Anthony James Harrison, known as Tony Harrison was from Darwen, Lancashire.

 

Tony’s inclusion on the Lions Scroll of Honour was to celebrate and pay tribute to his passion for raising awareness of suicide which was unparalleled and has probably impacted on the dramatic decrease in Blackburn with Darwen’s suicide figures.

 

Tony was a talented, semi-professional drummer, who, in his younger days, played with different bands in various pubs and clubs in the BwD area. His love of music was shared with his daughter, Vicki.

His life changed when Tony lost his daughter, Vicki, to suicide in 2010.

As a devoted dad and losing his only daughter, he was determined not to let what happened to him happen to other families.

Within a month of her death, Tony had penned ‘Angel on the Breeze’, a song which didn’t directly mention his daughter but dealt with some of the emotions he was going through at the time.  Later he released the effort on the video sharing website You Tube and to date it has had more than 130,000 views.  People from around the world used to get in touch to ask permission to use ‘Angel on the Breeze’ at memorial services and funerals.

In 2012 Tony became involved with the organisation Papyrus – Prevention of Young Suicide.  He became an official trustee in autumn 2016 for this, now national, charity which was founded in East Lancashire 20 years ago.  Tony was a highly skilled communicator, convener and public speaker. He used his excellent people and negotiation skills to be an authentic spokesperson on raising awareness of suicide and the support available for helping prevention taking every opportunity to talk to audiences, locally and nationally, about the work that PAPYRUS does.

He shared his experience with others and spoke passionately about the charity reminding audiences that help is there when needed most in the form of HOPELINE UK.  It is impossible to know how many lives Tony helped to save doing this work but be sure and know that Tony helped to save lives.

Darwen Town Council thank ex members of Darwen Lions for their support and assistance, in particular Kevin Jennings the last President of the club, which unfortunately had to disband. The Town Council are committed to maintaining the Scroll for the future