In June 1960 Ken married Sheila Evans and they moved into a house at 239 Broad Street, Bromsgrove. They had a son, named Mark Steven. Ken enjoyed playing lots of sports including swimming, table tennis, snooker, golf and fishing, and was a keen dancer too.

The 1960/61 campaign was numerically Ken’s best with nine successes to his name. It started brightly with two winners in the opening month of August for Cheshire trainer Colin Laidler and ended in April with two for Shropshire handler Jack Peacock. The first of those Peacock-trained winners, Kaingaroa in the opening race at Hereford on Easter Monday 1961, prefaced what might have been a great day for Ken, who had six rides and came close to landing a hat-trick in the first three races. But after winning on Kaingaroa, his second ride was beaten a neck and his third was beaten a head.

Ken’s five winners in the 1961/62 season culminated in him riding out his claim when

achieving his 25th success aboard King’s Star on 10 March 1962 (right). But no sooner had he lost his claim than the rides began to dry up. The following season he was given a retainer to ride for Kenilworth trainer Tom Bates but no winners emerged.

The 1963/64 season was almost at an end when Ken rode The Fossa to victory in a Whit Monday Uttoxeter novices’ chase for Alrewas trainer Don Charlesworth, his first winner for more than two years. I was there that day – my first visit to Uttoxeter, when Stephen Davenport rode four winners to effectively clinch the amateur riders’ title – and I can still remember someone going up to Dodds, patting him on the back with the words “The Fossa, eh Ken. Well done mate.”