Opening the archives

This is where you can go back to brush the dust off the archives

Markstock 1
Saturday 26 June 1998

I don’t remember how or why it all started, one idea is that it was an end of A-level celebration. The very first Markstock was held on 26 June 1998 at Mark’s old Ladythorn cresent house. We put the tent up on the Friday and then watched England beat Columbia 2-0 to go through to the knock-out stage of France98. There was a very definite Woolworths theme at Markstock that year Mark, Lee, Mike and Paul Tunnicliffe (was last heard of moving to a house in Bolton) were all working there. Only Me, Chris, Mark, Pete and Mike stayed over. There was also a character called Jim (aka Syph) who I’ve never seen since. The 8 brave souls who turned out that dark, wet and cold night will forever be referred to as “the founding 8”.

I believe this was my first encounter with Big Rick (who most people thought was a total stranger who’d crashed the party, rather than mark’s brother-in-law), who spent most of the evening watching the football indoors and only appeared only when food was available. The weather was dire (about 11degrees and very damp) and we unsuccessfully tried to persuade one of Mark’s next-door neighbours to come over, but her Dad was having none of it. One look at the drunken mayhem that was occurring next door caused him to mutter “Absolutely not!” and the door was slammed shut. That night we also ran out/forgot food and had to make a mid-BBQ dash in a Vauxhall Nova to Spar on Dairyground. When we returned the BBQ flames were about 20ft high with Lee and Mike pouring more lighter fuel onto it!
Big Pete pitched his own tent beside the main tent as he wanted his privacy. The next morning there was a fair amount of vomit outside the entrance.

Incidently, Pete attempted a “Petestock” rival event later that summer. The event only had 3 guests (Me, Mr T and Piggy) and involved drinking a sizeable amount of Rum (my Grandad loved the stuff) as well as Whiskey and watching Tomorrow never Dies till 4am. It proved to be a one-hit wonder that was never repeated and has long since been forgotten.


Markstock 2
Monday 30 June 1999
Second year on and Markstock was feeling the pinch – relegated to the unpopular and obscure slot of Monday night. In fact, things were so difficult that Mark had started brewing his own beer (whose name escapes me). The Homebrew must’ve been about 12%, was a blackish/dark reddish colour and tasted more wine than beer. But it was freely available on the black-market, no one complained and it kept the cold out!

The number of guests dropped to an all time low of 7, though Jack Baraclough (whom I’ve not seen since Dec99) was a new guest.

Pete’s mother later told me that Pete had emptied the contents of his stomach (mainly the Homebrew) on the kitchen floor that night and wasn’t best pleased about the whole thing. I struggled into work at the NEAB dazed and hungover the next day.

Would Markstock survive, or would it go the way of Petestock and vanish into the void of obscurity and cheap daytime TV…