OVER the last 40 years, Bob Woodward, founder of children's leukaemia charity Clic, has raised more than £50m for good causes.
After a lifetime of service, we would all forgive Bob a few years relaxation, sitting back in his Frenchay home with his feet up in his dotage. But that's just not Bob.
The 79-year-old has agreed to come out of retirement one more time in order to raise one more million – for a cause that is very close to his heart.
Today he is launching The Starfish Pool Appeal – a fundraising drive to pay for a much-needed £1m hydrotherapy pool for Claremont Special Secondary School.
For the students at the Redland school, who have range of disabilities, it will provide not only vitally important physiotherapy facilities, but by giving them a place to swim, will be a door upon a moment of freedom that able-bodied people take for granted.
Bob knows what it will mean to them, because his own eight-year-old granddaughter, Laura, is herself severely disabled.
"She was born with a condition simply referred to as an abnormality of chromosome 15," he says. "It means she is both mentally and physically disabled. It is a condition that severely hampers her mobility and her freedom.
"But her special school in Chesterfield has a hydrotherapy pool, and I've been there and seen her using the facility. Her face just lights up," Bob says.
"It is difficult to communicate with Laura, but when you see that smile as she starts to swim, you know she is loving every moment.
"Being in the water is wonderfully calming for her, and there is a real sense that she can enjoy a freedom and mobility in the pool that she is unable to get for the rest of the time. Getting into that pool is always the highlight of her week. To see some joy in her face means a lot to me and my family."
But the 83 disabled students at Claremont Special Secondary School do not have it as easy. The school opened in 2007 as a development of Claremont Special Primary School a couple of miles away in Henleaze. But the new site did not include a pool.
"It means the children have always had to be bussed up to the primary school to use their pool," explains headteacher Alison Ewins, as she walks me through the space where their dream 62 sq m pool would be constructed.
"When you're dealing with children with severe physical and mental disabilities, organising that two mile bus journey becomes an enormous task each time. Many of these children are emotionally quite sensitive, and the process of getting on and off the bus itself can be very stressful.
"A big part of the attraction of hydrotherapy, beyond the obvious physical benefits, is the calming effect the water can have on these youngsters.
"But to get them out of the pool and have to get them back on the bus can often negate any calming benefit the session has provided.
"If we had a pool here on the site, it would mean we could go straight from pool sessions into lessons, and I think it would be enormously beneficial to their learning.
"There is also the simple physical issue that the pool at the primary school is designed for primary aged children. It's small – too small really for our 11 to 19 year olds, some of whom are over 6ft tall.
"To get this pool would be a dream come true for the school."
For Bob the fundraising project is a temptation he just can't resist coming out of retirement for – even though it's only a few weeks since he had a major operation himself, to replace the joint in one of his knees.
But Bob has retired unsuccessfully from his tireless fundraising two or three times. He left the top job at Clic Sargent in 1996, after being diagnosed himself with prostate cancer, stepping down from the charity he founded as CLIC (Cancer and Leukaemia in Childhood) in 1974 after his son Robert was diagnosed with cancer.
He continued to develop the organisation after Robert's death at the age of 11 in 1977, later merging with the Sargent Cancer Fund to become Clic Sargent; the country's biggest childhood cancer care charity.
He retired from the charity in 1996, after being diagnosed himself with prostate cancer. He had raised more than £50m for the organisation during the 32 years.
But Bob's charity work continued into his retirement, notably with his involvement in the Jack and Jill Appeal and the Children's Hospice for Bristol Appeal, and 13 years ago he took on the role of administering the Starfish Trust – a fund set up by Bristol millionaires Charlie and Mary Dobson, aimed at helping disabled youngsters.
The wealthy philanthropists handed over more than £5m over the years for Bob to administer to charitable causes. Among other projects, the Starfish Trust built seven hydrotherapy pools for disabled children across the country. The trust was wound-up in 2010, with Bob's final job before his retirement being to administer the distribution of the trust's final £1m.
But when they heard of the need for a pool at the Redland school, the Dobsons made another extraordinarily generous offer.
"I had a call from Charlie," Bob says. "They'd already pledged £250,000 towards the £1m pool appeal. But he said, if I would come out of retirement to lead the project, they would double it – offering up to £500,000 towards the pool on a match-funding basis.
"It means that for every £1 raised for the pool, the Dobsons will match it with another £1. The school has already raised £100,000, so effectively we need to raise another £400,000 to get the pool built.
"It is an incredibly generous offer from the Dobsons, and I could hardly say I wouldn't come out of retirement again, under the circumstances.
"But in fact, I was delighted of the chance to be involved," Bob says. "It's going to be such a lovely project, because I know very well how wonderful this facility will be for the children when it is completed. I've seen what the hydrotherapy pool means to Laura.
"I can almost see all the faces of the children now, splashing about in the pool, enjoying themselves. What more incentive could we need to make this happen?"
● To make a donation to the Starfish Pool Appeal visit the website at www.starfishpoolappeal.org.uk or donate by texting (free of charge) 70070, quoting POOL44 followed by the amount to be donated – either £1, £2, £3, £4, £5 or £10. Or you can send a cheque to Friends of Claremont School, Redland Green Campus, Redland Court Road, Bristol BS6 7EH or call 0117 3772500.
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