saying goodbye to an old friend

Today was a sad day. I took Kane to attend the funeral of his old human companion Doug, who passed away last week.

Doug loved Kane very much and his daughter Liz's eulogy is a tribute to a remarkable man

My father was a remarkable person and a self made man. I am honoured to be standing before you today to pay tribute to him, and to relate some of the many qualities he had that made him the strong, independent and unique individual that he was.

Doug touched many lives, and those who knew him well, held him in enormous respect and deep love. It is gratifying to know that there are so many people who feel that strong sense of kinship with our dad, and with our family.

Dad was a unique individual who grew up in an era and in a family that set great store by the traditional values of honesty, integrity and self-reliance. Dad’s life spanned most of the twentieth century and he saw great changes during the 91 years of his life. He was born at the beginning of World War I and saw his own father go off to fight for his country in the Great War.

When dad graduated from Summer Hill High School in 1931, the Great Depression was sweeping the country, and there were no jobs to be had in his hometown of Sydney. This was the first of many challenges that would eventually make dad into the ultimate survivor. He headed west at age 17 and worked odd jobs in country towns until he found relatively long term employment, first as baker and later as a projectionist in a theatre. This episode of employment stability was short lived when World War II and the RAAF came calling.

Dad entered the European theatre of operations in 1942, after training in Canada as a wireless operator and an aircraft gunner. He was assigned to the 460 Squadron as a sergeant where he flew Lancasters in bombing runs over Germany. This was in many ways a turning point in his life as he faced imminent death on every mission and learned the value of working as a team with his mates to complete each mission and survive. Dad’s squadron was led by the Lancaster bomber, G-George, so it was a great coincidence, when years later this trusty old plane came to live at the War Memorial in Canberra.

Much of the rest of dad’s life was defined by his experiences in WWII. To us as a family, the most important event of WWII was that he met, and fell in love with a beautiful young English WAAF, who he affectionately called, Nellie Eccles, as Eccles was her hometown. Doug and Ellen met at a RAAF dance in April 1943 and won the competition for the spot dance that seemed to be an auspicious omen for their future. They were married three months later, and remained devoted to each other for more than six decades.

To know our dad it is easiest to focus on what he loved.

He loved our mum most of all. After the war was over he brought mum and his new daughter, (me) to Australia. He was very cognizant of the sacrifice our mum made in leaving her own family behind to come to Australia and he made a pledge to love and support her in the best possible way, which he did for the 62 years of their marriage.

He loved his children, Peter, Margie and me, and our partners Nora, Luke and Bill. He loved his job as a pioneer in establishing the Department of Civil Aviation in Australia, first in Kempsey where, in 1949, he converted a dirt landing strip into a commercial aerodrome. Next he moved to Canberra as the Technical Manager of the Canberra aerodrome that consisted at the time of one corrugated metal hangar and a rudimentary control tower. He remained there for over 30 years. Dad worked long hours at his job and was always on call to fix malfunctioning navigation equipment on mountain tops around the region at all hours of the night, but he always had time to care for his family and spent endless hours helping kids with maths homework, taking us on holidays and teaching us about the world around us. Dad was proud of us in our successes but was always there to help and support us in the downtimes.

He loved his grandchildren, Tony, Nicole and Marcus in America and Georgia, Zoe and Michael here in Australia. He always liked news of his American family and loved it when they came to visit or when he went over there. He loved watching Georgia, Zoe and Michael grow up and being able to get baby Zoe to sleep when no one else could.

He loved animals. First he loved the horses of his youth, getting up in the early hours of the morning while still in high school to train racehorses at Canterbury Racecourse. Then came his dogs, Prince, a German shepherd who he had to leave behind when he went off to war. Then Timmy, a blue cattle dog who adopted our family when we first moved to Queanbeyan and guarded each and every family member for the next seventeen years. Then came the succession of German shepherds, Omar, Willy, Ben and Kane, each one living to a great old age in the love and care of dad. We have Kane with us here today and are very grateful to Daniel for taking over where dad left off and giving Kane the kind of loving care dad would have given him in his golden years.

