Not the retiring type
When we sifted through the photographs to be included in my biography of Kenny Smith we decided not to feature the image of the book’s hero receiving his MBE close to the front. It’s a lovely shot of Ken with his mum Dorothy at Government House taken in 1987. It was obviously a memorable day when the boy who grew up in a state house became a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. Then came the idea — brilliant, as it turned out — to place it on the page adjacent to a copy of Ken’s school report from 1956. There’s a laminated copy of that report at the foot of the stairs in Ken’s workshop/museum at Hampton Downs. Kenny is clearly not ashamed of his teachers’ comments, such as “Very poor”, and for diligence, “Has none”, and for progress, “Nil”. They weren’t totally down on him which probably makes the other comments fair: He got a “Good” for conduct. The final comment from his form teacher was: “He is wasting his time at school”.
Fast forward 31 years to that day at Government
