Rolling Stones blue plaque: Jagger-Richards Dartford train meet marked

Mick Jagger and Keith Richards bonded over their love of blues music

A blue plaque has been unveiled to mark the chance encounter between Mick Jagger and Keith Richards which had a profound effect on rock music.

Jagger and Richards had their first proper meeting on platform two of Dartford station on 17 October 1961.

They bonded over a love of the blues and formed a musical friendship that would lead to the foundation of The Rolling Stones in 1962.

The heritage plaque was unveiled at the station on Thursday.

The plaque was unveiled by mayor Avtar Sandhu and Dartford Grammar head John Oakes

Jagger and Richards' musical partnership is still going strong

"We've held a low key event today because Dartford is a working railway station and platform two is a modest space considering the station's enormous role in pop music history," Dartford Borough Council leader Jeremy Kite said.

"I hope that in the years ahead many thousands of rail passengers will enjoy looking at the plaque and realising what a huge part the station played in bringing The Rolling Stones together."

When they met, Richards was on his way to Sidcup Art College, carrying a hollow-bodied Höfner cutaway electric guitar, while Jagger was travelling to the London School of Economics with some of his prized blues records.

The teenagers recognised each other as they had both gone to Wentworth Primary School in the town, with Jagger then going on to study at Dartford Grammar.

The Rolling Stones formed in 1962, and went on to become one of the most successful, influential and enduring rock 'n' roll bands in the history of music.

Musical railway connections

• Paul Simon penned the lyrics to Simon and Garfunkel's Homeward Bound at a station in Widnes, Cheshire, in 1964 as he waited for a train home

• Former Brit award-winner Shola Ama was overheard by a record producer singing to herself on a platform at London's Hammersmith tube station when she was 15 years old

• In 1964 Muddy Waters and Sister Rosetta Tharpe were part of a "massively culturally significant" gig at south Manchester's disused Wilbraham Road station

• London's Marylebone railway station and the Minehead branch line in Somerset featured prominently in The Beatles' film A Hard Day's Night