Long-time Tokaanu resident Alasdair (Jock) McNab was an active community voice. Photo / NZME
Long-time Tokaanu resident Alasdair (Jock) McNab was an active community voice. Photo / NZME
The Tokaanu community has lost a wonderful friend.
About 40 years ago, Alasdair (Jock) McNab moved to Tokaanu for a retirement filled with laughter, croquet parties, fishing, environmental advocacy, and haranguing of big business. He died on Monday, July 4, at Taupō Hospital after suffering a fall at home.
Jock was born in Taumarunui on July 27, 1921, to Vera and Sandy McNab. In 1925, Sandy was transferred to manage a bank in Wellington and the family moved to Days Bay. He attended Muritai School and Ngaio School, and then went to Scots College.
Instead of going to university, in October 1937 he got a job with the Union Steam Ship Company as a shipping clerk, riding his pushbike between the company office and the port, delivering bills of lading.
His nephew David Johnston, of Manunui, says Jock asked to finish the school year but the company wanted him to start straight away, and he did because jobs were hard to come by during the Great Depression.
"He started from the bottom and by the time he retired in 1981, he was in charge of cargo. He was a logistics man, good at doing the mental maths about how much you can fit in the hold of a ship."
World War II came and as a member of the territorial army reserves, Jock was sent to defend Wellington Airport after a surprise attack on Pearl Harbour on December 7, 1941.
"They were told 'the Japs are coming' and rushed to the airport. Of course, it was a false alarm."
The following year Jock was called up for army service with the 3rd New Zealand Division where he used his logistics skills while he served in Solomon Islands, Norfolk Island, and then New Caledonia.
"When he was up in the islands someone came into their digs with a 4-gallon can of white powder, and said 'spread this around on your mattress and blankets, it will kill the bugs'. So they dipped their hands into it and spread it around. Of course, it was [synthetic insecticide] DDT."
He was based in Northern Italy for the later part of the war.
"Jock would tell the story about being based in Rome and going to see an open-air performance of the opera Aida where the theatre company got animals from the zoo and would lead them in for the show," David says.
"He didn't like the look of the hard seats and so sat on one of the soft seats at the front, not realising they were for dignitaries. By the time the issue of his seat came up, he had already befriended the Turkish ambassador who was sitting next to him, who insisted Jock was his guest."
David says Jock made friends wherever he went. While at his house last week, David found three envelopes with more than 50 phone numbers and names written on them, all people Jock regularly telephoned. He never married, but had a huge social life.
Tūrangi resident Jock McNab died on July 4, aged 100. Photo / NZME
"He will be missed by a lot of people, just because of the person he was."
David says Jock was straight up, both generous and parsimonious, liked helping people, and never did things by halves.
His home at Tokaanu has a croquet green and every week people would come up to play, he loved to cook for his many friends and would host parties. Employees from the Union Steam Ship Company would call in, and David says Jock would say "he or she was one of my young ones".
"He was old-fashioned. They don't make them like that any more. He would put on lovely big roasts and make sure everyone was full."
Jock retired from the Union Steam Ship Company in 1981, at the age of 60, and not long after moved to Tokaanu. Years earlier a neighbour from Ngaio had got him hooked on trout fishing, and in the late 1960s, he bought a section in Tokaanu and built a house.
Early into his retirement, Jock took an active role in local conservation initiatives around preserving the fishery and improving the waterways. He became an active member of Advocates for the Tongariro River, and was part of the Tokaanu Stream Management Network.
"Every day he would ring the electricity generation company [now Mercury] to get the lake levels, then he would ring to have a bitch and they would ask how he got his information and he would say 'you gave it to me'," David says.
"If he went away for a month, then I would have to ring and get the lake levels. Once he was committed to something, he was fully committed."
In the mid-2000s, Jock joined forces with others to take on electricity distribution company The Lines Company about its controversial peak-use charging method. A petition was prepared for Parliament and, although it was unsuccessful, David says it paved the way for the power company to make changes.
"It galled him that they couldn't explain how they worked out their charges. If you rang Te Kuiti you got shunted around."
David says Jock hated a fuss and refused to have a big celebration when he turned 100, although he was looking forward to family coming in from overseas in August, when he was due to turn 101.
"If he is up in the clouds, reading this newspaper story, he would not be impressed," David says.
Jock is survived by his nephews David and Andrew Johnston, his nieces Jane Howie and Sarah Kinghorn and all their children. A memorial service for Jock is planned for 11am on August 14 at the Tūrangi RSA.
