Major traditions often start in a modest way. The inaugural Priestley Night at the Pennington Midland Hotel attracted 60 people to dine on meat and potato pie - not an overwhelming number but respectable enough for a first event of this kind.

The organisers hope that it will have been the first of many such nights up and down the country. That is a glorious dream. It would be splendid if Bradford's most famous literary son and the pie which so impressed him were to be celebrated nationally in this way. But rather than thin down the gravy too soon it is perhaps best to concentrate first on making the event a regular, meaty fixture on the Bradford scene.

This city does not make the most of its famous sons and daughters. It is quietly proud of them but declines to shout about them. That is not the Bradford way of doing things. We acknowledge the Delius link with the city via a leaf sculpture next to the Victoria Hotel, then argue about its artistic merits. We have a Hockney Gallery, as well we should to celebrate the work of the country's most outstanding living artist. But it is not the result of civic recognition. It is because of David Hockney's friendship with the late Jonathan Silver that Saltaire has become a place of pilgrimage for Hockney fans.

And Bradford took long enough to honour J.B. Priestley, spending years sulking over the fact that he moved South. Let's hope the Pie Night catches on and marks the start of a change of attitude to those who have put Bradford on the map over the years in such positive ways.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.