Allen Smeaton

Early days in Sedan Place

Allen was born in 1947 and grew up with his brother Brian, eighteen months older and his “constant companion, protector and idol”, and their parents Albert and Lillian in a two-up two-down in Sedan Place, Leeds 7. The toilets were at the end of the terrace and shared between four houses. Day trips to Scarborough, sticklebacks in a jam jar, and a Bonfire Night spent crying at the wrong bus station waiting for his dad and the fireworks.

We never really realised we were poor. When you grow up without much, as we did in Leeds 7, it was just the way things were.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

A step up, with its own toilet

When his mum broke her neck and spent six months in bed, ten-year-old Allen went to live with his Grandma in Castleford, opened canal locks for the coal boats and missed his eleven-plus. When Sedan Place was knocked down the family was given one of the new flats at Carlton Rise. “My mum especially thought this was a real step up, because this place had its own toilet!”

The Original Oak, where it all began

He left school at fifteen in 1962, started as an office runner at William Crabtree's printing-press works, and by night was managing The Original Oak outside Headingley Stadium. One evening a young woman called Pauline came in with a friend to ask for a job. He gave her one. A month later the regional manager said she couldn't have the Thursday off that Allen had planned to take her out, so Allen put his jacket on and quit on the spot.

Even at that point, although we’d only known each other about a month, I knew she was more important to me than any job.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

The happiest day of my life

Their first trip abroad was to Lido di Jesolo by coach, with a day in Venice where they bought his mum a little set of glasses. They got engaged on his twenty-first birthday in March, married on 25 October 1969, and went to Blackpool for a week's honeymoon. After three days of unrelenting rain they came home; the Illuminations had already been taken down. They went back to see them with the boys years later, and then every year.

We saved our money for travelling, and that’s continued for the rest of our lives.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

Having the boys

Glen arrived on 7 February 1972 while Allen and Pauline were running a fish and chip shop in East Ardsley (they once left a cinema in shame when the woman behind asked “can you smell fish and chips?”). Damian followed on 10 January 1975. Oban Close in Tingley was home: Sunday convoys of three cars, six children and the dogs to Hardcastle Crags, Bolton Abbey and Southport beach, Damian's lovebirds and rabbits, Glen's clothes, and the party where Allen dressed as Superman.

Since they have grown up, they have been our absolute rocks. They are always there for us and they are both lovely ‘boys’.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

The rep in the Ford Capri

Granada TV Rentals, Ray-Bans for Bausch & Lomb, twelve years at Radial Chemicals and fifteen at Ferring Pharmaceuticals, where he refused the company Mondeo and picked a Ford Capri instead (soon every rep wanted one). He brought in Ferring's first million-pound order from Leeds General, was applauded at a company meeting, hated it, walked out and asked to go back to being a rep. They let him keep the salary and the Mercedes. He retired in 2007 at sixty.

People don’t buy from a company, they buy from people, and I always liked the people I met.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

The red flat cap on the mountain

A pharmacist customer lent them his apartment in Sion and skiing became a family infection: Pauline's sister Brenda, John, Richard, Jayne and Charlie, cousins Carol and Gary, and seventeen-year-old Damian, who for his eighteenth chose skis and boots over a car. Allen skied an iced-over red run he had no business being on, and survived. Pauline rode the drag lift all the way down and back up again rather than jump off.

I sported my usual style with a fetching Yorkshireman’s red flat cap. Gary always said I looked like a matchstick, but at least you could always see where I was!Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

Adventures with Pauline

Safari in Kenya, where Pauline packed a hairdryer for a tent and they watched a lioness stalk and take a wildebeest. Capsizing a sailing dinghy in the Dominican Republic, then a canoe on the next visit. A Nile cruise, Rome, Jersey Boys in London, the northern lights and whales at Tromsø, and Cyprus for their fiftieth wedding anniversary in 2019.

Pauline took her hairdryer with her, not realising that we were staying in tents and there would be nowhere to plug it in.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

Jumping out of a plane

For his sixtieth, Pauline and Glen bought him a tandem skydive from 12,000 feet at Headcorn, which he “absolutely loved”. Damian added hang-gliding off a cliff in Kent. There was a Ferrari day (he squealed the tyres on purpose), a flying lesson at Stapleford, and the day he got to drive a steam train.

I would love to have done a solo jump but never got to that point.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

Buying in Spain

They sold up, lived by the river at Reedness and then in Melbourn, and bought an 89-square-metre apartment with a glass front onto the Mediterranean at Aguadulce. Pauline's birthday at La Cava, the restaurant in a sea-cave, ended by candlelight when a storm cut the power. Madrid, Seville, the Alhambra, Gibraltar's apes, and a fake policeman with a gun in his waistband whom Allen told to lead the way to the station. He drove off.

We sat and watched what turned out to be a meteor shower for a while. It was one of the most magical moments either of us has ever had, and a lovely thing to have experienced together.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

Home again

Two years renting in Maasdam in the Netherlands near Glen, then back to Spain to sell the apartment, then Chatham and Allhallows in Kent, and finally Cowbit near Spalding, which the locals pronounce “Coobit”. Glen in London with Winston; Damian and Emma in Pudsey with the shih-tzus. Dog-sitting, presents at Christmas, and the two of them still travelling.

Glen irritates the hell out of me sometimes, he’s so clever! He never has arguments, he just tells you you’re wrong, explains why, and you change your mind. You can never win.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)

The next stage of adventure

In August 2022, after a holiday in Crete, the doctors told him he had Parkinson's disease. He finished his memoir that December with Pauline reminding him of the details he forgot. Allen died in the spring of 2025, and his funeral was held on 19 May 2025.

This was a bit of a downer but I suppose I’ve always been adventurous and this is like the next stage of adventure – who knows how it will turn out? Meanwhile Pauline, as always, has been absolutely fantastic.Allen, from his memoir “Where’s This Taking Me?” (2022)