Curate, connect, and discover
Head canon accepted, it is now canon in my eyes.
He probably learned how to pickpocket from older orphans. Nothing like an unassuming small child to lower a person's guard.
He had to learn to resist the urge (or ger more creative) in Slytherin because if anything went missing, he'd be the first suspect.
Tom also curses like a sailor whenever his control slips & his sticky fingers never quite go away
Peep snakefaced Voldemort slipping a wall ornament from Malfory Manor into his robe when nobody but Nagini's watching
Tom absolutely was missing a tooth or two. He's got a punch-able face and definitely annoyed the other orphans.
Going back to the cockney accent though 👀
This child absolutely learned how to fake a semi-convincing upperclassmen accent by people watching. I like to assume he learned to do this before Hogwarts either to make him a more desirable adoption candidate or just to make himself sound more trustworthy.
Speaking of, Tom 100% used his posh-voice on Dumbledore when they first met so he has never heard Tom's cockney accent.
No wonder Dumbledore thinks Tom was just built different. Tom went through an 💕I'm not like other girls💕 phase and never got a wake up call because he was too busy convincincing everyone else that it was true.
Look me in the fucking eye and tell me Tom Riddle had straight teeth as a child
That boy grew up in 1930's London in a muggle orphanage, his chompers had to have been a wreck
It was probably one of the first things he got bullied for, alongside his clothing and surname (because no decent Pureblood child has crooked teeth and in Slytherin there are only decent Pureblood children, honestly, what is Riddle even doing there?) and was almost certainly one of the first things he sought to change in his life using magic
I can just imagine him trying his best to be charming, learning how to smile without showing his teeth, talking without opening his mouth all the way & never letting anyone see him laugh for real bc any time someone catches a glimpse of his teeth it instantly undoes all his hard work bc at the end of the day- no matter how charming or clever he is- he's still just a mudblood gutter rat and his crooked teeth never let him (or anyone else) forget that
Until one summer (I'm thinking before 5th year, so around the time that he murders his relatives) he sneaks away from the orphanage to see a back alley Healer in Knockturn Alley to finally, finally get his teeth fixed (for a fee, of course, but they don't question where the money's from and Tom certainly isn't telling) and that September he strides into the school with the most winning smile money can buy, and suddenly it's over for everyone who once doubted him
With a Horcrux on his finger, noble blood in his veins, and a freshly winning smile, Tom Marvolo Riddle feels nothing like a gutter rat, not anymore
He's the Heir of Slytherin, Greatest of the Hogwarts Four
Galatea Merrythought was the dark arts professor during Tom Riddle’s school years, retiring when he graduated.
In this fic, Merrythought becomes Riddle’s mentor and was the one to introduce him to the many creatures (vampires, werewolves, giants, etc) who would’ve made up Voldemort’s ranks. Instilling in him a sense of adventure and treasure hunting that gave him the knowledge to find the lost Diadem in the first place.
Merrythought takes him on wild adventures that are only possible because she has an illegal time turner.
Tom accidentally becomes friends and fellow adventurers with Muggleborn Hufflepuffs Nobby Leach and Margot Doope, and Ravenclaw underclassman Myrtle Warren.
Nobby being a blunt, angry little gremlin who says what he thinks no matter what others may say about him. He has no patience for his bloodpurity spouting Pureblood classmates and will throwdown for his fellow Puffs anytime, anywhere. Despite his rude, brash personality, his fellow Muggleborns still find him a compelling leader. Now, Tom and Leach together...they’re practically unstoppable.
Margot is a cold, logical upperclassman who would likely fit in with the Ravenclaw’s if not for her dedication to her work. She refuses to believe magic and muggle technological advances can’t be combined and experiments with both. They often explode in her face, but she refuses to give up.
Myrtle is always popping up where you least expect her, and annoying the hell out of Tom. She’s far sharper than her boy-crazy tendencies would have you believe, but she usually arrives at the wrong conclusion and still somehow manages to be right. (Much to Tom’s frustration.)
Basically the Muggleborn friend squad you never knew you wanted. This time with an extra helping of the ignored and overlooked Hogwarts Houses, aka the not-Gryffindors. :D
A group of friends working together to figure out wixen culture, their identities, and their place in the world.
Also they’re all LGBT+ of some kind. You’re Welcome.
TL:DR
Tom Riddle Hogwarts AU where he gets a supportive professor and muggleborn friends who go on wacky adventures together and figure out how to be human.
And yes Tom is still messed up, but so are they. It’s not gonna be all sun shine and roses. See my other tom riddle posts for reference. I’ll likely be addressing most if not all of them.
Alright this one’s going to get disturbing very quickly. WARNING: Pureblood inbreeding shenanigans.
