In normal daily life it is rare that anyone asks me about my late father. To be fair, I do not often ask other people about theirs. We are too busy, caught up in our own lives.
Yet I think about him often. Today, 9 December 2023, marks the 40th anniversary of his death. He was aged only 54 and had been admitted to hospital for a coronary by-pass operation, but passed away before the surgery took place.
He had been fit and active all his life. He was born in 1929 to an Armenian father and English mother and grew up near Ealing, west London. He worked for a time in his father’s antiques and carpets business, before moving on to work for an electronics company. He met my mum whilst they were both working for Ultra Electronics in Perivale in the mid 1950’s and they married in 1957, moving into a new detached house in Ickenham, a suburb of London which had a pleasant, village feel. I was their first child, in 1959 and was later joined by a sister and then a brother.
Dad stayed at Ultras, working as an electrical maintenance engineer until 1974 when he moved to a similar role at EMI, better known as a record label, although he worked in a totally different division, building electronic equipment.
At home, he always kept busy, outdoors mostly, such as in tackling jobs in the garden or doing all his own maintenance on the house or the car. One end of the garage comprised his workbench, full of tools and surrounded by odd pieces of scrap metal and wood which might be of use. He once built me a magnificent go-cart, which my friends and I loved to ride around the garden. My parents had landscaped the garden, to include a pond, which my friends and I loved to play in.
He had numerous interests over the years, from collecting coins, Victorian bottles, fossils, flint arrow-heads, attending philosophy evening classes, and a keen interest in watches, cameras, and guns – to name a few. He enjoyed the novels of Nevil Shute and was keen on old films, having been to the cinema’s matinee club, every week for a year as a child, knowing all the Hollywood greats.
If we visited a town centre together, we would always pause at watch shop windows, and pass judgment on all the watches on display and pick our favourite. As a young man he was proud of his Heuer Chronograph. I recall that, as his tastes changed, he bought a Rolex GMT Master, but after a few years, swapped this for a Rolex Submariner (or it might have been the other way round). He then tried the new Bulova Accutron, before eventually coming full circle and reverting to simple, inexpensive hand-wound mechanical watches such as Sekondas, that he did not need to worry about.
I remember him trying numerous different, mainly 35mm cameras too, from a Contax, to a heavy Russian Zenith E (his first SLR camera), a Petri TTL, then an Olympus OM1, his favourite. There were many others, including a Konica with one of the first auto-focus systems, a tiny metal Minox “spy camera” and a Zorki 4.
His other most enduring hobby was shooting. He held a firearms licence and, as with his watches and cameras, progressed through a number of different models. He often took me with him to Bisley ranges on a Saturday morning, or to our local gun club, from the age of about 6 onwards. When I later went to a boarding school and joined the cadet force, I did at least have one advantage in that I was already familiar with handguns and rifles. Dad had owned dozens of different models.
He had not been interested in fountain pens, but if he had, I imagine that he would have gone through a similar journey as he did with his watches, cameras and guns, always wanting to try something else, before eventually concluding that he needed only something simple and inexpensive.
As a young man he took an interest in law and liked to discuss legal issues with an acquaintance who was an in-house solicitor for a large corporation. He was happy that I was to go into the legal profession. By the time he died, I was 24 and had been working as a trainee solicitor (then called an articled clerk) for two years and was due to qualify in March of 1984, embarking on a career of almost 40 years as a solicitor in private practice.
Memories of my dad often pop into my head and catch me unawares. About 10 years ago, I compiled a list of some that I could remember, giving them each a key word or words and then sorting them alphabetically in a mobile phone app called Colornote. I continued to add to my list for some time, before writing up these fragments of childhood recollections, one by one, with a fountain pen in an A5 journal. I tried to set aside an hour on Thursday mornings, when I could rise early and enjoy some quiet time with a pen and notebook. Within a few months I had “written a book”, albeit of significance only to myself. It felt good to have these memories down, in case I forget them later. I have since given this to my niece Emma, who missed out on knowing her grandfather by a few years. I was to repeat the writing process later with memories of my mum, then my school days and then college years. It was an enjoyable and satisfying process which I would recommend.
