OBITUARIES

GEOFFREY ALAN WILKIN (54-61)

BORN 4 NOVEMBER 1942, DIED 9 MAY 2022, AGED 79

The 1961 Speech Day programme records Geoff as receiving a Newcastle upon Tyne City Council Scholarship and securing A-Levels in Pure Mathematics & Mechanics (Distinction), Physics and Chemistry.

A degree in Physics from King’s College Newcastle followed, leading to an engineering career, initially with Morganite and then with IRD of Heaton. Colleagues remember his association with the IRD Walking Group.

JOHN NEVILLE HILTON COX (50-57)

BORN 4 DECEMBER 1937, DIED 21 SEPTEMBER 2021, AGED 83

Born and brought up in Heaton to Mary and Geoff Wilkin, an only child, he entered the second form in 1954. His father had a shipbuilding background with Swan Hunter of Wallsend.

School records reflect Geoff’s broad interests and talents. Unrecorded were his quiet sociability and an insatiable curiosity, particularly for things mechanical.

In 1955 he won first prize in a competition for sketches and essays organised by the Northern Architectural Association, (ahead of CN Dodds (48-59) and BC Syrett (55-61), who received second, and third prizes respectively).

Geoff was awarded rowing colours in 1961 and as Captain of the Boat Club wrote pieces for The Novocastrian

Geoff met Sue in 1966, marrying in May 1968 before settling in Cramlington, where he become a local councillor in retirement. He is remembered as a kind and thoughtful husband and parent to Helen (who briefly taught Chemistry at RGS), Sarah, Katie and Louise, as a grandparent and as a loyal friend.

Geoff succumbed to Lewy body dementia after a long and distressing illness. He is survived by Sue and his four loving daughters and by grandchildren.

Peter Robinson (54-60)

Geoff (centre front) as Captain and Secretary of The Boat Club with the A and B crews in 1961.

John Cox’s life journey came to a close on 21 September 2021 after 83 years. His surviving RGS contemporaries will universally cherish affectionate memories of a popular, genial young man who contributed enthusiastically and responsibly to a variety of school activities. He played a convincing Malvolio in the Fourth Form production of Twelfth Night. John became captain of RGS Boat Club and, unusual for a six-footer, was a member of the RGS Gym team.

A CCF cadet throughout his school career, John transferred to the RAF section where he was awarded a Flying Scholarship. He obtained his pilot’s licence flying in Tiger Moths and, following the completion of A-Level examinations, he invited a classmate to accompany him in an Auster Autocrat as he added another hour to his pilot’s log. John’s natural affability and good manners made him a clear candidate for Head Boy, a role he accepted in 1956.

At Cambridge, John read Natural Sciences, rowed in his college boat and flew with the University Air Squadron. John spent much of his working life with BP, particularly at Hull making organic chemicals before moving into the company’s Personnel department. After retiring from BP in 1991 he turned to charitable work particularly in Central Europe.

In retirement John enjoyed painting and travel, particularly in Australia and New Zealand. He settled in London, attracted by the museums, lectures and art exhibitions.

John was devoted to his family: son Richard, daughters Helen and Sarah and his seven grandchildren.

GEORGE ROBERT COTTRELL (34-41)

BORN 29 MAY 1923, DIED 15 SEPTEMBER 2022, AGED 99 also served the community as a volunteer driver taking patients to and from St. Oswald’s Hospice. As a member of Heaton Rotary Group he was proud to be chosen as their President for the year 1989-90 and remained an active Rotarian until the end of his life, continuing charity collections outside supermarkets well into his 90s.

In 1941 George began his medical education at King’s College Newcastle, then a part of the University of Durham. On account of the war, they had four terms each year and no long summer vacation so he graduated quite early in December 1945. His first job after qualifying was as a houseman in Ashington Hospital, which in those pre-NHS days was a joint venture between Ashington Coal Company and the NUM.

George was born in Elswick and lived in Tyneside all his life, apart from his war service in Germany after the second world war. In 1934 he received a Governors’ Scholarship to the RGS, his primary education having been at Westgate Hill Council School. He passed his School Certificate in 1939, weeks before the outbreak of the second world war and was evacuated to Penrith for his two Sixth Form years: so began his lifelong love for the Lake District. He was very fit as a young man, captaining the crosscountry running team while at RGS and on at least one occasion cycling all the way from Newcastle to the Lake District over Hartside Pass. He also had the honour of becoming a school prefect.

