A 95-year-old RAF hero enjoyed a dance at the nightclub where he met his late wife in the 1940s.
Kevin Topham was desperate to go to Club X in Newark, Nottinghamshire, after it reopened for the first time in a decade. He used to attend dances at the venue in the 1940s, when it was known as the Corn Exchange.
Kevin, who joined the RAF aged 17 at the end of World War II, met his wife Molly there in 1949.
He was determined to go back to the club for one last time after reading about its re-opening in a local paper.
Kevin was warned by his carer that it would have “booming music, strobe lighting and be full of 18-year-olds”.
But he wasn’t deterred and got the go-ahead from Club X managers to visit an hour before it opened to young ravers.
The grandad-of-one donned his finest suit and put on his military medals and RAF tie as he hit the dancefloor.
He danced with carer Donna Harvey to the 1941 hit Chattanooga Choo Choo by the Glenn Miller Orchestra.
Kevin said it felt “a little bit sentimental” to be back inside the club 74 years after meeting Molly there.
“I did enjoy it,” he said. “I put all my gongs [medals] on and my RAF tie. The staff were all very good. They made me very welcome.
“It was very sentimental. It's a long time since I was in there.”
Kevin, from Edingley, Notts, was a self-confessed ladies’ man in the post-war years.
He said: “Sometimes I would end up with three partners in the middle of the dancefloor.”
The former RAF bomb disposal man remembered having to flip a coin to choose between them.
“I used to go when the Americans were in there, they’d often be sat on the front steps. They used to take all of our pretty girls,” he said.
“I met my wife there, at a dance.”
Carer Donna said Kevin used to reminisce about dancing at the Corn Exchange even before he found out about it reopening.
“Every time we go past there - if I’m taking him to a doctor's appointment or his daughter’s - he says ‘I used to go there’,” she said.
“He told me, ‘I used to go there and all the Americans would come and pinch our women, and there would be fighting’.”
Donna said her dance with Kevin “melted my heart”.
“It was just so humbling,” she added. “It made him happy. It was amazing. His face absolutely beamed.
“All of his memories came flooding back to him. He hasn't stopped talking about it.
“I told Kevin it would be nothing like it was in 1949. There would be booming music and strobe lighting, and it would be full of 18-year-olds. but he would not let it go.
“I thought if I didn’t take him he’s probably going to get in his car and go, which I didn’t want him to do, so I had to make sure he was safe.
“When we got there he asked where the piano was, bless him, because when he used to go there was a live band.”
Kevin tied the knot with Molly in 1952, three years after meeting her at an RAF dance at the club.
They were married for 66 years, until she died in 2018.
Their daughter, Karen Mason, 65, said she was grateful to Donna for organising the dance.
“It made me feel quite emotional that he was dancing on the floor where he met Mum, and his granddaughter felt the same,” she said.
“It was lovely to see that and he was full of it all weekend.”
Club X manager Amy Smith said staff were moved to tears watching Kevin dance.
“Our DJ, Mio, had the record that Kevin wanted to hear and we turned the volume down to an adequate level for Kevin,” she added.