This isn’t going to be another post explaining why Tom hated his name because it’s a muggle name or because it’s common. I think that’s part of it, but I haven’t seen anyway address this angle:
Tom hated his name because of his mother.
Alright, so at some point someone in Hogwarts likely tried to slip Tom a love potion. Let’s say, in his Seventh year. It doesn’t work, Dumbledore finds out and mentions this one study about how those conceived under a love potion are immune to its effects...and also incapable of love. (I think that last part is bs but that’s a different post).
In his last year at Hogwarts, Tom is already aware that his mother was a witch and his father was the muggle. He’s already pinned the blame on his father for leaving, and placed his mother into the role of victim. He saw his father as having the power, and his mother as being weak. His father, the strong Slytherin-like Muggle who conned the weak witch Merope into sleeping with him.
But this changes things.
All of a sudden his mother is the one in the role of the abuser, and his father in the role of victim. It’s his Slytherin, Pureblood Mother who forced his oblivious Muggle Father into marrying her.
She kidnapped and raped Tom’s father, and then when he escaped, and Tom was born, she named her son after her victim.
And what were her first, and last, words for her son? She hoped, “that her son would turn out to look like his father.”
Alright here’s where shit gets real.
What were the Gaunt’s known for again? Rampant and extreme inbreeding and incest. Cousins marrying cousins, sisters marrying brothers, etc.
So mothers marrying sons? I do not find that hard to believe for this family.
When you replace “father” with “victim” the ickiness really shines through. So here’s Merope giving her child the name of her victim (and her father, who abused her, now those implications I like even less, if that’s possible) and the first thing she does is express a wish that he’ll look like her victim. What the Fuck.
So here’s the very real possibility that Merope could be thinking about grooming her small child into becoming her replacement Tom Riddle 2.0 husband, or at the very least a Tom Riddle that was dependent on her, had no other choice but to love her, and could not run away because there was nowhere to run.
Tom probably pieced this together, promptly threw up, and very aggressively doubled down on his new chosen name.
TL:DR
canon Merope Gaunt would not have been a good mother, no matter what Dumbledore believed, and Tom dodged a bullet on that front.
I love this addition! Tom absolutely had experience minding kids.
Now I imagine that entertaining the babies and toddlers, while probably not fun, was still easier for Tom than interacting with kids older or around his age, once he got the hang of it. Babies are simple, you don’t have to put up a mask around them, and I imagine Tom found that relaxing to have every once in a while. Masking can get exhausting.
It also puts an interesting light on Tom’s choice to go after people so much younger than him to join the Death Eaters. Outside of the fact that the generation he was apart of would not have looked twice at him, these were 20 somethings in their prime following a middle-aged man (I know a few fics that explore just how jarring the age difference could be sometimes but I can’t for the life of me remember the names). Tom could’ve recruited abroad (Karkaroff is right there so obviously he dabbled in it) or tried the purebloods who started Hogwarts immediately after his graduation and therefore did not have enough knowledge of Tom Riddle to connect the dots.
But Tom knows how to deal with kids, the orphanage taught him.
I’ve already talked about the under-utilization of Nobby Leach, but what about the Orphanage?
As someone who had to live with several people (adults & children both) who made my life miserable and disliked me just as much as I disliked them…there’s no way Tom Riddle was able to avoid them all to the degree canon wants you to believe.
Sure he has his own room, but he still has to eat, take care of his hygiene, do his chores, go to church, help with the younger children, etc. He’s going to have to interact with the other orphans and matrons at the orphanage, there’s no way around that.
And some of the other kids may be afraid of him, but children have no fear and are always ready to test boundaries. The adults, Mrs. Cole, especially are already suspicious of him, and you bet the other kids are aware and take advantage of this to taunt and subvert Tom’s authority in front of them.
Outside of this, there’s also no way to hate everyone and everything at the orphanage all the time. There will be some good moments because that kind of lasting hatred just is…not viable. If not on Tom’s end, then the other kids will undoubtedly become tired of tip-toeing around him. And when the bombs start to fall…no one’s going to give a shit about Tom Riddle and his weirdness, they have bigger things to worry about. And they’re all stuck together anyway.
Let’s examine some of the relationships Tom had with the other orphans. Tom gets into a fight with Billy Stubbs and, according to Mrs. Cole, hangs his rabbit. On a trip, Tom lures Denny Bishop & Amy Benson into a cave and traumatized them for life with something so horrible they can’t bear to speak of it.
Nothing about what caused the argument with Billy Stubbs or why Tom chose those specific orphans to traumatize for life. Because luring two suspicious, jaded orphans into a cave where no one can hear them scream? That would take planning and a big enough motive that Tom thought the risk of Mrs. Cole catching him doing something weird again was worth it.
