Class Notes

Athol Earl – 50th anniversary of his rowing Olympic gold medal

Friday 2 September 2022 marks the 50th anniversary of one of the great days in New Zealand sporting history – when the Men’s rowing eight won the gold medal at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games. This was the classic David versus Goliath contest, where a group of Kiwi amateur rowers defeated the professional Eastern bloc nations and the USA. Blasting off the start line in the final, the New Zealand eight led all the way down the Feldmoching course to record an emphatic victory. The youngest member of the crew that day was Old Collegian, Athol Earl (1970), who at 19 years of age, still remains the second youngest New Zealander to win an Olympic gold medal. Athol, who began his rowing career at St Andrew’s, stood out at being 6 foot 5 inches tall and immensely powerful, also won a European championship in 1971 and a bronze medal at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, both in the eight oared boat. Athol also rowed for the Avon Club in Christchurch and more recently became a national rowing selector, contributing to the remarkable success of New Zealand crews over the past two decades in international competition.

The St Andrew’s College community would like to congratulate Athol on his outstanding achievements in rowing over his lifetime.

Athol Earl (third from left) with the rest of the gold medal winning Men’s eight crew at the 1972 Munich Olympics.

Story credit: Andrew Sidey (1990)

Class

notes

Under his stage name of Ritchie Venus, Michael Brathwaite (1966) has released a new recording called Listen to the Angels, which is a track on American label Spacecase’s compilation LP We Live in Strange Times: a Spacecase Records Sampler.

Michael Brathwaite Paul McEwan

Paul McEwan (1971) was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list, for services to neonatal care. Paul has been chair of the Canterbury Neonatal Unit Trust for the last 30 years, following he and wife Julie’s personal experiences with their own children being born prematurely. Since 1992, the Trust has raised more than $600,000 for support services and equipment in Canterbury and Westland, including incubators, travelling costs, and funding New Zealand’s first human milk bank at Christchurch Women’s Hospital.

Mike ‘Scrump’ Johnston

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Tayler Hubber-Davis (2012) was nominated for the National Association of Women in Construction (NZ) 2022 Excellence Awards Rising Star. Tayler graduated with a Master of Building Science in Project Management from Wellington Faculty of Architecture and Design Innovation. For the past three years she has been working at Beca as a Digital Engineering Advisor where she has found a passion for Digital Engineering and Building Information Modeling.

Tayler Hubber-Davis

Blake Morgan (2013) attended the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England, as a Broadcast Engineer providing facilities for Sky Sport NZ at the International Broadcast Centre.

Charlotte Elley (2014) was selected for the Splice Construction Magic netball team for the ANZ Premiership in 2023.

Henry Shipley (2014) was named Canterbury Cricket’s Player of the Year.

Wairoa dog triallist Ned George (2014) and his trusty Huntaway, Sprocket (second dog on the left), took out the New Zealand Straight Hunt title at the Tux Champs in Taumarunui. Ned and Sprocket finished third in the North Island Straight Hunt with a score of 97, and in the New Zealand run-off a 96.5 score gave them the title. The newly formed Te Manu Tioriori Trust, which is dedicated to ‘creating and developing original musical theatre by, of and for the people of Aotearoa,’ has selected Isaac Shatford (2014) to develop his new musical, Ruth. Isaac is writing the book, music, and lyrics for this show.

Ned George

Isaac Shatford

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Christina Shepherd (2017) and younger sister Alexandra Shepherd (Year 13) were featured in an article about their involvement with CanTeen, a charity supporting young people living with cancer, and were invited to fly in an Air Force helicopter with 12 other past and current cancer patients. Christina also visited a Year 13 Physics class as a member of the team from Taska Prosthetics to demonstrate their prosthetic Taska Hand. Christina has been coding for the company since finishing her Bachelor of Science in 2019.

Saxon Morgan (2018) was named in the U19/23 Mixed Team Relay World Championship team, which competed at the Groupe Copley World Triathlon MR World Championships in Montreal.

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George Gray, Laurence Arundell, Nash Forrester and Tom Rance (standing)

David Chang (2018) completed his degree in Mathematics at the New Zealand Graduate School of Education, where he won a TeachNZ scholarship to train.

Ayrton Shadbolt (2019), Dougal Shepherd (2018) and Oliver Egan (2017) were named in the New Zealand team for the World University Orienteering Championships in Switzerland in August.

Olivia Brett (2019) was selected to represented New Zealand in Canoe Racing for World Cup 1 in Racice, Czech Republic and World Cup 2 in Poznan,