With McCain, I took a leading part in the system implementations within my own company; in Europe as well as
North America. This allowed me to travel on the company’s dollar. There are three occasions that are most
memorable.
able to enjoy the experience of a free vacation in Toronto while I spent my time at a boring conference.
This happened again on the second of the more memorable trips I made for the company. This time I was touring
Britain and Europe and Linda was able to come with me. I worked, Linda played tourist!
This trip was particularly great since we were able to spend some time with my parents, both at the beginning and
at the end. I had picked up a car at Heathrow and when we left my parents we drove it onto train that took us
through the Channel Tunnel. At the other side we switched to a left hand drive vehicle for the European roads.
Linda and I went to Brussels where we met Colin who was taking leave from the US Army in Schweinfurt,
Germany.
Then we drove to Amsterdam and found we’d been booked into a very nice hotel downtown. Again,
while I did my meetings with the company brass, they did the tourist thing. I did have the evenings to join them
and nothing would do but on one occasion Colin had me join them in a visit to the red-light district which he and
Linda had earlier toured.
Then it was time to return to my parents in Britain for their 50th anniversary. So with Colin in tow, we drove back
to the tunnel. Since Robert’s estranged daughter was there, it was nice that we could have one of our sons also in
attendance.
Of course I have been able to make many other trips, most to the out-of-the-way places that McCain’s have
factories sited for access to the fields. But I have visited more exotic places like St Johns, Newfoundland,
Boston, San Diego, Denver, Atlanta, Seattle and Las Vegas to mention a few.
As I said much earlier I had an interest in sports and that ontinued through most of my working life. When I say
I had an interest I mean I played. I was never much of a spectator. After school I put my enjoyment of
motorcycles to a fuller use and got into motorcycle racing. In those days a grand Prix race would have a lot more
competitors because bikes were a lot less sophisticated and an amateur mechanic with some knowledge of the
fundamentals could take a road machine and tune it to race. That’s no longer true, much the pity, for today’s
racing machines are much more efficient. They require highly trained mechanics with the well funded backing to
be competitive. But in those days I could spend one winter getting my bike tuned-up and race it the following
summer. We were even paid starting money; hardly enough to pay our travel expenses but it was something.
Anyway a race would have the ten or so professionals with the factory bikes and the rest of the field were
amateurs like me on home-grown hot-rods. Like many of my contemporaries, I had a Triumph 500 cc engine in a
Norton Featherbed frame. It was a sweet machine even if my mother had blown her top when she came home
once to find the cylinders cooking in her oven. I had it tuned more for acceleration rather than top end speed
which best suited my local track, Brands Hatch.
Thinking back, I can still smell Castrol R, the racing oil so many of us used, and feel the high pitched sounds of
engines revving.
As I said we had big fields and with so many amateurs there were lots of spills. So to cut a long story short, I
raced until I hit an oak tree at speed (the speedometer was stuck at 70). I took the turn at Paddock a bit too
fast and over corrected which left me losing control on the approach to Druids. That was the end of Grand Prix
for me.
After I joined the army I found another motorcycle sport; motocross. That was even better, the army supplied
the bikes and my unit mechanics were all-too keen to help tune them up. I never won a race but I once was in the
lead until the British Champion, Jeff Smith, taught me how it was done. He pulled beside me and then kicked my
front fork and sent me flying. I continued riding until I wrote off all the squadron’s bikes and my CO decided
that was enough.
Of course, being in the army we were encouraged to take part in sports and I did play rugby. One of my fellow
subalterns was Graham Lilley who was picked to play for the Baa Baas; the Barbarian rugby team which is made
up of potential recruits for the British national teams. I wasn’t in that league but I did play for Salisbury.
I also boxed and with the reach of my 6’3” frame and able to weigh in at 160 pounds as well as being fit as hell,
I had a real advantage. My only loss was when they had me box a cruiserweight who I swear hit me with a
sledgehammer.
With my height I was also dragooned into playing basketball but I really wasn’t that good at it.
I must admit that I let sports slip at university but then I really didn’t have the time. And, for the first few
years working, I was too involved with my sons’ efforts. I got involved in minor hockey as a division director. That
was real politics. I made few friends with my insistence that all kids would have the same ice-time. There are
always those whose kids with more advanced skills but I contend that everyone paid the same so they played the
same. Besides, concentrating on the better kids, discouraged the late-bloomers and gave them no chance to
catch up. I also insisted on emphasizing their skating skills which also put the back up of the “active” parents
(active –meaning those parents who felt their own kids should have more ice-time on an all-star team).
