JACK

[Terry]

JACK

In the early days of gold detecting my partner was my brother-in-law John and for awhile another brother-in-law called Roy tagged along for awhile and we were very successful in those early days.
About this time the family suffered a very sad lost when my Mother-in-law passed away leaving her husband Jack with little to do but mope about by himself. So we decided to take him up bush with us and he took to the prospecting life like he’d been doing it for years even though he’d been a school teacher all his working life. So there we were Jack, john his son and Roy and I, both son-in-laws.
We were a bit of a strange mixture, old Jack was a strict labour man while us younger blokes had a pretty low opinion of the whole lot of them, so a fair bit of friendly chiacking went on but Jack more than held his own and it was all in good fun.
Jack was a notorious snorer and liked to have an afternoon nap; on a still day you could hear him snoring a mile away, so at night john and him shared a van. Roy was also a champion snorer so he was banished to a tent on the outer reaches of our camp while I camped in my old Transit van.
John, Roy and myself always worked as a team gridding large areas of likely looking ground, this proved to be a very successful method and a lot of gold was found doing this. Jack on the other hand liked to wander far and wide at a rapid pace, but still had some success. Mind you he terrorised anyone who had a call of nature; you were never safe, even after checking Jack was nowhere in the vicinity, he still seemed to be drawn unerringly to your bit of cover within minutes.
He also had the habit of detecting through the block you were gridding and was constantly ordered to go elsewhere. After one of these instances Jack disappeared into the distance and we didn’t see him again until we returned to camp that evening and there he sat looking very smug. He had a large quarts specimen balanced on a old fruit can; it had over 10 ounces of gold in it.
Within a short length of time he became one of us; quickly shedding the Father-in-law image and he loved it up there as well.
Unfortunately Jack was a big smoker and it eventually caught up with him when he developed lung cancer. But he had a couple of good years up bush before his illness got the better of him, he was a wonderful old character and we really missed him.

© T.E. Piggott

[Vic Jefferies]

A nice yarn Terry. I enjoyed reading about Jack. Have you ever read Ion L Idress' books? I think
you would find them very interesting.

[Terry]

Hi Vic.
As A young bloke I read most of his books and even wrote to him a couple of time and he always replied.

Pleased you enjoyed the read Vic

Cheers Terry

[Ron]

Yes good yarn Terry,
And good to see that you were able to give Jack, what I imagine to be, a fullfilling time to help see out his twilight years.
I can visualise many of those scenes there, in particular the snoring ones! I have been on many trips with blokes who could outdo a sawmill in full swing! (have been informed at times that I am not too bad in that department either!)

Cheers
Ron

[Terry]

Thanks Ron,

Jack took to it like he'd been doing it all his life.
The deal was that he was our guest so to speak, everything was laid on and he just did what he wished.
He took a great interest in nature and was very knowledgeable on the subject as well; he also had a good sense of humor.
Us son-in-laws had always got on well with him (like us he was also a keen fisherman), but the relationship
morphed into an even closer one up there and he was soon just one of the boys so to speak.

Cheers Terry

[Neville Briggs]

Interesting memory Terry. Prospecting always sounds too hard a life for me.

Just to get off the track ( how unusual ) the famous US lawman gunslinger Wyatt Earp by the turn of the twentieth century was the last survivor of the gunfight at the OK Corral and spent a lot of time prospecting in various goldfields. Wyatt and his wife Josephine made $80,000, $1,000,000 in todays money, prospecting at Nome in Alaska.

[Heather]

Made me smile Terry.

Heather

[Terry]

G/day Neville,
I didn't know about Wyatt Earp went on to be a prospector and a very successful one too by the sound of it.

Prospecting is like anything I guess you put into it what want, I always found that the harder I worked the luckier I got.

Cheers Terry

[Terry]

Hi Heather,
Jack had 6 daughters and 3 sons and as far as I can remember all the son-in-laws called him Jack from day one.
I was thinking of him when I first met my son-in-law Sam, I could see he was trying to work out what to call me so quickly told him to call me Terry, I guess most people do it that way these days.
On the other hand Jack's wife (Kathleen) was always Mrs. Prince to all of us, not that she ever asked to be called that.

Terry