Oldest bookie George looks back on the gamble of a lifetime that paid off

George Carrigill remembers exactly where he was when he realised when it comes to gambling, only the bookmaker is guaranteed to win.

It was the 1940s. He was a grammar school pupil in Dewsbury and rumours his form master was also a practising nudist began to circulate. Amid the sniggers, George saw an opportunity. He bet his classmates sixpence that he wasn’t and a further sixpence that he would ask him direct.

“After prayers one morning I went up to him and said, ‘Excuse me sir, are you a nudist?’ He replied, ‘I’ve walked in the nude, I’ve swam in the nude, but I’m not a member of a nudist colony. It was simple, as long as I asked the question, whatever the answer, I couldn’t lose.”

George soon became the school’s unofficial bookmaker, offering each way bets on the annual cross country race and once skipping an afternoon games lesson to cycle to York Races. At the time betting was illegal and it certainly wasn’t a profession for a grammar school boy. So instead, he got a job as a reporter on his local paper, earning extra money as a freelancer.

“A court case of an Irishman drunk in charge of a horse might have only made a few paragraphs in the Dewsbury District News, but it was front page news in the Cork Examiner. They’d pay me £5 for the copy, which felt like a fortune.”

The problem was that George was also a regular at the town’s dozen or so illegal betting shops. As quickly as he earned money, he spent it. “It set me thinking,” he says. “Instead of giving the bookies all my money, I decided to open my own betting shop.”

Using £350, which had been left to him by his father, George opened his first shop on March 15, 1954, sharing the premises with an upmarket ladies hair salon and becoming the country’s youngest-ever bookmaker

“The salon belonged to a lady called Phyllis Wilson,” says 78-year-old George, who is now Britain’s oldest bookmaker, still working seven days a week at his six shops across Dewsbury. “When we were negotiating the contracts she asked what I did for a living. I told her I was a bookmaker and she couldn’t have been more pleased. She thought I made books for a living. By the time she realised I was actually opening a betting office, it was too late.”

It was still some years before betting shops were legalised, but aside from one memorable raid, Dewsbury police generally turned a blind eye to George and the rest of the town’s independent bookies.

“There had been a big crackdown in Leeds on prostitution and afterwards, the city’s chief constable turned his attention to illegal betting shops. There had been similar raids in Barnsley and Huddersfield and when the police chose not to act in Dewsbury, there were rumours of bribery and corruption. After one of his daily morning press conferences, the Dewsbury chief constable said he wanted to see all the bookmakers in the town. He told us, ‘Look, I’m going to have to come and raid you, but don’t worry, it will be on a Tuesday and I’ll let you know the day before. If you could have some betting slips and a little cash ready, I’ll make it as painless as possible’. When the raid happened, there must have been about 40 people in my smoky back room. A few of them opened the window and escaped down the drain pipe, but the rest were asked by an officer at the top of the stairs to file out, giving their name and address, before going across the road to the police station. And you know what? Every single one of them did just that. It was a very civilised. The customers were bound over and told not to frequent the premises again and I escaped with a £5 fine.”

Betting shops were finally legalised in May 1961 and over the last half a century George, who most days arrives at work long before the cleaners, has watched the industry change beyond all recognition. In the early days, bookmakers had to shut half an hour before a race meeting began and often found themselves at the mercy of the British weather – during the winter of 1963, betting shops were closed for 13 weeks when snow forced racecourses to cancel entire meetings.

Today, there’s always something to fill a gap. Horseracing now accounts for less than 50 per cent of George’s business, with football taking over as the bookie’s main sport. In fact it’s now possible to bet on pretty much anything, but he draws the line at offering odds on the sex of celebrity babies and the UK’s chances in this month’s Eurovision Song Contest.

“A few years back there were a lot of bets being placed on who would be the next Archbishop of Canterbury. In the morning George Carey, then Bishop of Bath and Wells, was 80-1. By the evening he was 1-2 odds-on favourite. Let’s just say the choir boys got their holiday money from that particular wager. There’s always someone with inside knowledge.”

In almost six decades as a turf accountant, George has seen countless dead certs fall at the first hurdle, but just occasionally the punters do triumph. His biggest payout was £151,000 to one of his customers who had waged small amounts on a series of trebles and an accumulator. The winning bet was sealed by a 66-1 outsider, which never won another race.

Like most bookmakers, George doesn’t like parting with money, but he admits the subsequent publicity did the business the world of good. “It made people realise that even a small independent bookmakers can sometimes pay out big amounts,” he says.

Many of his fellow bookmakers have not been so lucky. Around 400 independent bookmakers closed last year, a result, according to George, of new Gambling Commission regulations. Prior to the quango’s birth four years ago, George paid £300 to secure three-year licences for his six betting shops. Now he has to find £39,000.

“A centipede has more use for an extra leg than the licensed betting industry has for the Gambling Commission,” he says. Nor does he approve much of Camelot and in particular the scratch cards targeted at the younger end of the market. “My son, Bill, says I shouldn’t make too much fuss, since scratchcards are like the betting industry’s kindergarten and once they’re old enough they’ll start coming to betting shops. He’s probably right, but it doesn’t sit easy with me.”

While it’s a few years since betting shops were women-free zones, they’re still used as a refuge by some customers.

“The internet has had an impact on the industry, of course it has, but we still have our regulars. They come here and as well as place a few bets, they also set the world to rights before going home to their wives.”

For George, who was also a successful greyhound trainer, the sport will always be the thing. He has been to 53 successive Cheltenham Festivals and while he allows himself a few modest bets, it’s the spectacle he’s really there for. “Cheltenham is magic, There’s no other racecourse like it in the would. I was there when Arkle won his three Gold Cups – I can still see him coming up that hill. I do have the odd bet, but normally I’m praying for certain horses not to win.”

He’s well aware that for some, the odd bet can turn into a full-blown addiction, but it is a bookmaker’s policy never to refuse a bet.

“Someone asked me recently whether I’d do any thing differently,” adds George. “I wouldn’t as the wonderful Edith Piaf said, ‘Je ne regrette rien’.”

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History of the betting shop

1961: Off-course betting shops became legal. However the legislation also demanded that betting shops should not encourage or induce betting. As a result no televisions or radios were allowed inside.

1986: For the first time betting shops were allowed to show live television coverage of sporting events and serve refreshments.

1995: Betting shops were allowed to open on Sundays, windows no longer had to be obscured and odds could be displayed in the window.

1996: Bookmakers lost £30m when Frankie Dettori won seven winners in one day at Ascot.

2001: The number of betting shops fell from 10,000 in the 1970s to around 8,500.