Councillor
Mary Nunns has been both the envy of teenagers and the object of miner’s
wrath, but not because she was Knottingley’s first woman councillor. On
the contrary, everyone was delighted at her success; other women had tried
to make the council chamber, but had failed.
Mary
Nunns aroused the envy of teenagers during one of her two terms as
chairman of the Urban Council when Gene Pitney opened Knottingley
Carnival. As chairman, it was her job to entertain him. She incurred the
wrath of the local miners when she refused to let them speak at a council
meeting. They marched to the Council Chamber shortly after rents on
Simpson Lane Estate were increased. Councillor Nunns eventually closed the
meeting.
She
was elected to the Council 18 years ago and has been a member since then
without a break. What spurred her on to enter politics? Was it her
husband, a former councillor? Her interest in people and their problems?
"Something to do with both," she said, but the main factor was
that "involvement in local government was a family tradition."
Her
great-grandfather, Alderman D. Longstaff, was a Mayor of Pontefract, and
her husband was a councillor, but retired when she was elected. Later he
served another short spell on Knottingley Council, but retired because of
business commitments.
Mary
Nunn’s main interest as a councillor concern old people and education.
She has been chairman of the Housing Committee six times and as such was
many people’s confidante. "They often found it easier to talk to a
women than to a man," she said. She has served on every committee of
the council and says throughout her time in local government, she has
never felt out of place as a women councillor and has been "treated
perfectly" by her colleagues.
Besides
council work, she has done much social work. She has belonged to the
W.R.V.S. for 31 years, joining during the war when she worked in the
hospitals. After the war she helped found the Knottingley Derby and Joan
Club. Now she is Centre Organiser. "Social work gives you a broader
outlook," she told me. "It removes some of the drudgery of
household chores." Councillor Nunns sometimes has to do washing and
other chores in the evening, but the satisfaction given by her work more
than compensates for every smaller hardship.
Both
her social and council work have "become part of my life" which
she say she would find very dull without any outside interests. She
thoroughly enjoys the way she lives but trying to encourage other women to
join in voluntary work is not quite as easy. They say they haven’t got
time!
Councillor
Nunns was born at Pontefract but has lived in Knottingley since she was
12.
