Rag week was of course one of the highlights of the student year. It gave us all the chance to let our hair down (which was very long in those days) and have a few drinks because of course, we didn't drink anything for the rest of the year!
The rag procession was the day when the students took over Manchester. Because there was the University, Manchester Poly and Salford University as well as all the assorted Colleges, the student population of Manchester was massive, and they all got together on the rag procession. It started from the University and wound it's way through the centre of the city to Salford, or the other way around I seem to remember, on alternate years. It was of course traditional to try and fit as many drinks in as possible along the way, and supplies of flour were taken along to bombard anyone and everyone with, aided by water pistols.
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It was also a chance to meet up with Bert and the boys! Bert had stayed on in Nottingham to retake some exams and then surfaced at Salford University after I'd already spent a year in Manchester. We used to write messages to each other on the walls of the toilets in the Plaza arranging to meet up at parties. An extra supply of flower was taken along just to make sure that the first ambush could be a big one so you had to keep an eye out for the Salford boys and make sure you hit them first!
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You would sometimes bump into others from school - Grat was at Manchester doing maths and Sally McCree was also there. I bumped into her doing the National bus trip through the Peak District occasionally. Anna Goodman also appeared at Manchester after I'd been there a couple of years to do Psychology - I remember sharing a musical high with her when we went to see Fairport Convention and witnessed Sandy Denny singing "Who knows where the time goes". We used to have a sort of Manchester University Exchange trip at Christmas when all the students I'd met in Manchester who were actually from Nottingham used to meet up during the holidays in the Salutation on Maid Marian Way.
Sorry that the photographs are all a bit blurred. It's obviously that there's a lot of action and movement going on - after all it's a procession moving very....err....fast! It's not that the photographer is always drunk, and in any case it can't be me as I am to be seen above, admiring the young lady with the glove on from afar! I think these photos are from the procession on 11th February 1975. My diary says I got very drunk (that's a surprise on a rag procession) and saw Lindisfarne at night.
