Bill Kay has passed on advice of the passing of a colleague from his OTC days.

Sad to say Robert J Taylor (RJ) passed away on 2 November 2024.

Bill has no further information about the circumstances of RJ’s passing. Clare, RJ’s partner, passed on the message on 26 November 2024. Clare will call Bill to provide more details when she’s feeling up to it.

Bill will update the Vets once he hears back from Clare.

If you have any photos or a tribute that you would like to share please email me and I will upload to the OTVA website for all members to see.

At last Thursday’s meeting of Vets at Club York in Sydney several of us asked Trevor’s son-in-law, Ian McDonald, and others for an update on Trevor. The update was that Trevor (aged 97) was doing well with care from nursing home staff and his daughters one of which, Jann, had attended the OTVA XMAS function.

Unfortunately Ian advised at 9:55am on Sunday morning that Trevor passed away with no pain at the Moran Nursing home Engadine. He would have been 98 today (Monday 18/11/24).

He didn’t quite make it to his birthday party which was to be held yesterday.

He was mentally excellent but had problems with hearing and mobility.

A “Celebration of Trevor’s life” will be held at the Trade Union Club at Gymea on Friday 6 December at 2.00 pm

If you will attend the celebration of Trevor’s life please email Ian McDonald <ianmcdonald01@optusnet.com.au> (Note 01 not O1) so that he can advise the club for catering,

If you cannot attend in person but would like to remotely watch the event via the streaming service please email Ian McDonald <ianmcdonald01@optusnet.com.au> and he will send you the remote access link.

Peter Burgess has advised that Ross Fenton has passed away after losing his fight with cancer that he has been waging since earlier this year.

Funeral details to follow when known.

The below photo is from the May 1988 Transit.

Our Secretary, Will Whyte, received a letter from Bill’s daughter, Andrea, to advise of his passing.

My father Frederick Clive Hickling, also known as Bill, recently passed away, at the age of 95 years, on the 22™ May. One of his instructions to me was to inform yourselves when this happened.

My Dad started his working life at Cable and Wireless and retired thirty nine years later in 1989 from the OTC.

He was married to Norma decd, had two children, four grandchildren and four great grandchildren.

He lived a very active and healthy life until his final year which saw his health decline rapidly.

Kind regards,
Andrea Russell

The sad news of Kevin’s passing was received from Neil Hemington via Andrew Jones and Rod Pernich.

It is with great sadness that we have learnt of the passing of a former colleague from PITC Gnangara, Kevin Hills.

Kevin was first employed by OTC as a Technical Officer at the Gnangara Coast Radio Station Perth in the 1980s, he later became involved with the AIS cable and in the early 90s transferred to the OTC International DMS300 telephone exchange section at PITC and later became part of the Satellite services team at PITC.

Kevin was primarily the international cable guy for those of us who worked with him. He was lead responsible for the JASURAUS cable in Port Hedland, the AIS cable here at Gnangara, the SMW3 cable out of Pier St Telephone exchange and more recently part of the team that worked on the Indigo cable installation project in Wellington Telephone exchange. Amongst other things Kevin was also an integral part of the USOSAT platform, the OTC international DMS300 telephone exchange and was involved with the coastal radio services out of the Maritime building earlier in his career. A career at Gnangara that spanned over 3 decades.

Following his recent discovery of cruise ships Kevin would take every opportunity to travel and rack up frequent flyer miles on the QE2 or some other exotic vessel that took his fancy.

Kevin retired in 2018 and COVID brought his travel plans to a temporary halt. Once the boarders reopened, back on the road he went. One of his last trips was to Tasmania with his family where he fell ill in early 2023 and rushed home to the diagnosis that he had Lymphoma.

After a long battle with his illness and what was almost daily trips to the hospital for treatment he finally passed earlier today.

Kevin was a great mentor to all the staff here in Gnangara and would show great patience in assisting his junior staff members develop their craft. He was a true gentleman and was well liked by all who worked with him and never a bad word was to be said about Uncle Kev.

You will be greatly missed.

RIP

The below photo is of Kevin alongside Maud Edmiston, founder and original owner of the Miss Maud Hotel / Restaurant and Miss Maud Café chain. On his weekly trip to conduct SMW3 cable routines you could always catch Kevin at Miss Maud’s in Pier Street at 10am on a Wednesday, like clockwork. The local staff would yell “Large mocha, Extra hot, Fruit flan” when he entered the café. They knew his order, and he didn’t need to verbalize it. It would be a disaster if he turned up late at morno to a sold-out cabinet of fruit flans.

__PRESENT

Kerry Kearney passed on the sad news that Ted Kearney passed away on 22 June 2024.

Ted’s service was held Friday 5 July at 2pm at Rookwood Memorial Crematorium West Chapel, followed by wake at the Canada Bay Club.

Ted’s son, Julian, thanked the OTVA for sharing the news about Ted’s passing with the OTC community.