But do I believe they were traumatized “for life?” No probably not. This is baby Riddle, not Dark Lord Voldemort, he’s new to the traumatizing children thing.
So here’s where I go into the more questionable headcanon I have about the orphanage: Tom Riddle has a sibling relationship with these kids he supposedly traumatized.
Hear me out.
Tom killed Billy’s rabbit and traumatized Dennis & Amy; how is that sibling-like?
I can tell you from personal experience. I have 9 siblings (technically) and several cousins who barge into my house uninvited. I also grew up on stories my mom had about her 3 siblings and my grandma had about her 11. My mom pushed her sister off a roof and cut off a piece of her tongue with safety scissors while she was sleeping. Me and the sister closest to my age drive each other crazy. Siblings are the worst to each other and routinely traumatize each other. My sister still will not let go of the things I did as a kid, and vice versa.
Now these kids may not have chosen to be siblings, but rarely does anyone get that choice anyway. (And if they do, they have moments where they regret it).
It first starts out with annoying the shit out of each other. You know, barging into their room and not closing the door when they leave, ganging up on the youngest (probably Tom), stealing each other’s toys and hiding them-Oh. OH.
…See where I’m going there?
Then once they get older they grow to tolerate each other and gang up on the much more frustrating younger generation of kids who’ve taken up residence in their orphanage. They’ll have to find a compromise on splitting up chores and they’ll need to have the option to talk to people they’re age. Cue reluctant siblings who refuse to admit their siblings.
Tom Riddle: Why do I get the night shift again?
Amy Benson, to Dennis: Hey, remember that time Tom dragged us to a cave and traumatized us?
Billy Stubbs: And killed my rabbit?
Dennis Bishop: And stole my toys?
Tom Riddle: You’re never letting this go are you.
Dennis, Amy, & Billy: Never.
These 4 kids grew up together and, if they were not adopted-out, grew into adulthood together.
TL:DR
Tom Riddle does not give off only-child vibes. Discuss.
Then there’s Mrs. Cole. The suspicious, strict matron who takes no shit and was probably the one to threaten Tom with institutionalization.
When Tom was a child she was probably in her prime, but as Tom got older so did she. And as parents (bc Mrs. Cole was probably the closest thing like that for Tom and probably some other orphans too) get older they become less strict... on the younger kids.
And if there’s anything the older kids can agree on it’s that the younger kids have it way better. And the parent remembers absolutely none of the strict rules they put on the oldest kids. Gaslighting at it’s finest (see kallmekris sibling series on TikTok for inspiration).
Smol Orphan: *leaves a dead rat and broken glass in another kid’s bed.*
Mrs. Cole: ...
Amy: oh that kid’s done for.
Dennis: He better say his prayers.
Mrs. Cole: ...Leave, I’ll clean it. Just don’t do it again.
Tom: That’s it?! You locked me in my room for 2 weeks after the rabbit incident!
Billy: You made me write lines on the entire Old Testament when I broke a window!
Mrs. Cole: That doesn’t sound like me. I never did that, you’re all so dramatic.
Tom: *dark lord energy manifests*
I’ve already talked about the under-utilization of Nobby Leach, but what about the Orphanage?
As someone who had to live with several people (adults & children both) who made my life miserable and disliked me just as much as I disliked them…there’s no way Tom Riddle was able to avoid them all to the degree canon wants you to believe.
Sure he has his own room, but he still has to eat, take care of his hygiene, do his chores, go to church, help with the younger children, etc. He’s going to have to interact with the other orphans and matrons at the orphanage, there’s no way around that.
And some of the other kids may be afraid of him, but children have no fear and are always ready to test boundaries. The adults, Mrs. Cole, especially are already suspicious of him, and you bet the other kids are aware and take advantage of this to taunt and subvert Tom’s authority in front of them.
Outside of this, there’s also no way to hate everyone and everything at the orphanage all the time. There will be some good moments because that kind of lasting hatred just is…not viable. If not on Tom’s end, then the other kids will undoubtedly become tired of tip-toeing around him. And when the bombs start to fall…no one’s going to give a shit about Tom Riddle and his weirdness, they have bigger things to worry about. And they’re all stuck together anyway.
Let’s examine some of the relationships Tom had with the other orphans. Tom gets into a fight with Billy Stubbs and, according to Mrs. Cole, hangs his rabbit. On a trip, Tom lures Denny Bishop & Amy Benson into a cave and traumatized them for life with something so horrible they can’t bear to speak of it.
Nothing about what caused the argument with Billy Stubbs or why Tom chose those specific orphans to traumatize for life. Because luring two suspicious, jaded orphans into a cave where no one can hear them scream? That would take planning and a big enough motive that Tom thought the risk of Mrs. Cole catching him doing something weird again was worth it.
