John O'Neill's memory board

The Life of John O’Neill written by John O'Neill Jnr Dad was born on the 28th August 1927. His father, John, was originally married to Bridget O’Neill and they had 5 children before Bridget passed away. His father then met and married Alice, Dad’s mum, and together they had 8 children, with Dad being the youngest of 13 children. Dad came from good farming stock, with his grandfather and great uncle arriving in the 1850s to settle the O’Neill clan in Coffs Harbour, NSW. Dad always talked fondly of the farm, along with how poor they were. He frequently told us that they were so poor his parents couldn’t even afford middle names for the children! He also referred to playing footy (which being a New South Welshman meant Rugby Union) with a ball consisting of a large cow pat wrapped in an old shirt. You see they couldn’t afford to buy a real footy. Being Irish Catholics, the children attended the local Catholic Primary School. Dad always said Aunty Pat (Pat now being the only surviving sibling of the O’Neill Bakers Dozen) was a bit wild and led him astray. Aunty Pat never denied it, but said Dad was always in to it up to his neck. I think he and Aunty Pat were not the most dedicated of learners, being frequently disciplined by the Nuns of the school. Dad used to recall one particular morning at school, when he and Aunty Pat were playing up a bit, Aunty Pat got a bit of a serve by one particular Nun (Sister Severity as dad referred to her), and Aunty Pat had had enough of it, so she absconded through the open classroom window. Well, Sister Severity was on to her and promptly shut the window sash on to Aunty Pat’s back and proceeded to administer the appropriate discipline of the time. Dad pushed her away and they both shot through, straight out of the window and ran home to tell their mum. Alice decided enough was enough, returning to the school to withdraw all the O’Neill children from the school, never to return again. In 1942 and after being a farm labourer for a couple of years, Dad’s desire to become a serviceman led him to enlist in the Army and entered basic training. However, it wasn’t long before the Army realised that something wasn’t quite right, only to find out that Dad was only 15 years old. They promptly sent him home with his tail between his legs. Well, that didn’t deter Dad, and at the appropriate age, he enlisted in the Air Force which was to be his career of choice. The Air Force was good to Dad and good for Dad. His service in the RAAF allowed him to travel the world as a young man, working in places like Papua New Guinea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Manilla, Japan and all over Australia also. No doubt there was a range of other places in the world he worked as well, that we were not made aware of. You see Dad was a bit of a dark horse, and played his cards pretty close to his chest, only really sharing information he felt necessary to be shared. Now, in Perth and around 1957, he met a pretty tennis playing receptionist by the name of Merle Estelle McNally, fell in love and they were married on 11th Feb 1958. They had three beautiful children, one a little more beautiful than the other two, and one a little odd…. That being Susan as she was born in Victoria with Jenny and I being born here in Perth. Let’s face it Sue’s still a little odd being a Dockers supporter and all! How that happened I am still trying to come to terms with. Dad’s life in the RAAF permitted him to be a great provider. As kids we really didn’t go without, not spoilt by any means, but never really went without. We were fortunate being Airforce kids, we travelled the world in first class with QANTAS and had the privilege to live abroad in our primary school years. We loved living in Hong Kong and Singapore which we have many fond memories of. We lived in a range of Armed Forces Accommodation until Mum and Dad bought land in Morley and built their AV Jennings home at No. 5 Hollett Road, Morley. This was our childhood home. There was always a pet or two in our house and Dad, holding the highest rank in the house, always felt he had the naming rights. Timmy was a runty little Australian Silky Terrier which resembled a rat. Timmy loved Dad and used to roll on his shoes when commanded by Dad to ‘clean my shoes’. Yes he loved Dad, but hated everyone else. Timmy became a little aggressive and after nearly ripping my arm from body and bailing Jennifer up in the laundry trough, Dad found Timmy a new home with a lovely family on a farm. ‘On a farm’ was code for the Vet and little runty Timmy had gone to meet his maker! This we found out some 30 years later. Dad had a real skill in naming pets, or so he thought! So we had Sandi, Brandi, Shandi, Candi, Sophie and Timmy to name just a few. Not really very creative on the naming of animals was our Dad. Nor his son come to think of it. At least he couldn’t forget my name! Being an avid gardener, Dad always took pride in his gardens in which he spent countless hours cultivating prized specimens. He loved to stick his nose over the neighbours’ fence just to check they didn’t have anything special requiring a cutting to be obtained for his own garden. He proudly displayed his Gerberas in the Perth Royal Show gaining prizes and commendations. As kids, we can remember the infamous Sunday afternoon drives, where we were dragged kicking and screaming to look at gardens around the suburbs and wildflowers in the Swan Valley. The only good thing about the infamous Sunday afternoon drive was we got to have an icecream as we headed home. A 5 c Ducky Double or Twin Pole I recall, while Dad always got the 15c Drums Stick. How things have changed. Dad was discharged from the Air Force in 1976, holding the rank of Warrant Officer. The RAAF wanted to promote Dad to an NCO post overseas, but Dad felt it wasn’t the right thing to do as the girls were in high school and we had not long returned from Singapore. So his Air Force days had come to an end. On leaving the RAAF, he then worked for Boans as Operations Manager before spending the final years of his working life as a Magistrates Court Usher with Judge Ivan Gunning. In 1977, Mum and Dad decided to sell the Morley house and we moved to the newer northern suburb of Greenwood where we lived our teenaged years at No. 8 Redgum Street. Sadly in 1983, at the age of 52, mum passed away after a courageous battle with cancer. However, in true Air Force tradition, we