The Phantom Old Boy.

The Phantom Old Aquinian.

Ken “Noddy” McAullay

I attended Aquinas College from 1951to 1955. For some years now a group of Old Aquinians from the late 1940s and the 1950s have been attending a morning Coffee Club and catch up at the New Generation Sports Club in Kings Park. Well, actually, apart from  a cup of coffee, we also enjoy a toasted ham and cheese sandwich and a glass of red wine. Good value at $20. 

Sadly, numbers from the 1940s and 1950s are dwindling and a few old boys from the 1960s are starting to attend our monthly gatherings where,naturally, we  talk at length about how great we all were back in the day.

To demonstrate how inclusive our group is, we occasionally enjoy our Coffee Club at the Craigie Tavern and at Bistro 21 in South Fremantle. This enables old boys in the far flung northern and southern suburbs of Perth to front up occasionally. The Craigie Tavern is owned by Fred Pawle (1955) and  Bistro 21 by Victor Paino (1952). In 2022 we also enjoyed our very first Coffee Club gathering at Aquinas College. We met in the Churack Pavilion, which was built from funds generously donated by Geoffrey Churack (1955).

At our October 2022  Coffee Club, Ross Willcock (1953), showed me a photograph on his mobile phone. He said he took the  photo of a piece of Aquinas memorabilia on a shelf in the Justin Langer room in the Churack Pavilion when our Coffee Club met there earlier that year. It was a picture of Ken “Noddy” McAullay in East Perth Football Club colours. Below the photo was a citation of Ken McAullay’s outstanding career as an East Perth and State footballer and as a batsman in the WA Sheffield Shield side. He obtained the nickname “Noddy” in his early days at East Perth because of his habit of nodding his head in agreement whenever coaches or senior players spoke to him.

 Ken was in the strong East Perth teams that played in Grand Finals in 1967, ‘68, ‘69 and ‘71 and were Premiers in 1972. That was the year Ken won the Tassie Medal as the Best and Fairest player in the AFL National Football Carnival.

The citation also states that Ken McAullay had been educated at Aquinas College in 1961.

As I handed Ross’s phone back I said, “ You know, I am an East Perth Supporter. I saw most of Ken McAullay’s games but I never knew he went to Aquinas.”

“He didn’t”, grinned Ross. “You know who told me?... Ken McAullay!”

It seems earlier in 2022, Ken McAullay went to Aquinas, for the very first time in his life, to watch his grandson play football in an interschool match. During the game, Ken visited the Churack Pavilion. Looking around at the memorabilia in the Justin Langer room he was astounded to see his picture alongside that of his East Perth teammate, dual Sandover Medallist and Old Aquinian, Peter Spencer. Ken moved in closer to read the citation. He was absolutely stunned to read that he attended Aquinas College in 1961. He told a friend, “I have never been to Aquinas before today.”

Ross later shared this quirky piece of information with the entire Coffee Club group, among whom was a 1961 Old Boy. He confirmed that a student named Ken McAullay had been in his Leaving Class at Aquinas in 1961.

It seems likely that some well meaning person, when  preparing memorabilia for the Churack Pavilion, noticed that a Ken McAullay attended Aquinas in 1961. They presumed it was THE Ken McAullay and decided to make a feature of the footballer/cricketers’ outstanding career.

The real Ken McAullay had already told Ross that  a distant cousin of his did attend Aquinas College in 1961. However, this cousin was not a champion footballer, he never won a Tassie Medal and never played in a winning  WA Sheffield Shield cricket team.

Presumably, the photo and glowing citation of Ken McAullay, the Phantom Old Aquinian, has been removed from the memorabilia display. Not sure why the year 1967 heads the citation. It was the year Ken made his debut for East Perth. (Apologies for the reflection in the photo's text.)

 

 PS. Any old boys from the 1950s or 1960s who would like to attend monthly Aquinian Coffee Club mornings should e-mail John Maslin (1956) at mazwilldo@gmail.com

 

The Right to Dissent. A daughter's anti Ukraine War drawing has made her Russian father a fugitive.

 

Recently, a Russian man's daughter drew an anti Ukranian war picture at her school. The school's principal reported her to the police. The father has now received a gaol sentence and the daughter is in a child care facility.

