My memory falls back to a chilly south-westerly wind blowing with accompanying sleet one winter’s afternoon in 1969.

 

Our community was attending a funeral for a local resident. That’s what friends and neighbours always did, the digging and the burying at St. Columba’s Church north of Singleton in the Hunter River Valley, NSW.

 

Sheltering in the lee side of the church my cousin related his thoughts, “Well, there’s a book died with that man”. It’s been a comment that this author has reflected back to many times; although more than forty years were to elapse before I acted on that initial thought.

 

The basic catalyst to write of life itself has been the realisation that very few country people have ever done so. Therefore, their life histories have largely been obliterated by time. It hasn’t necessarily had anything to do with ability or education, life on the land is a full time occupation.

 

Also, it’s a question of importance requiring much resolve and in this case has taken more than a lustrum to achieve this biographical history.

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