Local legend marks 50 years of service at sports shop

And he can now add 50 years of service at the sports shop he took over from his father to that list of achievements.

Tyndall, 67, has lived above the David O. Jones Sports shop since he was born, and began to help out aged six.

When he left school in 1966, Tyndall went straight into working in the shop – much to his father’s displeasure.

“Dad said to me ‘do whatever you like, but don’t get into the shop’.

“It was the first and last time I ever disobeyed him,” Tyndall said.

He took over the shop after his father died in 1973, and ran it with his godmother Frances Harrison.

When he retired in 2009, Tyndall handed the reins over to Paul Froome, 33, who used to be a Saturday boy at the shop. He now runs it with his wife Katie, and Tyndall works there on weekday mornings and Saturdays as a volunteer.

Now he has more time on his hands, Tyndall has focused on his fundraising pursuits. Up until 1999, he said he had raised £3,000 – but by the end of this year, Tyndall expects to have collected £112,000 in bucket donations in his lifetime.

He was introduced to it aged 27 by his godmother, who he described as a ‘great collector and a ‘mentor’.

He will have taken his bucket to 38 events by the end of the year – including those organised by bonfire societies across the county and beyond, and a gruelling six-and-a-half hour walk during the London Marathon.

Tyndall is modest about his success, but said it was a way of giving back: “I was fortunate enough to have a good life and a good career so it’s my way of giving back, but without the bonfire organisers I would be redundant. They’re the heroes.

“Even now, after 40 years of collecting I still get a buzz before a parade starts, so I still have the love for it.”

His other passion is metal detecting, which catapulted him into the national papers after his discovery of a rare Anglo-Saxon artefact dating from the 6th century on farmland in Littlehampton.

Called an escutcheon, the decorative copper and glass disk formed part of a hanging bowl and was exhibited in the British Museum.

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