A few weeks ago, it occurred to me that my dad’s date of death, 9th December or 912, was also a model of a Pilot Custom Heritage fountain pen that I liked. I toyed with the idea of buying one in his memory, although admittedly that seemed a weak excuse to buy yet another pen. However, when my wife was in Hong Kong recently and asked whether there was anything I would like her to get for me, the idea of the Pilot CH912 was at the front of my mind. She very kindly tracked one down on her last full day there, with my first choice of a Waverly (WA) nib as requested. I love it. I like to think that dad would appreciate his 40th anniversary being remembered and marked in this way.
Fountain pen blog 
Wonderful post. And what a memory you have. Thank you for sharing.
Also, it’s a good thing that pen shop is far away. If I were to visit it, I don’t think I’d be out before 2034!!
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Thanks Jonathan. I agree with you about the pen shop: this was just one of several that my wife visited, to find the pen I had requested. If I had been there too, we may not have made it on time for our flight home.
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Touching piece (and reminds me the next time I go to Hong Kong it might not just be a suit I come back with…).
The bit about the cameras reminded me that my first SLR was an old Zenit (3 or 3M I think) which my father had used possibly as far back as when he met my mother at the Southport Photography club. He had passed it on to my mother and it had eventually ended up in a cupboard until I found it and started using it. One thing I particularly remember about the model was that when you wound on the film the mirror was brought up so you could no longer see through the view finder until you pressed the trigger ….
It was replaced by a Zenit 11 I was given for free by a friend, a ‘modern’ version of your father’s E, before I bought a second hand Ricoh KR-10 Super, which lasted me about 15 years.
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What an excellent article this is. Beautifully written and very touching. I am so sorry that you lost your father early. My late father was born the same year as yours.
It’s certainly is a very small world. I grew up near Ealing and went to school there. I still live locally, close to Gunnersbury Park. I work as a Solicitor Advocate and frequently pass through Ickenham on the way to Uxbridge Magistrates Court. There is still an Armenian community in Ealing and they have a centre close to Northfields Underground Station and another near Acton Town tube. A young lady from that community was a pupil barrister in a law firm that I once worked for and she used to shadow me on Court visits. She is now in chambers and I sometimes bump into her at various Crown Courts around Greater London.
The final coincidence concerns the Zenith E camera. I too had one of these in the early 1980s. It was my first SLR and took excellent photos. Another Russian camera that I had around this time was a Zorki 4K rangefinder. It was the closest I ever got to owning a Leica! Russian cameras were popular with youngsters in the UK as they were much cheaper than the Japanese alternatives. The next step up was the Praktica, which was made in the equally illiberal East Germany (“German Democratic Republic”- how about that for irony?). From memory, I think that Dixons sold the Prakticas and they possessed an internal light meter. In contrast, the Zenith E had an external selenium cell meter on the front of the camera just beneath the prism.
Incidentally, Contax was based around Dresden before the Second World War and I believe that the factory was damaged in the bombing. After the Soviets occupied the area, the manufacturing equipment contained in the factory was carted off to the Ukraine as war booty and was used to produce copies of the pre-war Contax under the label “Kiev”. I believe that Kiev cameras continued in production up until the 1980s.
Thanks for sharing these precious memories with your readers.
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Thankyou Adrian. How interesting that we have so much in common! I was an articled clerk at a firm in Ruislip (from 1981-84) and went to Uxbridge Magistrates’ Court a few times. The senior partner did a lot of advocacy there and I had an interesting time, often attending the Crown Court hearings with counsel at Reading, Aylesbury, Newbury, Wood Green and the Middlesex Guildhall.
I have fond memories of Ickenham and enjoy any opportunity to go back.
I inherited my dad’s passion for cameras and have a few East German models, such as the rather unusual Zeiss Werra, which required a twist of the lens to wind on and cock the shutter. I developed (no pun intended) a bit of an addiction to collecting vintage cameras and was only cured of this when I got into fountain pens.
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Thanks Gary. Reading your recollections of the Zenith cameras reminded me of using ours. My dad gave me his, when he got his next camera. I recall that you had to focus at full aperture, and then remember to turn a ring on the lens to stop down to the required aperture before pressing the shutter, as the camera did not do this automatically. People who know only the modern digital SLRs, may not appreciate how many advances have been made!
