'My first is now a grandfather'

Prolific foster carer tells life story

- Tristan CORK [e-mail]

A MAN who has dedicated his life to trying to get wayward or vulnerable young teenage boys back on the right track is still going strong, 35 years and around 100 kids later.

Now John Stokes has, rather reluctantly, told of his remarkable story, ahead of a celebratory event at which some of the scores of troubled young teens have returned, often decades after he took them in.

John is one of Bristol's most prolific foster carers. Over the years since 1990, he has taken in at least 80, but probably around 100, young boys who are either extremely vulnerable, challenging or simply going off the rails.

At 65 he decided to retire, but found he couldn't, and now - with the support of David, who was his youngest foster child and his longest-lasting, he is still going, still looking after two teenagers.

John’s remarkable life is intertwined with that of Bristol's cultural history too. As a youth worker at Eagle House in Knowle West in the mid 1980s, and alongside fellow youth worker and the now Bristol broadcasting and music legend Pat Hart, he provided a space for the young people to explore making music, and staged some of the first hip-hop events Bristol’s youth had ever seen.