On 15th May I became a Freeman of the City of London. Each and every one of you will have your own memory of this ceremony, and though I too had been told it would be "special," I didn't fully grasp what that might mean until I was in the room. I brought my family, my husband and our daughters, along with the girls' godfather, and three close friends who are themselves interested in, or already in the process of, joining the Glovers.
We're told roughly 800,000 men and women, stretching all the way back to 1237, nearly 800 years, have sworn this same oath. Standing there, I found myself thinking less about the ceremony in front of me and more about the enormous, quiet line of people behind it, most of them names none of us will ever know, all of them having said the same words I was about to say. I suspect every one of you reading this will recognise that unique feeling, because whether your ceremony was last month or forty years ago, you've stood in that same room and pledged the same words. That shared thread is, I think, what makes this whole thing so special: it isn't just a personal milestone, it's a link.
What made the day feel truly personal within that vast history was the work of the Clerk, Laura Miller. She incorporated so many personal details into my ceremony: that I live in the Midlands, for example, and that while freedom from tolls is technically a right of a Freeman, I couldn't actually drive my sheep from Leamington Spa across London Bridge in my car. She prepared the room with photographs from the archives, mindful that as a woman, my daughters and I might find it especially meaningful to see some of the prominent women who'd held Freeman status: Florence Nightingale, Margaret Thatcher, and Dame Judi Dench.
Knowing I hold American citizenship too, she'd found a few notable Americans among the Freemen, and told us wonderful stories along the way- that Ulysses S. Grant, 18th President of the United States, was the first man ever issued a traffic violation, and that Theodore Roosevelt, my own father's personal hero, was another. She'd even found room for the rather unexpected addition of Henry Winkler, The Fonz himself.
Nor did she miss the Glovers. She mentioned that Queen Elizabeth I was rarely seen without gloves, and of course, highlighted the various gloves on show in the Guild's collection.
That's the thing about this institution, I think, that is so impressive. It's vast enough to hold Winston Churchill, Christopher Wren, Morgan Freeman, along with generations of ordinary Londoners, our esteemed Royal Family, and each one of us. What a truly special place this is.
And the story doesn't end here. In Plaisterers’ Hall on 8th July at the Awards Lunch I completed my next step: elevation to Liveryman. If becoming a Freeman of the City was like being offered one glove, this is completing the pair.
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