New Club Treasurer
Wednesday 12 August 2026
We are delighted to announce that the club now has a new treasurer. John Bowen has kindly stepped into the position and has sent us the following profile for those who do not know him. I attended TC from 1967 to 1977. Lower School was huge fun, happy memories included being sent into the village to buy meat for the pet terrapins in Form 1 – all alone and 8 years old – it wouldn’t happen now! I was involved in many of the Theatre Productions and was a very keen member of the Scouts, even being allowed to form my own patrol called the Kestrels! I was fairly good at athletics, by best event being the 200 yard sprint even after the long trek down to the (then) Aldersley Stadium. One of the ‘rights of passage’ in Junior School was the expedition to walk Hadrian’s Wall which awesome starting in Burgh by Sands and ending up in Newcastle on Tyne with camping all along the way. The move to Upper School required a bit more focus on study although my involvement in the school Scout Troop continued and we had the big annual summer camps in either Wales or the Lake District. Proper ‘old school’ camping with cooking over open fires with the toilets being a hole in the ground. Night hikes were the most exciting exercise being driven into the darkness and dropped in the middle of no-where to find your way back to camp!Achieving 12 ‘O’ Levels and 4 ‘A’ Levels, I got into me first choice, Manchester University where I studied Geology and Geography. Manchester in the late 70’s was a superb place to be and a very sociable, which may explain my rather average 2:2 degree result!I then joined Bass as a graduate trainee, and had a 15 year glittering career rising to report directly to the Chairman. As well as pubs and breweries, Bass at that time owned many other businesses including Holiday Inn hotel chain, Pontins, Coral, Gala Bingo and British American Bingo. I was fortunate to travel across the UK, Europe and USA working in many of these varied businesses. This led to me leading a business transformation programme and design of a retail system which I subsequently led the deployment into the (then) 3,500 managed pubs that Bass owned.I was asked to join the supplier of the retail system and saw this as a good move as this was the first to market and I then spent the next few years introducing the technology into the majority of the pub, restaurant, hotel and ferry companies in the UK and in Europe. An expansion globally led me to spend more time in Europe and Asia before multiple take-overs did the business no good and I left to join the Board of one of our key suppliers and returned to the West Midlands. Now nearing retirement, I am married have two grown up sons, and two grand-children. Hobbies include clay pigeon shooting, skiing and cycling along with other voluntary work including being Chairman of the Codsall Wood Village Committee and (until recently) a founder Director of the Codsall Wood Pub Company. We formed the CWPC 10 years ago to save our last village pub (The Pendrell Arms) from closure. We succeeded and ran it (with Tenants) for 10 years but have now sold it into safe hands to allow further investment.I owe much of my business and life success to my education at TC, and when the search for new Committee members came last year I had no hesitation in volunteering. This year I answered the call for a new Treasurer and hope to give time and knowledge to aid in the ongoing support and success of TC.