Colourful magazine vendor is a man of many talents

From the Echo, first published Tuesday 14th Oct 2003.

HE makes a bit of a splash wherever he goes - you don't expect to buy the Big Issue from someone in top hat and tails or wearing a CCTV camera on his head.

You don't expect him to have amassed £30,000 for charity or have been voted Citizen of the Year by his local newspaper, either.

But Wimborne vendor Graham Walker, 49, has done all this and more and has a file of cuttings, photos and letters to prove it.

There are pictures of him with Ukrainian children he helped bring over from Chernobyl and letters of thanks from Devon's director of social services.

It was Graham who dreamt up the jokey notices - "buy the Issue or the puppy gets it", "form an orderly queue" and "free home delivery on all purchases over £25".

He builds up support in a new town with original poems, tales and agony uncle pages inserted in every magazine.

One tells the story of him bedding down in a wheelie bin only to wake up on the back of dustcart. He escapes compacting but has to make his exit watched by the biggest bus queue in Bristol.

Hiding his embarrassment, Graham wishes them all "good day" before sauntering nonchalantly off into the sunrise.

As a vendor he gets his fair share of abuse while women swap their bags to the opposite shoulder or shepherd their children out of his path.

But he also makes an astonishing impact, inspiring whole towns to get behind his charity work.

When he did a continuous seven-day and night shift selling the Issue in Totnes as a fund-raiser, the charity he was helping kept him supplied with food in relays.

On the Sunday a lady bowled up with a patio table and chair, table cloth and wine.

"I sat on the pavement, eating a full roast dinner and the traffic was going past," he said.

"I cracked up a bit because I was being shown so much compassion - I think I overdosed on niceness."

For a Devon children's hospice he dressed up in top hat and tails himself and persuaded a dentist, a journalist, a bank manager and a clergymen to dress down and join him, raising £5,300 in one hit.

He even wrote a column for the North Devon Journal - the publication which awarded him Barnstaple Citizen of the Year in 2000.

If Graham is so talented and charismatic how come he landed on the streets and why is he still there after 12 years?

Following a chaotic and loveless childhood, he ended up in care, escaping into the army at 17 for an unhappy year.

Respectability crept up on him - a domestic appliance engineer, he progressed to management and marriage.

But divorce and single-parenthood catapulted him into mental illness. His son went back to his wife and Graham flipped on his release from hospital.

"I just packed a bag and walked out - it's not a day I regret," he said.

"It seemed like a lifetime's burden was pulling me down."

The initial exhilaration soon evaporated in the grim reality of street life but he has found a certain peace.

Four times in the last six years he has managed to house himself, saving sizeable deposits, but has been back on the streets within weeks.

"I'm sure financially I could make a living but psychologically I couldn't cope with it ," he said.

"I wasn't actually happy - I was still homeless even though I got all those flats, it never, ever turned into a home, it was just somewhere to stay."

He's very clear that his fund-raising has grounded him and given his life meaning.

"I need more than to be able to sell the Issue," said Graham.

"I need more, a deeper challenge, and when I have done that it's time to move on."

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