 2011

Interview Transcript

Jenny: I wonder if we could talk a little bit about Fred now and just his . . .  cos it’s clear that he did really feel part of the Edge Hill . . .  he was a, a, a real part . . .

Hazel: He was a Liverpudlian, wasn’t he? (laughs)

Jenny: Yeah. And I suppose what I wanna ask is, what – well, obviously, we’ve said about the demolition, but what was it that really drove him to, to, sort of, put so much back, do you think?

Hazel: Well, he was a man of deep spiritual beliefs and faiths, but, one wouldn’t have known it . . .

Jenny: Yeah.

Hazel: . . . you know, his, he was what he called a practical Christian. He wasn’t a church, a particular churchgoer, that was actually the driving force, the fact that it was, one had to show in this life, practical Christianity, that was his . . .  and, the whole thing came about, which you probably know, is because, actually, of the queues in the tunnel.

Jenny: Oh, right, I don’t know this story.

Hazel: Well, in those days, the late, well it . . . the late 60s, the 70s, there were – I’ve got to go – they were tremendous queues to go through the tunnel, there was a so-called rusher . . .

Jenny: Oh, right . . .

Hazel: . . . and he would be . . . no, the demolition would be in the 70s, actually, the late 60s, 70s – and there was this immense, immense queues, and you’d be sitting there, you know, somebody’d break down, they’d run out of petrol, you’d be there for half an hour, standing still (Jenny makes an exasperated noise) and it was . . . they didn’t really have car radios, they weren’t that much good in those days (Jenny giggles), and so you had time to think, and that’s when it came to him, that if everybody could do just a little bit for everybody else . . .

Jenny: Yeah.

Hazel: . . . they would, you know, feel everybody helping everybody else, and that‘s when he started all this business with the penny in the pound, but that’s a completely different story.

Tagged under: freemans, demolition, edge hill area, religion

Categorised under: Change & Communities

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