CRUSADE FOR JUSTICE pt2

[IAN SPARTICUS HARDY]

CRUSADE FOR JUSTICE. was more like a big army canteen with yellow cod fish and chips most nights, we then were escorted to our huts Mum, Dad, Colin and I are put in one hut together and Lynn, Anne and Jill got their own hut. We slept well that night as it was a very long and hot day, but finally we are here Kangaroo's, Kookaburra's, lookout here we come. We awoke to the shrieking sounds of the Sulphur Crested Cockatoos and Laughing Kookaburras, we are all refreshed and head for the canteen it was porridge for breakfast followed by large helpings of eggs and bacon, our new home was starting to look great. Dad was getting ready for his appointment at the Lucas Heights Atomic Reactor Group at Menai, while Colin and I decided we would go out and explore East Hills desert. Our first day was started with a jar in hand and off we went hunting for lizards and snakes, we ventured into the desert at Holsworthy and we did see our first frill necked lizard it dropped from high in a tree and its neck opened like a parachute as it gently floated to the ground then ran on its back feet with its front legs and head high in the air darting away to safety, it was scary at first but I soon learned how to pick them up. The snakes were a little bit different as they can spit and bite giving a fatal bite unless treated with anti venom, the first snake we saw was a Copperhead snake, it was lay under a piece of fibro out of the sun and it was about 4 ft long and slithered away when we got close, but we saw it perfectly. It was then that we attracted the attention of a couple of soldiers who were on patrol exercises they said we should not be there as it was dangerous, we did not know it was the restricted Holsworthy firing range for the Australian Army, so the two soldiers put us in their vehicle and we were escorted back to the hostel in restraints, seat belts. Seems like only yesterday but it took place long ago, it was October 1966,the date I remember because all the money changed from pennies and pounds to dollars and cents, the main reason I remember it is Valentine
my first aussie dog half Alsatian cross Dingo, he was part human I am sure of it, he saved my life once on the hostel. We had all gone swimming in the local creek it was called Dead man’s creek it ran off Williams creek anyway we were all splashing around in the water and right beside the creek someone had dumped an old lounge suite, I got out of the water and began jumping up and down on the lounge using it like a trampoline as I jumped off a huge Red Belly Black snake came out from inside the lounge and reared up just like a cobra, it's mighty head flat and slightly bent as if readying to strike, when Valentine jumped between us

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and attacked the Red Belly Black snake, giving me time to move back out of range of its strike, Valentine had the snake by the tail end it was trying to get across the creek half in the water an half out, so I screamed Val and he let go of the Red Belly’s tail. It then swam across to the other side of the creek while everyone ran from the water watching in amazement, to this day I don't know how or why I was not bitten, but Val saved my neck and our bond just grew from that moment on, we became inseparable we even slept together in the same bed, I have slides of us in bed that my dad took 41 yrs ago.

THE BLUE RINGED OCTOPUS This was also around the time that we all went to Cronulla beach as a family, it was beautiful so blue and the sand looked like gold dust. Mum and Dad were lay on a blanket getting a tan, Colin and I went exploring in the rock pools, when we found a small blue and brown octopus I scooped him up in my hand and raced back to mum and dad to show them what we had found, dad gave me a paper cup to place the octopus in with a little sea water, I asked if I could keep it and they relented and said okay, so we started to head home on the train, Colin and I began to examine our new pet taking him out of the cup and holding him in the palms of our hands it was then we noticed that it had lightning blue rings as well as brown with lighter off yellow white over most of its body and as I prodded it the blue rings would fire up like lightning mum shouted at me to put it back in the cup, we arrived back at East Hills station and began to walk across footbridge that crossed the Georges river when mum was just struck with a strong premonition and urge to tell me to throw the Blue Ringed octopus into the river which I did but reluctantly, and we walked on towards home. Three days later an Australian soldier who had been at Cronulla and had picked up a strange Blue Ringed octopus just like I had done a few days before only this time it was fatal they had just discovered and had first fatality from the Blue Ringed octopus in Australia, An individual blueringed octopus tends to use its dermal cells to camouflage itself until provoked, at which point it quickly changes color, becoming bright yellow with lightning like electric blue circular ringed lines that flash bright when prodded. It hunts small crabs, hermit crabs and shrimp and may bite attackers, including humans if picked up or provoked or stepped on. Now I have thought many times about how Colin and I both managed to place the Blue ringed octopus in the palms of our hands and we both prodded it to see the rings glow bright blue several times yet neither of us was harmed and I still wonder now as I did then just who was watching over us that day, I think maybe it was my Aunty Betty who had died just before we left for Australia. 66 WATSON RD PADSTOW.