But I missed my own enjoyment so, taking advantage of the numbers of youngsters coming out of the school
system that had played soccer, I founded the St. John River Valley Soccer League and recruited two teams from
Florenceville and others from Woodstock, Nackawic and Houlton Maine. Then. for several years, I played in one
of the teams and regained my fitness.
Several years later there was a very nice article in the local paper about how I’d created this successful
opportunity for the continuation of the sport beyond high school.
My boys meanwhile, once they started school, had branched out into different sports including competitive
swimming and track. So it was a good job that I had regained my fitness for I was able to run in a half marathon
with all three of my sons where we each won our age group. Of course I had to help my 6 year old, Cameron,
complete the course by carrying him on my shoulders.
The local high school had an exchange teacher from Wales who was keen to start rugby. That got me involved as
a keen former player myself. Having helped start rugby in the local high school, I was eager to repeat my soccer
experience and started a local rugby team, the Woodstock Wildcats. So, after many years away, in my late
forties, I found myself playing rugby again. I didn’t play every minute of every game but I put in my time as a
player coach. Charles, my oldest, also played for the Wildcats which made it that much more fun.
I should tell a story here; on one occasion I was berating my middle son for getting into a fight where he broke
his hand. My loving wife, who usually backed me up, asked me “and who was it that got into a fight in the last
rugby game?” Heck if a fellow plays with a heavily braced knee, he should expect someone to go for the weak
spot! Ah well, like all rugby games it ended in with drinks and, of course, the usual rugby songs.
That’s what’s so great about rugby, it’s more than a game, it’s a culture and after the game you all enjoy its
special comradery.
After we moved to Chicago, I was encouraged to join a local team there. Colin had a close friend from the army
who had been born in Scotland and was a keen (and excellent) player. Scottie had also settled in the Chicago area
and it was only natural we all got together to play.
But, there is only so far that experience and a blatant disregard for the rules can carry you. So at 56 I finally
decided that it was getting a bit too hard to keep up with the youngsters and I sure didn’t bounce back like I
used to. I finally hung up my boots.
So what was I to do? I settled on golf! My sons can all play, Linda took it up with her women friends; so why not?
Now if I can only learn to hit it where I want it to go and be able to read the greens, I should be a pro! Or at
least keep up with my family!
I said earlier that I had the soul of the poet, the strength of the warrior and the confidence of one at peace
with the soul. I think I’ve covered the warrior bit but the soul of a poet?
Yes I believe I can say that. I’ve certainly written some poetry; in French as well as English. I’ve also tried my
hand at writing three novels. Maybe one day they’ll get published! With my career, I had to write a great number
of things from articles and papers to instruction manuals. It’s so very important to master your language; it’s
difficult to get your message across without that skill. Writing comes fairly easily to me and, although I’m tone
deaf and can’t carry a tune, I seem to be able to get the meter and cadence right when I write. My biggest
problem is that I can get a bit long-winded so I have to watch that.
I never have understood the mindset of too many that poetry and physical activity do not go together. And it’s
not just poetry; technology and the sciences, artistic skills all are looked at as being outside of a “jock’s” area of
interest. Music is probably the only exception. I mean, look at the warrior poets that history records; Lord Byron,
Sir Phillip Sydney etc.
And there am I; soldier, sportsman and with other interests! As I said, I write poetry. I spent my career in a
“nerdy” occupation. I have made jewellery some of which I hope will become heirlooms for my kids and their
families. I’ve hooked a few rugs, acted in and made sets for plays, designed and sewn a shirt, enjoyed the arts
(or some of them) and still cannot be considered anything but the consummate “jock”. I’d like to shake some
sense into the heads of some high school boys!
Another thing I’ve always enjoyed is working with my hands. That started I’d say with my early love of motor
cycles. I may have had an income as a teen but it was limited so I needed to do my own maintenance and repair.
That forced me to learn how to take care of them. Later, buying a run-down house with limited means provided
another incentive to learn to learn blue-collar skills. Maybe it was the genes inherited from my maternal
grandfather, but I found I had the knack to put things together and make them work.
Albert Simpson, my maternal grandfather was an engineer and, as I’ve mentioned, was awarded the MBE for his
wartime work. I only recall him after he retired but, as a young boy, I’d often spend holidays at his house.