This is Putin's totalitarian regime in operation. It bears all the hallmarks all totalitarian states.                Any form of dissent must be stamped out immediately. As a brave Russian dissident, currently living in Europe  said recently, "In Putin's Russia Dissent is followed by poison, gaolg or deportation."

Fortunately, the father, who was wearing an electronic device in home detention, was able to remove the electronic shackle and is now missing. It is said some in the courtroom cheered when that news was given to the judge by the prosecutor. Very brave of them.

We can condemn the school principal, however, it is probable that he would have also faced gaol himself, if he had not reported the girl's "crime". That is how totalitarian states work. Everyone is a snitch, for their own self protection.

In 1963, I lived in Toronto and got to know a Czechoslovakian asylum seeker. He had sought political asylum in Canada when he was returning from a conference in Cuba. I'll call him Joe.

In his home country, Joe was separated from his wife but had weekly access to his son. One Saturday, on an outing with his son, the boy asked him why there were so many armed soldiers in the streets.

Joe replied that the soldiers had to carry guns because some people may become unruly if soldiers did not have those guns to keep them in order.

A few days later, at three o'clock in the morning, Joe was roughly roused from his sleep by the local version of the secret police and taken away for interrogation.

it seems his son had mentioned the incident to his mother who had quickly told the local police that her former husband was telling her son that the Czech people would revolt against the communist government if they were not continually threatened with guns.

Well, Joe, managed to talk his way out of trouble (maybe his inquisitors also had vengeful ex wives).

About a month later, Joe, who was a television animator, attended a conference in Havana, Cuba, for people working in TV.

On the flight home, his plane stopped to refuel in Gander, Newfoundland.

Joe, with the other passengers, disembarked and went to have a meal in as dining area. There were several government officials (secret police) in the group which was in a separate area from all other the travellers. The only door out of their enclosed dining area was guarded by a large, Royal Canadian Mounted Policeman.

After a while, Joe stood up an announced he was going to the toilet. He started walking slowly towards the toilets but, as he neared the big Canadian mounted police man, he sprinted towards the door. Several "government officials" set off in hot pursuit after him.

Joe made it to the Mountie, a few seconds ahead of his minders. The Mountie quickly twigged what was happening. He opened the door to let Joe through and then quickly closed it. He then stood as resolute as Horatio on the Bridge, stopping the government minders from grabbing Joe, who had continued running through the building until he saw another Mountie and said he was seeking asylum.

Joe finished up working in Toronto with a friend of mine, who was also a TV animator.

I met Joe socially many times. He was sorry that he was unlikely to ever see his son again but he was forever grateful that now he lived in a beautiful, free country, Canada.

Despite the kindly actions of the burly Mountie, Joe always had a fear of men in uniform.

Living in Toronto, my friends and I often spent  weekends in Buffalo and Niagara Falls.

On one occasion we took Joe with us. As we walked across the Peace Bridge to the American side of the Falls, Joe became agitated. Up ahead, he could see uniformed Canadian and US customs officers whose job it was to check passports of people passing between Canada and the USA. Our experience on the Peace Bridge was that, even as Australians, we were usually waved through without anybody ever stamping our passports, or even looking at them.

We told Joe not to worry. However, he became more agitated  and soon turned around and walked back to the Canadian side.

We followed him back. Later on we convinced him to drive with us across the bridge. Our car had Canadian plates and, as usual, we were just waved straight through.

How terrible it must be to live in a dictatorship where even an innocent conversation with your child can result in an early morning raid from the secret police?.

How horrible is it that a person's life is so traumatised by totalitarianism that the mere sight of a uniform can cause a panic attack?

I hope the father in the story above finds freedom in a country where he can one day live with his young daughter.

Imagine her grief..and guilt..that her innocent peaceful anti war drawing has made her father a fugitive from a regime that cannot tolerate even the mildest form of dissent.

We can always find reasons to grumble and groan because the government of the day is not doing something about something that we think they should. 

However, we should be grateful everyday that we can complain, grizzle, write nasty letters of protest to the papers but the government will not lock us up...unless we are violent of course.

Let us be very, very grateful that we do not live in a country where a father can be sentenced to a long gaol term because his school aged daughter drew a a picture calling for Peace on Earth.