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Dad starts work at the Lucas Heights Nuclear Reactor at Menai and we move from the hostel to 66 Watson rd Padstow, and Jill my sister gets a horse called Star who Valentine competed with for our attention, when Star would have his feed we had to put another bowl down for Valentine and he would eat just like Star even eating grass to show us he was as good, it was funny Val was an incredible dog. . We at last are off the hostel and are in a house at Padstow, it’s close to the shops, and has everything close by especially Salt Pan Creek. Where Valentine and I spent many hours and had many adventures. Our new home is right next door to my new public school, Padstow North Public so there are no excuses for being late. It is very different than the schools in the United Kingdom, here it’s so open and everywhere you look there are animal’s bird’s lizard’s snakes and the like. Our back yard was huge we kept Star my sister Jill’s horse there, he shared it with Valentine when I was at school, which turned out to be not that often as I had a lot of trouble adjusting to the new system and school. I got on ok with most of the other children but seemed to be always with the older kids as I seemed to fit in better with them and having an older sister in same school helped as some were her friends also. Our first time at Padstow picture theatre, we had all gone to see the old westerns The Lone Ranger they were kids shows, I escorted my first real girlfriend Terri Millard blonde blue eyes, my first real kiss, I got for a Jaffa a ball of chocolate covered in orange coating the kiss was nice too. Yet we separated after the movie never to go out on a date again as I met Joanne. We went to the school dances and so on it was nice but as things at home spun ever more out of control so did I. At school we used to play piggy back fights all the boys in my grade would gather on the fields this is when I met Robert Neubert and Andrew Scippione who as it just so happens is the current Police Commissioner of my state of New South Wales, we always teamed up because I was classed as a white wog and they were Italian's so it stood to reason we would be together we always won. During this time Dad was working at Lucas Heights Nuclear Reactor, his eyes were starting to change the colour was starting to fade and soon they were white and he was blind, it changed all our lives as the atmosphere changed from always happy to one of uncertainty that we all felt from Mum and Dad. Fun seemed to become just a memory due to Dad’s condition everyone had to be quiet as Dads eyes caused him to get severe headaches so we could not make any noise. The memory of this time still makes me feel uneasy, Mum and Dad went through hell, and it was only their love for each other and us that kept us together. Mum had to work full time 6 days a week and started work at Metter’s making electric stoves and refrigerators, while dad recovered from the experimental surgery, he was one of the first to undergo freezing of the eyeball in order to cut the lenses away from his eyeball, not the simple form of cataract removal today but what they call Extra Capsular Extraction, taking both sides of the capsule where normal cataracts only take the lens from inside the capsule, leaving the capsule intact. Well the first op was a semi success the second was a disaster, rupturing his right retina causing a prolapse of the vitreous fluid or in other words his eyeball burst open leaking fluid like a balloon filled with grease being popped. My dad never complained, he just accepted it and moved on making do with what he had left. But I recall when he received word from his beloved country the UK that they would render him no assistance what so ever the stresses started to have an effect on Dad and he began to drink more heavily than ever before,

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placing a huge strain on mum and dad’s relationship. Yet there love for each other even during all of this, stayed true, their love was evident to us all and it kept us going keeping us together. Dad started his case for compensation against the UK AEI POWER GROUP, Owners of S.17 secret research lab at Trafford Park. There were many very late nights in our home where Mum and Dad would be sat at the kitchen table Dad talking and Mum writing his recollections of his secret work. Dad told me that it was only because of Mrs. Isabelle Hardwich that the radiation hazard was discovered as she had already been exposed prior and had a low blood count so she requested a radiation hazard team come in and take readings that the alarm bells were sounded. Bringing about sweeping changes in the way things were done afterwards. Yet even these changes were of little use and the Beryllium laboratory went the same way as S.17 and ending up with the same fate and being dumped into the Irish Sea. Dad told me years later what they had to do each day after and before finishing and going home. He said and I quote that the fire hoses were used to wash all the benches table tops, machines lathe beds all of it was washed onto the floor then washed into the drains that then emptied into the local storm water drains that the local children played in daily. This was also policy in the Beryllium lab also Dad said, he did not do this of his own accord but was directed to do this by his seniors, the Metallurgists. The other thing that Dad said was the two occasions that fires happened in the small scale Nuclear reactor this also was doused with water which went down the drains, finding its way to the children’s feet playing in the storm drains. It was shortly after this that Dad said the S.17 secret research lab was sealed off to all personnel except the radiation hazard team. Dad was able to retrieve all of his tools and one of a pair of solid Tungsten Carbide Plates that was used to press 1000's of Uranium Fuel Plates used to simulate thermal cycling in a nuclear reactor. The other plate was put along with all the machines and buildings, under hazard conditions chopped up into pieces small enough to fit inside special stainless steel 44 gallon drums sealed inside huge concrete blocks then placed onto ships by crane, taken out to the Irish Sea and dumped without a ceremony. Operation De-Contaminate was in full swing, among the drums were scraps from the Beryllium Lab and Uranium that had been under thermal cycling and highly radioactive, all the Uranium Oxides were carefully placed in special containers and shipped to a lab at Aldermaston. Dad also worked at the new Dungeness Nuclear Power Station doing special welding for the AEI POWER GROUP. Dad also made components that he said were used in the bombs at Maralinga in Australia, this was before we came here. So I understand why the United Kingdom’s Government would not want this story to ever see the light of day. But what hurt me the most was my Dads stubborn loyalty to this country that had used him as a virtual guinea pig it must have been the soldier in him and his family history, his dad who was Jack Hardy