Grandma used a coal-fired stove and oven for cooking yet still managed to cook a full Christmas dinner including
plum pudding made from scratch. I can recall the sides of bacon hanging in the kitchen from the pigs he kept at
the bottom of the garden. I also recall being bathed at the kitchen sink since as I remember they did not have a
bathroom and the w.c was outside close to the pig sty.
He did own quite a bit of land; two gardens and a huge field which today is a housing estate. He had two summer
houses in the formal garden and a workshop any machine shop would envy opposite the vegetable garden. When I
visited, I’d invariably find time to join him in his workshop. He had a fascinating array of tools and equipment and
was always making something.
He was one of the old timers who, as he would
tell me, “if a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing
well”. That became somewhat of a mantra for
me in my life. In many ways, Granddad Simpson
became a role model for me.
The picture to the right shows me with him
and my grandmother, Agnes Simpson.
The Simpsons were a large family giving me a
lot of relatives. Not as many cousins for half
of them were childless. There were uncles
Percy, Ken and Reg and aunts Phyllis, Eva and May. In the picture Dad is in the back row third from the left.
Aunt May’s husband Albert is next to him. The other man is Eva’s husband Bob Chilton. In front of them, from
left to right, are Phyllis’ husband Arthur, Uncle Ken, Mum, Uncle Percy, Aunt May, Uncle Reg and then Phyllis’
sons, Derek and Raymond with Derek’s wife. The second row has Uncle Ken’s children with, from left to right,
Eva, Granddad, Grandma, Phyllis. Seated on the floor are the rest of the grandchildren, I’m the tallest with
Robert to my right.
Percy was another engineer who worked for the family firm Worthington and Simpson. He and Aunt Elsie spent
several years in Argentina. After his return, his wife died early from cancer and Percy seemed to lose himself
into alcoholism. That led to his being forced out of the firm due to some financial irregularities. To the end he
was a bit of a character; he’d escape from the care home (often in his dressing gown) and visit the
neighbourhood pub. I recall one time drinking with Mum and Dad when he appeared so enrobed.
Ken started his own business in construction. His son Chris ran the business after him. Reg was foreman of the
local council works department. Phyllis married a farmer, Arthur Bowman and I remember many visits to their
farm. On one of the earliest I actually saw a steam engine in use thrashing the corn. Eva married Bob Chilton,
a foreman at “Simmo’s” as they called the business. May married Albert Berridge who also worked for
“Simmo’s”. May was childless and always favoured me; so much so that she was like a second mother.
On Dad’s side, he had a brother, Tom, and sister, Mary. Dad and Tom were both active in politics as members of
the Conservative party. Dad was a great promoter of Margaret Thatcher as pushed hard for her to become
Prime Minister. I have a personal note from her to Dad and Mum on their 50th wedding anniversary. Dad also held
high office in the Masons and held various posts in local government.
When Dad retired at 55, he and Mum became involved in Dog Shows. They had a boxer, Max who won a lot of
awards around the country. So between, the Masons, politics and dog shows, Dad managed to keep busy in his
retirement.
After Mum died, Dad seemed to lose his way a bit. He was lonely. But his interest in the Masons kept him going
as well as his determination to outlive his mother. He drove and looked after himself until he died at 92.
As for myself, I’m basically a country boy although I dislike country music so now that I’m retired it’s natural to
have chosen a rural environment. Now don’t get me wrong, I’ve enjoyed living in cities but the relaxed pace of
country living just suits me better.
I remember when at 19 I worked in London with a 2 hour commute. Not a problem for a young man, I’d often just
stay for the evening after work. That was particularly true after I’d got involved with a couple of young women
with a flat just off Mayfair. Thank God for a young man’s stamina but it was refereeing their arguing that wore
me out in the end.
London was fun in the nineteen sixties; there was always something to do and the freedom to do it. Of course we
scandalised our parents’ generation with the licence we took; the pill, money in the pocket and our music, the
world was ours!
In those days, after the more restricted years after the war, sexually transmitted diseases were uncommon so
with the availability of the birth control pill suddenly there was no need to hold back on sex. That and the fact
that the shortages of the war were finally behind us and young people could afford to enjoy life freed us to let
down our hair without worrying about the cost.
It was different with Chicago, Linda and I were older and less the party animals. Of course it was great to be
able to take in the ballet or symphony after the years of living in the backwoods of Canada but we seldom felt
like making the effort, content to pick and choose. As an interlude, it was a great opportunity to make up for
the past dearth of social activity.
