IF a young Elizabeth Oakes had her way she would have been a policewoman serving with Greater Manchester Police.

That would have been a great loss to not only several well-known charities but also to the many individuals who have benefitted from her raising hundreds of thousands of pounds over the years.

Now, as she retires at 65 as regional fundraiser for the Children Today charity, she can look back on a fascinating career without regret. “I’ve simply loved all of it,” she stated.

Elizabeth was born in Salford and has an elder brother. She attended Wardley Grammar School where she enjoyed sports including hockey, tennis and swimming and had her heart set on the Police Force until her father intervened.

She was also interested in cookery and so, when she left school at 16 after the family had moved to live in Bolton, she enrolled at Bolton Catering College and took a Diploma course.

She left both qualified and with a desire to “have my own place – a pub or restaurant”. Instead, the young woman found herself in the Isle of Man where she worked in a large hotel for two seasons, graduating from waiting on to learning the management side.

Back home again, she worked briefly in a bank before reverting to catering work and then saw an advert for a cookery demonstrator for the Electricity Board. “We were called home economists then and they were mostly the pearls and twin-set brigade,” she recalled. “I was nothing like that – I was 21, all hot pants and direct manner but they took me on and I really enjoyed the work.”

This involved demonstrating at events in Manchester, London and around the country, going to big shows like the Brighter Homes Exhibition and demonstrating home appliances in schools and Women’s Institute meetings among others.

Bright and vivacious, Elizabeth was well-suited to the work “and I loved meeting the public,” she added.

She gave up this work when she married at 30 and had two sons, Mark and Andrew. When the children were still very young, she decided to add to her catering qualifications and took her Master Restauranteurs again at Bolton College. She then went to work part-time in local restaurants.

Keen to do other work as well, she spotted that the National Children’s Homes charity was looking for home-based workers for a campaign they were planning.

Elizabeth applied, got the post and then became involved in the pioneering campaign for house-to-house collections. “I was a co-ordinator – there were eight of us around the country plus four more in Scotland,” she explained. “We recruited mappers, researchers, telephonists and volunteers to carry out these collections.”

The innovative idea won NCH an award from the Institute of Fundraising and launched Elizabeth on a charity career.

Here, she met Hugh McCaw who left NCH and joined the Children’s Hospital Appeal Trust (CHAT) buying equipment for local hospitals. He recruited Elizabeth and she worked on this charity, raising large amounts of money, for several years before Hugh founded the Children Today charity. This buys bespoke equipment for children and young people with disabilities and he quickly once more recruited Elizabeth.

Children Today is 25 years-old next year and Elizabeth has been a regional fundraiser there for most of that time. She has organised everything from balls, dances, afternoon teas, quizzes and comedy nights to annually taking groups of volunteers abroad for challenging breaks backed by football’s Professional Footballers Association PFA).

These trips have taken her to Egypt, Nepal, Borneo, Malaysia, South Africa, Cuba, Peru, Slovinia, up Mount Kilimanjaro and to the depths of America’s Grand Canyon twice. Elizabeth has always thrown herself into these events, taking part in the same challenges – even where she had to swim with sharks or had to cross 220 miles of the Sinai Desert on a bike when she had never cycled before.

Back on home ground, she’s regularly rattled collecting tins and buckets and done everything from firewalking to parachuting and regularly works in the charity’s shop on Churchgate.

“I’m going to continue doing a couple of days for the charity but I think I’ve been very lucky,” she insisted. “I’ve had a great career and met hundreds of people, many of whom are still my friends.

“I’ve also found that the public is mainly good and generous and that there really are more of them than the nasty people in life.”

Caption: LIFE OF FUNDRAISING – Elizabeth Oakes in the Children Today charity shop on Churchgate, Bolton