Hector = taxman.. why?

[MmarcoM]

hi all,
i m a newbie here...
by having a look at different posts on this BB, i found out that Hector is the nickname of the taxMan..

can anyone tell me why? where does that name come from?

thanx and regards
marco

[sasguru]

Yeah. The original taxman was called Hector Higginbotham. He was employed in 1914 when Income tax was first introduced. Originally tax guys were called Higginbothams but that was too much of a mouthful, so they bacame Hectors.

HTH

[AtW]

Prior to that their name was chosen in a raffle after a random UK town name, so the name was Hector Scunthorpe, but they had to change it pretty quickly - I suppose Hector got his wifes' maiden name.

[MarillionFan]

Higginbottom.

hth.

[Mordac]

It comes from an old (and crap) advert

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/uk/1109716.stm

as in Hector the Tax Inspector.

[sasguru]

Higginbottom.

hth.

No I believe he was related to the illustrious clan from which Ian Botham came from. His great grandfather was Higgin, married a Botham and the initial hyphen vanished over a generation.