BP News

Wally Smeeth (1915 - 2008)

Wally Smeeth, a member of the Bancroft Players for more than fifty years and our treasurer for sixteen of them, died peacefully last month at the age of 93. To his wife Jean, who survives him, we offer our deepest sympathy. The couple were among the first to be made Honorary Life Members in recognition of their many years of work for the society.

Wally and Jean lived at Maples Court in Bedford Road and, as enthusiastic ballroom dancers, greatly enjoyed their retirement years at the popular Town Hall Tea Dances. It was at a dance in Bedford that they first met. Married in 1940 they saw little of each other during the war. Wally joined the Royal Artillery and spent several years as part of the "forgotten army" fighting a bitter war against the Japanese in the jungles of Burma. For this he was awarded the Burma Campaign Star and in 1951 he became a founder member of the Burma Star Association.

The Smeeths settled in Hitchin when Wally was appointed manager of Hepworths, the High Street tailors. In April 1955 they decided to celebrate their wedding anniversary by going to a BP's production of Agatha Christie's Ten Little Niggers at the Town Hall. A year later they joined the society.

For the next three decades the couple were among our keenest and most reliable members. Wally working in the box office and as Front of House Manager or Stage Manager for many productions; Jean, as assistant wardrobe mistress, making and repairing costumes, or selling programmes and providing refreshments. Wally, who once said he had joined the society for its social side, definitely not the acting, ended up playing cameo roles in more than twenty productions. He developed a particularly good line in absent-minded butlers.

When he retired as Treasurer in 1983, he recalled that in 1967 there were only four columns in his cash book. One for each of the three annual productions and a fourth headed "Sundries." Asked which had been our most difficult year he named 1975. "That was when there was a loss of £137.77p on the year's productions," he said. "Fortunately the bar profit was £869.00. The AGM rejected a suggestion that we should give up shows and concentrate on drinking!"

Having no children Wally was the last in his family line. Sadly, very few were present to support Jean as we bid our old friend farewell at Luton Crematorium on August 21st. Of the ten people there, half were Bancroft Players.

Richard Whitmore

Rory Reynolds writes: "Wally was a kind and generous man whom I first met when I was about 14 years of age and he was a bastion of the Society. Wally always had time for people and it was he who encouraged me to be part of the Bancroft Players and take part in their shows at Hitchin Town Hall - even though I was a noisy, arrogant and disrespectful sort of creature. Wally was a person who could see through all that rubbishy bravado and he was ever respectful and quietly supportive to me and to many others. For that I am very grateful. I know he was much loved in the Society and his death robs us of a true friend and a wonderful Bancroft Player."