If you’re the type of person who enjoys perusing old newspapers, every now and then you’ll come across a story that is more than a mere curiosity, one which either by being completely extraordinary, by having a significant effect on its era or – rarest of all – by having a continued impact on modern society transcends the time and place in which it occurred. This is very much one of the smallest and most treasured group, the story of an event that threatened but ultimately failed to destroy hundreds of clubs across the country, is still regularly quoted in legal circles more than 70 years later, and also made 48-year-old Bessie Stone of Cheetham Hill, Manchester really quite upset.
The story starts on 9 August 1947 when, midway through Denton St Lawrence CC’s away match against Cheetham, Miss Stone left her house on Manchester’s Beckenham Road and stopped for a chat with a neighbour. Meanwhile, over the road, beyond a 7ft fence, down a further 10ft of natural slope and across 75 yards of playing field, a certain Walter Leadbetter, teacher at a Southport school, was batting for the visitors. The bowler’s name has been lost to history, which is probably as he would have wanted it: with one ball of his first and final over of the game remaining, Leadbetter had already hit two sixes and a four. The final delivery was no better than those that had preceded it, and Leadbetter swung his bat, connected sweetly, and sent the ball soaring.
Written by Simon Burnton
This news first appeared on https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2019/oct/15/bessie-stone-head-injury-court-case-cricket-the-spin under the title “The Spin | Bessie Stone’s head injury and the court case that threatened cricket”. Bolchha Nepal is not responsible or affiliated towards the opinion expressed in this news article.
