Paul Thompson, now an archaelogist at Coventry Museum, has always been fascinated in recreating history - down to the finest detail. He and his mother, Jill, talked about how the family has been affected by Paul's obsession with the past... World War II holds a fascination for many, but few take their interest to the point at which recreate the spirit of the blitz in their own bedroom. Paul did. "All the books on the shelves," he explains, "had to be the correct ones from the 1940s or earlier - it just got worse from there on." Even the sounds were authentic, with a radio which didn't work rigged up with a tape recorder behind it playing Glen Miller and Vera Lynn. Paul never regarded his interest in World War II as odd, "I wanted to wear the stuff, and experience what it was like to wear a tin hat or be in an air raid shelter."
The other members of the family weren’t allowed to stand back and admire. Oh no! "No one was exempt," says Paul."I did a couple of exhibitions at school. The family not only had to help me find the exhibits, they had to wear them as well!"
Paul’s mother, Jill, struggled with birthdays and Christmas presents, "The things he wanted had to be searched for months in advance. I did get interested. I was born at the end of the war, and when I realised what it was about, no-one wanted to talk about it - so I learned with Paul." Paul’s sister, a Home Economist, didn’t escape either. "She had to make cakes," says Jill, "We’ve got all the leaflets and recipes - how to make apricot tart from grated carrots and a tiny bit of jam." Only once did Paul push his mother too far, "That was when he started to get interested in a real tank," says Jill, who refused, quite reasonably, to have one on their driveway.
When Paul's interest moved to the medieval period it presented a few difficulties, "You can’t buy the things - so you’ve got to make them from scratch," he explains. This is where his mother was invaluable to his relentless search for authenticity, "I had to make hose and codpiece - but the pattern didn't look as if it’d make anything wearable!" says Jill, who even went to medieval events and surreptitiously studied how a cod piece should really look.
Paul has a loyal and patient ally in his mother When Paul specialised in bones, Jill was on bone-duty, "I was assigned to scrape up any dead animal I came across, bury it in the garden to de-flesh it and then save the bones."
Archeology and history are still Paul's passions, "The period I'm living in now is the 15th century, particularly the Wars of the Roses. My partner, Alexandra actually fights with me on the battlefield - and it's historically accurate that the women fought too."
