The world of 1978 was a very
different world from the one I live into today. I was young and 17. I had just
started work in London and the city was a vibrant hive of activity. The music
scene was wonderful with Punk Rock and other great British bands imposing themselves
upon the music scene. There were record shops everywhere with all the latest
albums up for grabs. The book shops were plentiful with wonderful novels of all
genres. The magazine stools were fabulous too with all sorts of delightful
topics that lured me. The world seemed like a very glamorous place and London
seemed at the centre of it all. I stared out at this world through naive and
very impressionable eyes. I drank in all the glamorous aspects of the late 70s
decade world and fantasied that all these wonderful things were waiting for me.
I thought the whole wide world was an eternity of voguish things and that I
might be a young knight of the modern day waiting to take it by storm. I looked at the world with huge delusions of grandeur
and believed the world, in turn, would view me with awe and marvel because out
there was something waiting. Something I might be good at. Of course this was
all fantasy, but sometimes I imaged I might be a dynamic Rock Star (waiting to
be discovered) and live life in the fast lane with beautiful ladies falling
head over heels in love with me. Perhaps, a star footballer scoring goals for
England or maybe a formula 1 racing driver who would win acclaim in the great
arena tweaking the nose of danger. I would die young and be an icon. Perhaps a
member of the 27 club. Wow! Ten years of fast lane living – an eternity!
I can see the reader laughing and
saying, “Yeah right.”
But I was, as mentioned, incredibly
naïve. I rather enjoy my naïve young days when I look back now. What an Earth
was going on in my head. I imagined I would climb some mountain of achievement
and have millions of onlookers stroke my adolescent conviction of vanity. There
were celebrities everywhere and none more so then in the Formula 1 racing
world. Nikki Lauda, James Hunt, Mario Andretti where all big at the time.
Maybe, I would like to be a Formula 1 racing driver. I began to buy the motor
racing magazines and was blown away by the sleek look of the Lotus team’s John
Player sponsored black racing car. They had Mario Andretti and Ronnie Peterson
driving for them. I thought the cars looked great and often envied the life
style these daredevils might live. I knew James Hunt had a great swashbuckling
reputation and he had one a championship back in 1976. Nikki Lauda bore the
scars of injury, but had also taken championship titles. Now in 1978 it seemed to
be Mario Andretti that was amassing points with his team mate Ronnie Peterson.
It was the Lotus car designs turn.
I had got a job as a humble
coding clerk in an American Re-insurance company called CNA-RE based in
Fenchurch Street in Fountain House. It was the claims department and I spent my
time writing policy numbers, premium amounts received and claim payments paid
out. It was before computers and there was no excel programs or computers back
then. I was writing these from policy cards kept in a large filing cabinet on
wheels. All day long I pulled out claims polices from this trolley and copied
the various transaction numbers and amounts into a folder. Why? I haven’t the
foggiest idea. It seemed like an incredible waste of time because everything I
was writing down was on other files here there and everywhere.
CAN-RE dealt with Lloyd’s
insurance brokers who went about the city E.C.3 area – predominantly Fenchurch
Street, Leadenhall Street, St Mary Axe etc. There were hundreds of these small
Re-insurance offices for the brokers to sell their insurance premiums to. The
risks were so great that the insurance was broken down into small sections and
5% or 10% would be sold to various different Re-insurance companies. These
insurance risks were big. Like airlines, shipping industries or other multi-commercial
interests. Interests so big that one insurance company might not be able to
take on a big risk alone. Because a claim for a huge cargo ship or jumbo jet
could work out to be multi millions.
For a single person life
insurance could be bought against an ordinary insurance company, but a single
Formula 1 racing car driver was Re-insured due to the high level of risk
involved.
In 1978 the Lotus team racing
Driver Ronnie Peterson got killed during the Italian Grand Prix. He was Mario
Andretti’s team mate in the Lotus racing team – the black JPS cars I thought
looked great and sleek, the racing driver I envied beyond all things. He was a
young man living this life I imagined as glamorous, but his sudden death
shocked me. I remember seeing Nikki Lauda in TV. interviews after his death
defying accident and the scars he had to his face. I believed that the turning
point had been reached. Now Ronnie Peterson had also been killed in this
promising Lotus team.
It made me dwell on things a
little and was a short shock about the less sensational aspect of racing from
the driver’s point of view. Maybe I was happier being a spectator on this one. Perhaps there is always a price to pay for such dearing escapades? The feelings resurfaced a few weeks later when I was writing out the claims
transactions and pulled out a Re-insurance claims card to copy details from.
CAN-RE had a small percentage of
Ronnie Peterson’s claim. It said he had been killed in the Italian Grand Prix
and I realised he was actually re-insured. I can’t remember my much company’s actual risk
percentage, but it was probably between 5% and 10%. I can’t remember the exact
figure in US dollars but it was multiple thousands of. At such a small
percentage I began to wonder what the overall claim would have been once the Lloyd's claims brokers had done the rounds upon all the Re-insurance companies taking
these multiple thousands here and there. It had to be staggering, I know it
was, but I remember thinking it was no good to poor Ronnie Peterson – the talented
Swedish Formula 1 racing driver who died aged 34. There is a statue of him in
Orebro, Sweden and among his funeral pole bearers was Ken Tyrell, Colin
Chapman, James Hunt, Nikki Lauda and Jody Scheckter. I remember thinking it was a tragic thing at the time and for me; perhaps a slice of life after the glitter is brushed away.