gassed at the Somme in France WW1 and Dads brother my Uncle John

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Who fought in the Deserts of Africa, we still have Granddad’s and Grandma’s brothers medals. Dad actually loved the Queen and at night here in Sydney when they used to show the national anthem at the close of the TV at 12 each night, my Dad would stand at attention I kid you not. He was a loyal servant to Her Majesty, listen to this I went through his boxes that were placed in our garage after he died and inside one, I found his 3 favourite dresser table picture frames, in the two smaller frames are my Mum Jean and in the larger frame is a God damn picture of the Queen. Finding them brought back all the forgotten memories of the many arguments we had, about when I tried to get him to go public in the early 1980’s but he would not do it. So I went behind his back and contacted the current affairs channel 7 in Sydney, a reporter was at my door within 30 minutes of me hanging up the phone, I told them my dad's story briefly and that he wanted to tell his story, they were very intrigued to say the least, so an appointment was set up for the following day complete with a camera crew to film his interview, when late that night I got a phone call from the lead reporter saying that he was very sorry and angry but that it had come from above the producer, that the story could not and would not go ahead. My Dad was right he said it would never be allowed on the News and he was right. I asked the reporter if this had ever happened before and he said no never and that it must have come from the government. He kept in touch telling me to try the Friends of the Earth Movement in Sydney, a Greenpeace group that do a lot of good work world wide, which I did try but they were shut down also and just to show you how dirty Governments can get when their interests are harmed or hindered, in 1985, the Rainbow Warrior, was sunk by magnetic mines codenamed Operation Satanique, it was an operation by the Action branch of the French foreign intelligence services, under the Direction of the Generale de la Securite Exterieure (DGSE), carried out on July 10, 1985. The flagship of the Greenpeace fleet, the Rainbow Warrior then sat on the sea floor in the port of Auckland, New Zealand, carried out to prevent her from interfering in a nuclear test in Moruroa. But it shows you the extent that the security agencies will go to, in order to keep a secret, secret. So the tentacles of the United Kingdom reach far and wide and after all this, for two years afterwards all of my mail from overseas was ripped open and things missing from inside, that had been sent to me from the USA. I t is quite amazing that Dad took pictures all the way from the UK to Australia and many from here after we arrived in Sydney, it still brings a tear when I see Valentine in slides. OUR HAUNTED NEW RENTED HOME 3 ADA ST PADSTOW. We move house to the other side of Padstow, about 2 miles away from Watson rd, but for me it was great as it is closer to my playground of Salt Pan Creek. It was so beautiful then when we first arrived as the water was unpolluted and crystal clear you could see the schools of fish swimming deep below, but sadly now it is a dirty brown colour, a shame that it could change so much in just 40 or so years. The house belonged to an elderly couple and the wife

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of the owner a Mr. Peterson died from cancer in the master bedroom and my sisters took this room as it suited the three of them, we were not told about the death when we moved in but it soon became very apparent that they were not alone and the room was always very cold even on hot days, all of my sisters saw her ghost at different times and we were glad to only be there for a short period. I increase my lizard collection with a giant sized Blue tongue lizard bringing my collection to 3 with 1 smaller Bearded dragon, they were not in cages they just ran around the house, my sisters hated them and Mum just tolerated them. Dad decides it is time for me to have a racing push bike and I soon get one for my birthday, but it is tinged with great sadness, as Valentine my constant companion disappears from our back yard, one day I go to school and come home to find his lead that was tied to a tree in our back yard cut and Valentine was gone I was so upset I never slept for a few days in expectation of him coming home but he never did. Dad and I searched for months every night walking for miles shouting Valentine’s name but he never came home, as I found out later in my life from Mum after Dad died why, Valentine had attacked a neighbour’s dog and stole its bone, so Dad always the one to please the authorities, gave him to a friend of his, who owned a farm, but never told me as I am sure he knew I would not have rested until I got him back, but I still wonder if that was true or if he was just put down. So after I slowly got used to Valentine being gone, the fun and games began again and I started to play at my new secret spot the Padstow railway train bridge that spanned Salt Pan Creek.

PADSTOW RAIL TRAIN BRIDGE. My friends and I would climb up on the tracks and place one, two, five and ten cent coins on the rail track and lay prostrate on the ground in full view of the rail, so we could watch where the coin would land as sometimes they would stick to the wheel momentarily falling off further away, some however did stick permanently and were lost, but mostly not and the train would flatten them out so you could still see the images, but the coins would be three times larger and as thin as a sheet of paper, we would later take them to school and sell them for a profit. After the steam rolling of coins we would climb inside the bridge as it is a box girder bridge, where the middle became our club house. The walls of the inside of the bridge is where we all wrote our names mine and Colin’s, Mark Cooper’s, Bill Krangtse’s, David Jefferies, David Barnier, Mark Lucas, Mark Punton, Ron Baxter, Steven Guy and Danny Willard this place became our world every weekend and we always met up there, where we would bring drinks and lollies and have a lot of fun by sticking our heads up through and between the rail sleepers and watch the train approach only pulling our heads down as the train roared over head it became a dare as to who could keep his head there the longest. Also we would walk across the sleepers to the Riverwood side, one day we were crossing and I was last in line, when the train approached us and out of fear we froze, unable to move as

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you had to look down at sleepers because of the gap between them and if you did not you would go between them and possibly fall to your death, so here we were frozen watching this train hurtling towards us and unable to look down out of fear of the trains approach, when sparks flew from the trains steel wheels as the emergency brakes were applied, stopping the train just in time and only a few feet away with just enough room for us to safely cross, we could see the scared to death look on the face off the train driver he was horrified and was shaking his head in disbelief as it could have been a terrible tragedy. This still did not stop us, crazy full of mischief 10 year olds, but afterwards there were a lot of frequent visits of rail police to our favourite spot, they had seen our cubby house and boarded up our secret easy access point and we did then stop going there in the end, but we found a new place just down the creek about 2,000 yards and it is called the Padstow sewerage