Now it’s not like Allegan is short of opportunity. Our home may be secluded but it is certainly not isolated.
Allegan itself has a lively social life and we are thirty minutes or less from the three main cities of Western
Michigan and only a couple of hours from Chicago itself. Unlike Woodstock, we can easily get to a major airline
hub so we can get away easily and visitors can find us without driving endless miles.
It’s a really lovely home and with over 12 acres has lots of room for our gardens and areas to play. And with the
lakeshore we have even more opportunities. From the dock, we can launch our kayaks or take the boat to enjoy
tubing or fishing on the 1500 acre Lake Allegan. With five bedrooms and four bathrooms, we can easily
accommodate friends and family. If pressed as we were in 2012, we can find more room and even pitch tents so
even 28 people weren’t falling over each other.
Buying the house in Allegan was made possible by years of putting aside money for our retirement. That was
something that took a bit of discipline for it was not always so easy to spare the money for building the nest egg.
And there were times the temptation to draw on it was almost overwhelming especially when finding money for
heating oil was a struggle or when we needed a new car.
We never shorted our children but we certainly shorted ourselves at times. I can recall driving the old Bonneville
to work on a subzero morning with no heater.
One purchase that we did make proved to be a real winner. To help out a friend I bought a camper. That opened
up a world of family fun. We were able to take trips and vacations at little cost but with great rewards. The boys
loved it! And it gave both Linda and I the opportunity of relaxing away from it all. As a return on investment I’d
have to say that was probably the most valuable we ever made.
One unusual thing about me is how I got my height. At 21, when I
joined the army I measured 5’11”(180cm). After commisioning,
at 22, I had grown to 6’0” (183 cm) as shown on my passport.
By the time I left the army at 25, I had gained another 3 inches
and stood 6’3” tall (191cm). Of course, I lost a bit of that when
the discs in my spine collapsed but regained it after the surgery.
As the surgeon told me, I played rugby a bit too long; well, all I
can say is that it was worth it!
Return to Part I
Return to Part II
To Return to my Home Page
The Autobiography
Part III
The Simpson family at my grandparents’ Golden Wedding 1954
The first was when I was attending a family Wedding in
New York state. I was called to attend a conference
which my company wanted me at. I made an agreement
that they would pick up the tab for my family to
accompany me. So after the wedding, instead of
heading home, we went to Toronto where I pulled into
the parking garage of the Delta Chelsea downtown with
my camping trailer in tow. The manoeuvres I went
through to park the trailer in a limited space were a
lesson in patience. Linda and the boys then had a great
time visiting the zoo, science museum and eating at
exotic places like the Spaghetti Factory. My family was
It was at the Holiday Inn at Brussels airport that it
was brought home to me that I was back in Europe.
When I went down to the Sauna I found I would be
sharing it with a family; father, Mother and daughter
about 11 or 12 years old completely naked. Never in
USA! The parents would have been whisked off to jail
and the girl to social services.So, while my wife and son
enjoyed the tourist thing in Brussels, I spent my days
visiting the factories in France and Belgium.
Definitely not the USA! Half naked women were
displaying their charms in the store-fronts. But it was
clean, no litter, no seediness. As we passed one
establishment featuring some kind of sex show we
were
invited in; “fun for the whole family” was the barker’s
inducement.
Then it was time to return to my parents in Britain for
their 50th anniversary. So with Colin in tow, we drove
back to the tunnel. Since Robert’s estranged daughter
was there, it was nice that we could have one of our
sons also in attendance.
The third of the memorable
trips was on a year’s end (the
McCain fiscal year ends 30th
June) celebration of a
particularly successful year.
It started with a week at the
Calgary Stampede and ended
with a week salmon fishing at a
camp in British Columbia. From
Calgary, we flew by ommercial
jet to Vancouver. There we
went down to the harbour to board a seaplane for the trip to the camp.
This was really well set-up with all the amenities including a whirlpool so
somewhat luxurious rather than the normal Spartan place fishing camps
tend to be.
As it was situated in a fiord nestled in the coastal mountains, the
scenery was spectacular. We each had guides to assist us when we went
out to fish. I’ve never been much of a fisherman but it was fun to take
the boat out into the bay and the fish were eager enough to take our
bait. We weren’t the only ones fishing; a great number of bald eagles
were doing the same. I never realized before but when an eagle drops
on a fish he goes into the water and it’s a remarkable sight to see them
bounce back up and take off with their prey.
