My transition to Australia is complete
Many years ago I was working in London for a company called LEO Computers. ‘LEO’ stood for Lyons Electronic Office which was a subsidiary of Joe Lyons – the people who made cup cakes and ran the Lyons Corner Houses. After I left university I joined them in 1964 and worked at their office in Queensway before moving out to Eastcote to work on a system to analyse the results of the 1958 census. I am not sure what happened to that system but I seem to remember someone telling me that the results of the 1963 census were produced manually before the results of the 1958 census were completed using the new system.
Anyway in February 1965 I was sent to Australia for a couple of years to work with Australian Computers which was the Australian branch of LEO Computers (although by that time I think it had become English Electric LEO and may even have become English Electric LEO Marconi). The Australian Government regarded me as a ‘permanent resident’ but since I had come from the ‘old country’ I had the same rights and responsibilities as Australian citizens. There was no need to become an Australian citizen and what’s more I was only planning to stay for a couple of years. Events overtook me. I got married in 1967 and then proceeded to have four children and so was rooted (so to speak) in Australia. Many years later (about 38 years later) I did become an Australian citizen but still felt a part of England as long as my mother lived there. My mother died on 17th November at the good age of 87 and apart from one uncle, she was my last link to the ‘Old Dart’. I now feel that I have completed my transition to Australia.
As I was traveling around to sort things out I spent time taking little diversions around the countryside to see things that I felt I wouldn’t see again. Our house at 213–215 Christchurch Road used to be called The Old Kennels and I notice now that it is called The Auld Kennels which seemed like a bit of unnecessary affectation. Land on either side of the house had been subdivided and houses had been built so that it looked hemmed in. The Nag’s Head pub over the road had gone and been replaced by a housing estate. My father bought The Old Kennels in 1958 for 7,500 pounds and it sold a few years ago for close to 1,500,000 pounds.
I went up to Macclesfield in Cheshire to pick up my uncle and bring him back to Ringwood for the funeral and after the funeral dropped him back again (a journey of nearly six hours each way – twice). When I came back down the M6 and onto the M5 I decided to come through the Cotswolds where I spent time during my university holidays. The Cotswolds are wonderful and I drove through Stroud, Bisley, Painswick, Minchinhampton, Slad, Chalford and Cirencester and it brought back memories of working with a small group for the Forestry Commission scything weeds around newly planted trees in the most beautiful parts of the Cotswolds.
From the Cotswolds I drove through Salisbury and down to the northern end of the New Forest, stopping off at The Royal Oak in Fritham for a beer and a Stilton Ploughman’s lunch. Then I got lost as I went through Ibsley by the Avon, Moyles Court, Linford, Stoney Cross and over the A30 to Minstead, Lyndhurst, Brockenhurst, Burley and finally back to the Star Inn where I was staying in the Ringwood marketplace.
I had no time to visit Essex where I spent my school days although I spent time there earlier in the year when I attended the 450th anniversary of the founding of my school.
Even though my transition to Australia is complete I don’t think it is possible to expunge the first twenty years of my life in England.
