Community, Development and Alumni Mr Clive Woosnam OAM (1939–2018) The Newington College community recently said a sad farewell to past staff member Mr Clive Woosnam OAM, who worked at the school for more than 35 years. Welsh-born Clive Woosnam, who yearned to see a wider world, became one of those extraordinary individuals who export a great deal of their homeland’s culture and history to their adopted land and in doing so enrich their adopted country. Coming to Australia at the age of 25, he brought with him music, poetry and an enthusiasm for Rugby. A miner’s son, Woosnam was steeped in the choral tradition of the Welsh hinterland. Later geographer, teacher, Rugby coach, chorister and writer, he inspired generations of schoolboys and a legion of older Australians. Clive was born on 2 October 1939 in Porth, a mining town in the Rhondda Valley, Wales, where he attended grammar school. During that time he discovered the work of Dylan Thomas. He later enrolled at the London University College to study Geography. He sang with the university choir, including carol service in St Paul’s Cathedral, then went to Exeter University Mr Clive Woosnam OAM. for his teacher’s certificate. the Geography department, head of the Woosnam produced a play, Good Night, He taught for a time at the Sloane Lower School, boarding house master, Dylan, arguing that Thomas’ death was Grammar School in Chelsea, London, Registrar, editor of New Focus not from drink, but medical malpractice. and from there travelled to Australia, (predecessor of this magazine) and Clive and Helen were both awarded arriving in October 1964. He was Alumni Manager/Archivist, while Helen, Honorary ONU Life Membership in 2017. assigned to a job in the correspondence taught in the NSW state system. At education section in Sydney, where he Woosnam’s urgings, Newington initiated Do Not Go Gentle into That Dark Night met the secondary school registrar, a system of pastoral care of students. was one of Thomas’s famous poems, Helen Moran. With desk space short, Woosnam sang with a masters’ quartet about facing mortality. Woosnam, in his she agreed that he could sit at the end and with a combined staff-student choir. final illness, did not rage but instead of her table. Woosnam worked on a imparted his boundless enthusiasm for weekly correspondence course, did In 1988, Woosnam responded to an life to his adoring friends. educational broadcasts on Radio 2FC, advertisement for the Sydney Welsh Choir, went to a practice and returned feeling his Clive Woosnam died at Mona Vale on 27 served on the curriculum committee and feet ‘tingling all night’. ‘It was something July. A private funeral was held on 6 wrote a new geography textbook. August and a series of generous tributes I had missed, really, really missed,’ he Woosnam and Helen fell in love, said. ‘It was not just the singing, but the were read out, including one from his travelled to Canada, married in Toronto Welsh songs I had sung as a boy.’ sister, Marjorie Grey, who had travelled and honeymooned at Niagara Falls. They from Britain to be with Clive and Helen travelled to England where they lived For the rest of his life Woosnam was a at the end. All attested to the warmth, and taught, Clive at Southgate Grammar. driving force for the choir, which intellect, selflessness and boundless Wanting to return to Australia, Woosnam performed in Sydney and outlying areas. enthusiasm for life that Clive had chose Newington College in Sydney. He It toured more distant regions in the exhibited. One particular anecdote and Helen arrived in January 1970 and state most years, travelled interstate testified to his continuing good humour to Woosnam went into the school’s and did six overseas tours. the very finish, where he said he knew Geography department. It was the In 1995, Woosnam became a founding where to find the radiotherapy unit at the beginning of a golden period of his life, member of the Dylan Thomas Society of Royal North Shore Hospital – ‘All I have which took up the next 35 years and Australia, and enthusiastically organised to do is follow the signs of the mortuary!’ saw him take readily to Rugby, cricket readings and outings. In 2009, he A memorial service was held at Newington and athletics, coaching excellence in received an Order of Australia Medal for College on 15 August, attended by over boys in sport he had been deprived of his contribution to Education and the as a child growing up in a mining Arts. In 2012, after thoroughly 250 family, friends, Old Boys and staff. community. Woosnam became head of researching Thomas’s untimely death, Mr Malcolm Brown (ON 1964) 56| NEWS SPRING 2018| GRATITUDE