John Hardie Ratcliffe (2 January 1906 – 26 May 1975) was an English musician, and

General Secretary Secretary is a title often used in organizations to indicate a person having a certain amount of authority, power, or importance in the organization. Secretaries announce important events and communicate to the organization. The term is derived ...

of the United Kingdom Musicians' Union from 1948. Ratcliffe was born in 1906 in

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

, and named after

Keir Hardie James Keir Hardie (15 August 185626 September 1915) was a Scottish trade unionist and politician. He was a founder of the Labour Party, and served as its first parliamentary leader from 1906 to 1908. Hardie was born in Newhouse, Lanarkshire. ...

. In childhood, he played

saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed on a mouthpiece vibrates to pr ...

and

flute The flute is a family of classical music instrument in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, meaning they make sound by vibrating a column of air. However, unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is a reedless ...

, and by the age of 17, when he joined the union, was already performing theatre orchestras in various towns and cities. He established several branches of the union, and eventually gave up playing music, to devote all his energies to its administration, accepting a post as a full-time official in 1937. Although he gave notice of resignation in August 1962, during a dispute over internal policy matters, he was persuaded to withdraw it, and continued as General Secretary until his eventual retirement in 1971. He appeared as a castaway on the

BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927). The service provides national radio stations covering th ...

programme ''

Desert Island Discs ''Desert Island Discs'' is a radio programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4. It was first broadcast on the BBC Forces Programme on 29 January 1942. Each week a guest, called a " castaway" during the programme, is asked to choose eight recordings (usu ...

'' on 9 November 1964, and died in 1975 in London.''England & Wales, National Probate Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations), 1858-1995''

References

1906 births 1975 deaths Musicians from Liverpool General Secretaries of the Musicians' Union (UK) Trade unionists from Liverpool {{UK-musician-stub