First name/s: Marion
Last name: Davies
Known names / nicknames: Davies was unlikely to have been her surname at Ruskin
Date of birth: 16/07/1939
Year of birth: 1939

Life before Ruskin

Date and place of birth 16 July 1939

Born Renfrewshire (?) moved to Carlisle as a child
Family

Daughter of Marion Brechin and John Hunter Davies, a pay clerk in the RAF. Sister of writer Hunter Davies (and sister in law of writer Margaret Forster) and Johnny ? and Annabel (twin).

Married Jeff when she was 23
Work Margaret Sewell School no O levels

Worked as a clerk for 17 years including Tyre Services Technical college 4 0 levels and A levels
Politics/Trade union activity

Trade Union membership (at time of entry to Ruskin)

Life at Ruskin

Dates at Ruskin 1974? (when she was 35)
Source of funding
Campaigns/political activity
Subjects studied at Ruskin Social sciences
Dissertation
Qualification

Life after Ruskin

Education
Work Carlisle social worker 1976 -7 (?); Moved to Camden Town then Crouch End in London 1977.

Wrote column in Guardian social work pages (pseudonym Mary Black) 1991
Politics/trade union activity
Family Partner Frances No children
Place & date of death 1995, London

Date of death: 12/11/1995
Year of death: 1995

Achievements / Publications

Material in archives or already published articles

Margaret Forster Precious Lives 1998

Image

Notes on Image/s

Comment of contributor/s and sources

I read Margaret Forster’s interesting biography some years ago.  I have written to Hunter Davies’s agent to try and find more information, to date without success. However, although information is missing, the narrative of a woman coming to Ruskin and starting on a new life and a new relationship seems very typical of women’s experiences of being Ruskin students.

More information would be most welcome!

Author/s

Hilda Kean