The death has occurred of a well-known former market trader and “ladies’ man”, who only gave up manning his stall at the age of 78.
A social media post on Reg Legg’s Facebook page said he died on 30th September at Leighton Hospital, aged 92, following a stroke.
When Mr Legg retired in 2010 from his vegetables and salad stall at Congleton Market, we reported that he credited his many years of successful trading to his gift of the gab.
He told us: “A lot of traders are quite shy; I have sold tons and tons of stuff for other traders. That’s how I have kept on and on. I haven’t lost my touch.”
Mr Legg said he believed market life had kept him young – and so had his female admirers.
He told us: “I have known so many women over the years and they always give me hugs and I think that’s what it’s all about. I soon make friends.
“I’ve made a lot of friends over the years. I’ll keep in touch and keep coming down.”
The posting announcing his death revealed that he had not lost his touch, or his friends, saying that while he was in hospital: “(We) ensured he had visitors – often multiple every single day – and we listened to his favourite songs and talked to him about all of the amazing memories. He was a charmer to his nurses, as expected, with his irresistible smile.”
Mr Legg, of Hawthorne Close, Congleton, set out his stall every Saturday at Congleton Market and every Thursday at Sandbach Market. He finally decided to retire after a decline in trade.
He told us in 2010: “I have kept on going and going but the trade isn’t there like it used to be. This last 12 months I have took half as much as I did two years ago.
“When the weather gets cold and you are not taking much money, you think ‘I’ll call it a day’, but I only decided a few months ago when I thought ‘I must be crackers doing this’.”
Mr Legg spent his working life bartering on markets.
He recalled: “I started off about 60 years ago at Moss Road Nursery. I traded on the market for them, as well as selling rose trees at Sandbach Market, then I started on my own about 53 years ago.”
When Mr Legg first set up on his own, he sold flowers and plants.
He said: “I’ve only been doing vegetables for the last five years. Flowers were a good trade. I could sell 40 or 50 bunches a day.”
He added: “My main trade with the vegetables and salad has been local tomatoes, I easily made £150 a day. A large number of people came for the tomatoes. They came every week. It’s a shame that I have finished with them now.”
Mr Legg said the last item he sold on his stall at Congleton Market was a holly wreath.
He added: “This time of year I make some nice holly wreaths. I spend a lot of time doing them and painting about 500 pine cones for them. They were fantastic. That was one of the main things I was making any money out of.”
Aside from trips to the market to visit old friends, Mr Legg planned to enjoy retirement by making hanging baskets in his greenhouse at home, a hobby he had enjoyed for many years.
The traders had a whip around for Mr Legg and bought him a watch to celebrate his many years of service.
A decade later we reported that Mr Legg’s love of wreath-making had continued and said he had been “inundated” with orders for his homemade Christmas wreaths, a year after several of his seasonal creations were stolen from outside his house.
Mr Legg had sold around 160 wreaths during the festive season while friend Stephanie Cheadle, who was behind a fundraising campaign for Mr Legg after the previous year’s theft, had taken orders for many more.
Mr Legg honed the art of wreath-making at Moss Road, where Congleton Garden Centre is now located.
He said locals went there to buy vegetables during the war. Mr Legg worked there for six years and learned how to make wreaths. He later sold his creations on Congleton Market until he retired.