pipes that span the aqueduct and the creek 70 feet below, you could climb up from the Padstow side and you could run across once you got the skip hop at the correct ratio, if you didn’t you would trip on the 5 inch high lip or strengthening rings or ribs every so many feet on the pipe, once I tripped and almost slid off and down the side of the pipe, but Colin god rest his soul, helped me back up. There are 5 large pillars that support the pipe and you can climb off the pipe and sit on them as they are quite large and flat I think we sat up there for many hours just fishing and playing kids games also it was great if we needed to hide from authority as they were never silly enough to follow us across, yes I know it was very dangerous and we could have been hurt but hindsight always makes things much clearer after the event looking back now it was very stupid but as bored to death kids it was our only excitement. THE BATTLE OF SALT PAN CREEK. This time was one of the most fun times we had Colin and I, let me fill you in a bit, the FJ Holden was one of the foremost classic car’s of its era and there were millions of them in Sydney when we arrived and because they were so common they became the main car thief’s target and Salt Pan Creek was one of the dumping grounds for them after being stripped of their engines wheels and doors, leaving just a shell. They had a dished roof shaped like an old Volkswagen roof so we got the idea of cutting the roof of one with hacksaws and it took us a couple of weekends to do it, after cutting the roof off and jumping all over it and after getting sick of sitting in the roofless shell we decided to chuck the roof in Salt Pan Creek and watch it sink, so we all grabbed a corner and heaved it into the water waiting for it to sink but it floated, someone stood in it and it still floated before long 5 of us were sat in the middle of the creek on the upturned roof of the FJ Holden. We used a fence paling as an oar and navigated the entire Creek up to the Henry Lawson car bridge, it was magic we felt like the great sea farers discovering the new lands it was funny thinking back, but then it was serious

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stuff, so here we were floating in the middle of Salt Pan creek when next thing rocks started splashing all around us coming from the Riverwood side it was the local Riverwood gang of kids, we had a lot of rivalry going on then and we had strayed into their waters so they tried to sink us using lumps of sandstone hurled with great force, we were just lucky Mark Lucas was in charge of the oar as he was a good cricket player so he belted any boulders that came too close and we made it safely to the Padstow side of the creek. We all helped lift our new

battleship out of the creek and hid her in the mangroves covering her with black mud ready for our next weekend. The weekend came quickly and we were all back down Salt Pan Creek as soon as we could get there, as we arrived there had been another car dumped so we got the hacksaws and soon had another battleship dry docked and ready to be launched. So we divided into two Navy’s the Aussies and the Pommies, World War 3 was about to begin, we made and loaded dozens of mud bombs and filled buckets with small rocks to use as our ammunition, we had galvanized garbage bin lids as shields to block incoming rocks we said a few words to each other climbed aboard then pushed of towards the centre of the Creek, once there we talked about the plan and how we would do battle when splash! It was the Riverwood gang who had been lay in wait for us to reach the middle, where we were now within cannon range then splash! again it had begun, they never expected us to be armed and we quickly had them on the retreat as we had them flanked we watched them run off into the distance so we cheered Padstow, Padstow, next thing I was hit with a large black mud ball thrown by Mark, so I chucked 6 back getting him a couple of times then the showers of small rocks bounced of my garbage bin lid protecting my head then bouncing and falling into the creek, Mark soon had run out of stones and we then had them at our mercy, we hit them back with overwhelming force their car roof vibrating in the water from bouncing stones but they had garbage lids also to protect their heads from well aimed stones and soon all our ammo was used up so tired wet and black from mud we all headed for the shore and again hid our ships in the mangroves ready for the following weekend. It came quickly and this time we decided to change the rules a little bit adding tomahawks also having boarding parties like the old swashbucklers with swords except we had tomahawks in each hand, not to hit each other with but to hole each other’s ship hull while at sea. So we arrive at our naval yard the aqueduct retrieve our ships say a few words to each other then push off the idea was to keep out of each other’s range from blows with the tomahawk, so far so good then we lose our oar and turn to see the Aussies closing in then just as they are in jumping range we both leap into each other’s boats hammering away with the tomahawks soon seeing a spurt of water in each ship, soon we realize that we were in the deepest part of the creek and sharks had been seen even this far up in Salt Pan, so we are soon floating in the creek without our ships imagining shark fins all around us Colin started to cry so we grabbed an arm each and had to hurriedly swim to shore expecting any moment to be eaten alive by sharks but instead all we got was stung by jellyfish and they hurt. What a day that was it went down in local folklore as the battle of Salt Pan Creek.

