Jock Rankin, ABC News,

From ABC News, January 17, 2002:
[Posted by Steve Padgham, in Hong Kong]


Victorian journalists have paid tribute to Jock Rankin, the veteran ABC broadcaster who died in Melbourne yesterday.

Mr Rankin joined the ABC in 1972, and had been a reporter for television and radio current affairs programs including Four Corners and This Day Tonight. 

He was Victorian Director of News and Current Affairs from 1988 to 1993, while in recent years he was best known for his work as executive director of the Property Council of Victoria. 

Mr Rankin, who was 52, is survived by his wife, state Education Minister Mary Delahunty, and their two children. 

ABC TV newsreader Ian Henderson says Mr Rankin made an important contribution to Victorian journalism. 

"Jock was an uncompromising and passionate editor of the old school - he was capable of both inspiring great loyalty and making you quake in your boots, like the best did," he said. 

"He was a great fighter for Victoria's place in Australian journalism."

Jock Rankin, ABC Radio interview with Mary Delahunty

This is from Padge, an email sent out on 27th August, posting now for the folks on the blog....

Dear all, you will all have memories of Jock. After all he was school captain. I remember dropping by his place when walking home in the afternoon. As most of you know he became a journalist and married Mary Delahunty (another ABC  journalist) and Mary went into State politics (Victorian Labor), became Arts and Education minister. She has recently written a book about her experiences and living with Jock's mysterious illness. Later diagnosed as` a rare cancer.

She was recently interviewed on Radio National. David Edmunds and I found it a very interesting account.

The Mary Delahunty interview from Life Matters is available on the RN website for which click here.

Trust all is well. Has anybody alse come up with other contacts?

Best wishes

Steve Padgham

Some more old photos

This is from Padge and Forse.  Padge reckons a number of you may find some these photos of interest....

Barry Faux, "G.D." the Red Setter and Big Pete Read (aka "Ace")

Tony Peppercorn, Oz and Jenny, plus Fish the Dog

Big Pete and Oz

Somewhere in the sixties.... Ray, Big Pete, Ross and Forse

September 19, 1969...

Hello from Hong Kong!

Padge and Forse at the Forsythe residence

Discovery Bay Hong Kong, 20 October 2010

Padge and Forse here. Padge just arrived in from four days in Shanghai following the Shanghai Masters tennis, with brother David (Grammar Class of 71).
They saw in action: Federer, Djokevich, Rafa, Sodeling, the Brien Bros and the eventual winner, Andy Murray.

Padge sends regards to all and boot in bum for no one having posted anything since June!

Off to Yacht Club now.....

Sydney Morning Herald Obit to Paul McKeown

Student returned to lead the way

June 3, 2010

Paul McKeown, AM, 1923 - 2010

Paul McKeown was an inspirational headmaster of Canberra Grammar and an honoured and respected Australian educator. In 1975 he served two years as chairman of the Headmasters Conference of the Independent Schools of Australia; he was also president of the Arts Council of Australia (1968-71), chairman of the ACT chapter of the Australian College of Education (1970), and president of the Australian Association of Religious Educators (1978).

McKeown lived and breathed education in all its forms, from preschool to matriculation and beyond. The humanities, sciences, performing arts, sport and the Australian bush all played important and complementary parts in his passion for teaching. It was his ability to unlock an individual's capabilities and to encourage lives that were fulfilling on a personal level, while contributing to the wider community that made him an outstanding educator.

He spent 27 years at Canberra Grammar and became its longest-serving headmaster. He also transformed the school. When he arrived in 1959 there were 300 students; when he left there were 1350 and the school had an enviable Australia-wide reputation for academic excellence.

Paul John McKeown was born in Tumut on November 1, 1923, the second of three children, and the only son, of Canon Kenneth McKeown and his wife, Florence (Whitaker). His education was initially at the Young primary school, before his father was appointed a canon and vice-dean of St Saviour's Cathedral, Goulburn. The last three years of his schooling was as a boarder at Canberra Grammar, where he excelled at sport and set many records, some of which he held for 30 years.

While he was waiting to gain entry to the University of Sydney World War II broke out. He was too young to enlist in his own right, so he sought his parents' permission. They were opposed to killing people, but permission was given, provided he was not in a direct combat role. He joined the medical corps, serving in New Guinea and Borneo.

After the war, he fulfilled his wish, with a veterans' grant, to study at Sydney University. He joined St Paul's College, where he was involved in cricket, rugby and athletics, and graduated with an arts degree.