But do I believe they were traumatized “for life?” No probably not. This is baby Riddle, not Dark Lord Voldemort, he’s new to the traumatizing children thing.
So here’s where I go into the more questionable headcanon I have about the orphanage: Tom Riddle has a sibling relationship with these kids he supposedly traumatized.
Hear me out.
Tom killed Billy’s rabbit and traumatized Dennis & Amy; how is that sibling-like?
I can tell you from personal experience. I have 9 siblings (technically) and several cousins who barge into my house uninvited. I also grew up on stories my mom had about her 3 siblings and my grandma had about her 11. My mom pushed her sister off a roof and cut off a piece of her tongue with safety scissors while she was sleeping. Me and the sister closest to my age drive each other crazy. Siblings are the worst to each other.
Now these kids may not have chosen to be siblings, but rarely does anyone get that choice anyway. (And if they do, they have moments where they regret it).
It first starts out with annoying the shit out of each other. You know, barging into their room and not closing the door when they leave, ganging up on the youngest (probably Tom), stealing each other’s toys and hiding them-Oh. OH.
…See where I’m going there?
Then once they get older they grow to tolerate each other and gang up on the much more frustrating younger generation of kids who’ve taken up residence in their orphanage. They’ll have to find a compromise on splitting up chores and they’ll need to have the option to talk to people they’re age. Cue reluctant siblings who refuse to admit their siblings.
Tom Riddle: Why do I get the night shift again?
Amy Benson, to Dennis: Hey, remember that time Tom dragged us to a cave and traumatized us?
Billy Stubbs: And killed my rabbit?
Dennis Bishop: And stole my toys?
Tom Riddle: You’re never letting this go are you.
Dennis, Amy, & Billy: Never.
These 4 kids grew up together and, if they were not adopted-out, grew into adulthood together.
TL:DR
Tom Riddle does not give off only-child vibes. Discuss.
I’ve already talked about the under-utilization of Nobby Leach, but what about the Orphanage?
As someone who had to live with several people (adults & children both) who made my life miserable and disliked me just as much as I disliked them...there’s no way Tom Riddle was able to avoid them all to the degree canon wants you to believe.
Sure he has his own room, but he still has to eat, take care of his hygiene, do his chores, go to church, help with the younger children, etc. He’s going to have to interact with the other orphans and matrons at the orphanage, there’s no way around that.
And some of the other kids may be afraid of him, but children have no fear and are always ready to test boundaries. The adults, Mrs. Cole, especially are already suspicious of him, and you bet the other kids are aware and take advantage of this to taunt and subvert Tom’s authority in front of them.
Outside of this, there’s also no way to hate everyone and everything at the orphanage all the time. There will be some good moments because that kind of lasting hatred just is...not viable. If not on Tom’s end, then the other kids will undoubtedly become tired of tip-toeing around him. And when the bombs start to fall...no one’s going to give a shit about Tom Riddle and his weirdness, they have bigger things to worry about. And they’re all stuck together anyway.
Let’s examine some of the relationships Tom had with the other orphans. Tom gets into a fight with Billy Stubbs and, according to Mrs. Cole, hangs his rabbit. On a trip, Tom lures Denny Bishop & Amy Benson into a cave and traumatized them for life with something so horrible they can’t bear to speak of it.
Nothing about what caused the argument with Billy Stubbs or why Tom chose those specific orphans to traumatize for life. Because luring two suspicious, jaded orphans into a cave where no one can hear them scream? That would take planning and a big enough motive that Tom thought the risk of Mrs. Cole catching him doing something weird again was worth it.
But do I believe they were traumatized “for life?” No probably not. This is baby Riddle, not Dark Lord Voldemort, he’s new to the traumatizing children thing.
So here’s where I go into the more questionable headcanon I have about the orphanage: Tom Riddle has a sibling relationship with these kids he supposedly traumatized.
Hear me out.
Tom killed Billy’s rabbit and traumatized Dennis & Amy; how is that sibling-like?
I can tell you from personal experience. I have 9 siblings (technically) and several cousins who barge into my house uninvited. I also grew up on stories my mom had about her 3 siblings and my grandma had about her 11. My mom pushed her sister off a roof and cut off a piece of her tongue with safety scissors while she was sleeping. Me and the sister closest to my age drive each other crazy. Siblings are the worst to each other and routinely traumatize each other. My sister still will not let go of the things I did as a kid, and vice versa.
Now these kids may not have chosen to be siblings, but rarely does anyone get that choice anyway. (And if they do, they have moments where they regret it).
It first starts out with annoying the shit out of each other. You know, barging into their room and not closing the door when they leave, ganging up on the youngest (probably Tom), stealing each other’s toys and hiding them-Oh. OH.
...See where I’m going there?
