I must thank Frank Falzon for taking me, and possibly others, down memory lane with ‘The penny stunt’ (December 28) and make me dig up the only photo I had of the first penny stunt that had been organised by the University Students’ Charity Campaign (November 7-14, 1964).

The idea had been introduced from similar UK university activities by our professor of English literature, Richard Beck.

The idea was novel to Malta – an activity with civic and philanthropic objectives.

The stunt consisted of covering the Tritons Fountain’s main path with pennies (partly visible in the photo). We had succeeded in achieving this objective. It was a one-week ‘24-hour’ job with people from all walks of life visiting us at all imaginable and unimaginable hours with interesting or boring communication. There were also the fun moments, as can be seen from the photo (incidentally, that jeep ended up enmeshed in a petrol station – of course, it was the fault of the station).

In those days, the number of university students ranged around the 600 mark with only seven faculties providing degrees. Students from all faculties participated and contributed to this event.

Undoubtedly, a very different world to today’s in more respects than one, locally and internationally. But the new idea of social-civic responsibility and assistance had been lit.

It is heartening to note that the seed then sown has borne fruit and, today, the concept of organising events to raise funds for worthy national or specific purposes has caught on. L-Istrina can be considered as the standard bearer of such events.

The solidarity of the Maltese people with those not so lucky in life and the resultant generosity – ever increasing year in year out – are most edifying.