From there he did two terms as senior English teacher at the Hamilton and Western District College, in Victoria, before going to Oxford in 1950 to study for his diploma of education. In Hamilton he had met Wilma David, a music teacher, and they were married in 1951 in England. On completion of his studies he spent a year as a master at the Dragon School, a leading Oxford preparatory school.

McKeown had heard about the Outward Bound Movement, which was just getting started at Gordonstoun in Scotland, and went to learn more about it. He was appointed as one of the early instructors at the Outward Bound Mountain School, which was being established at Eskland in England. There he met Eric Shipton, who became warden of the school. Shipton selected the route that Edmund Hillary took to reach the summit of Everest in 1953 and McKeown met Hillary when he returned to England and to Eskdale to thank Shipton for his assistance.

In 1954, McKeown became deputy superintendent at the Northampton Remand Home. Then he applied for a position in Australia as a teacher and was appointed as an English master at Timbertop, an annexe of Geelong Grammar School in the Victorian Alps. There he established the Outward Bound principles of mountaineering, rock climbing, swimming and hiking.

In 1959 McKeown was appointed headmaster of his old school, Canberra Grammar - at 35 the youngest to be offered the post. It was his headmastership here that defined the man. He poured himself out for the school. When he arrived the dormitories for the boarders were above the classrooms. He built new accommodation for them and turned their old quarters into classrooms. As the school expanded, new facilities were added. The junior school was greatly enlarged and the infants school in north

Canberra was built.

His greatest love and achievement was the school chapel, with a specially designed altar front and stained glass windows.

In 1966, McKeown was awarded an inaugural Churchill Fellowship. He went to the United States and England to study the development of independent schools. During a sabbatical in 1971 he went to Russia to see what was happening there in education. In 1979, he was made a member of the Order of Australia.

Paul McKeown is survived by Wilma, their sons Christopher and Jonathan, daughters Deirdre, Elizabeth and Penelope, his sister Theodora and their families.

John Farquharson

Seen on the BBC; International power duo

there I was watching the BBC News when on came an advertisement promoting Hong Kong featuring our own Peter and Jing Forsythe. They came across as the international glamour power couple. The ad took some from this HK promotion piece. Click on http://facesofhongkong.com/en/ and then click on the faces of Peter and Jing and they will take you on a tour of Hong Kong waters. I think an ad for ROLEX watches should be next and I should be their manager (just kidding).

Steve Padgham
For more on Peter's sailing you can go to http://sites.google.com/site/x55xena/

Class of '68 Blog

1968'ers also have a Blog site.

Click here to see it.

I'm sure you will If you go to  you might recognize those that were in the class behind us.

Cheers,
Steve P.

Death of Paul McKeown

Mr Paul John McKeown AM,
Mr Paul McKeown was Headmaster at Canberra Grammar School from 1959 to 1985. Early this morning we were advised that Mr McKeown passed away, peacefully at his home. He was 87 years old. Details about a memorial service, according to the family’s wishes, will be advised in due course.
Outstanding leader in life and education ...is the heading in The Canberra Times Obituary published on Thursday 27th May 2010..you will probably have to click on image and enlarge as it was scanned.

Fast Barry....latest

Steve,

Ended up second outright after five very slippery days and 400 race km. on Tasmanias roads 120 competitors 20 didnot finish.

Unable to make the 15/16 . Thanks for the email.

Barry

Possible get-together on 15-16 May?

[PF] Posting below emails from Padge and Dave Edmunds, re possible get-together on 15-16 May....

[SP email of 2nd May]:  
Dear mates, I am forwarding this e-mail from David Edmunds to those who might like another opportunity to get together on the weekend of 15th/16th May. Do a reply to David ASAP so he knows if he should go ahead with the booking. You can count me in David, I hope we can get a quorum.

Barry fanging along with Therezia in Targa Tasmania

Thanks to Steve Padge for bringing this to our attention.

Barry, long-time competitor in the really, seriously competitively racy Targa Tasmania has been doing this for many years, with great success, mostly with podium finishes and often first.

Story in Canberra Times of 26th April, reporting that Barry and Therezia are climbing the leader board (I guess the result known by now).

Click on photo at left for larger size, and lint to another story on them in the Times' here.

Another photo of Barry, looking very fine and very young, below a few years back, at the Yacht Club here in Hong Kong.

