GERRY Marsden, who died earlier this month, left a poignant legacy in Bradford - raising funds for the city's pioneering burns unit.

The Bradford Royal Infirmary unit was set up using £100,000 of proceeds from charity record You'll Never Walk Alone, re-recorded by Gerry and various stars from pop and TV entertainment to raise funds for the Bradford City fire disaster appeal.

Gerry and his Merseybeat band the Pacemakers were the first act to top the charts with their first three singles; How Do You Do It?, I Like It and You'll Never Walk Alone.

Here Derek AJ Lister, who was DJ Dal Stevens at Bradford's Gaumont and Majestic Ballrooms from 1959 to 1965, looks back at an early appearance by Gerry and the Pacemakers, which nearly didn't go ahead when the band turned up without any instruments...

"Gerry and the Pacemakers appeared a couple of times at Gaumont Theatre Package shows and one Friday evening in 1964 they came to the Majestic Ballroom.

"The next day the Telegraph & Argus headline said 'Pop group had no instrument' - an understatement of what had could have been a chaotic night!

As they were a top group, I made my usual late afternoon call to see if they'd arrived. There was no group, nothing. I set the DJ equipment out on stage and went home to change. Later, fellow DJ Dadio (Terry Moran) and myself were informed by the manager that Gerry and the Pacemakers had arrived, but with no equipment. Was there anything we could do to solve the problem?

Dadio and I went to the dressing-room and encountered Gerry and his group. Had he any ideas, we asked, and he answered with some bad language! When he calmed down he said their van had broken down near Manchester with no hope of getting here for the show. We asked him what equipment he needed then, with Gerry's brother (the drummer, Freddie) behind us we headed to the manager's office. Due to our contacts with local groups we were able to get in touch with Bradford's Terry Sexton and the Telecasters and Geoff and the Fairlanes from Shipley. Both responded to this SOS and, like the troupers they were, supplied Gerry and his Pacemakers with their own equipment, instruments,and amplifiers.

In the meantime Dadio and I got the show on the road. We controlled the bewildered crowd of over 1,000 teenagers that night, as they could see that there was no equipment on the stage. The band were also running late as, when the replacement instruments arrived they had to practice a while on them in the dressing-room. It was 9.15pm when Gerry and the Pacemakers took to the stage, making up for it by playing a full hour.

Looking at the article in the T&A the next day, it seemed Dadio and I did not exist, thanks to the manager's observations that he was the hero and saved what he said was nearly a riot.

When we left Gerry really was apologetic and he did thank us, and the local groups who helped, and gave Terry and myself each a fiver. It was really those local groups who saved them.

At the Majestic and Gaumont Terry (Dadio) and myself in 1965 celebrated over 1,000 rock 'n' roll nights. We always said that the Bradford teenagers who came to those venues at that time were not just patrons, but friends."

Professor David Sharpe, who was on duty at St Luke's Hospital on that Saturday

The worst cases were treated at the regional burns unit in Pinderfields Hospital, Wakefield.

Later, Prof Sharpe - who had only been in the job four months when the tragedy unfolded - was asked what positive use could be made of some of the disaster appeal money.