the head in the riot, although no one realises the seriousness of his injury until it is too late. On 20 May 1996, a few days after his release from prison, Arthur suffers a brain haemorrhage on the allotments, and dies the next day in hospital. Arthur's funeral is delayed pending an inquest, but the jury eventually returns a verdict of accidental death, much to the disgust of Mark and Pauline, who believe that the prison services neglected to seek proper medical help for Arthur. A bench is placed in dedication to his memory in Albert Square; the dedication is entitled "Arthur Fowler: He loved this place". In 2007, after Pauline's death, Dot Cotton (June Brown) buries her ashes at Arthur's grave. In 2015, Martin names his son with Stacey Slater (Lacey Turner) after his father, though it emerges that he is actually the son of Kush Kazemi (Davood Ghadami). Creation Arthur Fowler was one of the original twenty-three characters invented by the creators of EastEnders, Tony Holland and Julia Smith. Arthur was a member of the first family of EastEnders, the Beales and Fowlers, and Holland took the inspiration for some of the series' earliest characters from his own London family and background. Arthur's original character outline as written by Smith and Holland appeared in an abridged form in their book, EastEnders: The Inside Story. "Rock-solid and reliable. Has an instinctive (unintellectual) wisdom...He cries openly at funerals, loves his wife, is strict with his children, doesn't drink a lot, supports Arsenal, votes Labour and would never walk down the street carrying flowers. He worked in a factory – but was made redundant, and has been unemployed for a year." (page 54) Bill Treacher was the first actor Holland and Smith had thought of to play the character, in fact, Arthur had almost been invented with him in mind. Both had worked with Treacher before on the popular BBC drama Z-Cars. His qualities as an actor were exactly the ones they wanted for the "very difficult" part of Arthur: "Warmth, directness and an ability to be convincingly ordinary without being dull". Treacher admitted in 2015 that he was initially reluctant to take on the role due to the long hours and the distance from his family, but said, "I rang my agent and said, 'Tell Julia I'll do it'. She said, 'I already have.' As an actor it's hard to