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THE LEGEND OF MICK SHERWOOD. I was only 10 and I would always leave home early to walk to the train station at Padstow, it was during one such walk that I met and began to talk whilst walking each week day morning with Mickey Sherwood, he was like a Greek Adonis, I kid you not. He was 10 years older than I, built like an athlete a male models looks with natural blue black hair and he could box like any great boxer he was a legend and people would come from all over Sydney looking for him to claim his crown but he out boxed them all he would walk and I had to run to keep up with him. He worked firstly for a bricklayer then he worked with my Dad at Abmal in the Lead works Dad told us a typical Mick story that happened in the Lead Mill at Abmal where they made car batteries, they have a huge crucible below the furnace that melts the lead and then its poured into this huge crucible then poured into ingots, this time there was an accident and 2 or 3 tons of hot liquid lead was poured onto the floor below quickly setting rock solid, a crew of 6 men were sent in to dig the lead up and place it back into the furnace to be re melted but progress was slow and nonexistent, then in comes Mick and another fellow who worked there, built like Mick he was a Ukrainian called Victor , Dad said the two of them stripped of their shirts and then using sheer strength, bare hands and a jemmy bar tore every single piece of the hot solid and heavy lead from the floor while the rest of the lead mills other workers looked on, within 2 hours they had cleaned all the lead from the floor and back into the crucible, to the cheers of all the workers, then the foreman sent them both home on full pay for the rest of the day. Each Christmas for a few years after Mick would call at our home to say merry Christmas to Mum and Dad and us. The next time I saw him he had become a Debt collector for a city bookmaker, Mick was something else, sometimes the older boys would target me on the train going to school, it stopped after Mick came one day with me and scared the crap out of them after that I became good friends with them, Mick looked after me often sticking up for me even though he was years older than me he treated me like his best friend, one time I went to Karen Dowers birthday party a friend of my sister Jill and Mick was invited, when I got there I could hear all this noise moaning and screaming in one of the bedrooms, so I went to check it out and it was Mick in bed with two married women who had sneaked away from their husbands to be with him, I went in and said hello what a sight that was him in the middle naked smoking a cigar a gorgeous woman on either side, you really had to be there to understand. But that was Mick Sherwood the lady’s man and they loved him. Just about every time I saw him it was a different beautiful woman on his arm, he truly was gifted in every way imaginable except one, he was like a child in a man’s body and very easily taken advantage of. I know it is hard to believe but it is true he was a very innocent soul inside this hulking warrior’s body. I still do not know what it was that drew us together as friends but friends we became, which made it all the harder to watch what happened to him later on in life. The start of his decline was a pub brawl against a gang of bikers at the Sundowners hotel, the bikers had a girl in the parking lot it was about 7 men, one on a bike the others were holding down a girl and the one on the bike was trying to ride the bike over her body she was screaming for help, the bouncers just stood watching and would not intervene when Mick saw what was going on and unlocked the hotel door and went outside on his own to help the woman, he knocked the first 3 bikers out cold but while he had his back turned one pulled a 15 inch long bayonet from his leather boot and from behind thrust it through Mick’s body coming out just above his naval, Mick just turned with the bayonet impaled through his body and knocked the rest of the bikers out and reached down and helped the girl to her feet, an ambulance was called for Mick and he was rushed to hospital with the bayonet still inside him, he did survive but not long after he was in a car

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accident and cut a nerve on one side of his face below his right eye that made his face drop causing his right eye lid to droop making his eye weep all of the time, he thought the girls would still make a fuss over him but it was the opposite. He eventually overdosed on Methadone at some place in Queensland. A true Legend had died that day and none of us could believe it so we all agreed it never happened it was simpler that way.

9TALLAWARRA AVE PADSTOW. We are finally moving into our newly purchased home, no more moving and best of all its only 500 yards from Salt Pan Creek. Lynn decides to throw a party to celebrate and she invites all of her new friends, she has made and they invite their friends so it becomes a big event, it was probably the biggest party our new avenue had ever seen, it was an extravaganza cars parked all up our avenue, it went on until the early hours of the morning music blaring. Dad’s eye surgeon Dr R. Loudon is preparing to operate on Dads eyes so it is a trying time for all of us, Mum holds us all together during this difficult time as she always did and still does now. I am from my memory about 10, we have settled into our new home, Mum and Dad have made it very comfortable as we begin our lives in Tallawarra avenue it is the aboriginal word for a slippery wet place the reason for its name was the natural freshwater spring that bubbles up at the front of our home across the street behind Mrs. Hogan’s house. In it are hundreds of the best fresh water eels you will ever see, I used to catch them and take them up to the toy shop at Padstow shopping centre, Terry’s Toys, he was Japanese a lovely gentle man, he reminds me of the Kung Fu show where grasshopper is being taught by the wise one he was like that, always giving me Confucius said this and Confucius said that I think he was a very lonely man looking back now, and he loved to cook and eat fresh eels, in return he would pay me or let me choose a toy or other item from his amazing shop. It was there that I bought my first air rifle and scope, then later he sold me a 10 shot 22 calibre Anschutz rifle with a Telescopic sight 10 shot automatic, it was a kid’s dream I would go down the creek and sit all day shooting bottles floating in the water and sadly I shot a few birds, that memory now horrifies me, to think that I was capable of inflicting such harm on a defenceless creature upsets me now I truly regret that. To think I could have done such terrible things hurts intensely as now I love birds and could not hurt or harm a feather, I know one day I will have to explain my actions as a child but will meet that when the time comes as I am sure it will. Dad has his eye surgery the first operation is a minor success giving him some sight back, the second operation was a disaster leaving Dad with only one good eye. He was hurting as we all were, our lives were about to change dramatically the happy days are few and far between and this just sent me off the rails and I became what the welfare call an uncontrollable child or neglected which was cods wallop, my

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Mum and Dad were under extreme pressure paying off a new home and they never stopped loving us. Yet even with the love and attention I seemed to fall between the cracks and became engulfed in a world of confusion becoming increasingly drawn to the negative aspects of life. Soon I was missing so much school playing all day every day at Salt Pan Creek that it became an issue with the authorities and they sent me to see a child psychiatrist with Mum and Dad, doing all these hearing tests in this booth that had been sound proofed from the outside world and I had to wear special headphones and then they started to play sound frequencies high and low trying to trick me like in a card game of poker with a bluff to see if I could hear ok, but they could not know then how good my hearing was and it was here they discovered that I had above average hearing and a thing called Bi lateral bat ears, so I passed the test with flying colours. The controller suggested a job in the future as a submarine sonar reader as my hearing was so acute. Then it was diagrams and what did I see in the picture being shown to me, well the guy was in fits of laughter with my responses and in the end they said there was nothing wrong with me it was Dad who had the problem, well I was chuffed and over the moon to find out that it was not me with the problem as they first thought. But Dad never spoke the whole way home. Later on in my life I had a corrective procedure to fix the bi lateral bat ears so allowing me a more peaceful quiet life, yeah right.

