Mike is a true gent (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Mike is a true gent

10:30am Wednesday 21st January 2009 in Search By Jim Greenhalf

When Saturday comes during the football season, Mike Harrison is to be found either at Valley Parade or wherever Bradford City are playing.

But not just in the capacity of a season-ticket-holding supporter, for since July 2004 he has been editor of the award-winning fanzine The City Gent.

But on Friday, January 9, he made a different journey to Cumbria.

Ten years ago, while on holiday there, Mike’s partner Nicky Rose collapsed and died at the age of 29. She suffered from Marfan’s Syndrome, a rare genetic condition that affects one in 5,000 tall people.

It is a disorder of the connective tissue which can fatally affect the skeleton, lungs, eyes and heart. Nicky was 6ft 2in. Mike is 6ft 8in.

He and Nicky met at an event organised by the Tall Persons Club of Great Britain. Although Mike had been married to his first girlfriend Maureen and had two sons, Richard, now 26, and Paul, 24, he was self-conscious about his height and remained shy.

Meeting Nicky changed that, which is why he feels the anniversary of her death so keenly. His current partner Emily and their ginger cat Billy offer comfort and support, each in their own way.

Nicky’s death came just 16 months after she underwent a seven-hour operation to correct a heart defect. They thought the operation had been a success. It was on the way to their celebratory holiday in Penrith in 1999 that Mike proposed. Nicky became ill while swimming on the final night of the holiday and died.

He said: “For four years I didn’t miss a City match; watching football took my mind off it. I haven’t coped well with my bereavements. It took me a long time to move on from Nicky’s death, something not helped by my own father’s death in October, 2005. But I have been able to move on with the help of Emily and Billy.

“Emily is very supportive of the work I do with The City Gent. She understands how close I was to Nicky and how traumatic it was for me to lose her.”

Mike, 47, a life-long Bradford City fan, tries to produce at least ten copies of The City Gent a year; each issue has a print run of about 1,000. He writes for it, collates it and sells it; but he gets no income from it.

One of the things of which he is proudest in his time in charge is the increase in subscribers.

He said: “I’ve got 150 now. When I took over there were 55. Subscribers pay £21.50 for the year. The majority are people who live outside Bradford and don’t get to many home games. I have up to 20 in Europe and the rest of the world.”

He pays two cartoonists and a designer, the rest of the contents are voluntary and unpaid, labours of love by other City fans. Any profit is donated to the football club. How much since 1984?

“Probably £20,000. The Bradford City Museum at Valley Parade also came from The City Gent. That was Dave Pendleton’s initiative. He was editor for five years. The City Gent has made donations to exhibitions and we bought the cabinets that contain bound claret and amber volumes of every copy of The City Gent,” he added.

Last August, he and Emily bought a house in Shipley – a brisk 30-minute walk away from Valley Parade. An upstairs back room serves as an office. It contains two computers, the other one belongs to Canadian Emily, who moved up to Bradford from London and has become a City fan.

“Without her support, I couldn’t devote so much time to the magazine.

“I’ve almost turned it into a full-time job with the work I do. I was left some money after my father died, so I don’t have to work full-time any more – though I might have to get a job soon to finish the house.”

He is also proud of the fact that last year The City Gent was voted the Best Fanzine in League Two in the New Football Pools Fanzine Awards. About 2,000 fans took part in the voting. There is a trophy somewhere in the house.

The City Gent first appeared in late October, 1984 –13 months after the club had been rescued from serious insolvency and six months before City’s Third Division Championship triumph and the fire disaster.

John Dewhirst, the magazine’s co-founder, said: “The new publication provided news and comment about City at a time when there were few other options. It represented an imaginative response by City supporters to help rebuild their club and a sense of community in the Eighties.”

With a regular turnout of between 12,000 and 13,000 supporters for home games, Mike Harrison regrets that more of them don’t buy The City Gent.

“It just about breaks even. It would be nice to have another 50 subscribers, then I could pay myself something for my work,” he adds.

Mike says: “Bradford has been a city since 1897 and The City Gent has been going for 25 of those years. That’s a fantastic achievement. I think people would miss is if we weren’t there.”