This week we have suspended our program of weekly member profiles to pay tribute to Past President John who passed away peacefully on Monday 1 May 2017.
John joined our club on 1 March 1988 and served in most directorships and executive positions including President in 1995/96. His service was recognised by the club with the award of an Paul Harris Fellow in 1997 and regularly since with the award of 4 Sapphires.
While in recent years John did not hold any specific office, he was active in all club projects and made a very significant contribution behind the scenes of which most members would be unaware.
An exemplary Rotarian and all round good bloke, John will be sadly missed. His funeral service will be held at the Newlife Uniting Church, Greenwich Street, Robina at 2.00pm on Tuesday 9 May 2017.
I was born in Sydney on 14 Feb 33 and attended Burwood Primary School and Sydney Grammar School.
When I left school I didn’t know what I wanted to do in an age when jobs were plentiful and everyone knew exactly what they wanted to do and usually did it for the rest of their lives.
Because of an uncle’s influence, I started at the Rural Bank of NSW but after about a year realised that was not what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. About that time I was called up for National Service in the army and loved it. I applied to go to the Officer Cadet School at Portsea, Victoria and, much to my surprise, I was accepted.
I received my commission as a Second Lieutenant in the Australian Army on 6 June 1952.
I served in National Service training battalions for more than 2 years then was posted to a regular infantry battalion at Ingleburn. From there I went to Japan then to an infantry battalion in Korea arriving after the cease fire had been negotiated. The only shots I heard fired in Korea were on the rifle range.
I returned from Korea and spent about a year in Australia before being posted to an infantry battalion in Malaya engaged in operations against the communist terrorists.
I returned to Australia with the battalion after 12 months and served at Holsworthy. In 1958, I was promoted to Captain and posted as Adjutant of the Officer Cadet School at Portsea where I had started my service six years earlier. Rosemary and I were married while I was there.
In 1961, I was posted to a ready reaction battalion which had been formed in Holsworthy outside Sydney. I was the Intelligence Officer and later became a company commander. I spent almost three years “ready reacting” with rapid deployments around Australia and overseas.
In 1964, I was promoted to Major and posted to the Australian Army Training Team in Vietnam. I served with the US Special Forces in the northern part of South Vietnam as the Air Operations Officer and later commanded a team of Australian officers and warrant officers serving with and advising Vietnamese combat units.
After I returned to Australia at the end of 1965, I spent a year in Perth before returning to Queenscliff, Victoria to attend a 12 months course at the Australian Staff College.
At the end of Staff College, I went to Enoggera outside Brisbane as the Brigade Major of a Task Force which was set up as a mirror to the Task force in South Vietnam. The purpose was to prepare units and individuals to go to Vietnam.
At the end of 1968, I was posted to the Australian Embassy in Washington DC for two and a half years to work in the US Army Research Office.
On my return to Australia in 1971, I was posted as second in command of an infantry battalion in Enoggera due to go to South Vietnam in early 1972. After a hectic preparation, the tour of duty was cancelled when Australia began to wind down its Vietnam commitment.
In 1972, I was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and posted to Army Headquarters in Canberra to work in the Directorate of Military Operations and Plans. In mid 1973, I was seconded to work in the Parliament as Executive Officer of the Committee of Inquiry into the CMF. That Inquiry took almost two years then I was posted as Colonel in Charge of Administration at the Royal Military College, Duntroon. I spent almost three years at Duntroon then retired from the Army in February 1979 at the age of 46.
I worked for the Institution of Engineers in Canberra for five years while our children finished their secondary education in Canberra then in 1984, my son and I went into business on the Gold Coast. We opened the Royal Copenhagen Ice Cream shop in Cavill Avenue then branched out into commercial property development.
I retired completely in 2002.
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