He learnt violin at RGS and played in the First Orchestra; music remained very important to him throughout his life, and he spent many years singing bass in the choir at Heaton Methodist Church. He was a keen follower of the Northern Sinfonia from the early City Hall days through to the Sage. His last visit there was on New Year’s Day 2022, when the fire alarm went off just before the interval. Many people gave up and went home at that point, but he was eager to go back for the second part, and shivered outside in his wheelchair for 20 minutes. As he became less mobile, and especially during lockdown, he spent a lot of his time listening to concerts from all over the world on YouTube.

In 1948, just after the founding of the NHS, he worked as a house physician at Newcastle General Hospital, then decided on general practice as a career. After assistantships in Benwell and Walkerville, he became a partner in the latter practice and stayed there until he retired in 1983, being very well loved by his patients, remaining with that practice as a patient himself until he moved to Jesmond in 2016 –a total of 66 years!

George became a friend of an RGS contemporary, Arthur Hughes (34-41), who invited him to Arthur’s sister Joan’s 21st birthday party in 1942. Romance blossomed and they were married in September 1946 so that Joan subsequently became our mother. However, arrangements around the wedding were not that simple! Although the war was over in 1946, he was called up and had to undertake four weeks military training. On returning home for two weeks of embarkation leave on the 14 September for his wedding on the 16th, he didn’t know whether he would be posted to the Far East or Germany. On return from their honeymoon in the Lake District, he found that his posting was to Germany, and he ended up as a garrison medical officer in Münster.

George had many interests outside his work. His Christian faith was a significant aspect of who he was. Brought up in the Plymouth Brethren, he joined Heaton Methodist Church after marrying Joan, who was a lifelong member. He served the church in multiple roles until it closed a couple of years ago. After retirement, he

General practice in those days was very demanding but he still managed to spend time with his family, and holidays were very important to him. We sons have many happy memories of caravan holidays from the 1960s onwards, in the UK as well as France and Switzerland. He was really quite adventurous in taking a caravan to Europe in the 1960s, before the days of satnavs and mobile phones! There were many scares on those holidays –including one time when the caravan towbar almost severed in two –so it’s testament to his determination and spirit of adventure that he continued with his continental touring.

Over the last several years, he enjoyed attending the ONA Dinner with son David Cottrell (60-70): his last attendance was in October 2021 when we’re sure he was the oldest Old Novocastrian there. He particularly liked it when the President drank a toast with those who were at the school during the reign of King George Vth!

It is always sad to say goodbye to a loved one, but we are very happy to have been close to such a caring and loving man: a true gentleman.

By Andrew Cottrell (58-68), David Cottrell (60-70) and Robert Cottrell (65-74).

MALCOLM HARRY DUNN (60-61)

BORN 22 OCTOBER 1942, DIED 25 FEBRUARY 2021, AGED 79 sources and techniques he established. Some of his most highly cited work was in the field of electromagnetically-induced transparency, which grew from his early spectroscopy work demonstrating the practical application of laser sources.

Malcolm Dunn joined the Physics Department at the University of St Andrews as a PhD student in 1965. In a career of over 50 years he made an outstanding contribution to its rise to among the very best in the UK.

Schooled at Stockton-on-Tees Grammar School and RGS Newcastle, Malcolm’s talents were noted in a long line of outstanding school reports. His natural curiosity was, and remained, wide ranging. Awarded a state scholarship to Cambridge, he wasted no time arranging a position at Parsons Nuclear Power Research Section, Fossway to fill time between scholarship exams and going up to Peterhouse. He was awarded the William Baron Kelvin Scholarship for his final year and in 1965 he was offered a PhD scholarship by Aaron Klug, his physics tutor. He chose instead to join Arthur Maitland with whom he had worked at Parsons. Arthur Maitland had, by this time, moved to the University of St Andrews to establish work in the emerging field of laser physics. Malcolm, Arthur Maitland and, later, Tony Smith were at the heart of this early laser work at St Andrews. From these pioneering beginnings, the School of Physics & Astronomy today has become an internationally renowned centre of research.

Malcolm was appointed as a lecturer in the Department of Physics at St Andrews in 1968. Much of Malcom’s research activity was driven by his keen eye for new application areas for the laser

It was not just in research that Malcolm excelled. Regarded as an outstanding lecturer he taught a wide range of general physics undergraduate courses and specialist laser physics, nonlinear and quantum optics courses to postgraduates. Malcolm placed great emphasis on the quality and craft of “doing” science. A generation of undergraduate and postgraduate students benefited from his keen insight and talent for explaining things from first principles. Among his notes and papers were a collection of postcards sent from exotic destinations by students who attended his advanced lasers course over the years. He would press upon them that only two fundamental rate equations were required in order to derive the key dynamic properties of a laser and that they should commit them to memory in case they became stranded on a desert island and needed them (to his – and the students’ –credit, most of the postcards gave the correct form of equations).

