The first time I got into contact with Peter was in 1975. He was fifteen, I was fourteen and both deeply involved in Sparks. This year he would have been 39. For more than half of his life, Sparks had a major influence on him and on everything and anybody around him. When we first met, I was amazed by his dedication, knowledge and collection he then had on Sparks. I also wanted to be that dedicated and started to collect anything possible on Sparks. In those days, Peter did too.

In Holland, there were already two Sparks fan organisations around in those days, which was even before the American fan club existed! In England there was a fan club (which later moved to the States) and in Holland there was a Sparks Correspondence Club and a fan club that released a magazine called "Propaganda". Long time member Bart van den Hoogen, a close friend to Peter was involved in it and so was someone called Arno Asman, who died somewhere in the mid-seventies. Peter became involved in the "Propaganda" fanzine and together with Bart, released it regularly until 1979.

In 1979, I was asked to take over the fan club and until 1985, I continued to release the "Propaganda" magazine, eventually with an English version as well. Peter always stayed in close contact and helped me out whenever I asked him too. Somewhere in 1985, I stopped the "Propaganda", basically because the interest for Sparks had declined so drastically, that it was costing a lot of money to continue and the feed back from the members was almost non-existing. Apart from that, the American fan club was so much opposed to the Dutch fan club, threatening with legal actions etc. that I just did not think it was worth doing it anymore. From then on it stayed quiet in Holland. I moved to Denmark in 1990 and returned to Holland again in 1993.

In 1994, with the release of Gratuitous Sax, I regained my interest in Sparks and decided to contact Peter again. He by then had already picked up his activities with regard to Sparks and had started a new organisation, releasing the Fan Mael magazine. After we got in contact again, he asked me to help him with the magazine, which I did. For the last two years, Peter and I were in close contact and I visited his house in Den Bosch regularly to prepare the Fan Mael or just talk about Sparks in general. Peter apparently had not changed much. For me, he was still the warm, friendly, humouristic and chaotic person I had learned to know and to like very much. Things were a bit different of course. He had been living for many years with his boy-friend John, who turned out to be the absolute opposite of him; very calm and quiet, taking his time to think while Peter was always acting very emotionally and impulsively. Peter was absolutely possessed by his activities for Sparks. He was always calling and writing all over the world to collect information and items on Sparks and shared these things with others very easily. Peter was always very generous and hardly ever kept things for himself. Besides Sparks, he was also very much involved into astrology and corresponding through the Internet.

Whenever I was with him, he always struck me as a busy, chaotic but very friendly person, who was always eager to learn details about Sparks and life in general and who always shared his warmth with others. The dark side, if he had one at all, was perhaps that he was rather unbalanced and very easy to be influenced. The fact that he was very often depressed, I never noticed as he never showed this to me But then again, why should he? With John, he seemed to be very happy and I’m sure he was.

On Monday, June 10 of 1996, Peter went from home on his bike in a rather disturbed mood. He would never return. More than four months later, his body was found not so far from his hometown. He had probably died the same day as he disappeared. Although the actual details will probably never be clear, it seems likely that Peter took an overdose of pills against his depression. Whether or not this was purposely, nobody will ever know.

With Peter, a Sparks fan legend has gone. I have come to learn many, many Sparks fans all over the world but nobody is like him. Peter had a tattoo on his arm indicating the "Sparks" lettering from the A Woofer In Tweeter’s Clothing album. On his coffin, a large Sparks logo was painted and during the ceremony, Bon Voyage was played. I for one person am missing him very much but I am sure this applies to many people, not to mention his family and friend John. I hope Peter is happy where he is now.  -  Ruud Swart 1996