PENNIE OUR 2nd AUSSIE DOG. We decide to get a new dog she was a gorgeous black curly long wiry haired floppy eared cross I am not sure what breed she was but she was a great Dog and followed me like she was glued to me. Dad stops working for the Atomic Energy as his eye condition worsens, he leaves Lucas Heights, he ends up with a much more mundane job at Abmal later to become Chloride Batteries. Dad should not really have had to work and should have been taken care of by the United Kingdom or the AEI POWERGROUP under the workers compensation scheme but they just acted as if we never existed, so Dad and Mum had to struggle on to pay the house off that he and Mum had bought for all of us, it cost $11,000 then in 1968 and now 2009 it is worth $450,000 plus, a pretty good buy I would think. So Dad and Mum start working, Mum gets a job full time at Metters making fridges and stoves, I also worked there once when I left school after being released from the boys home and Dad works part time at all of these companies as a private self employed fix it man for Bliss welded products, Goyen Controls, Repco and Lincoln Electrics as Dad was in high demand for his skill as a Toolmaker, who were at that time as rare as gold teeth, he was able to delegate the reading of micrometers and verniers to the 3rd year apprentices, he works full time at Abmal using his coke bottle bottomed glasses and magnifying glass and somehow he manages to bluff through but he did make some mistakes using his trusty verniers and micrometer, he was able to correct this but it upset him as he would never make such mistakes before his eye condition. He later took on a much bigger role as the AMWSU as the Union Delegate, allowing him much more freedom and he was instrumental in changing the safety laws on a dozen or so major issues,

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also when they became Chloride Batteries a United Kingdom owned company the conditions changed for the worse, starting with the polluting of Salt Pan Creek with Mercury and Lead that was allowed to flow untreated into the drains that led into the creek, this I only know about because I briefly worked there with Dad and I was given the job of painting the concrete reservoir with special rubberized black paint, used to increase the effect of solar rays to help neutralize the acids before being filtered of heavy metals so allowing it to go into Salt Pan Creek as treated sewerage, so Dad called a strike meeting and it became the longest strike in Australia of 6 weeks at that time the longest known strike, uniting all of the unions from all industries creating a strike fund where all workers gave money to help pay the men’s wages while on strike. Policy was later changed thanks to my Dad and the company did give in and conditions changed dramatically and Dad started his stay safe at work news magazine for the workers using poems he wrote to add a little laughter, Here is one he wrote on eye safety called, SAFETY SEARCHLIGHT. The spotlight for the month of July, Has searched and come to rest on the EYE. It seems, we should all be thinking a lot, About this precious and vital spot. If running to Sister Olive you go, Hit in the EYE by a U.F.O. While getting first aid, it’s no use sighing, For a Vinson’s Powder won’t stop you crying. Or a cheery word from Tom Mclean, Will not really help to ease the pain. Guard it well lads, the OPTIC NERVE, Without it you could not even perve! So, why miss out on the shapely lasses, Because of forgetting your SAFETY GLASSES.! If you see your mate, committing this crime, Then remind him about this little rhyme. This would surely be progress in any weather, And in safety mates, LET US PROGRESS TOGETHER. By Norman Hardy Union Delegate.

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My Dad was a multi talented man and wore many hats and could have succeeded at any type of job or trade he wanted to do. Dad’s case for compensation is going very slow, as there were no computers or speedy internet connections, everything was done by air mail and it could take weeks to receive a reply from the solicitors who in turn were awaiting replies from the United Kingdom. So for seven years it became a waiting game, a constant state of apprehension that we could palpably feel, so imagine how Mum and Dad felt. HAILEYS COMET. My birthday is coming up and Dad is now blind after his surgery, even though he is blind he decides it is time for me to learn about astronomy and he buys me a 4 ½ inch 300 x power Astronomical Telescope with several sizes of lenses and he puts it together blind then he taught me how to use it correctly and when I looked at the moon for the first time I was just awestruck at the moons sheer beauty, then it was Hailey’s comet it was absolutely incredible, with Dad telling me all about how they formed and what made them come on the orbits that they do. I became quite good at setting the Telescope up by myself and spent many nights just looking at Saturn, Venus and Mars. I kind of escaped into the outer Universe for awhile. THE MINI BIKE After the first visit to Minda Remand Centre, Dad builds me a mini bike it is an old dragster push bike frame similar to a BMX frame he then takes the normal back wheel off and replaces it with a pumped up scooter wheel with a thick sprocket attached to it, he then buys me a Briggs and Stratton 75 cc lawn mower engine and adapts it to fit onto the Dragster frame, he uses an 18 inch long 2 inch wide by ¼ inch thick steel bar and mounts the bar to the dragster frame and then he mounts the mower engine to the bar, he then connects the chain attaches wider handle bars also a set of motor bike throttle and grips, a small fuel tank with an on off tap a head light and a horn, a unique clutch he designed and then he sat me on it with the back wheel off the ground and pulled the starter rope and the engine roared to life he told me to rev it and to get use to the vibrations wow it vibrated like hell it was awesome so now I was ready for my first test drive down the creek on the aqueduct, I walked it down then sat on it pulled the starter rope and it fired up just the way it should and slowly I disengaged the clutch and it stalled as I let the clutch out to quickly but next go I was off flying all day up and down the track at Salt Pan creek. After a few months I got bored with just the creek track and started to go on the main streets around Padstow and soon I was in trouble with the law and being chased by Police patrol cars but because I was on a small bike I could fit through narrow gaps and would get away from them but in the end they tracked me down and I was banned from the roads. MINDA REMAND CENTRE. After leaving public school for high school Colin and I were separated, I was deemed a bad influence so I was sent to East Hills Boys High School and Colin and Jill went to Sir Joseph Banks High School which was coed, this just added to my problems as having Jill at my school was a kind of guarantee that I would turn up at school, being by myself just gave me the key to the city so to speak, allowing me to get side tracked every day going to school, I would have every intention of going but would get side tracked and in the end the inevitable happened and I was taken from Mum and Dad’s custody aged 13 and placed at Minda remand centre for children waiting to go before the children’s court, what a joke that was, my friend

