Huddersfield will pay tribute to a very special couple on Monday.

Frank and Anne Beaumont died just a day apart after they were married for 68 years and had given decades of service to their community with Frank dedicating 60 years to local football.

The Wooldale couple – Frank was 91 and Anne 89 – will have a joint service to celebrate their lives St David’s Church, Holmbridge, Holmfirth, at 11.30am on Monday, September 30.

They were inseparable and both passed away at Greenacres Care Home in Meltham where Frank was being cared for with dementia and Anne had been a resident for just a few months.

Son Ian said: “It was a huge shock when mum died first. I believe she died of a broken heart after receiving the news that things weren’t looking great for dad.”

 

 

The couple had been members of Wooldale Community Association and Probus.

Frank’s dedication to local football in Huddersfield is legendary, spanning the best part of 60 years and he was still a committee member with the Huddersfield and District Association Football League right into his mid-80s.

In 1998 he wrote a book called The Origins And History Of Huddersfield and District Association Football League.

His love of local football was inspired by former league secretary, the late Alf Richardson, who needed someone to help him in the role.

Frank obliged … and then also married Alf’s daughter, Anne, too. The couple married at Sheepridge Church in May 1956.

 

 

Although Frank’s first official role as assistant secretary began in 1960 he’d been helping Alf before then and had first joined the league committee in 1951 as a representative for Bradley Rangers, a team he played in for 13 years.

Frank became league secretary in 1966 when Alf retired and stayed in the role for 10 years. He was appointed league chairman in 1977 and president in 1983 before retiring in 2016 when he was made honorary president for all his years of selfless dedication.

Frank joined the Huddersfield and District FA Council which runs the game in 1961 and again rose to president in that organisation in 2000 before retiring when he was in his 70s.

Frank began his own football career at the age of 12, playing for Dalton St Pauls in the old Sunday Schools League during the Second World War and remembered playing centre forward in the Heaton Shield final at Berry Brow in 1946.

In 1950 he was signed by Hull City’s manager Raich Carter to play for their intermediate side but that ended in 1951 when National Service meant Frank had to join the RAF.

He spent two years at RAF Hemswell in Lincolnshire as an engine mechanic working on Mosquito aircraft. When he was demobbed Frank joined Bradley Rangers where he ended his playing career.

 

Margaret Whitaker, president of both Huddersfield Football Association and Huddersfield and District Association Football League, said: “Both Frank and Anne were very well respected and held in the highest regard by everyone who knew them.

“It’s hard to put into words all the time and effort Frank put into grassroots football and Anne was always by his side supporting him in whatever he did. They were so hands on in the roles too so you’d see them helping out in the car park and taking money at the gates at local football finals.

“The fact that Frank was made life president says it all really.”

Frank was also a member of Holme Valley Beagles for more than 30 years and became Joint Master.

Frank and Anne leave son, Ian, daughter Jill and sadly lost another son, Neil, in a moped tragedy on Crete in 1988. They have three grandchildren Carol, Alexander and Nick and one great granddaughter, Edith.

Written by ANDY HIRST who runs his own Yorkshire freelance journalism agency AH! PR (https://ah-pr.com/) specialising in press releases, blogging, website content, copywriting and ghost-writing autobiographies.