Then once they get older they grow to tolerate each other and gang up on the much more frustrating younger generation of kids who’ve taken up residence in their orphanage. They’ll have to find a compromise on splitting up chores and they’ll need to have the option to talk to people they’re age. Cue reluctant siblings who refuse to admit their siblings.
Tom Riddle: Why do I get the night shift again?
Amy Benson, to Dennis: Hey, remember that time Tom dragged us to a cave and traumatized us?
Billy Stubbs: And killed my rabbit?
Dennis Bishop: And stole my toys?
Tom Riddle: You’re never letting this go are you.
Dennis, Amy, & Billy: Never.
These 4 kids grew up together and, if they were not adopted-out, grew into adulthood together.
TL:DR
Tom Riddle does not give off only-child vibes. Discuss.
I probably will now, eventually, Nobby Leach is such a blank slate that I don't feel any pressure with keeping him canon.
But Tom Riddle? Now that little shit is frustrating to keep in character. I have so many headcanons for him it's difficult to adhere them to canon. Btw definitely gonna post a new thread about those in a bit. You guys got me on a roll.
The poison-dragonpox headcanon with Abraxas is also one of my favorites. I would absolutely write that.
Its supremely unfair how under utilized Nobby Leach is in fanfic.
He's a blank slate! The 1st Muggleborn British Minister of Magic but we know very little about him personally or even the circumstances of his election.
Voldemort rose to power in the late 60s-early 70s. Leach was minister sometime between 1962-68. And Leach was supposedly threatened from returning to his position or possibly assassinated.
Do you think poor, working-class, assumed Mudblood of Slytherin Tom Riddle didn't see these shady dealings and go "Okay so taking the legal route to power won't work."
If having power was Tom's only goal then he absolutely would've taken a quicker route to it. But instead Nobby Leach's failure just proved the system was too broken to fix from the inside.
(Quick disclaimer, I think Riddle only used the blood-purity thing to get an in with the purebloods who were running the country. There are better posts that expand on this idea in detail so I'm not going to get into it too much here. Okay? Okay.)
We know so little about Leach that he could conceivably have gone to Hogwarts at the same time as Tom Riddle. Did they know eachother? That's up to you, but if they went to school together then they definitely knew OF eachother.
So here you have Nobby Leach who hit the ground running after graduation, who clawed his way to being the FIRST muggleborn Minister of Magic in a government made up of bloodpurists, and then he just...resigned? Fuck that. That doesn't fit at all.
And anyone with half a brain would've picked up on that. Tom Riddle could not have missed how uncharacteristic this would be if he knew Leach, or heck just noticed the sheer will and patience it takes to become THE Muggleborn Minister of Magic.
On that note, there might've been some sort of Muggleborn movement happening in the background following Grindelwald's defeat. After all it takes more than one person to achieve this kind of victory.
So Tom Riddle watches (or is apart of 👀) a fast-paced, determined movement place the FIRST Muggleborn Minister of Magic and then watches as this victory silently tumbles down into forgotten history.
Meanwhile Tom builds the Death Eaters who also work outside the system via raids and murder despite the fact that they all work inside of it already. Theres already lots to unpack with THAT decision but moving on... Once the Ministry finally gets its shit together and arrests the (clearly labeled with Dark Marks) perpetrators, throwing them in wizard prison eventually reaching the point where they would be thrown in without a trial (Sirius Black), the Pureblood lawmakers all of a sudden realize "oh fuck, this is getting real."
And now what do they have to do to avoid suspicion in this very Red Scare-esque era of spying and tattling on eachother (it worked for Karkaroff) to avoid wizard prison? Play nice with the Muggleborns.
TL;DR
Nobby Leach: went the legitimate route to making change by working WITHIN the system. He rose fast and fell silently.
Tom Riddle: went the shady route to power by working OUTSIDE the system, painstakingly working for decades to build a support base, and falling in notoriety.
There needs to be more fics with them as foils to eachother. And if it has to be me, I warn you it will take YEARS to finish.
I have, in fact, read the entire thing more than once and it was the inspiration for my current nobby leach crisis. 😭
And I do love the idea of LeachxRiddle but I didn't want to come off too strong in the first post.
I loved Retired Prometheus but Leach's character just fell a little short for me. It absolutely worked for the fic as a whole since he wasn't the main character, but it's just made me want to see him more fleshed out in other fics.
This man had the balls to run as minister for magic and be the first muggleborn to win. That speaks of ambition and cunning, and I very much want to see more of that.
Nobby Leach and Tom Riddle together? Now that is a power couple in the making. They're goals could arguably be the same, but the different methods they use to go about accomplishing them are very much opposites.
