33-MILE CONSTITUTIONAL

Northern Advocate, 24 October 1935, Page 6

33-MILE CONSTITUTIONAL

COLONEL’S 70TH BIRTHDAY' FEAT A footsore but happy veteran crossed London Bridge recently. It was his seventieth birthday and he had triumphantly achieved a 44-year-old ambition.

The veteran was Lieutenant-Colonel Frank Harris, who had followed in his father’s footsteps by walking, on his seventieth birthday, the 33 miles between Bidborough (Tunbridge Wells) and London,

Colonel Harris’ achievement was a sort of retrospective challenge. His father, who died at 87, took the same 33-mile constitutional on his 70th birthday 44 years ago. To his son, then aged 26, he said: “If you ever live to be seventy you’ll never be able to do what I’ve done.”

Colonel Harris thought otherwise, and he proved it. Starting at 5.15 a.m. and scorning by-passes that would have shortened the distance covered by his father, he reached London Bridge at 6.20 p.m.

“Well, I’m glad I’ve done it," he said on N his arrival. “And, in some .ways, I've improved on my father’s record. It was a cooler day when he did it, and, of course, he had no motor traffic to contend with.

“Ah, those motors, they take up all the road. In many places there are no footpaths and, anyway, the footpaths are too narrow.” Colonel Harris would like to start a campaign for bigger and better footpaths.

“Yes, it was hot,” he agreed, “too hot even to smoke. I got through ao ounce of tobacco between Tonbridge and Sevenoaks and then I realised that I should have to give up either my pipe or my 33 miles. So I gave up my pipe, but”—lighting it up with an appreciative gesture—“it was a wrench.”

One square meal—At Bromley—two glasses of beer and a cup of tea sustained Colonel Harris on the journey.

“And at one of those halts I very nearly decided to give up and give in. The fatigue wore off, however, and here I am.”

Several times he was offered a lift, but he scorned them all.