The resident at the forefront of a campaign to prevent the closure of a sheltered housing scheme in the district has died aged 72.

Michael Clark had moved from Wheathampstead to Caroline Sharpe House in Chiltern Road, St Albans, in 2001 where he started up a social club for his 37 new neighbours and held fundraising days for several charities.

When it was announced in 2007 that the home was to be demolished and rebuilt to offer more modern accommodation for the elderly, Michael started a campaign to prevent it.

He collected 850 signatures on a petition and appeared on both local television and radio as well as in the Herts Advertiser.

But his campaign was unsuccessful and he joined the residents who moved out. With no social club to run to joined Age Concern and became the resident quizmaster of two of the charity’s clubs.

Michael lived his entire life in the St Albans district, becoming a local hero at a young age when he rescued a girl from the river at Verulamium Park when he was only eight years old.

Two years later, he started working at the Express Dairy at weekends for pocket money and went to work there full time when he left school. In total he was employed at the dairy for 45 years during which time he delivered to all the farms between St Albans and Redbourn.

In his spare time he collected diecast models of Ford Model T vans, a hobby which took him all over over the country and resulted in him building up a collection of 430 models, all in a different livery.

Michael never married and is survived by his brother Frank Clark, niece Nichola and nephew Paul.