Biographies

Well, we asked for "head shots" and BIOs, some are short and some are long so here we go:

The first is from Sue Upton (now King), and it goes like this:

After the Leaving Certificate, I received a teacher’s scholarship to Wagga Wagga Teachers’ College, where I spent possibly the best 2 years of my life. “Growing up’ without mum and dad hanging over my shoulder was certainly a bonus!

I only taught for 5 years here in Canberra at North Ainslie Primary as I married a young German guy, Gerd King, in 1969. My years in Enid Watson’s and Marian Ryan’s German classes certainly paid dividends! Shortly after marrying, we lived in Germany in the Black Forest for about 18 months.

As Gerd was a letterpress compositor, we decided on our return to Australia in 1971 to start our own printing business, which (we are very proud to say) we are still working at together! Retirement is somewhere in the future ………….

Our 2 children, Martin Wendelin 38 and Elizabeth Anna 30, have decided that Canberra is the place for their families to live. As grandparents living here, we couldn’t be happier.

Until recently, I was a board member of the Canberra Racing Club, as Gerd and I are keen racehorse owners and race goers. Skiing has been shelved permanently as the knees are not as good as they were, so going to the races is a very pleasant way to spend our leisure time together.

Life is good.

Another from Norman (Norm) Collings follows:

I was born in UK and came to Australia in February 1949 as a toddler hanging onto the hands of my Ten Pound POM parents. We came straight to Canberra and dad started up a building business and we lived in two different houses in Narrabundah and the family finally settled in Deakin. I have lived in Canberra ever since.

My education included Telopea Transition, Narrabundah Primary (1^st and 2^nd classes), Telopea Primary (3^rd, 4^th and 5^th classes), Griffith Primary for 6^th class and then five years at Telopea Park High School.

I joined the Department of Defence in 1963 and had a career in various aspects of Information Technology for 35 years.

During the time at Defence I obtained a Bachelor of Arts (part time) at ANU with majors in Psychology, Philosophy and a sub-major in Computer Science.

I have been married twice, divorced twice, have two children from my first marriage. Had several other “colourful relationship” experiences and am now in happy requirement with my partner of ten years, Liz.

I played hockey at school and on weekends and this continued until I was 33. I then developed a total bicycle life style: commuting to work, touring (nationally and internationally), training and racing both track and road. Competition cycling had to cease in 1990 because of medical reasons, but I am still social cycling.

Information Technology was my career, and is now my hobby. As a Rotarian I do voluntary work.

The important things now are health, family (now including grandchildren) and keeping active.

More BIOs to come in later posts....