Richard Stuart Head

The Life and Times of Richard Stuart Head

Richard always believed, “The Good Die Young”, and was doing his best to live forever!

 

Richard was born in the late 40’s, no one is exactly sure who his father was, but his mother died at childbirth and he was brought up my relatives. His cultural back ground was a mixture of East End Jewish street trader, and somehow a bit of Scottish, this made Richard very frugal, extremely frugal indeed.

Richards’s education record is also very sparse.  He tells all he went to college, but should the truth be known; the nearest he got to college was to  go to the dances at the local poly on a Saturday night where he would spend the evening trying to impress the girls with his expertise on second hand cars, unsurprisingly not with much success. He would drink bitter that someone else had bought him. His trick was to offer to buy a round for all but when he got to paying would offer a £5 note; knowing the bar would not accept such large denominations!  Because of his lack of change would ask a friend to pay for the round and that he would buy one later when he had change, which of course, he never did. The same £5 note stayed in his pocket for years until the royal mint changed the design in 1971.

Richard did eventually fall in love and marry. Whilst on holiday at Butlins, Skegness, he met the girl who had won the weekly bathing beauty contest. It must be said this was a wet week in late September and she did not have much competition, in fact she won by default as no one else turned up in the rain to compete. Later the same evening she was presented her prize of £5 in the ballroom and had photos taken for the local newspaper. (In later years this became exaggerated to a Page 3 style glamour shoot.)

Following the presentation, Richard by then slightly aided by alcohol and goaded by his mates offered to buy her a drink. She said yes and chatted with him laughing at his jokes; for Richard this was a match made in heaven. He even actually paid for her drink! (Although he managed to get her to pay for the rest of the evening with her winnings.) But when the evening finished they were still talking and Richard walked her back to her chalet, via the fish and chip shop, and at the age of 27 had his first kiss with Aisha.  Within 6 weeks he had proposed and married her, he says it was love at first sight, but most are sure there was a dowry involved Dick never did anything for free!

Richard was in luck Aisha lived in Enfield, North London, not far from his home in Tottenham, oh yes and Richard was a Spurs supporter! He had never actually been to a match, and even at school never even kicked a ball, he always managed to have a sick not on PE days, but in family tradition he was a Spurs supporter. Back to Aisha; her father ran a corner shop selling papers cigarettes sweets and strange vegetables that few English people could identify. Aisha worked in a clothing factory, during the week and at weekends in her father’s shop. Richard was therefore able to pop in and see her with actually having a “paying “date. This coupled with the fact that her father owned a shop and therefore had money, fitted Richard’s profile for a perfect girlfriend.

Richard always thought of himself as a business man an entrepreneur; he could see how other people got it wrong and how business should be run.  For Richard this could have lead one of two ways, either a concerted effort and make himself worthy or find a backdoor!

To Richard making an effort for anything was too much; he believed he should have been given a silver spoon if he was not born with one! He always believed that his father was probably landed gentry and that one day it would all come to him. The only current option was to find a back door.

His first thought was to join the Masons, but here he stumbled because he did not know where to find them. He questioned many of his associates (not friends he never really maintained them after the meeting Aisha) but none were members, or admitted to being members.  Richard got the feeling the establishment was against him, why should he not be a rich business man who did nothing all day but listen to the sound of his own voice proclaiming his importance in this world. Richard was good at this he would often lecture strangers he met in pubs or railway stations etc, how important he was and that one day he would be a household name. He would tell them of his business plans and how simple the whole thing would be. Of course those he lectured smiles politely and walked away sniggering; after all he was only a young lad, he would learn.

His next step to find an easy way to the top was to join the Conservatives. This was fairly easy just sign the form pay the annual membership fee and wait for the next member sub-committee meeting. Richard was accepted! This was it he thought and easy run now. When the next election was due he would offer himself as a candidate, would win with a massive majority and have business offering him money just for his influence in parliament. The path was set all he had to do was sit back and wait for the next election.

While his political career was in abeyance Richard had to find income and carry on in the style which one day would become the norm! He had told Aisha’s father he was and important manager. Earning £8 sweeping up at the local soap factory was hardly management!  This is where his get rich schemes started. Dick could never understand that people would only buy a product that appealed to them; not what he was selling. He believed that sales was a case of having a product , any product, not necessarily the product that people wanted. He would buy last year’s model and say there was no difference from this year’s and could not accept people would want to buy at a discount. He believed that it was people’s duty to buy from him. Maybe the Conservatives would help! Conservative were all rich business men that did little all day, He could learn from them. It was time to visit the Conservative club!