This group of devoted friends have had a pint at the same pub in Sheffield every Thursday for 56 years

The Star, Sheffield

A group of friends have met up at the same pub, The White Swan, Sheffield, for a pint every Thursday for their weekly catch-up since 1968.

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00:00Ken King, 80, Nick Cotton, 81, Paul Haynes, 79, Brian Ayres, 83, Bill Mundon, 78, Peter

00:17Thirlwall, 78, nearly 79.

00:33We've been doing it for such a long time, I know these guys very well, they're my best

00:38friends and I know that when I get here we're going to have a lot of laughs and when I leave

00:47I'm going to have a smile on my face which will last for a long time.

00:51That's because he's been drinking.

00:56Well I think it's lasted for 56 years because of the camaraderie, we all have the same values

01:02in life and we've all got a great sense of humour.

01:08So we just tell jokes, we tell stories, we've done so many things over the years, you can't

01:14just do this based on meeting up on a Thursday, we've done other things, we've run marathons

01:20together, we've played golf together, all sorts of things so we've got this bond now.

01:28We've done marathons, we've done long walks, we started off doing the lightweight walk

01:32which was 42 miles across the North Yorkshire Moors and at that point we weren't walkers.

01:39Hey, don't forget the star walk.

01:42Oh well I'm talking about mine, these are my memories, you can talk about the star walk.

01:50He's only saying that because he passed me on the last 100 yards going into the stadium.

01:55And I learnt some new words that day that he said to me as I went past on my way.

02:02Instead of meeting in the pub because of lockdown, we started a Zoom meeting and that enabled

02:11us also to get a couple of guys, one in Australia and one in Pittsburgh to join in and it worked

02:21wonderfully well and we do it once a month with the guy in Australia and the guy in the

02:29States, just the same, so we keep them informed of what's happening.

02:34Not forgetting Melling, the Eastbourne.

02:37Not on a Thursday night though, we can't let them interfere with Thursday night, we do

02:42it first Tuesday in the month I think.

02:45We did our original Zoom to replace Thursday night in lockdown, we did that on Thursday

02:51and then when it all finished we thought we can't really just forget these other lads

02:56so we carried it on on a Tuesday night.

02:58It must help with longevity as well because look at all us lot, there's only me and Peter

03:03that are not 80 yet.

03:06I'm not 80 yet.

03:08You're 80 shortly.

03:10He's got days.

03:12He's joining the senior group next week rather than junior members.

03:17We're junior members.

03:19We had the advantage of growing up in the rock and roll years without mobile phones or any

03:29of that and so we're a different generation to the kids that might want to start something

03:36like this now.

03:37They do everything over media and Facebook.

03:39We didn't have mobile phones.

03:41It's all rock and roll, I mean some of us used to go to ballroom dancing and so didn't

03:47we?

03:48We did, yes.

03:49You were crap at that and all.

03:50I was, I was.

03:51But it did, I did learn to talk a lot, to take the mind off the phone.

03:57I was going to say that we didn't have mobile phones but now we have mobile aids.

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