Dad loved building things. He built three houses, the first one was in Kempsey, then came our home in Queanbeyan and later our beach house at Rosedale on the south coast. Dad also had an exquisite understanding of the nature of wood and designed and built many pieces of fine furniture for our home. Dad learned electronic engineering during his days in the RAAF and was able to apply those skills to amazing projects at home. I was quite convinced that there was nothing he could not do. He built our first TV set before TV was even being broadcast in Australia, getting the parts brought in from overseas as hand luggage by his pilot friends. He had to wait for the first broadcasts from Sydney to see if he had got the design right, picking up the signals from the top of Mt Ainslie, where he had surreptitiously strung a huge aerial on top of a DCA tower as a repeater so that the signal could be amplified sufficiently to reach our roof top antenna at home. He was delighted to see that it worked perfectly, except that the picture was upside down. That was fixed in short order and our house became the wonder of the neighborhood, the only one with a TV for about two years. He built our stereo system and any other electrical gadgets we needed. He also loved his cars, from an A model Ford in Kempsey, followed by a spectacular 1938 Pontiac with a radio in it that was an unheard of luxury in those days. Then came the Zephyr, the Ford Fairlane with enormous fins and an EH Holden. He loved working on them – building any part he couldn’t get or that cost too much to buy.

In his later years dad never gave up his creative efforts, he was still at it in his early 80’s, helping Margie and Luke build their house and spray painting all the inside walls. In his late 80’s he would sometimes complain of back pain, the cause of which was often that he had been up on the roof clearing the gutters or fixing the tiles.

Dad loved his retirement of 30 years and often said that in retrospect, he didn’t know how he had ever found time to go to work, as there was so much to do in retirement. He and mum traveled to America and England and took several cruises. Dad and mum loved going to Rosedale, especially going fishing in his boat or on the beach.

During his long life, dad rarely spoke of his time in the war, he said that he didn’t want to be remembered for inflicting pain and suffering on people he didn’t even know. But his experience in the war was a large influence over the rest of his life and while he was reticent to talk of it with his family, he wrote many stories about incidents involving his fellow flyers. His great sadness at the senseless suffering and loss of so many comrades and anonymous civilians came through loud and clear in his stories. Some of these stories were published in Australian magazines after the war. We share part of one of those stories in the booklet you have today.

Dad was devastated when our mum died in 2004 and since then it has been his dearest wish to join her. Today our sadness is tempered by the knowledge that he has been granted that wish and now will live eternally, reunited with his beloved Nellie Eccles.

Dad was comforted in these last years by the friendship and kindness of Bill, who he met here at the cemetery when they were both paying their respects to their late wives, and Bill expressed his admiration of dad’s dog Kane. Bill’s friendship has sustained dad over the last few years and given him a special kind of companionship.

Our dad was a very private man and didn’t have a large coterie of friends, but those he did have, were very dear to him and also dear to all of us. He and mum had a long and close friendship with Bill and Norma and our two families spent many wonderful times together over the years, going on picnics and holidays down the coast together. Today that friendship extends to the third generation with Bill and Norma’s children and grandchildren continuing the bond with our family.

Nanette is one of dad’s special friends, and is loved by all our family. She always went to great lengths to make sure dad’s every need was met in his later years. Nanette watched over mum in her last years and then became a source of loving strength when dad was left alone.

Next-door neighbors Kay and Terry were also special friends and we are very grateful to them both for being there everyday to help dad out. Dad and Kay had a secret code for communicating through the kitchen window. Every morning dad was supposed to open the Venetian blinds to let Kay know he was OK. He quite often forgot and Kay had to run next door to make sure dad was all right.

When dad was no longer able to stay in his home last November, he moved into George Forbes House where he was cared for by an outstanding staff. Their kindness and caring allowed him to spend his last months in comfort and dignity.

I like to think that dad passed on some of the wonderful aspects of his character to Peter, Margie and I. There is a strength and determination in each of us that I’m sure we owe in large part to our dad. I also see glimpses of these same characteristics in all six of his grandchildren.

Dad was an inspiration to all of us and we loved him very much. Even though his life was hard at times, he always made it look like “A Piece of Cake”.

Rest in Peace Doug. I am honoured to continue the care of your wonderful Kane.

After the funeral, we went to Kane's family home for his last visit. Everybody loves Kane including the Labradors Blondy and Lucky who just wanted him to play. Kane has a wonderful family, and I'm glad to now be a part of it.