Ted retired more than 30 years ago from OTC where he worked in the Administration Division that was set up in 1970. Ted Kearney was the first recruit of the ADP (automatic data processing) section within the Administration Division, starting with the commission in March 1971, as senior systems analyst.

According to Transit articles Ted was one of the Board of Directors of the OTC Credit Union for many years.

Photo from Transit

Lorraine Bartels, daughter of Des Kinnersley, has advised that Des’ wife, Betty, passed away on 24th April 2024. Her health had been in steady decline for some time.

Lorraine describes it being a tough time up to her passing for the  whole family.

May She Rest In Peace

The below photo is of Des & Betty on the occasion of their 71st wedding anniversary earlier in 2024.

Gregory Sachs has relayed the sad new provided by Carole Hungerford, Keith’s wife, through Gay O’Connor.

Keith passed away in RPA hospital last Wednesday night, from a heart attack.

He had been ill on and off which was actually long COVID and was in hospital after having some infusions that made him feel stronger.  But the heart attack came, unexpectedly.

The family is shocked. It was so sudden and unexpected.

May He Rest in Peace

Honorine McKertich, Noel’s wife, has with deep sorrow informed the Vets that Noel McKertich, a retired  employee of OTC, passed away peacefully at home on 1 September 2023 of COVID-19 Pneumonia with all his family at his bedside. He was just 2 weeks short of celebrating his 94th birthday.

“Please remember my beloved husband and devoted father of 5 children, grand father of 14 and great grand father of 4 in your prayers and thoughts.”

A search of the Transit magazine library did not uncover any photos.

If any ex-OTC staff have any photos of Noel from his working years in OTC or any stories about Noel and any of his memorable antics or achievements please email them to me for consideration for posting.

The OTVA Autumn Reunion was a great success with the following OTVA members attending: Ben McGee, Dave Coutts, David Free, Frances Free, Geoff Whale, Greg Martyn, Jim Simpson, Lex Vipond, Mick Callaghan, Neil Yakalis, Orm Butler, Peter Bull, Robin Tuckfield, Shaun Higgins, Tom Barker, Trevor Housley.

The Function Manager of Club York had arranged for us to use the Phillip Room on Level 2 at no cost to the OTVA and for the Zabou Bar & Grill staff to bring our lunch orders upstairs to avoid us have to share space with other patrons of Zabou Bar & Grill. She offered this additional consideration as she was aware of the inconvenience that was caused to the OTVA group that attended the November 23 Reunion when we were crammed into a corner of the Zabou Bar & Grill that made conversation difficult. This was greatly appreciated by those present and made the Autumn Reunion much more enjoyable.

There was plenty to talk about as we had David & Frances Free who had travelled from the UK to visit David’s family in QLD but made time to visit Sydney and attend our luncheon. Frances’ brother has lived in Engadine NSW for over 10 years and she has visited Sydney several times. David had travelled from QLD to work for OTC between 1981 and 1986 primarily in the ITMCs at Paddington and Broadway so there were plenty of stories that centred around people that he knew from those days. After his OTC days David has had several contracts across a variety of industries spread across the UK and US so he regaled us with some of his exploits during his years abroad. David and Frances will be in Sydney for another few days before heading off to QLD to catch up with David’s family. They will be in Australia until May 24. We wished them well during their visit.

Shaun Higgins also attended. Shaun brought with him a lot of stories and memories of his years in NDC and Telstra. Shaun has agreed to make scanned copies of NDC and Telstra magazines available to the OTVA for inclusion in its library where appropriate. Shaun too had some interesting stories that related to his working life and his dealings with international communications.

David Free also actively engaged with Jim Simpson, Lex Vipond and Trevor Housley on the NASA missions and the Australian expertise that made them so successful especially where technological challenges were addressed and overcome by the knowledge and expertise and cooperation of OTC technical personnel.

The table of ex-Paddington and Broadway ITMC staff had multiple interesting conversations going on at the same time making it sometimes difficult to keep across the tread of some of the conversations. Some of these conversation got quite animated at times. Having said that everyone seemed to have a good time and were still there deep in conversation when I left at 2pm to go back to work.

Below: Carlo Viglianti, Peter Bull and Lex Vipond

Below: Geoff Whale, Robin Tuckfield, Orm Butler

Below: Neil Yakalis, Tom Barker, Trevor Housley

Below: Ben McGee, Shaun Higgins

Below: Orm Butler, Dave Coutts, Mick Callaghan

Below: Shaun Higgins, Greg Martyn, Neil Yakalis

The Paddington and Broadway ITMC crew: Mick Callaghan, Ben McGee, Geoff Whale, Greg Martyn, Robin Tuckfield, Orm Butler, Carlo Viglianti, Dave Coutts

Below: Lex Vipond, Frances Free, David Free, Jim Simpson