On April Fools’ Day 1979 a young man, dressed in top hat and tails and clutching a bottle of Bollinger, hurled himself off Clifton suspension bridge and plummeted over 200 feet.
Then, to the amazement of those witnessing this shocking spectacle, ‘he bounced back up’.
David Kirke had completed the world’s first bungee jump.* And David Kirke, it turns out, lived in Oxford.
We met him once. We were in a pub in North Parade enjoying a quiet drink. A somewhat florid and whiskery gentleman walked over with a newspaper in one hand and a glass of red wine in the other. We fell into conversation, agreed to keep in touch, and he jotted his contact details on the back of what looked like a business card.
My companion, ever alert, noticed the initials DSC after his name and enquired. It turned out that David Kirke MA (Oxon) was the founder of the Dangerous Sports Club. And Bungee-jumping was just one of his many daredevil activities.
In 1986, Kirke flew over the English Channel in a makeshift ‘pouch’ attached to a kangaroo-shaped cluster of helium balloons – only narrowly avoiding a jumbo jet.
Instead of skiing, which he professed to find ‘especially boring’, he encouraged DSC members to ‘swoosh down the mountains’ on whatever they liked – his vehicle of choice being an ironing board (other options included a grand piano, a punt, and a Sinclair C5 on skis – prompting predictable wisecracks that this was the fastest such a car had ever been known to travel.)
He skateboarded among the running bulls at Pamplona armed only with a neatly folded umbrella.
He hosted a black tie cocktail party on the rim of an active volcano in Saint Vincent.
And he broke his back in three places, having been catapulted from an aircraft launcher over a cliff in the West of Ireland.
We never got to have our follow-up conversation. Covid intervened. Then we found out that DK had died (peacefully, in his bed) on 21 October 2023. He was 78. The obituaries described him as ‘a free spirit’ who was known to ‘enjoy a glass of wine’. The words ‘irrepressible’ and ‘maverick’ were used liberally.
As an undergraduate at Corpus Christi College, David had studied Psychology and Philosophy, graduating with what, in those politer days, was known as a ‘Gentleman’s Third’. It would appear that he developed a highly personalised, not to say idiosyncratic, take on both subjects. But he was never pompous or pretentious. When asked by one journalist about his mental process, he replied, ‘The main thought going through my mind is: “Whoopee!”‘
Very silly. Very eccentric. Very dangerous perhaps. But definitely not an April Fool. David Kirke, proud Oxonian that he was, made it his mission to rush in where angels fear to tread.
*The bungee stunt was apparently inspired by a documentary about Pacific Islanders in Vanuatu leaping off bamboo platforms with only a length of braided vine tied around one ankle. ‘Bungee’ is derived from an old West-Country dialect word, ‘bungy’ meaning ‘bouncy’.
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Andrew Lockett, editor of The Rough Guide to Cult Sport, notes:
As well as bungee-jumping, the DSC is credited with promoting sports like BASE-jumping and hang-gliding. Other possibly eccentric and decidedly niche sporting activities associated with Oxford include: boat-bumping, punt-jousting, and Aunt Sally. There are also inter-collegiate competitions in Muggle Quidditch, croquet, frisbee, and Tiddlywinks. Corpus Christi, David Kirke’s alma mater, annually hosts a hotly contested tortoise race which, though it is perhaps not quite as hair-raising as his usual antics, has attracted a good degree of media interest.
Prize-winning novelist, Tim Pears had a number of intrepid assignments in his earlier, Jericho life:
Once upon a time my film-making friend Roger called me and said, ‘Tim, I need a second camera. Are you free tomorrow? Course you are. Be outside the Phoenix at eight. I’ll pick you up.’
By ten o’clock we were parked near Clifton Suspension Bridge, waiting for some kind of signal. Suddenly a Land Rover shot past us and screeched to a halt in the middle of the road. A couple of guys jumped out. The first had what looked like a grotesque intestine spooling out of his stomach. The second attached it to a stanchion, got back into his vehicle and sped off.
‘Come on,’ said Roger, thrusting a wind-up 16mm Bolex into my hand. ‘Ready?’ he asked, climbing onto the bridge parapet. ‘You go that side.’ We each stood a few yards either side of the man, and started filming. I didn’t have a clue what I was doing, or what was going on.
In a flash the man jumped off the bridge. I leaned over to record his descent. Suddenly my knees went wobbly with vertigo and I felt an almost overwhelming urge to follow him down. I suppose a sliver of survival instinct kicked in and, thankfully, held me back.
We filmed the man bouncing up and down. By this time people – stewards, police? – were running towards us from the far end of the bridge. ‘Let’s get out of here,’ Roger said. We ran to his car, jumped in and raced back to Oxford. ‘What about that bloke?’ I asked. ‘How’s he going to get back up to the bridge? Is he going to be arrested?’ ‘Probably,’ Roger said. ‘He’ll be disappointed if he isn’t.’
I don’t remember the bungee-jumper being dressed in top hat and tails, with a bottle of champagne in hand, and I think this was later than 1979, so maybe jumping from the Clifton Suspension Bridge had become a common DSC event by then, an initiation rite perhaps for apprentice daredevils? Maybe …
In the words of one commentator: ‘unique and inimitable, like Monty Python, like James Bond (perhaps a bit of both) the Dangerous Sports Club is already a British classic.’
Philippa Farrow, proprietor of the wonderful White Rabbit pub in central Oxford, knew DK well. She writes:
I have many stories about David (not all of them printable). He was what one might politely describe as a ‘lovable rogue’. Did you know that he was very friendly with Graham Chapman of Monty Python fame? Kindred spirits one suspects. I think they may even have written a play or made a film together …
A note of validation and a spelling enquiry from Oxford’s preeminent lexicographer, Peter Gilliver:
I am glad to report that the Oxford English Dictionary has entries for ‘bungee jumping’, ‘bungee jump’ (noun and verb), and ‘bungee jumper’; tantalizingly, the earliest evidence we have is from a Daily Mail story dated 3 April 1979 where, incidentally, the spelling ‘bungy’ is used. It would be very satisfying if someone could find evidence from the previous day. The only newspaper reports of the Clifton escapade from 2 April 1979 that I’ve seen don’t use the term.
Our thanks to Sam Kendon, Bristol-based architect:
Morris Oxford readers may be interested in these videos about some of the other antics of the Dangerous Sports Club. Bonkers!
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0D-6cmc17Wk
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1fvGC2Qn2w
It’s slightly disappointing to learn that the guardians of Clifton Bridge are worried that bungee jumpers might damage it. I feel sure Brunel would have approved of such intrepid spirits.
A final fling for Holly Forster, Oxford’s favourite fearless barmaid.