Also I don't know about you but I love the idea that Leach's personality is the exact opposite of what would you expect from the token muggleborn character. You know the muggleborn who's soft-spoken, quiet in their convictions, and polite no matter what slurs they're called.
Give me a Leach who spits in Purebloods faces, goes to muggleborn protests with a megaphone, and displays his outrage for their sub-humane treatment blatantly.
Give me a Leach who should not have won the election because he wasn't a tolerable, charismatic, token minority but did anyway.
Its supremely unfair how under utilized Nobby Leach is in fanfic.
He's a blank slate! The 1st Muggleborn British Minister of Magic but we know very little about him personally or even the circumstances of his election.
Voldemort rose to power in the late 60s-early 70s. Leach was minister sometime between 1962-68. And Leach was supposedly threatened from returning to his position or possibly assassinated.
Do you think poor, working-class, assumed Mudblood of Slytherin Tom Riddle didn't see these shady dealings and go "Okay so taking the legal route to power won't work."
If having power was Tom's only goal then he absolutely would've taken a quicker route to it. But instead Nobby Leach's failure just proved the system was too broken to fix from the inside.
(Quick disclaimer, I think Riddle only used the blood-purity thing to get an in with the purebloods who were running the country. There are better posts that expand on this idea in detail so I'm not going to get into it too much here. Okay? Okay.)
We know so little about Leach that he could conceivably have gone to Hogwarts at the same time as Tom Riddle. Did they know eachother? That's up to you, but if they went to school together then they definitely knew OF eachother.
So here you have Nobby Leach who hit the ground running after graduation, who clawed his way to being the FIRST muggleborn Minister of Magic in a government made up of bloodpurists, and then he just...resigned? Fuck that. That doesn't fit at all.
And anyone with half a brain would've picked up on that. Tom Riddle could not have missed how uncharacteristic this would be if he knew Leach, or heck just noticed the sheer will and patience it takes to become THE Muggleborn Minister of Magic.
On that note, there might've been some sort of Muggleborn movement happening in the background following Grindelwald's defeat. After all it takes more than one person to achieve this kind of victory.
So Tom Riddle watches (or is apart of 👀) a fast-paced, determined movement place the FIRST Muggleborn Minister of Magic and then watches as this victory silently tumbles down into forgotten history.
Meanwhile Tom builds the Death Eaters who also work outside the system via raids and murder despite the fact that they all work inside of it already. Theres already lots to unpack with THAT decision but moving on... Once the Ministry finally gets its shit together and arrests the (clearly labeled with Dark Marks) perpetrators, throwing them in wizard prison eventually reaching the point where they would be thrown in without a trial (Sirius Black), the Pureblood lawmakers all of a sudden realize "oh fuck, this is getting real."
And now what do they have to do to avoid suspicion in this very Red Scare-esque era of spying and tattling on eachother (it worked for Karkaroff) to avoid wizard prison? Play nice with the Muggleborns.
TL;DR
Nobby Leach: went the legitimate route to making change by working WITHIN the system. He rose fast and fell silently.
Tom Riddle: went the shady route to power by working OUTSIDE the system, painstakingly working for decades to build a support base, and falling in notoriety.
There needs to be more fics with them as foils to eachother. And if it has to be me, I warn you it will take YEARS to finish.
Not to mention, you have the narrative struggle of being pulled in two different directions.
Tom Riddle, as a half blood in Slytherin, is pulled between these two extremes of the wizarding world. Abraxas being the elitist pureblood rhetoric of protecting the status quo and Leach representing the muggleborn movement for equality.
If you want to draw an even bigger connection between Leach's fall and Voldemort's rise, you could say that Tom wanted to believe that things could change. He wanted to believe Leach could do it. And when it didn't happen...well it's time for Riddle to take the reins and force the purebloods to change it themselves.
Riddle: You want to uphold the status quo? Well I'm gonna hold it up SO HIGH you'll beg for me to stop.
And they did.
I mean when you look at Voldemort's ranks it really shows just how much he's likely changed the concept of blood purity.
I mean, would post-Grindelwald purebloods be willing to work with werewolves, vampires, giants, etc? I doubt it. And then you have the half bloods who joined.
Would those post-Grindelwald wizards turn against eachother and actively torture and kill other purebloods (ex. The Longbottoms) from their already limited gene pool? I very much doubt that.
Voldemort limited the concept of blood purity to be against muggleborns and anyone who disagrees with Voldemort. And you can even argue that he would welcome muggleborns since he canonically attempted to get Lily Evan's on his side.
Riddle over here sneakily making the Death Eaters more tolerant by upholding the status quo he defined and placing all of his supporters on an equal level when it came to receiving his approval and being in danger of wizard jail.
So I suppose Riddle found a middle ground after all.
Its supremely unfair how under utilized Nobby Leach is in fanfic.
