In late 1976 I had been watching Fall Out and had seen Dave Barrie’s address at the end of the episode, I hastily found a pen and paper and scribbled it down. I wrote a letter that night (some people even drove there) and I received a reply with details of the formation of an appreciation society called Six of One, with a list of its aims and objectives. One of these was to form a network of local groups to put people in touch with each other to arrange local meetings. I was excited to think that I would soon be able to meet people who liked The Prisoner as much as me and perhaps they might be able to answer some of the questions the series had posed to me.
I was a naive boy, just turned 17 and still at school, in the 6th form, so I strongly identified with a lot of the concepts expressed in The Prisoner. Towards the end of January my mother called me from my bedroom one evening saying there was a call for me from a Jackie Butcher. I didn’t know her but I took the call and it started events that made a big change in my life. We had a nice chat and she explained she had been given my name by Dave Barrie and that she had been asked to form the Nottingham local group and was arranging a meeting the following Monday – and would I like to come!!
I was totally amazed and excited, hoping that my questions could be answered and I could find out what had happened in the episodes that I had missed. We met at a local pub in the City Centre Yates Wine Lodge, Jackie was very kind and offered to give me a lift there and back as she only lived a few miles away from me. I was a bit apprehensive as I had never been to a town pub on my own before being under age. I was very law abiding in those days, I remember feeling guilty through the evening drinking my half of larger – social conditioning at such a young age.
I met 4 or 5 new people who had all seen Dave’s address too. I can’t remember all their names; there was a lad about my age, Dave Old, who also lived near me and Mick and Diane, who were self-described flower children who had seen The Prisoner in the 60s. I was into Rock music and Mick was a follower of the Rolling Stones, so we had plenty to talk about. There was also another couple, Pete and Robbie, also Rita, who had come over from Derby, and we all had a great bonding conversation.
The outcome was that no one knew the answers to the questions The Prisoner poised and we all felt that it was showing elements of society that we weren’t happy with: the turning of people in to numbers, having no names, accepting your lot without question to be happy – there were some very inspiring conversations. We carried on meeting once a month throughout the year often at people houses and sometimes at a back room of a pub, the Crystal Palace; the landlord had been an actor and said he once acted in a play with Patrick McGoohan.
Throughout the year there were some stand-alone events, a visit out to the cinema to see Silver Streak and giving a cheer when Patrick McGoohan’s name appeared in the titles. We also got information about the series from Cheltenham – those there had made contact with ITC, who had given them a load of stills which were able to see and buy and look over with a magnifying glass, looking at the fine details.
Each local group received a copy of the ITC synopsis, which we were all allowed to borrow and photocopy, so we could read them over again. We had a few parties, which were fun and we were also invited to the home of Keith Gould, in Oxford, one Saturday evening to watch Prisoner screenings in that area – more about that another time – and we also had an invite to meet up with further members at something called a ‘work in’.
