Former Lancashire Evening Post electrical engineer leaves behind a legacy of laughter and love to all he met

Allan Fazackerley, passed away peacefully, but unexpectedly, working on his laptop, from a combined brain haemorrhage and aneurysm, just three days after his 83rd birthday, on Thursday, August 25.

A lover of many sports, he lived for football and cricket and also had trials for Preston North End, before a compound fracture to his left leg ended his football career. In later years he carried out some temporary work at the Lancashire Evening Post building on Fishergate, Preston. He loved it that much, he never left and spent his entire career there as an electrical engineer in the maintenance department.

Born on August, 22, 1939, to Arthur and Lily Fazackerley, Allan was a younger brother to Sheila, now 87, who lives in Warrington, with her husband Ernie, also 87, who shared her brother's love of jazz music. Originally living on Hammond Street in Preston, next door to his maternal grandparents, the family moved to Hillside Avenue in Fulwood a few years later. He developed his love of gardening off his father, and his green fingers from mother. His passion for gardening and the outdoors never waivered and he was still mowing the lawn and cutting hedges well into his 80's. However, due to poor health his father Arthur did not see active service during WW2 and sadly passed away from terminal cancer when Allan was just 15 years old.

He attended Emmanuel Street Primary School, and then Preston Grammar where he hated maths and rugby and played in a local table tennis league. On completing his education at Preston Grammar School in 1955 he secured an apprenticeship in the offices at County Hall. However, during the summer break he took on some temporary work at the Lancashire Evening Post building on Fishergate, Preston, where he stayed for 40 years, being forced to retire due to ill health.

On a night out in 1962 he his wife-to-be Adrienne Ann Burgess (known as “Ann”), by accidentally knocking her over on their respective ways “in and out” of the Dog and Partridge Pub, Friargate, Preston on a night out! Six weeks later they were engaged, and they married the following June (22nd June 1963). Originally living on Lowther Street, they had their first child, Iain Mark Fazackerley on the May, 15 1965. The closeness of the canal and concern for their child’s safety, prompted them to move with their toddler to a larger family home in Shaftesbury Avenue, Penwortham. In 1973 Ann delivered twins - Lindsay Jane and Steven Keith - and their happy family was complete.

His daughter Lindsay Catterall told the Post: "Mum was 18 and dad was 23. Mum's father Stanley told her on the morning of their wedding that “You must be mad getting married at 18!”. They’d not long celebrated 59 years together, and would have been married 60 years on the 25th June 2023.

"We all have happy memories of dad cycling to and from work in all weathers; he even appeared on the Look North West opening sequence montage for years. Every night we would look out for him on TV, cycling home to us across the Strand Road junction! Dad enjoyed the fame, even if it was just at home.

"He was also a teller of very tall tales. One of his favourites was “Did I ever tell you about the time I got my head blown off during the war?” - referring to the prominent horizontal line on his neck resulting from a healed abscess - it made for very good story telling."

In the late 70’s Allan beloved mother Lily passed away, and in the early 1980’s Ann's parents Stanley and Ellen (known as Nellie) passed away. Shortly afterwards the family made their final journey to a larger house in Penwortham where they lived together for the next 40 years.

Speaking of her father's time spent at the Post, Lindsay added: "The LEP building on Fishergate was closed and everyone was transferred up to the Broughton Printers building in Fulwood. Despite working with the same people, and doing the same job, dad was not a fan of the “big red bus shelter in the sky” as he called it, and longed for the old LEP building, full of happy memories of a bygone era.

"In fact if you’ve ever walked down Cheapside from Fishergate and noticed a brown door with a keypad next to it, Dad installed that. It was the secure side entrance to the old LEP building. He said it was his “007 door"

"As he settled into life at Broughton, and progressed into his 50’s, his health began to deteriorate rapidly. Whilst he had suffered from asthma for a number of years, he was diagnosed with the much more serious disease Emphysema. Following a number of collapses at home and at work, resulting in hospital admissions, extended periods of sick leave, and a raft of medication, his specialist Mrs Taylor told him that his lungs were in a terrible state, and that he needed to retire, or he very likely only had two years left to live.

"At the time, the LEP were looking for candidates for voluntary redundancy and he applied. With his friend, and colleague Alan Webster, he officially retired on the November, 4, 1995, meaning he was able to spend more time with Ann, pottering in his garden, and supporting his best friend, avid fellow photographer, and former colleague Joe Robinson, who had been a labourer at the LEP.

"Within a year of retiring dad was fitter and happier than we’d seen him in years. The man we genuinely thought we might lose to COPD in the 1990’s beat the odds and thoroughly enjoyed (an almost) a 27 year retirement.

"He continued his association with the Evening Post by being a regular contributor to the Post Bag, and proudly kept scrapbooks filled with all of his published letters.

"He was a regular caller and contributor to the Graham Liver Breakfast Show on Radio Lancashire; Graham often said that he must meet dad in person over a pint one day – living as they did only two streets away from each other in Penwortham– but dad's pint drinking days had long been over, and sadly they never did meet in person.

"Dad was one of a very rare breed – a character - a consummate quizzer, a teller of tales and very bad jokes! But more than that he was a loving father, a devoted husband, caring brother, proud grandad and great grandad, and a loyal friend. Everyone knew him, or knew of him. He will always be loved and sadly missed by us all."

He leaves behind his wife Ann, children Iain, Lindsay and Steven, sister Sheila (and family), his grandchildren Hollie, Poppie, Robyn, Rohan, William, Kurt and Poppy and great grandchildren Zayne, Jude, Albie and Charlie.