Fuel panic

Watford’s car drivers and motorist-commuters using the town went “berserk” following the Chancellor’s Tuesday budget announcement that petrol would immediately jump by 5 1/2p a gallon. There were queues, some more than a quarter of a mile long, at many garages and Paul Jeffery, manager of Hirus Vehicles in St Albans Road, said: “Motorists went berserk. They were stupid.” Queues stretched for hundreds of yards at the Rickmansworth Road-Hempstead Road junction by the town hall as drivers waited, engines running, to be served at D.S. Moss Motors in Hempstead Road. A garage official said: “It really was chaotic. The most a big car driver could have saved was about 50p. That would have been used up waiting in the queue.”

[April 1, 1977]

Thatcher in town

Many Watford shoppers will have an opportunity of meeting Mrs Margaret Thatcher this morning. The opposition leader is due to undertake a “walkabout” in the town centre during a visit to marginal constituencies.

[April 1, 1977]

Fight for pub

So far as Ind Coope are concerned the Kings Arms, in Church Street, Rickmansworth, is dead. But outraged locals are still fighting to keep their pub open. Over 300 of them are sending a petition to the giant Allied Breweries, who control Ind Coope, deploring the decision to close the pub on April 24. “What they are trying to do is get three large hyper-pubs in Rickmansworth and force out the smaller ones,” said Mr Jim Sheridan, who organised the petition. “The Kings Arms, thankfully, has kept its village pub character over the years and is where one can have a quiet game of darts without the constant blare of the jukebox or the crack of pool tables.”

[April 8, 1971]

Abortion counselling

A call for more abortion counselling in Watford came at the annual meeting of Watford Samaritans on Thursday. A Watford marriage guidance counsellor, Mrs Freda Clarke, said the best known works of Marriage Guidance was remedial counselling. Not so common was abortion counselling. “I feel this is important,” said Mrs Clarke. “I wish there were more done in Watford about this.” She said young girls went in for abortions without any idea of what was going to happen. “I feel our counselling is almost non-existent at the moment,” said Mrs Clarke.

[April 8, 1977]

Jimmy Carter can’t make it

Hopes that President Jimmy Carter of the US would visit Watford, home of a link with his ancestors, during his visit to this country in May have been dashed. Watford Council were told by the county archivist that President Carter’s ancestors were likely to have had some connection with Carters living in Watford in the 16th century. This information stemmed from research undertaken by Mr Noel Carrer-Briggs, a genealogical and historical research consultant. Watford councillors got in touch with the Prime Minister’s office to see whether there was any likelihood of the American President visiting the Watford area during his visit to this country in May. However, 10 Downing Street advised that they regretted the programme for President Carter’s visit made it unlikely.

[April 15, 1977]

A new dawn

Sun Printers, the giant Watford company which has suffered heavy losses over the last three years, are working on a blueprint they hope will reverse the trend and spell success for the future. Faced with a deficit of more than £670,000 in 1976, chairman and managing director Clive Bradley reorganised his management team as a prelude to the new strategy plan. Mr Bradley said: “It is an ambitious plan and we hope it will succeed in turning the company around.”

[April 15, 1977]

Elton plans super club

Plans are afoot to make Watford Football Club a household name all over the world. Negotiations are well advanced to link the club and their superstar chairman Elton John to a worldwide advertising campaign with the football club collecting the proceeds. Plans for the £1/4m deal are so far advanced that the Hornets are calling in architects and surveyors to design a substantial social and sports complex at their Vicarage Road ground. The complex, which it is hoped will be completed in the 1978-9 season, will contain a banqueting hall, gymnasium and “a magnificent social club”.

[April 22, 1977]

Up the junction

Watford Junction, the stopping point for British Rail’s speedy inter-city services to and from the Midlands, may look like a mini-Euston Station within the next few years – shops, kiosks, cafeterias, super-loos, the lot. British Rail sources say that the facelift, costing at least £1m, could begin by 1980. The Junction, which even railmen label a “Victorian monstrosity”, handles up to 200 people a day using inter-city services. Said Bob Long, deputy station manager: “A transformation for the Junction can’t come soon enough for us.”

[April 29, 1977]

What was happening in the world in April 1977?

  • Red Rum wins the Grand National for the third time (April 2)
  • German Federal Prosecutor Siegfried Buback and his driver are shot by two Red Army Faction members while waiting at a red light (April 7)
  • The Clash’s debut album is released in the UK (April 8)
  • The film Annie Hall is released (April 20)
  • National Front marchers clash with anti-Nazi protesters in London (April 23)
  • Prostitute Patricia Atkinson is murdered in Bradford; she is believed to be the fourth woman to die at the hands of the Yorkshire Ripper (April 23)
  • Christopher John Boyce, an American defence industry employee, is convicted for selling US spy satellite secrets to the Soviet Union (April 28)
  • Children at Orlando West Junior School in Soweto, South Africa, refused to go to school, following a decree which forced all black schools to use Afrikaans and English in a 50-50 mix as languages of instruction (April 30)