My husband, Chris Black, who has died aged 75, was a lifetime member of the Labour party and activist in local politics in Bedford.
He was born in Southampton, son of Arthur, a metallurgist who was head of research for aircraft manufacturer Vickers Supermarine, and Olive, who had been one of the first women to study metallurgy at Sheffield University, and worked on stainless steel products for Firths of Sheffield. His family background was politically centre right but Chris was an independent thinker who was strongly influenced towards the left. He attended Peter Symonds grammar school in Winchester, leaving in 1957 for Birmingham University, where he gained a degree in physics in 1960. We met at Birmingham and married in 1961.
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