soldiered on, but we could see this was a great loss for dad. Dad never remarried and I guess in many ways, following his retirement and the loss of mum, he chose to become an isolate enjoying his own company, smoking his 3 packets of cigarettes per day, consuming copious cups of tea, enduring fairly frequent migraines, enjoying the odd splurge on the pokies at the casino and tending to his garden. He was never a drinker and I think I can only remember him having one or two small shandies at Christmas on the odd occasion. With his smoking, we always said to Dad, ‘Why don’t you quit smoking Dad? His reply was simple, “I’m no quitter son!” or “It’s not that I don’t have enough will power, I have too much won’t power”. Well, a few years later after spending a couple of stints in hospital due to two heart attacks, Dad came out of hospital a non-smoker. Just like that! Well, I guess he had finally found the will power to give up! Around 1998, Dad finally realised the Greenwood house was too big for him and the gardens were getting away from him. He decided to sell and move to a duplex where the owners of the other side dragged dad, screaming an kicking, to the Quinns Rocks Senior Citizens Club, where he became quite a social being, playing cards and bingo. From our perspective, this was quite out of character. This new found social life led Dad to sell up again in 2000, moving to the RAAFA Estate to be around like minded service people. The RAAF Estate was his final home, living a great life there for the next 15 years. Whilst there, his social prowess continued to develop to the point we nearly had to ring and book in a time for a visit. No point in just dropping in as he was never home! Dad had become a social butterfly, a non-smoking, card playing, Bingo enthusiast who surprisingly drank scotch! He was the master of the 4 o’clock drinks which commenced promptly at 3.20pm! Remember I said Dad played things pretty close to his chest? Well I can remember sitting on the balcony at Rottnest one year, just before Dad moved to the RAAFA Estate, and my sister asked me had I spoken to dad lately. “What do you mean?” I inquired. “Have you spoken to dad?” What the heck are you on about I thought… You see, evidently Dad’s work in the Air Force had not been exactly what we had been told it was. He wasn’t simply in telecommunications, he had actually been an operative with a skill in code breaking, the application of listening devices and interception of radio messages. We also found out when he left the RAAF he was approached by ASIO to work with them. Dad declined that offer. But wait, it gets better, on moving Dad into the RAAFA Estate, whilst unpacking and settling him in, we came across an old pack of playing cards. This box didn’t have cards in it but it rattled. “What’s this Dad?” I asked. He took the box, opened it and poured the contents into his hand. It was a necklace and some earrings. “Ah” he said, “these belonged to my first wife. Your mother would never wear them.” “Your what?” I exclaimed (well, I am pretty sure they may not have been the exact words I used) “They were my first wife’s. Didn’t you know?” Know? Know? Noone knew!! Dad was married very young to a lady called Patricia Elizabeth Foord. Sadly, Patricia and their baby were lost during childbirth and Dad never spoke of them. Over the last ten years we consistently asked Dad to write down his memoirs or leave a verbal account of his working life but he refused. He always said he had signed the secrecy act and that was that! Sadly he kept his word! Dad was bestowed a range of medals reflecting his service in the RAAF. However, in 2007 on his 80th birthday, he received the award he was most proud of, an OBE! Well it wasn’t the Order of the British Empire, but the Over Bloody Eighty award bestowed upon him by his Granddaughter Melissa. This award was proudly on display in his room which he showed to everyone who entered. At the RAAFA Estate, Dad had many friends. He always spoke highly of Ted Pearsall, Hocky Ellery, Hester Simmons and his great friend Mary Lockwood (now all deceased) and a range of other close friends including Molly Coarse (his long time neighbour) and of course Ellen Cox. Over the last few years of Dad’s life, Ellen was a great and dear friend to Dad and Ellen your infectious effervescence certainly rubbed off on him in a really positive way. Dad’s sense of humour got better with age. He had a few cheeky nick names for some of the residents (or inmates) up at the RAAFA Estate as well. He used to talk about Pimple Bum, the Blow Fly and Happy Bum to name a few. Some of the others I don’t dare repeat! Obviously their identities will remain anonymous to protect the innocent and just to let you know, none of them are gathered here today! Or are they?? Towards the end Dad knew he was suffering with the early stages of dementia. His short term memory was slowly drifting from him a little more frequently, but he never lost his sense of humour. Being the teacher I am, I liked to test his memory on a few things each time I visited. For example, I liked to have him try and recall the weekly menu up at the RAAFA Estate. So we used to say, “Hey Dad what did you have for dessert last night. At that he scoffed and said, “You know the answer to that… it’s always the same, some kind of crumble, peach crumble, apply crumble, peach and apple crumble you know”. But one day he said with wide eyes, “Oh we had that other thing, you know (he paused for a while as his memory had eluded him again) that thing, dirty, um, dirty snake thing”. “Dirty Snake what?” said Candi. Well Dad burst into laughter cackling something about, No, no that wasn’t right, but he couldn’t quite think of what it was. He was laughing so hard like I had never seen him laugh before. With tears of laughter rolling down his face, Candi hysterical beside him, we finally worked out what hell was on about! It wasn’t dirty snake anything but Sticky Date Pudding! Even with his memory failing him, Dad could certainly still see the funny side of life. Well on the 30th September this year, the caring staff at the RAAFA Estate checked on Dad at approximately 6am. He was still sleeping soundly so they let him sleep and returned at 7am to find that Dad had peacefully slipped away in his sleep. 88 Years on this earth was a pretty decent innings. Dad, you were a proud Airman through and through who served your country with pride. We will miss you. Rest in Peace Dad.