chris o'hara

I used to work there, and I used to do loads of hours back then. But I wasn’t eighteen!

I’d started going in round about 1980. I stayed on in sixth form, and I needed some money. Some mates had got a job, or were on the rock’n’roll and stuff, but I used to go in the Tavern a lot. And the landlord was Don, you remember? The Canadian guy. His wife’s name slips my mind…Pam! I’ve been trying to think of that for months! Anyway I just approached them and they said yeah.

I remember there was a Black lad who worked there. Really nice lad. I don’t know whether he’d remember me, because I was new, and I was young, seventeen, and he looked out for me in that first few months. There was an incident. A lad came in and he wasn’t a regular, and – I’ll always remember this – he was showing off. And I wasn’t quite savvy to it, you know, I was just learning, and tidying up after everyone, and wiping every spilt drink. I soon stopped that, because it was pointless. And this lad had said something, and I hadn’t answered. And I think he felt embarrassed in front of his girl, or these two girls he was with, and he was acting really weird. And then Phil noticed something, and the lad kind of lunged across the bar at me with something. And Phil pulled me away and dealt with this lad, kind of thing. But that was the only time I had trouble there.

When pints went up to a pound. It almost caused a riot in there! Don said, We might have a bit of bother. I’ll never forget that! Why’s that? We’re putting the beer up to a quid. When I first went there, I think a mild was 58p. A pint of mild.

Down in the cellar there was, there was some really kind of old tiling and that. You could tell that that was a really old pub. It was quite oppressive. I remember finding Don asleep a few times on a few boxes of Cheese and Onion. He taught us everything. He taught us cellar and everything. He was really good.

When I'd finished my shift I carried on drinking in there, so I gave them my wages back basically.

There was one guy came in and he used to just drink halves all the time and I could never work this out, why he always drank halves. Why don't you drink pints? And I assumed he didn't have a lot of money. Occassionally I used to think, do I just say, Look, I can give you a pint, you know. but then I found out after I stopped working in there and socialising in there that he was absolutely minted. I think back then it would have been the pools, not the lottery. But he carried on going in there.

There was another guy called Afghan, for obvious reasons. He used to drink, like a lot of them did, Newcastle Brown Ale and I remember it used to startle me how much he could put away. He just used to drink bottles and bottles and bottles of Newkie. And I just used to think, he's gonna walk out of here, no bother. And he'd buy me a pint, ya know, just get one for yourself. So I'd love to see if he's around.

One day I went and I’d had my hair cut short and people were just looking at me, like, what have you done? Like I'd committed treason. And Pam said, Oh I really like it. I was scared thinking I'd committed a sin, Look I've got short hair.

Around Christmas time the dare was to climb up on the Man on the Horse, wasn't it? And me and a mate, Peaky, he'll remember this. He's in Ireland now. We thought Fuck it, we're gonna do it, we're gonna do it finally. So we got up, gave each other a hand up and got up on there.

He’d got a cone from somewhere did the old classic and I'm up there with it and then of course getting down I’d forgotten how high it was and I was pissed. And then I can remember just coming down the back of it holding onto the horse's arse and sliding, and falling off. Hitting the plinth as I went down. I was on the floor, and there were these two coppers just stood over me. And I can remember just holding my hand up thinking they were going to help me up. They gave me a little mild beating and that was it. Just left me there. I never got on the horse again. What times. My lad, he's massively into his rock now, he goes to the Giffard and I keep saying to him, Oh Dan, you'd have loved the Tavern.

I don’t know if you ever got into bar work around then, but when I said I’ve worked in the Tavern, I got jobs wherever I wanted. They said, You’ve done what?? The Tavern??!! and then I used to work in the Giffard. And wherever I was living, I could always get a bar job, for years, on the basis of being in the Tavern.