He's a blank slate! The 1st Muggleborn British Minister of Magic but we know very little about him personally or even the circumstances of his election.
Voldemort rose to power in the late 60s-early 70s. Leach was minister sometime between 1962-68. And Leach was supposedly threatened from returning to his position or possibly assassinated.
Do you think poor, working-class, assumed Mudblood of Slytherin Tom Riddle didn't see these shady dealings and go "Okay so taking the legal route to power won't work."
If having power was Tom's only goal then he absolutely would've taken a quicker route to it. But instead Nobby Leach's failure just proved the system was too broken to fix from the inside.
(Quick disclaimer, I think Riddle only used the blood-purity thing to get an in with the purebloods who were running the country. There are better posts that expand on this idea in detail so I'm not going to get into it too much here. Okay? Okay.)
We know so little about Leach that he could conceivably have gone to Hogwarts at the same time as Tom Riddle. Did they know eachother? That's up to you, but if they went to school together then they definitely knew OF eachother.
So here you have Nobby Leach who hit the ground running after graduation, who clawed his way to being the FIRST muggleborn Minister of Magic in a government made up of bloodpurists, and then he just...resigned? Fuck that. That doesn't fit at all.
And anyone with half a brain would've picked up on that. Tom Riddle could not have missed how uncharacteristic this would be if he knew Leach, or heck just noticed the sheer will and patience it takes to become THE Muggleborn Minister of Magic.
On that note, there might've been some sort of Muggleborn movement happening in the background following Grindelwald's defeat. After all it takes more than one person to achieve this kind of victory.
So Tom Riddle watches (or is apart of 👀) a fast-paced, determined movement place the FIRST Muggleborn Minister of Magic and then watches as this victory silently tumbles down into forgotten history.
Meanwhile Tom builds the Death Eaters who also work outside the system via raids and murder despite the fact that they all work inside of it already. Theres already lots to unpack with THAT decision but moving on... Once the Ministry finally gets its shit together and arrests the (clearly labeled with Dark Marks) perpetrators, throwing them in wizard prison eventually reaching the point where they would be thrown in without a trial (Sirius Black), the Pureblood lawmakers all of a sudden realize "oh fuck, this is getting real."
And now what do they have to do to avoid suspicion in this very Red Scare-esque era of spying and tattling on eachother (it worked for Karkaroff) to avoid wizard prison? Play nice with the Muggleborns.
TL;DR
Nobby Leach: went the legitimate route to making change by working WITHIN the system. He rose fast and fell silently.
Tom Riddle: went the shady route to power by working OUTSIDE the system, painstakingly working for decades to build a support base, and falling in notoriety.
There needs to be more fics with them as foils to eachother. And if it has to be me, I warn you it will take YEARS to finish.
You've read my mind. I had a completely different post in the works about the Malfoy-Riddle-Leach connection.
It's really fascinating how these 3 characters connect in canon and in fanon.
Because they represent the three main "blood statuses" even if Riddle's is assumed to be muggleborn.
Abraxas Malfoy was able to efficiently get rid if Leach with little effort and loss of power on his side. Going by the official site, people knew he was involved but they couldn't do a damn thing to prove it.
If purebloods were capable of this then what the hell were the Death Eaters in the ministry doing?!
Voldemort took away their security in power, because by the time of his first downfall purebloods were being arrested without trial, or solid evidence, in droves. If Abraxas Malfoy had done what he did to Leach during the Voldemort era he would not have gotten the same leniency he flourished in post-Grindelwald.
TL;DR
Pre-Voldemort
Ministry of Magic: We know it was you.
Purebloods: Oh it was absolutely me.
Post-Voldemort
Purebloods: Bloodpurity? Don't know her.
Ministry of Magic: jail
Purebloods: well if isn't the consequences of my own actions.
Its supremely unfair how under utilized Nobby Leach is in fanfic.
He's a blank slate! The 1st Muggleborn British Minister of Magic but we know very little about him personally or even the circumstances of his election.
Voldemort rose to power in the late 60s-early 70s. Leach was minister sometime between 1962-68. And Leach was supposedly threatened from returning to his position or possibly assassinated.
Do you think poor, working-class, assumed Mudblood of Slytherin Tom Riddle didn't see these shady dealings and go "Okay so taking the legal route to power won't work."
If having power was Tom's only goal then he absolutely would've taken a quicker route to it. But instead Nobby Leach's failure just proved the system was too broken to fix from the inside.
(Quick disclaimer, I think Riddle only used the blood-purity thing to get an in with the purebloods who were running the country. There are better posts that expand on this idea in detail so I'm not going to get into it too much here. Okay? Okay.)
We know so little about Leach that he could conceivably have gone to Hogwarts at the same time as Tom Riddle. Did they know eachother? That's up to you, but if they went to school together then they definitely knew OF eachother.
