Pete was born on 27 July 1933 in Heath End, Pelsall, near Rushall, into a family of nine children which had grown to twelve by the time he was 7.  There were two younger sisters, Margaret and Janet and a brother, the youngest, Colin, who died when he was 1 year old. Heath End is a fairly built-up area now but in those days it was a small village with one shop which his paternal grandfather owned, two pubs and a football pitch.  Pete recalled that as kids, there wasn’t much to do in Heath End but remembered playing on what they used to call the ‘stepping bridge’ over the railway line.  Some time between 1937 and 1939 the family moved to Rushall into a house specially built for large families. 
 
Pete described his mother as a wonderful woman who had a hard life.  She picked potatoes in the local fields in between other jobs and had to look after the entire family on only £2 a week.  She was a great cook, one dish he remembered was something she called ‘chawl’ which was a boiled pig’s head.  This would last the family for three or four days. Pete’s father was a typical man of those times, a lorry driver who worked hard to provide an income for his family but who left his wife to look after the children.
 
Times were very hard for the family, Pete couldn’t recall any Christmas presents except for an orange and an apple and a few sweets from Granny’s shop.  There were no toys. There were no holidays although he does remember a trip to Dudley Zoo where he managed to get himself lost.
 
Despite all of this, he remembers a happy childhood in a family where the children were never short of love and affection.  There were lots of children in the street, and a football pitch and playing field nearby where they spent most of their time.  He recalls them making a ball out of some rags and having a 20 a side football match. They also dug out a circular cycle track so that they could have races. There were no toys so they had to make their own entertainment.  
 
Pete in his own words was “not very good at school” although he did like history and geography.  He spent most of his time playing sports particularly football and it was around the age of 12 that he started to emerge as a talented footballer. 
 
He left school at 15 and worked as a chain maker before doing his national service which he served in Germany.  He loved the army, the life suited him and his football playing talent was recognised and encouraged.  He was promoted to Lance Corporal and would probably have stayed on after his period of national service had ended but by that time he had met Jean.  They were married in 1956.
 
As a married couple they lived in Brownhills, then Rugeley and then in 1972 they moved to the house in Burntwood where their two children Michelle and Adrian were brought up and where they would remain for the rest of their lives.  For many years Pete worked as a lorry driver at Wernicks in Brownhills and then was promoted to transport manager with a company car! Jean was in heaven.  They had arrived!
 
Pete was a keen DIYer and could turn his hand to most things.  He spent much of his spare time working on their house in Burntwood, he built a complete extension to the kitchen and living room himself, from scratch as well as a new porch.  He was always painting, building, fixing, repairing, always pottering, both at his own house and later at Michelle and David’s in Shropshire. He laid new floors for Michelle and most famously built an enclosure for Ben’s new chickens to stop one of them escaping which when completed resembled a POW camp from WW2, minus the guard tower and search lights.  He and Jean would come over every Sunday for lunch and he would spend hours mowing the huge lawns and paddock putting his teenage grandson to shame who hated having to do this with a vengeance.  At aged 80, Michelle came home one day to find him on top of the garden shed with Ben repairing the roof!
 
Pete had a keen interest in sport.  He loved to watch sport on the TV, mostly football, but also golf, cricket, tennis, athletics, darts… you name it.  Saturday afternoon was always set aside for horse racing and he would always place several bets.  In the last couple of years, after he had lost his leg and was unable to get to the betting office, his niece Linda’s husband Neale would place his bet for him and he had a few significant wins, including recently a win of around £1300 which he mostly shared out among his children and grandchildren.  He loved to play golf and played frequently with Adrian especially after he retired. They had lovely weekends away together and days out, real dad and lad times.  In later years he had go use a buggy to get around the course as his legs become more painful and walking more difficult but he didn’t let that get in his way. 
 
Both Michelle and Adrian became involved in athletics as young people and he was central in encouraging and supporting that, just as he was with his granddaughter Isabel, who is now aged 15 one of the fastest sprinters in the country in her age group.

Pete was a very funny man who made everyone around him laugh.  He was always laughing and joking, always singing at the top of his voice and whistling, usually songs from the 1950s – he loved Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole.  He used to sniff to make the sound of the drums which was hilarious. He actually had a very nice voice although Michelle and Adrian probably know the words to more songs from the 1950s than they should.  He was renowned for mispronouncing words and names: lasarnay not lasagne, J low 2 not J2O, Cordovia virus not Corona, to name a few.  The funniest was the name of his vascular surgeon at Stoke, Mr Jaipersad, who he always called Mr Rasperkat.  One time Michelle rang him for a chat and could hear horrendously loud music in the background.  Adrian had recently bought him an Echo Dot so that he could listen to music, etc. more easily.  He said that he’d been unable to turn it off or down despite shouting at it repeatedly: he said “I keep shouting Clarissa, Clarissa, turn the music down” but that she was ignoring him.  it should have been Alexa :-) It was very funny.
 
