TOPICS OF THE WEEK

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28222, 9 March 1957, Page 9

TOPICS OF THE WEEK

A MAN AMONGST MEN

With the recent death of Mr W. L. Parkinson, a respected and very familiar figure disappears from livestock circles in Canterbury and, indeed, the whole of the South Island. “Parkie,” as he was widely and affectionately called, was the acknowledged cattle king of Addington, and will pass into history as a man in the real sense of the word—and also as one of ability, vision, and progress. After triumphing over early vicissitudes (common during the lean years to all men who dealt in store cattle), Mr Parkinson rose to eminently successful heights in business. He weathered success (to many so often a very hard task) as blithely and humanly as earlier in his career he had combated adversity.

It is the human side of his character that will live longest in the memories of his wide circle of friends and acquaintances. His keen sense of • humour and his ability to see the funny side of! things even when the joke was I on himself were well known, and as a raconteur he had few, if any equals. Renowned for his, integrity, he concluded countless business deals, many of them in-j volving very substantial sums of money, by word of mouth alone without the benefit of pen and ink. Over the years he had achieved the reputation of being a man of his word, and he kept this to the end. One will never learn of his many private charities and studied acts of kindness. Gruff, hale and hearty, and above all generous, many anecdotes might be told about him, but to the writer perhaps his most telling saying was that so often expressed by himself in congenial company, “There are enough good chaps in this old world without doing business with mongrels!”