So here you have Nobby Leach who hit the ground running after graduation, who clawed his way to being the FIRST muggleborn Minister of Magic in a government made up of bloodpurists, and then he just...resigned? Fuck that. That doesn't fit at all.
And anyone with half a brain would've picked up on that. Tom Riddle could not have missed how uncharacteristic this would be if he knew Leach, or heck just noticed the sheer will and patience it takes to become THE Muggleborn Minister of Magic.
On that note, there might've been some sort of Muggleborn movement happening in the background following Grindelwald's defeat. After all it takes more than one person to achieve this kind of victory.
So Tom Riddle watches (or is apart of 👀) a fast-paced, determined movement place the FIRST Muggleborn Minister of Magic and then watches as this victory silently tumbles down into forgotten history.
Meanwhile Tom builds the Death Eaters who also work outside the system via raids and murder despite the fact that they all work inside of it already. Theres already lots to unpack with THAT decision but moving on... Once the Ministry finally gets its shit together and arrests the (clearly labeled with Dark Marks) perpetrators, throwing them in wizard prison eventually reaching the point where they would be thrown in without a trial (Sirius Black), the Pureblood lawmakers all of a sudden realize "oh fuck, this is getting real."
And now what do they have to do to avoid suspicion in this very Red Scare-esque era of spying and tattling on eachother (it worked for Karkaroff) to avoid wizard prison? Play nice with the Muggleborns.
TL;DR
Nobby Leach: went the legitimate route to making change by working WITHIN the system. He rose fast and fell silently.
Tom Riddle: went the shady route to power by working OUTSIDE the system, painstakingly working for decades to build a support base, and falling in notoriety.
There needs to be more fics with them as foils to eachother. And if it has to be me, I warn you it will take YEARS to finish.
Its supremely unfair how under utilized Nobby Leach is in fanfic.
He's a blank slate! The 1st Muggleborn British Minister of Magic but we know very little about him personally or even the circumstances of his election.
Voldemort rose to power in the late 60s-early 70s. Leach was minister sometime between 1962-68. And Leach was supposedly threatened from returning to his position or possibly assassinated.
Do you think poor, working-class, assumed Mudblood of Slytherin Tom Riddle didn't see these shady dealings and go "Okay so taking the legal route to power won't work."
If having power was Tom's only goal then he absolutely would've taken a quicker route to it. But instead Nobby Leach's failure just proved the system was too broken to fix from the inside.
(Quick disclaimer, I think Riddle only used the blood-purity thing to get an in with the purebloods who were running the country. There are better posts that expand on this idea in detail so I'm not going to get into it too much here. Okay? Okay.)
We know so little about Leach that he could conceivably have gone to Hogwarts at the same time as Tom Riddle. Did they know eachother? That's up to you, but if they went to school together then they definitely knew OF eachother.
So here you have Nobby Leach who hit the ground running after graduation, who clawed his way to being the FIRST muggleborn Minister of Magic in a government made up of bloodpurists, and then he just...resigned? Fuck that. That doesn't fit at all.
And anyone with half a brain would've picked up on that. Tom Riddle could not have missed how uncharacteristic this would be if he knew Leach, or heck just noticed the sheer will and patience it takes to become THE Muggleborn Minister of Magic.
On that note, there might've been some sort of Muggleborn movement happening in the background following Grindelwald's defeat. After all it takes more than one person to achieve this kind of victory.
So Tom Riddle watches (or is apart of 👀) a fast-paced, determined movement place the FIRST Muggleborn Minister of Magic and then watches as this victory silently tumbles down into forgotten history.
Meanwhile Tom builds the Death Eaters who also work outside the system via raids and murder despite the fact that they all work inside of it already. Theres already lots to unpack with THAT decision but moving on... Once the Ministry finally gets its shit together and arrests the (clearly labeled with Dark Marks) perpetrators, throwing them in wizard prison eventually reaching the point where they would be thrown in without a trial (Sirius Black), the Pureblood lawmakers all of a sudden realize "oh fuck, this is getting real."
And now what do they have to do to avoid suspicion in this very Red Scare-esque era of spying and tattling on eachother (it worked for Karkaroff) to avoid wizard prison? Play nice with the Muggleborns.
TL;DR
Nobby Leach: went the legitimate route to making change by working WITHIN the system. He rose fast and fell silently.
Tom Riddle: went the shady route to power by working OUTSIDE the system, painstakingly working for decades to build a support base, and falling in notoriety.
There needs to be more fics with them as foils to eachother. And if it has to be me, I warn you it will take YEARS to finish.
The official website even says 'conspiracy theories abound' and if that isn't an invitation for fanfic writers I don't know what is.