Inspired by Captain Tom: 99-year-old fundraising for three charities and offering salient advice

Students from Whanganui Collegiate's Harvey House: Kate Rendle, Hugo Mabin, Jessica Knapp (Hamilton Logan's granddaughter), Hamilton Logan (one of the oldest Old Boys from Whanganui Collegiate), Logan Brown (head of Harvey House), Henry Jones (housemaster of Harvey House), Tyler Weyburne, Ben Fraser, Jemma Rasmusen and Tony Hunt (past president of the Whanganui Collegiate Old Boys’ & Girls’ Association.)

Hamilton Logan, a 99-year-old Whanganui Collegiate School Old Boy (one of the oldest surviving), was inspired by Captain Tom in England to do a 100km fundraising walk for three charities involved in Cyclone Gabrielle’s assistance in Hawke’s Bay.

“Captain Tom really did make a difference. I thought to myself, if I’m fit in limb and wind and can still think clearly, I want to do something that will help other people to have a better life, particularly young people,” he said.

“I decided to keep quiet about it until it got nearer to the time because the worst thing you can do in life is to get ahead of yourself.

“I thought I was capable of dedicating quite a high number, 100km and approaching 100 years of age sounds pretty impressive, so I went with that figure,” he said.

Hamilton Logan addressed the Whanganui Collegiate 1st XV after training (wearing their pink Bully Free Week Training Jerseys).

His birthday is in November and he has completed 71km, so far, since January. He wanted to get off to a flyer as he said you never know what the weather is going to do and you never know how your health will be.

Raising money for three charities

The three charities Logan has chosen are Helicopter Rescue in Hawke’s Bay, St John and East Coast Rural Support Trust.

“I’m interested in Rural Support because of support and preventing young people from committing suicide,” he said.

“Following Cyclone Gabrielle, there has been a spike in young people taking their lives. A lot of these people just need to pause and think for a few seconds about what they might be doing or not. Often that pause will completely change their mindset.

“I talk to a lot of young people, I always impress when you’ve got a difficult situation, don’t go around in circles.

“Just stop and pause and think ‘Where am I, what am I doing this for, why am I like this?’

“Everyone uses St John at some time in life, the first time I used them, I was playing an inter-city rugby game, I was playing for Napier against Hastings. I went to tackle a very big player who was marking me, he put his knee up and caught my nose.

Hamilton Logan addressing the Whanganui Collegiate Board Trustees with College Board chairman and Harvey House Old Boy, Paul Bayly and the headmaster, Wayne Brown.

“My nose took a right-angled twist to the left, I went off to the sideline, where the St John person was. We used to call them Zambucks in those days. I ran up to him with blood squirting everywhere and he caught hold of my nose, pulled it, pushed it over to one side, pushed it back, put a couple of plugs in my nose (because I was bleeding profusely) and he said ‘You can go back on the field now’.”

“St John does a wonderful job and so does the rescue helicopter - they rescue people from the mountain tops to out at sea, young and old.

“All those organisations help save lives, particularly those who are young, that’s why I want to support them. I am calling it Second Chance At Life,” he said.

Christian teaching at Collegiate has helped hugely and having had an inspirational headmaster, Mr Gilligan, said Logan.

“It was evident he left his footprint on so many of my age.

“He was compassionate, understanding and approachable. Those qualities are so important for young people. A lot of young people are too shy to go to the ‘boss’ and share some of their concerns and problems. Mr Gilligan was a wonderful model for people like me, especially during the war years.

“The current headmaster I think is an excellent one, Whanganui Collegiate is so fortunate to have Wayne Brown as headmaster. He will go down as being one of the great headmasters of the school, I’m certain. He’s got this quality of compassion, being approachable to young people and understanding them.

“If you don’t understand young people, don’t get involved with them, it’s better to keep away, because you tend to muddy the waters more than not. People who understand them should be working with them.”

Salient advice

“One of the things that shaped my life I believe was when I was 14 years old, in the Great Depression, and I commented about someone having a nice new Buick car.

“My father looked at me and said ‘materialistic things and money are a help in life, but the real things that matter in life are people. You have to be friendly to them, you’ve got to help them and you’ve got to look after them’.

“That’s become indelible in my mind that one of the things I had to do in life was to help and look after people.

“Going to schools such as Hereworth and Whanganui Collegiate just fortified that approach to your fellow man. If you don’t have your fellow man with you, you won’t go anywhere,” Logan said.

Background

Having longevity in the family has contributed to Logan surviving to the age of 99.

“I grew up in the Great Depression years, living on a back-country farm in Hawke’s Bay. My diet was very basic, my father had a big vegetable garden.

“Processed food didn’t make an impact until after World War II. With a simple diet, leading a life where I’ve done a heck of a lot of things, and played innumerable different sports.

“I’ve lived my life with a bit of moderation - don’t take things to excessive heights unless you are able to.

Hamilton Logan with current Whanganui Collegiate Board chairman Paul Bayly, the headmaster Wayne Brown and four former board chairmen.

Napier Earthquake

“I was six years old when the Napier Earthquake struck in 1931, at home on the farm, I was helping myself to a sweet biscuit in the storeroom when the Napier Earthquake struck.

“The first thing I knew, I was having difficulty in standing up. Then all of a sudden all of my mother’s preserved fruit and jams started cascading down off the shelves and I was absolutely bewildered - I didn’t know where I was.

“Then I felt a strong arm going around my waist - that was my elder sister. She just picked me up bodily and took me to the nursery and said ‘We’re going to stay here until it’s all over.’ Just as well we did because we had five large chimneys in the house and there were bricks flying everywhere and tanks coming off their stands.

“Had we tried to go outside, it may have been a different story,” he said.

Starting at Whanganui Collegiate

Logan started at Collegiate in 1938, enrolling two terms before he was supposed to. He was at Hereworth School and became very ill, with a high blood-sugar count. The doctor thought he should stay away from school. Mr Gilligan was headmaster of Whanganui Collegiate School and said to Logan’s father: “If you would like to send Hamilton to Collegiate two terms sooner, I will undertake personally his good health and wellbeing and I’ll take him up every month, personally, to the hospital to have tests.”

That was a very good undertaking from the headmaster and it shows what type of man he was, said Logan.

“I struggled a lot because I’d missed the whole of Form 2,” he said.

“It didn’t make my life very easy to begin with. I enjoyed Collegiate from that day, I couldn’t have asked for a better school at the time to go to,” he said.

Highlights

Logan has had a lot of highlights and downturns in his life, he told Midweek.

“Whatever you may think what you’re going to do in life, or how you’re going to do it, you’re always going to have troughs and peaks - this is life.

“We were saddled with an enormous amount of personnel to take on from the other companies we acquired. That required smart footwork to survive.

“Getting the company through that time, with the help of others, was a great achievement,” he said.

Logan has had a lot of enjoyment from different types of sports.

“The three sports I enjoyed most were the three Rs: Running, rowing and rugby.

“I played senior rugby after I left school and hurdled for my province.

An old friend of Logan, Tony Hunt from Tauranga, was asked to set up the weekend visit for him, as he had previously been on both the College and School Boards and is a past president of the Whanganui Collegiate Old Boys’ & Girls’ Association.

Hamilton spoke to both the 1st XV and the Whanganui College Board of Trustees during the weekend.

■ Donations can be made to: https://www.hawkesbayfoundation.org.nz/our-funds/