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who had the bed next to me in our wing Wayne King he was a strange boy never spoke much and would look at you with a cold steely look as if peering into your very soul, come to think of it he never smiled much either, just the same facial expression all the time. We worked in the kitchen he was in charge of the knives and forks after each meal; he would wash them and do a count while the wardens counted us. It was not a bad place don’t get me wrong but I think on a personal level it needed much more work in the teaching of children how to become caring instead of bitter and resentful urchins as so many had become and showing the troubled children that there is another world other than what had led them to Minda. I was released back to my parents after a month in Minda we went home and the very next day on the front page of the Daily Mirror was a picture of Wayne King, who unknown to me was the youngest murderer in New South Wales. He had been an adopted child I think and there was some friction with his Grandmother and one night while her husband was at work he climbed out his bed room window in his pyjamas walked across the road to her place picked up a large round pebble, then knocked on the front door as she opened the door he went into a frenzy hitting her on the head repeatedly then went inside and got a carving knife from the kitchen draw and stabbed her 27 times leaving the knife in her chest and walked back home covered in blood then climbed back into his room and went to sleep in his bloodied clothes. The police just followed the trail and found him fast asleep in bed. He received a gaol sentence of 14 years with an 8 year non parole, to be served at the men’s prison of Long Bay as he posed a risk if placed in with other children. Not long after being sent home to Mum and Dad I was again in trouble for truancy and taken again back to Minda remand only this time I was sent to reform school at Mittagong, about 80 miles outside of Sydney. After about 6 months Colin has a serious accident while riding my racing bike as it had a loose handlebar neck so if you turned too quickly the wheel turned one way and the handle bars would turn the other way and Colin was riding down a hill in front of a bread van and he must have panicked turned quickly and he went in front of bread van and was knocked high into the air landing on his head on the road, he was very seriously injured with a cerebral haemorrhage and almost died. He was in Bankstown Hospital and I asked if I could go see him but I was refused, the very same day while playing soccer I was running and kicking the ball towards the goal when I jumped in the air to avoid Jimmy Johnson who was much bigger than I, but we collided in the air his boot connecting with my leg just above my knee joint and there was an almighty cracking sound and my leg just sprang like an unwinding spring snapping my right femur above the knee, so I ended up in hospital at Bowral then because it was my femur they needed to send me to a more skilled hospital so I was transferred that same day to Bankstown Hospital and ended up in the same ward as Colin truly, Mum was there when I was brought in on a stretcher, then we were told that I would be in there for 3 months! in a Thompsons splint with traction meaning weights ropes and pulleys it was terrible my bed was always raised at the foot end 12 inches higher than the head end then two weeks in they x-rayed my leg and found it was crooked so I had to undergo surgery to re break the bone again so they could set it straight and after 3 months the traction and splint was removed and my bed levelled then for 2 months I slept holding onto the sides of my bed as it felt like I was sliding off the end of the bed Poor Mum cried both of her sons in hospital with serious injuries, Colin was never the same again.

