BRILLIANT STUDENT

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 77, 13 March 1933, Page 9

BRILLIANT STUDENT

A PRIME MINISTER'S SON. DESMOND LYONS’ SUCCESSES. An old head on young shoulders is the most concise description that can be given of Desmond Lyons, the brilliant eldest son of the Prime Minister of Australia, who, by entering the University of Tasmania at the age of 15, has become the youngest law student in the Commonwealth. He is too young for matriculation, but special arrangements have been made by the university to enable him to study law at once. Desmond Lyons is rather a remarkable boy in many ways. His school record indicates possession of great natural talent. Away from school, ho is a self-reliant, reserved type, thoughtful far beyond his years, obviously endowed with unusual powers of concentration and capacity for absorbing knowledge. He is rather short and stockily built, with brown hair and a boyish freckled complexion. He is fond of games and of tho open air, and takes rather seriously his responsibilities as eldest of a family of 10. It goes without saying that he is the idol of his brothers and sisters. The boy is sturdy, vigorous, and apt at games, takes an active part in school athletics, plays a good game of football, and swims a great deal. He has been a student at St. Virgil’s College, Hobart, for many years. He has annexed scholarships and exhibitions with ease in competition against the toys'of the whole State. His record in the last leaving examination is extraordinary—six credits and three passes, university science scholarship, the Sir Richard Dry exhibition for mathematics, the university general scholarship, and tho university prize for geometry. Desmond’s father is intensely proud of his success, especially the winning of the Sir Richard Dry exhibition, because this was founded in honour of the first native-born Speaker and Premier of the Tasmanian Parliament. The young student is a son of the first Tas maniau-born Prime Minister of Autralia and tho first Tasmanian-born Privy councillor.