[posted by PF]

Steve Padge asked me to post this:
Remember the days when many of us used to ride motorcycles. More than a few of us are dedicated motorbike riders now. There must be many more photos of interest out there. Send them to the Blog (To Steve Padge).
Above photo sent by Ian Sare, a photo given to him by Rob Armstrong.  Ian's on a Suzuki 80, which he later sold to Padge.
PF comment: I think Barry Faux is off to Vietnam on a bike trip, South to North, shortly...

Alan Gould's literary references to the class of '67

Fellows,

Steve has asked me to describe for this blog a little of how I have used CGS in my fiction over the years. The school comes into two of my published novels, To The Burning City (1991) and The Lakewoman (2009) and an unpublished ‘creative memoir’ called Life Drawing.

David Edmunds and his amazing micro-light adventure

After leaving school I went to university and after graduating spent three desultory years in the public serviced before deciding I wanted to go teaching. I spent my first couple of years teaching in Alice Springs, and then another 28 teaching in Canberra. I sometimes thought about doing something else, but couldn’t find anything that I would have preferred. There was rarely a day when I didn’t enjoy my day at work.

Along the way I gained a wonderful wife and two children, now grown up and out of home.

When Steve Padgham encouraged me to write this post he asked me to tell the following story.

About twelve years ago I decided to build an aeroplane. During the seven years when I was working full time I did a little bit on the plane, but work was very busy, so not much was done. I need to get a run at projects like this and find it difficult to start work at 9.00 at night.

In the first three years after I finished full time work, building the plane was my main occupation.

Eventually I got it finished and took it out to Goulburn airport where I completed the final fitting and engine runups and the like. I got to know a local pilot, an EX-CGS boy as it happens called Dick Nell, and a friend of Grant Nuthalls, who is very experienced and agreed to test fly the aircraft for me. He suggested that I complete the taxi tests, and then do a high-speed run where I just lifted the wheels off the ground, then let it sink back onto the runway.

I started the high-speed run, but when the aircraft lifted it gained height very rapidly and I realised that I would not have enough runway left to land it, so thought, in the short time available, “well fuck it, I might as well fly the thing”

So I flew one circuit around the airport and landed, a bit heavily but OK.

My wife was with me and photographed the event, and here it is.

As we were not expecting to fly, she was not exactly equipped with the appropriate camera, so the video is pretty rough.

Having flown the thing, it seemed a bit precious to now ask my test pilot to check it out, so I thought that I might get him to do one or two of the more complex sequences a bit later and in the mean time I would continue test flying the aircraft.

So I went out to do the second flight with the aim to sort out the landings. Now the very limited book of instructions said to fly the final approach at 50mph and then let the plane float under ground effect and settle on the runway. So I thought that if I flew the final approach at 70, I should have a big margin as this would give me much more lift. This is what I did. As I flew over the fence on approach to the runway I let the speed drift back to about 65 when I was perhaps 30 feet above the ground and the plane fell like a stone, I did not have time to catch it and it pancaked onto the runway, breaking off the nose gear, bending the wings where the main gear attached, breaking the propellor and numerous other fittings, and leaving me completely unscathed. Pity really because otherwise it flew OK.

I had a good look over the ruins and decided that I could build another one in the time it would take to repair this one and just at the moment I was not in the mood, so I sold the wreck to a guy who intends to get it back flying, but hasn’t yet.

I loved the building experience, so that compensates for my very short flying time.

I bought another plane about 18 months ago.

In July I am going to the large aircraft convention at Oshkosh with Rick Frith, and one of my main goals is to check out what I may be able to build. We are then going to hire Harleys and go for a bit of a ride.

Thank-you Peter and Steve for the blog, you have done a great job.

News from Alan Hardcastle

Dear all,

The Blog is a terrific idea. Yes, Steve has done a great job in getting the year of 67 back in touch with each other.

Last January (2009) Ken (and wife Takako) Nichizu held a 60th birthday party at his home at Mount Pleasant (Wollongong) and a number of Old (elderly) Grammarians attended.....

Rob Armstrong writes in, July 09

Rob Armstrong in the surf at Tathra

Sorry this one got missed and just re-found (Steve P).  From Rob Armstrong 1st July 09....

2nd 15 Undefeated in ASC Comp 1967

Captain Theo with his hands on the ball........

Botanic Gardens Faction Meeting

Dave Edmunds, Steve P, Grant N, Ken N

Murder in the Cathedral

More cerebral than the mob below?....

Recognise any of these?