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His personality had changed forever, he was still Colin but he was different, not known to us until much later in our lives Colin had become schizophrenic hearing voices that tortured him. AFTER ANGLEWOOD SPECIAL SCHOOL. After leaving Anglewood my leg was still stiff at the knee after being in traction for so long the knee joint had dried out and it took a good year before I could bend it like before it was broken, I never went back to school they sent a letter asking me to continue my education but I told them no and after I came home Mum and Dad had no influence in that regard as I had kind of grown older and thought I knew everything, so I had to a job so I began looking and soon found one at Academy Plastics doing injection moulding, I did enjoy it immensely and soon was able to set up the die in the machine by myself. It was about this time that I began to experiment with LSD and along with my friends each weekend we would all get together and drop acid and trip at night in the Padstow shopping centre it was a weird time in my life and it did change my perception of all things forever. COLIN DIES. He told me a few weeks before he died that it was as if someone was stood next to him and were shouting in his ear, I felt so powerless and it was this that drove him near to insanity, I tried to help him in his last few months of life by getting him to see a Dr in Padstow but the Dr was not very good or just did not care and Colin’s time had run out, as the voices were driving him crazy. So he began to drink bottles of Port or Claret, as it seemed to give him some kind of relief from the constant voices. People would make fun of him at the pub calling him Cosmo or Cosmic Col, it hurt watching him fall deeper and deeper into this hell he seemed trapped in. So on his last day on earth he fixed all the little holes in his aviary so his birds would be safe and protected, then he took care of all his loose ends, then he carefully checked that we were all busy doing things, mum was cooking in the kitchen dad was in bed sick I was on the computer and he came into my bed room and asked me what I was doing, I was playing a game that was new then it was Wolfenstein 3d so I asked Colin if he would like to play it but he declined and said he had other things to do, so I carried on playing as Colin walked away, me not knowing it would be the last time I would see my little brother ever alive again. He walked out into the back garden then went into the garage which was my workshop for my Perspex business and closed the door, he then simply tied a piece of nylon rope up to the exposed rafter tied it around his throat and bent his knees until he breathed no more, he hung like that for 1 hour and 40 minutes. When mum had gotten dinner ready and had set all the plates up mine, Dads, Colin’s and hers, noticing Colin was absent she asked me where he was then asked me to shout him, Dad thought he had gone to Padstow shops so Mum then said go check outside so I went outside calling out his name, but without answer so I walked around to the garage finding the door was locked, so I went looking for the key and found Colin had placed a magazine over the key to hide it on my computer desk he must have done it when he came in to see what I was doing, so I grabbed the key and as I walked past Mum she was putting plates of food on the dining room table, asking me to

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hurry and find Colin so I walked to the garage door put key in lock and turned the key pushing the door open and standing with knees slightly bent with arms at his sides was Colin, at first I thought he was just standing there so I called out to him then the reality of what I was seeing struck me I ran to his side and tried to lift him but he was a dead weight so I ran inside and called Dad to help me without saying anything to Mum we raced outside but Mum must have known and followed us to the garage where upon seeing her child she wailed like I have never heard anyone cry before it was primordial it cut right through my soul, Dad and I supported Colin as I cut the taught noose around his throat accidently nicking his neck as the noose had closed so tightly and as he fell we sank to the floor Colin landing in my lap, as we landed he gasped out his last exhalation of air that was trapped in his lungs Colin was gone and was no more, I sat with Colin like that for what seemed like an eternity with Mum just wailing, her soul laid bare, nothing we said or did could console her or stop her grief. Dad then told me to ring the Police or Ambulance so I rang triple 000, then within 20 minutes the Police arrived to take charge of the scene of Colin’s suicide, asking us to leave the garage until they finished, after 30 minutes they came in and asked if we would like a few minutes alone with him to say our final last goodbyes which we did, afterwards they took Colin’s body away for autopsy. We were told that it was wrong to have cut the rope as they needed to take measurements before to make sure there had been no foul play involved. But as Dad said we could not leave him like that so we cut him down. Dad then told the Police he was solely responsible for Colin being cut down so if anyone was to be charged it would be him. Colin’s funeral was very nice and a lot of people came so he had a good send off.

AFTER COLIN’S FUNERAL. Life began to slowly fall back into place once again, I had gone prematurely grey within two weeks and Dad was still sick in bed with severe back and neck pains and was seeing specialists at the St Vincent’s Hospital where he was prescribed heavy duty S8 medicines for the pain. Even this did not seem to work very well and Dad was bed ridden most of the time only rising for the grand children’s birthdays then he would go back to bed, after Colin died Dad never talked much and two years later it was Dads turn he had lost his fingernails and his toe nails also he had lost all his body hair, I awoke on Dads last day at 5.00 am and came into the kitchen to find Dad staggering and trying to make his coffee so I marched him back to bed and made it for him, taking it into him and I kissed him goodbye told him I loved him as Mum was just awaking I kissed her to and left to go to Auburn to see my Dr, my elder sister Lynn was driving me as my car was off the road for mechanical work, we were gone for about 50 minutes arriving back home to find Mum sat on the front step crying as we pulled up, we ran to Mum asking her what was wrong and she said its Dad he’s gone so we raced in to find Dad sat but lay on side of the bed with his back arched high arms out stretched with a gasping look upon his face a half finished coffee that I had made him before I left sat on his

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bedside table, it was terrible to see. So Lynn and I carried his body into Mums room as his room was a mess, with his documents and papers everywhere so Lynn and I decided to give him the respect in death that he was refused in the latter part of his life. Mum and Dad had separate rooms because Dad tossed and turned so much at night from the pain she could not sleep so they then decided it would be better for Mum to sleep in spare room until Dad got better, so we lay him on Mums bed and called 000 once again as we had for Colin. Our lives forever are about to change once more. I just never imagined Dad would die in such a way.

THE MAN WHO NEVER EXISTED
Staff Sgt Norman Hardy s/n 22043729, British Royal Engineers. My Dad was a brave man an honest man, a husband a father a grandfather. The autopsy was inconclusive in regards to his exposure to radiation, yet oddly no one in our family had mentioned Dads work or anything to do with his work but it was mentioned in the letter from the coroner, the other weird thing that happened was the removal of Dads eyes and brain without permission, this we only found out about 2 years later when we received a letter from the coroner’s office saying that Dads eyes and brain had been disposed of, this created more questions than it answered and further answers we never got. FINISH LATER. Tags: ACCIDENT, DEATH., FAMILY, LOVE, NUCLEAR, RADIOACTIVE