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Beautiful story. Thanks for sharing it.
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Thank you very much Debi. I have been touched by all the wonderful reactions to this post.
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A fitting note of remembrance. Dad ‘Gus’ was a character.
I have my own cherished memories
But alas not as many as you dear brother. He passed away whilst I was away at school. I was 11 years old.
Sleep well Dad ❤️
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Thank you so much Clive. It was particularly hard on you, to lose a parent at such a young age and whilst away at boarding school. Yes, certainly our dad was a character and an influence on us all.
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Rupert, you are just as amazing as your Father was!
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Thank you very much for your kind comments Lennart. Remembering how active and industrious my dad was, makes me feel very lazy in comparison. But I believe I have inherited some of his sense of humour, love of music, interest in cameras and watches, pocket knives and lots more, although not the guns.
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What a lovely glimpse of your dad, Rupert. It sounds like he was an interesting man. As a child, I loved just watching my dad doing stuff – puttying in a new pane of glass in a window, mending a puncture in a bicycle tyre, icing the Christmas cake – and learned as much by osmosis as by being “taught”. A good weekend for us all to raise a toast to our dads.
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Thanks very much Pamela. Yes, absolutely – doing jobs like puttying a window and mending punctures and doing countless other dad-stuff, is how I remember him. He was always “rolling his sleeves up” and getting things done. We all think our dads were the best. I have enjoyed reflecting on my memories of him this weekend and it is funny how one recollection leads to another.
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Well, your Dad surely died too young, but at least he left for you a world of fond and cherishable memories. Cheers! Vic, from Portugal.
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Many thanks for reading Vic, and for your kind comments. I do feel very fortunate to have so many happy memories of my parents and childhood.
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The first anniversary of my own Dads death will be the 21st of this month. I still can’t believe he’s gone. He lived to the age of 90 and had a happy retirement. I now own his Parker 51 fountain pen and his collection of antiquarian books.
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Thank you Dave. It is always hard to lose a parent. I hope that it gives you some comfort to know that your Dad lived to such a great age and enjoyed a happy retirement. I send my condolences to you as this first anniversary approaches
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Thank you very much for sharing that moving memory of your father. I particularly like your recommendation to write down memories of parents in case their history is forgotten. My mother died in 1989 and my father in 2000 and I wish I had spent more time asking them about their lives, but somehow that seldom happens in families where we are so busy dealing with the here and now.
I detect that you have inherited the same collecting ‘bug’ from your father… My son combines being a data scientist with professional dealing in antique coins (having previously collected fossils…) a development that my wife and daughters point out was probably inevitable given his father’s collecting instincts (towards pens and other collectibles).
The Hong Kong shop your wife went to (Hop Cheong Pens) is a wonderful little cubbyhole in Des Voeux Road, a busy thoroughfare in central HK. It is a remarkable little place, with an owner who has been there for decades, somehow managing to keep a fantastic stock of pens in a tiny shop space, including quite rare Pelikans and similar. It is also a dangerous place full of temptations but I think the most interesting and welcoming pen shop in HK.
Best wishes to you and your family for Christmas!
Philip
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Thank you very much Philip. I am sure you are right about my inheriting the collecting bug. It is good to know that this has been passed on responsibly in your family too! I do sense that I share my dad’s tendency to always be wanting the next “thing” and in my case, my various hobbies have given me great pleasure over the years. Having said that, I could have saved a lot of time and money if I had been better at appreciating and using what I already have! A glance at my Instagram feed shows that I am not alone in this regard.
I was interested to read that you know of the Hop Cheung pen shop in my wife’s photo. (I asked her to take some pen shop photos for me!) It is pity that we do not have more places like that here. Although maybe just as well!
Best wishes to you and your family too, this Christmas and I hope to see you again at a pen show next year.
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Thank you Rupert for sharing. Your father had a fullfilling and wonderful life. I imagine as a young boy it must have been very exciting for you. Very sad that his life was cut short. I am glad you found the time to write down your memories and share them.
Hong Kong… during my first visit there I purchased two Montblancs (wink wink, nudge nudge).
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Thank you very much Danny.
Yes, my first taste of Hong Kong was similar. Many people in the streets asked me whether I needed a Rolex.
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