Craftsman Roy Hancocks honours tragic Blues footballer Jeff Hall
Sep 10 2008 By Edward Chadwick
WATCHMAKER Roy Hancocks has clocked up 60 years helping Brummies keep an eye on the time.
But he admits that his latest task will be the most poignant so far.
Not only will it help to remember one of the city’s football legends, but it takes the 75-year-old back to the football ground which he overlooked from his childhood home.
Mr Hancocks is putting the finishing touches to a clock in memory of Birmingham City legend Jeff Hall before it is unveiled at St Andrew’s this weekend.
The specially designed timepiece, measuring 3ft in diameter, will take pride of place on the stadium’s Main Stand to mark the 50th anniversary of the death of defender who died from polio aged just 29 nearly half a century ago.
As the club prepares to unveil the clock during Saturday’s home game against Doncaster Rovers, Mr Hancocks revealed his close ties to the area.
“I grew up in a little terraced house above a pawn shop in Coventry Road right opposite the ground, so I suppose it’s fitting that I was chosen to make the clock,” he said.
“My grandparents owned some of the land on which the football club is now built.
“It’s an honour to be commissioned to do the work to remember this gentleman of football and I’ll be very proud when it’s up there.”
Mr Hancocks, who has a shop in the Jewellery Quarter, has spent more than six decades working on anything from tiny pocket watches to some of the best-known clocks in the city.
Most recently, he replaced the pavilion clock at Edgbaston cricket ground in time for England’s Test Match against South Africa and completed a “nut and bolt” restoration of the clock tower at Aston Cross during the 1990s.
Mr Hancocks revealed the clock will be one of his last before he takes up semi-retirement and passes the running of the business on to his stepson.
“I’ll never give it up completely because I can’t imagine what I’d do without it,” he said.
“But I plan to work only for two or three days a week and spend more time with my wife.”
Mr Hancocks served as an apprentice with Birmingham watchmaker George Bouverat before being put to work servicing Army watches during national service.
He then went to work for some of the world’s finest watch-making firms in Switzerland before setting up his own firm in Birmingham.
Jeff Hall was a talented right back who had made 264 appearances for Blues and won 17 England caps when he died from polio on April 4, 1959, aged just 29.
The club is planning other events leading up to the game against Wolverhampton Wanderers at St Andrew’s on April 4 next year and will recognise what Hall achieved during his time as a Blues player and how his tragic early death helped kick-start vaccination in this country.
