In 2005 my grandma passed away. I was 20 years old at the time, and I had been incredibly close with her my whole life. I loved her vigour and her kindness, I respected her values and her principles, and I always turned to her for advice or encouragement. Her name was Jennie Shearan and she was born and raised, and lived the majority of her life, in Hebburn. She embodied all the very best qualities of the people of South Tyneside; she was friendly and she was fair and she had a great sense of humour. And she was also very well known in and around Hebburn. Indeed, there wasn’t a bus in South Tyneside that I would go on with her without bumping into someone who would see her and say “Eeh hello Jennie, how have you been?” It was uncanny; from Heworth to South Shields, wherever we would be, there would invariably be a similarly aged person who would affectionately greet her and chat with her until our stop would arrive.
I suppose that was my earliest glimpse into understanding that Jennie Shearan was more than just my grandma. At the time of her passing, I was studying Literature at the University of Cambridge. She was so proud of me, and all the nurses in South Tyneside Hospital knew about her grandson and the “executive” job that I had lined up after graduating. I write this now, aged 40 years old, and I still feel in my heart the force of love and pride that she had for me which pushed me along in life, and the values that she instilled in me, which I have tried to follow to this day.
“Always look people in the eye, Gian, you are no better or worse than anyone else.”
“Shy bairns get nowt Gian.”
“You can only try your best Gian.”
And I can just as vividly remember our last moment that we shared together. The rest of the family had left the room so that my grandma and I could have a few minutes on our own. As I held her hand, she asked me, “would you write a book about the coke works?” My instinct was to answer “yes” immediately. I didn’t really know what the coke works were, nor did I know what her involvement in them was, and I especially didn’t know how to go about writing a book. But, of course, there was no other answer that I would have given her than to say yes.
The days that followed her death were painful for the whole family. Days turned to months. Months turned to years. I never forgot my grandma, or my promise to her. Yet the thought of researching and writing a book about a topic that I had no knowledge of and featuring a person that I cared so much about was daunting to the point that I procrastinated on my commitment for well over a decade. And then in 2021 I realized that Jennie’s centenary year was fast approaching. I set out to finally fulfil my promise and get the book published by the time she would have reached 100 years old.
In doing so, I discovered a veritable powerhouse of a woman, a stunningly resilient environmental activist, who was way ahead of her time and changed the face of the North East with her vision, her passion, and her extraordinary communication skills.
For those of you unfamiliar with her story, Jennie and her family moved into newly built post-war housing in Monkton Lane Estate in 1953. On their doorstep was Monkton Coke Works, which had been built in 1936 in response to the Jarrow March to provide much needed employment in the area. At the time of moving in, the incoming residents had voiced concern at living so close to the coke works, but they’d all been assured that the facility would soon be closing down. This turned out to be quite the opposite, and the plant quickly doubled in size, and went on to manufacture 600,000 tonnes of coke a year. Coke in and of itself is an environmentally noble fuel in so much as it is smokeless when burned, but the problem is that the process to make it is an incredibly dirty and polluting one, and the residents living opposite the plant were exposed to appalling levels of pollution day in and day out. Jennie devoted decades of her life trying to clean up Monkton Coke Works.
She was fearless and resourceful and she put it all on the line to get environmental justice for her town. She united and empowered her community and gave them a voice. She led protests, she was interviewed in the local newspapers countless times, she got the BBC show Watchdog to visit the town and run a documentary about what was going on, and she took the case all the way to the European Parliament. She educated herself on the complex manufacturing processes involved at the plant, she researched for endless hours about the health impacts of living next to a coke works, and she ran her own health survey of the community, collecting thousands of responses from residents that substantiated everything that she had feared about the damage to people’s health that living next to a coke works would cause. As the leader of the Hebburn Residents Action Group, she represented her community in two public inquiries, directly taking on British Coal, both eloquently and effectively, thanks to the compelling evidence that she and her fellow grassroots activists had accumulated.
The steps she took and the lengths she went to in the campaign for clean air were nothing short of astonishing, and as I uncovered each new eye-opening detail of her journey, I started to understand all of those mantras that my grandma would tell me as a little boy on a completely different level.
“Always look people in the eye, Gian, you are no better or worse than anyone else.”
“Shy bairns get nowt Gian.
“You can only try your best Gian.”
