“FOR THE LOVE OF MIKE” Autobiography by John Pearce – OBE Formatted by Bruce Carty – Ph.D. CHAPTER 1. There is a temptation to start with the line "I was born at an early age." But, I can top that. I wasn't supposed to be born at all! Oh, nothing to do with lack of contraceptive knowledge back in those pre-pill days, days when men walked into pharmacies, asking to speak to "the male chemist". I was born because my brother had died. My dear old Pommy dad was the last of the line. It was a pretty long line, dating back several centuries, and having a title somewhere - probably lost due to non-payment of rates, or other handouts demanded of the King of the day. Preservation of the line meant a lot in those days. My dad had two of sisters who had also come to live in Australia. They both married, but none of them to anyone called Pearce. My dad's firstborn was Edward; but, at the age of about eleven, he died of something people don't much die of these days {well, not as much as they did} - rheumatic fever. By this time my sister was very much alive, a couple of years younger than the lamented late Ted. But she would never be a male Pearce, able to carry on the name. And that's where I came into being. I've never believed I have lived on borrowed time, but, if Edward has been sitting on a cloud "up there" watching all these years, thank you, older brother, for letting me have a great life. Amazing the progress in relatively few years. My mother and father were born in the same year that Daimler Benz patented the motor car. They lived to see a man on the moon. I was born at about the time when the first commercial radio station came into being in Australia. First memories? I don't think I ever liked my mother. {And there's one for the psychologists!}. Loved her I may have. But I certainly have no memories of "like". And I do have memories of dislike. Not that she was not a remarkable woman. A several generation Australian, her family came from the manufacturing side of the tracks. My sister, one with a far better penchant for detail than I, has the family tree on the Pearce side, accurately detailed back to the titled gent in England centuries ago. On our mum's side things were somewhat vaguer. They say that, if you scratch any Australian deep enough, you'll find Irish. There was certainly some O'Meras down there somewhere. However, one of her forbears went into manufacturing, and cornered a market in a product. Years later, some cousins and I sold our share in what had then become a fairly important conglomerate to an Australian multi-national. Along the lines, my mum had acquired the ability to handle money. She worked to a simple principle: if you don't spend it, you have a lot of it left. Was she mean? Damn right she was! As a kid, I was sent to do the family shopping on Saturday mornings, equipped with a list of where to shop, what to buy, and how much not to spend. I had to keep a list of what I spent, and answer an inquisition upon return. I hated that bit. Mind you, all this was very handy when my dear old Pommy dad made a business miscalculation and was bankrupted. Mother's ability to stretch the pennies kept us going. Maybe it was a sign on the times, but I remember her as a terrible snob. A neighbour, a little looked down upon because he was a wholesale fruit and veg dealer and a very rich one, whereas my dad, an accountant in his own business, and "professional", remarried. But his second wife {they said in whispered tones} had been a barmaid at the pub near the fruit markets. I was almost banned from playing with the son of the family. This would have been a pity, as they lived on a double block in suburban Hurstville, and had rolled out a cricket wicket, which was where I practised my left arm spinners. I shall always remember the time these neighbours moved. We lived in a two-storey house. It had not been two-storeyed to start with, but we had built upon a quite humble weatherboard house, quadrupling it in size, and boasting such things as a billiard room. Into this room - upstairs front - on the day of the move . my mother. She had made herself a Thermos of coffee {she didn't drink tea}, and had cut some sandwiches. Never having been invited into the house opposite - probably because she had never invited them to our place – mother watched each article of furniture taken out into the vans of Grace Bros Removals. It was her day. Snobbery went a little further. Our local doctor, a general practitioner, specialising in surgery, had been long cultivated socially. Indeed, my mum spoke of his wife as "Mrs Doctor Smith". In one way I was glad, as the medico's two sons went into their dad's calling, one of them becoming my best man when my bride and I flew up from Hobart to marry in the old School Chapel at Shore, and didn't have any male friends to stand at my elbow. Mother was a wonderful shopper. She understood she had the one thing going for her that assured a win - time. If she wanted something, she rang David Jones, and demanded to speak to the buyer of the relevant department. No-one else would do. If the buyer wasn't available, she would wait, right there on the telephone. When the hapless buyer came along, mother would use the same opening line, "I am an account customer". This was before the days when department stores handed out accounts to anyone who could write their name in running writing. And Bankcard hadn't been invented. She would then berate the official until she got what she wanted. At his end, he saw the clock upon his office wall ticking along, and, realising the inevitable, gave in. She would then tell us, with great pride, of her success. Mother never joined anything unless she could run it. She was certainly the boss of the women’s' committee of the U.A.P., the right wing political party that fell to bits, to be resurrected by Bob Menzies when he formed the Liberals. I have memories of the large political meetings taking place at home. I don't know if much political discussion took place, but the meetings, held in our billiard room, were very social. Or as social as Hurstville could expect to be. Brought up when she was, mother had some wonderful manual homemaking skills. She knitted. Never stopped. With three chromed needles, she knitted my father's socks. They were of the finest quality wool, but I suspect were less than fashionable. And, when they wore out, they were darned. Everything was darned! We only threw out things when the amount of darning exceeded the amount of the original garment. Dad had enough money for three assistants in the home. One day each week, a lady came to do the washing. This started with the cutting of wood to boil the copper. Took one whole day. Dad had no interest in gardening - and I have inherited that. So we had a garden requiring minimum maintenance, and a chap came in to do it. Never knew my old man behind a lawn mower. It would have been out of character. And we had a live-in maid. For the princely sum of one pound {two dollars, though worth a lot more in today's living standards} per week plus keep, she worked six days and nights. She was permitted a day off, and, in addition, only one other night out. But she had to be back by nine- thirty. Sounds like slave labour? We were in Depression times, and people were queued up to work for that, and even less. In contrast with her many other talents, mum was a lousy cook. She had no interest in the culinary arts. On the maid's day off, we seemed to eat those dishes that had been prepared for us. Overall, there was no food problem that couldn't be overcome by putting another couple of cups of water into yesterday's stew. Dad was allowed to cook Sunday tea. He screwed a mincing machine to the kitchen table, took all the leftovers from the fridge {we had one of the first ones, better than others' ice chests}, and chucked them, with spices, into a hot pan. I seem to recall it was the meal I most looked forward to all week! That same kitchen and table was once recreated into an operating theatre, to remove my tonsils. There was quite a little bit of home surgery in those days. I knew the facts, but never understood, of how my early education got completely mucked up. I was just two years of age, and the family, parents, sister and I, were on holiday. We boarded a ship in Melbourne for Launceston, Tasmania. Somewhere mid Bass Strait, the folks ran afoul of either a head shrinker, psychiatrist or phrenologist. He examined little two year old me and pronounced, "This boy will become a genius. Don't send him to school until he's eight." For far too long they believed him.