Peter Deadman Personal Site: BNHC

The Brighton Natural Health Centre

The Brighton Natural Health Centre is a charity devoted to teaching self-health care methods including yoga, tai chi, qigong and dance.

I helped set up the centre (BNHC) with my Infinity Foods business partner Robin Bines, pretty much the last thing I did before I left Infinity. In 1978 we were renting a rambling old warehouse directly behind the shop. Infinity Foods and a few other so called 'alternative' business in Brighton were being targeted by local fascists (Combat 18) at the time because we refused to stop selling an anti-fascist paper. We'd received warning letters and had a ball bearing fired through the front window of the shop. Maybe that was in the back of our minds when the annual insurance renewal on the building came up. It was expensive and we uhmed and ahhed for quite a while before deciding it was probably a good idea to renew it. Not long afterwards, over the new year holiday, the warehouse burnt down to the ground. Arson was suspected (by us) but never proved.

However, with the insurance money, in 1981, phoenix-like from the ashes, the Brighton Natural Health Centre was pupose built and is coming up to its (delayed) 25th birthday celebrations.