In 1992 the Monkton Coke Works was finally demolished, and in the years that followed, she was closely involved in the planning of how the contaminated land would be dealt with and how the space would be deployed. Today, the site is called Monkton Community Woodlands and Business Park. It’s a green space that employs more people than Monkton Coke Works ever did.
The case was a landmark in many ways. It catalysed the creation of the Environmental Law Foundation which today helps communities throughout the country get access to legal support in their fight for environmental justice. The use of European Union legislation on air pollution was the first of its kind in a UK case. And the community-led health surveys that Jennie created became the blueprint for future health studies, with Newcastle University’s epidemiological report on the correlation between a coke works and the health of the nearby residents also being the first of its kind.
Learning about her bravery and resilience, I knew that I had to pour every drop of my own resources to make sure that this David vs. Goliath story got as widely heard and read as possible.
I worked with a graphic designer who, like me, was working in California, but had roots in the North East, and he succeeded in conveying the heroism of the story in the book cover. I wrote to Sir Jonathon Porritt CBE, environmental advisor to King Charles, to ask if he would support the book. I had stumbled upon his name as I delved through the comprehensively catalogued archive of newspaper clippings, court documents and VHS recordings, and in the 1980s, as leader of Friends of the Earth, Sir Jonathon had vocally supported Jennie’s fight. On reaching out to him, he agreed to write the Foreword to the book. I had noticed that Jonathon had himself written a book and that Sting had contributed a review as part of the books’ marketing materials, so I asked Jonathon if maybe Sting would be open to supporting my book. To my amazement, Sting was open to the idea, and the post on his Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts, promoting the “inspirational true story about female empowerment, grassroots activism and environmental justice” has been viewed by thousands of people. The BBC interviewed me about the book, and the Daily Mirror covered the story in a two-page spread. I was trying every way I possibly could to spread the word about Jennie’s story. As part of the launch, I embarked on a speaking tour across the North East, and it was very touching to see audiences so consistently moved by the story. This tour would prove to be an ideal training ground for a TED Talk that I gave on Jennie’s story in her hometown, on the final day of her centenary year. The talk is online and has been viewed and beautifully reviewed by people throughout the world. The many heartwarming reviews of the book have been very rewarding, as have the comments on the CLEAN AIR Instagram page that features video footage of Jennie’s campaign. Perhaps most satisfying is the knowledge that this story is being read throughout the world. Wor Jennie is inspiring people in every corner of the globe!
And this all leads to perhaps the most fitting way that we have been able to commemorate the redoubtable efforts of Jennie and the Hebburn Residents Action Group, and their legacy of clean air and clean employment in their town. During the week of my book tour, I thought it would be a good idea to leave a few copies of the book in places where I thought there could be people who would be interested in the story. One such institution was the Common Room. I had heard about this marvellous building but had not ever ventured inside. It was certainly fun to explore the space and get a sense of the history of the place, and I felt that by leaving a few copies on the coffee table on the top floor, a few likeminded people would enjoy discovering Jennie’s story. Months later I got an email from the Common Room and South Tyneside Council, explaining that Jennie had been chosen to be honoured as part of the North East’s Inspiring Pioneers program which aimed to celebrate women of the region who had inspired great change. A member of the team at the Common Room had read a copy of my book that I had left behind and felt that Jennie was the perfect candidate to represent South Tyneside.
We’re living in a time when we’re yearning for real leadership, when achieving positive change seems so difficult, and when many of us can feel powerless against the corporate and political machine at both a regional and national level. Jennie’s remarkable story shows us that we have more power than we think we do.
In the mid-90s the Evening Chronicle ran a retrospective on the campaign, with the journalist writing that “Jennie and her fellow campaigners deserve an award for their tenacious decades-long struggle against the fumes … but you don’t generally get prizes for taking on the establishment.”
And this is why the plaque unveiling was such a special moment for our family. For Jennie to have been recognized in this way, and for the plaque to be at the site of her former home, which now overlooks Monkton Community Woodlands, is a huge honour. I’ll always be grateful to the Common Room for making this happen.
The Common Room commemorated Jennie Shearan with a plaque in Hebburn on 21st November 2023, alongside members of Jennie’s family, including her grandson Gianfranco. We were also joined by original members of the Hebburn Action Group, with whom Jennie campaigned. This commemoration was a part of our Inspiring Pioneers project, commemorating women of the region who inspired great change. You can find out more about the project and other Inspiring Pioneers we have commemorated here.