In 1990 Malcolm was appointed Professor of Photonics and in 1992 elected to a Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. He served as Head of the School of Physics and Astronomy (19941997) and Vice-Principal for Research (2001-2003). In this last role he was responsible for the promotion, strategic development and evaluation of research across the University.

Malcolm always maintained a focus on the wider societal benefits of university research. In order to bridge the gap between university research and its commercial exploitation he was keen to promote interaction with industry. While Malcolm was obviously incredibly well organised, moving fast through the building with his watch beeping the half hours, he never seemed to be under stress but radiated a positive attitude that was invaluable during his period as Head of School. He was always a pleasure to talk to because of the interest he took in others’ research. Malcolm read widely in science and literature and had a particular love of poetry. He had a lifelong interest in photography and a fascination with the lesser-known work of James Clerk Maxwell on optics. He was scrupulously fair in his dealing with others, especially in acknowledging their contribution to his work.

He is survived by his wife Catherine and daughters Sarah and Ruth and remembered with great affection by his many students and colleagues.

Obituary compiled by colleagues, friends and family, a fuller version is available online.

ROGER HENNESSEY (STAFF 62-73)

DIED 25 AUGUST 2022, AGED 84

JAMES ‘JIM’ ALAN SKEVINGTON (39-47)

BORN 6 MARCH 1929, DIED 19 AUGUST 2021, AGED 92

My father, Roger Hennessey, who has died aged 84, was an inspirational teacher at the RGS Newcastle from 1962 to 1973, and an effective head of the school’s economics department. After the RGS, Roger was an HMI – a schools’ inspector – from 1973 until his retirement in 1992, latterly becoming the staff inspector of history.

Roger was born in Hammersmith, west London. He was the son of a Royal Navy officer, Sydney, who commanded HMS Scott on D-Day. An only child, Roger grew up with his mother, Winifred (nee Palmer), when his father was away at sea. He eagerly anticipated his father’s shore leave, which invariably began with an understated message from a phone box asking for “the kettle to be put on”.

After education at Epsom College, Surrey, and national service with the Army Catering Corps, Roger read History at Downing College, Cambridge, specialising in the British economy from 1870 to 1940. He graduated in 1960, completed a postgraduate certificate in education in 1961, and joined the RGS the following year. The headteacher, Mr Hayden, wanted to broaden the curriculum and tasked Roger with establishing an Economics department.

He also edited the school’s Old Novocastrians’ Association magazine and wrote a number of secondary school textbooks for the Batsford Past-intoPresent Series, including Transport (1966), Factories (1969) and Railways (1973).

In 1963 Roger married Penelope Coningham, my mother. Although my parents divorced in 1991, they maintained an affection for each other and a shared interest in their three children and four grandchildren.

His time as staff inspector of History coincided with the first national curriculum for History being devised. The chairman of the History Working Group, Michael Saunders Watson, wrote in the foreword to the final report: “I wish to single out the quite outstanding support we have received from our observer representative of Her Majesty’s Inspectorate, Mr Roger Hennessey.”

Around this time Roger met Jennifer Worsfold, who was in charge of the History Working Group’s secretariat, and they married in 1995.

Tempted by generous terms offered when Ofsted was established, Roger retired from the inspectorate in 1992. In retirement he published more books, including Worlds Without End (1999) and Atlantic: The Well-Beloved Engine (2002). Jennifer was diagnosed with dementia in the early 2000s and died in 2016. Roger is survived by his children, Emma, Jasper and Justin, and grandchildren.

Justin Hennessey

James was born in Newcastle. At the age of 10 he was evacuated at the beginning of the war to Penrith where he stayed with Mr and Mrs Pearson until the end of the war. When he finished his schooling in 1947 he joined an Insurance Company and soon he was transferred to South Africa in 1953. He arrived on a Union Castle ship in Cape Town, travelled to Johannesburg by train, until 1962, then transferred to Durban until his retirement.

James was very involved with charity work and appeared in various local shows as a compere, reciting monologues, the most famous being Albert and the Lion which was enjoyed by old and young. He also sang in the Durban Symphonic choir and sang in many shows.

He enjoyed sport and ran the gruelling Comrades’ Marathon from Durban to Pietermaritzburg ten times obtaining his green number in perpetuity and running many other races. He was secretary of the Bluff Athletic Club, also producing the monthly newsletter.

Frail with dementia, Parkinson’s disease started five years ago and became worse in the last two years. James died in the St Augustine’s hospital, survived by his wife of 46 years, Lorraine.

Lorraine Skevington