Speaker Tony Emmott - My Job Talk

Tony said that, encouraged by his membership of U3A he had self-published his own biography entitled “Life's but a Walk in the Shadow”. This was his second attempt at writing his first attempt was about the Bradford Club’s Optimists’ Corner.

He was born in 1942 to parents who owned a news agency in Wyke. He went to Bellvue School along with other members of Blaize. He could have gone to Bradford Grammar School on a Scholarship but turned it down. Later in life he became a Councillor for the Heaton ward on Bradford Council.

His first job was at Bradford Metropolitan Council working on slum clearance. In 1965 he applied to Huddersfield District Council. Whilst working there he was also taking a local government course at college. He wanted to take articles whilst working for the council but they turned him down so he applied to Roger Suddards at Last Suddard solicitors.

He lived in Oakenshaw with his wife Jackie. They had 3 children as the second pregnancy produced twins. He always felt under the shadow of Roger and so he decided to move to Halifax Building Society. At the time he received a telegram from Roger saying “Good for you bad for me”.

His original application to the Halifax was refused because he had a beard but he refused to shave it off and they hired him anyway. He then moved to Heaton with a Building Society mortgage of 3% which was very low for its time. He specialised in land and planning maters around country.

He then went to work for Sugden Spenser specialising in planning matters where he worked with Bill Hudson although Bill was in a different department. Sugden Spenser split up and both Tony and Bill stayed in Bradford until 2002 when the firm was taken over by Gordons. Tony’s biggest client was Car Phone Warehouse who invited him to dinner at big London hotel to celebrate their new head office.

In 2007 he retired and moved to Ilkley. Tragedy struck on 16 September 2012 when his wife Jackie was killed in a car crash by a foreign driver who was driving on the wrong side of the road. There is now a plaque to her on Market Street in Bradford. This was not the only such tragedy in the family as his son Sean had been killed in a car crash in 1990.