What I remember is the ornate Victorian architecture and the distinctive smell of the old building, the wooden floors that creaked wherever you went and the colourful heraldic pictures on the walls. As a 19-year-old, I was persuaded to join, to my eternal gratitude, by a Colonel Grant, a keen genealogist and a jeweller in South Shields. He acted as my "sponsor" which you had to have in those days. Hew Stevenson, member since 1959 Jobs for the Boys: the Story of a Family in Britain's Imperial Heyday by Hew Stevenson (ISBN 978-1-902563-02-2). £15 + £5 p&p. _www.dovebooks.co.uk_ (http://www.dovebooks.co.uk/)