Sitting on the polished oak seats of Bristol’s Central Library on many week day nights between 1965 and 1970 was not much fun. For me it was a necessity as I faced the monotony of completing the H Foulks Lynch correspondence courses in preparation for my accountancy exams.

Outside the ‘Swinging 60’s’ swung on without me. Only at weekends and the occasional midweek night could I escape to see the Rolling Stones, John Lee Hooker, Bob Dylan etc. at the Colston Hall or the Cream, the Yardbirds and Marianne Faithfull at the Corn Exchange.

I was inevitably bored with my studies and took to taking a break by wandering around the reference library and peeking into obscure books.

One was about the history of Worcestershire and inside I found a reference to my namesake (almost), John Dafforne. It was a trigger for a life long interest in genealogy. But it was a slow burn as in my free time 60’s music and drunken weekends at the Mandrake club took priority.