Stan Cox
He was a man who it seemed always had a twinkle in the eye accompanied by a shrewd sense of humour. Always willing to put his heart and soul into a performance he is fondly remembered for taking a lead role in the ‘send up’ of ‘Wait ‘til the Sun Shines Nellie’. He had good musical skills and would never pass up a chance to step out in front of the Chorus to direct whenever the opportunity arose. Amongst his many skills Stan was viewed as the Club Carpenter; made boxes to balance the height of the vertically challenged on each row of the risers; made the first Club banner in bright red and silver material to match the uniforms at that time; and could be relied upon to find ways and means to fix almost anything, or find someone who could. His boxes for the Chorus trophies are still in use today
Second City Sound, our sister Chorus, was formed in 1990/1 and initially Stan was its Director, later becoming the Assistant Chorus Director to John Riseborough and subsequently John Brackpool [originally Pratley] carrying his musical skills to that Chorus whilst still singing with Anvil Chorus. He was a proud member of the Bronze Medal winning Chorus at Harrogate in 1988
Stan enjoyed his cigarettes, and even whilst confined to hospital, he was always seeking out ways to sneak out to have one of his ‘fixes’. In later years he suffered a serious stroke but fought back from this really well. It’s said that whilst over in Ireland for one of their Conventions, he was waiting outside for other Club Members to emerge from their Hotel, and had decided to do his daily exercises, which included repeatedly flexing his affected hand into a fist and then releasing this. Rarely was Stan rendered speechless, but he was taken by surprise when a passer-by assumed that he was begging, and promptly thrust a coin into his outstretched hand!
Such was Stan’s affection for the Chorus, that he left a substantial bequest of £1000.00 to the Club in his will which the Management Committee committed to Education and Training initiatives.