Football played a big part in Pete's life.  He was a fantastic footballer in his youth and was recognised as such from an early age.  In the early 1950s, he and three other local lads reformed Rushall Olympic FC by gaining support from a local fish and chip shop owner.  He was a striker and prolific goal scorer, a bit of a local hero where he lived, very popular with the girls.  After he finished his national service, he played semi-professionally for Shelfield United and was frequently in the local newspapers, there were even cartoons made about him.  He was approached by scouts from Walsall and also Derby County and both clubs wanted to sign him.  He often told a story about two men in black suits and a big car coming to pick him up from his humble house in Rushall to take him to Derby to meet with the manager.  It must have been quite intimidating. He never did play as a professional although he could and should have without a doubt.  He lacked the confidence needed to take his career to the next level despite being blessed with such a clear and obvious talent.  When Michelle started at Chase Terrace High School in 1976, the terrifying maths teacher, Mr "Bomber" Bewley, made everone in the room stand up and introduce themselves.  When Michelle said her name, he asked whether she was related to Peter Male - he used to watch him play regularly in the 1950s and said he was an amazing footballer. Michelle just wanted the ground to swallow her up! But Pete never lost his love and passion for the game.  He was a keen supporter of Walsall FC and followed them closely over the years.  One very happy memory is when Walsall got to the FA cup final and he went to Wembley with Adrian and three of his grandchildren – Ben, Isabel and Milly.  They had a lovely day and there is a wonderful photo of him being carried up to the steps at Wembley in between Ben and Adrian – two 6 ft+ young men – as he found it too painful to walk.  Pete always had an interest in children and young people playing football and was a qualified coach.  There were several kids in the road where they lived in Burntwood who over the years he encouraged, supported and used to watch play.  Into his late 70s he was still playing with Ben and his friends next door in the paddock and when he couldn’t kick the ball any more, he played in goal. 
 
But above all when you think of Pete, you think of family.  His family was everything to him.  He had a long and happy marriage to Jean.  It wasn’t perfect and as with many long term relationships, there were ups and downs, good times and bad.  They were particularly happy after Pete had retired, lots of days out and holidays He always described her as the love of his life.  He looked after her and cared for her for years following her diagnosis with vascular dementia.  This became increasingly difficult and isolating as her condition deteriorated and although he did struggle sometimes he would never hear of her moving to a care home.  Unfortunately, after he lost his leg in 2018, he was unable to continue to care for Jean and she did have to go into residential care.  He was heartbroken, it was the first time they’d been apart since 1956 but he did go down to visit her in his electric wheelchair, almost every day, come rain or shine.
 
Pete was a kind, generous and loving dad to Michelle and Adrian, he always put them first.  He worked hard to provide a lovely home for them and ensured they never went without even though money was always in short supply. He would do anything for them, take them anywhere, give them anything.  This never changed even as they became adults.  As he lay dying in hospital in horrendous pain, his concern was not for himself but for the impact seeing his distress was having on Michelle.
 
Pete really came into his own as a grandad.  He was wonderful.  He and Jean were at the centre of Ben and Milly’s lives.  They came over twice a week, most weeks, there were lovely Sunday lunches, happy times in the garden, every Christmas was spent with them, wonderful holidays in North Wales and Pembrokeshire. He was always playing with them, laughing and joking with them, having fun.  He was also loved by the children next door whose own grandparents were a bit stuffy and not very child friendly.  “Grandad to the world” we used to say.
 
His love of family also extended to his brothers and sisters, especially to his two younger sisters Margaret and Janet. He was particularly fond of Margaret’s children Mark and Jane and of his niece Linda and her husband Neale who helped him so much in the difficult years following his amputation.  He included as ‘family’, his former neighbours, Debbie and Neale and their children Ashleigh and Thomas. 
 
The last two and a half years of Pete’s life were very difficult.  The peripheral arterial disease from which he’d suffered for several years  become much worse and he had to have a leg amputated in 2018.  He was now wheelchair bound and so unable to continue to care for Jean who was suffering from vascular dementia and had to go into a care home.  He was devastated.  From then on it was just one medical crisis after another involving numerous stays in various hospitals.  He was in pain for much of this time due to the lack of blood supply to his legs but despite everything he went through and what he had to cope with, he was remarkably resilient, still laughing and joking right up to the end. In April 2020 just at the start of the Covid lockdown, Jean died of cancer and he was without his wife of 64 years.  At the beginning of July his femoral artery became completely blocked and so with no blood supply to his legs at all he was given a couple of days to live.  He suffered terrible pain in hospital but Michelle and Adrian were able to stay with him, never left his side and were with him when he died, telling him how loved he was and how much he would be missed. Two of his grandchildren, Ben and Milly, were also with him for the whole day before he died.
 
Pete was unique, a one-off, who has touched the lives of so many people.  He will be so very sorely missed; life will never be the same.