Rob Edgerley writes from Zimbabwe

G'Day All,

I have read with interest all the various emails surrounding the CGS Year
of 67! Steve knows, because he and my sister in Canberra chat from time
to time, that I am currently working in Zimbabwe for BAT.

Name for Blog

Now that I've posted most of the emails from the last year, and various people's updates, could you now put your minds to coming up with a name for this blog.  It's currently "Class of '67", but that was just a quick working title.   
If you can think of a better one, let me know.  Padge suggests “Ego Yah..”, but neither one of us can remember the proper spelling (if we ever knew it) nor what it means or meant....  Let us know what you think: by Comment below 

Be the first to comment, do it right here below >>>

John Hampshire writes to all

Sheila, Laura and John Hampshire, Christmas '09

12th January, from John Hampshire.  

Greetings all:

I have just found a large number of emails in my outbox that were meant to be sent in the pre-Christmas period ... 

Tony Peppercorn: at last!

Dear all, Dave Edmunds has tracked down Tony Peppercorn. Thanks David and welcome Tony to the list.....

John Gray joins the list

3rd Jan (Steve Padge):  Dear all, John Gray has joined the e-mail list via Eric Dowling. Welcome John!

15-16 May for next get-together

23rd September, from Steve P: Dear all, Eric and Kim Dowling have confirmed  that Saturday 15th May 2010 and Sunday 16th May 2010 are the best available  dates for our next get-together....

23rd August, Ian Sare gets in touch

Steve P says: Dear everyone, Ian has been in touch....

Alan Gould launches novel and poetry

23 August 2009

Alan Gould to launch novel and poetry

20th August, Gray touches base..

20^th August (from Steve Padge):

Dear all, one contact leads to another. I should have made clear in the last e-mail that Mark Hodgkin is living in London. Here is Gray's update....

19th August, news from Hodge...

From Steve Padge: G'evening the class of 1967, I have just heard from Mark Hodgkin and I have added him to the list. He's in good form, all things considered, windsurfing, going to opera etc with his wife Madeleine. He has 3 daughters, who must all be in their 20s by now.) I have copied in his e-mail.

30th June, news from John Somerville

G'day Padge,
great to hear from you, I will certainly attend any reunion that can be arranged, it will be great to see everyone again....

29th June, More news from Steve...

Dear All, good to hear from Robert Fisher and it is interesting that Kenichi hopes to catch up.....

28th June: Robert Fisher reports in...

Missive to all from Robert Fisher, now living in Perth....

9th June update

Post get-together at Neringla, Jamie's place at Araluen, Steve P rounds up:

Photos of the Araluen get-together

Rick Frith's lovely atmospheric photo of Jamie's Place, Neringla, Araluen on the weekend of the get-together, 23-24 May.  Some other of Rick's photos are here.  Go down the blog to where Steve kicks it off to get the blow-by-blow lead up to the get-together.

See also Clive Davidson's photos here and John Cursleys here.

Special mention of the Convener, Comrade Padgham..... here with Jo and Therese:

David Pitt to Peter Cornhill et.al. 12 May 09

Peter,

I am pleased to see that the CGS get-togethers are continuing. Give them all my regards....

Update 3 May 09

Padge on 3rd May: 

To Peter Cornhill and John Cursley,28 Apr 09

Padge writes, 28th April 2009 to Peter Cornhill and John Cursley:    

Three months later....

Padge writes on 16th April 09:

Steve kicks it off, 26 Jan 09

Steve Padgham ("Padge") sent out an email on 26th January 2009:

Welcome!

Hi folks, this is Peter Forsythe in Hong Kong.  I've just set up this blog so that we can bring together all the stuff that's been flying round this last year, most  thanks to the interest and hard work of "Padge", aka Steve Padgham.

I've been blogging elsewhere for about six months or so, and find it very easy and convenient.

Here's the thought for the moment: I'm going to make Steve and me kind of "Blog-masters".  You can send stuff to us and we'll post it.  Or you can just email the group, as you've been doing, and we'll then cut and paste it to the blog, so that it's there for all time.... (ha!).

The idea is that this should be kind of private: private to the same extent that you would consider your emails to the group private.  That is, you assume that we may pass on to old grammarians, but that we would not spread it to the wider world.

Any ideas or comments, you can comment here, or send email to me peter-at-forsythe.hk.

(Photo above: me at helm of our yacht Xena, on way to Discovery Bay regatta, 27 June 09.  Any old Grammarians and fellow blog-istas hereby welcome aboard any time in Hong Kong!)