Brian writes:

I was at the College from 1960-64, firstly at Port Jackson, then Harbinger. My father Peter G. Harris was also at the College, Macquarie 1930-34. He was sporty and captained several Pangbournian teams. My parents had a cabin cruiser which was kept on the Thames after it served in the 2nd world war, and we spent many happy Easter & summer holidays cruising up and down the Thames. My wife and I now have a 1/10th share in a Dutch Barge (50ft steel hull, two cabins with heads) which is moored at Caversham and we have a minimum of 4 weeks holiday a year on that; I have happy memories when we pass the Pangbourne College boathouse. There are currently two shares for sale so if anyone reading this is interested please get in touch (brianpeterharris@hotmail.com). My Pangbourne experience enabled me to teach sailing in Malta for the whole of the first summer holidays of my degree course, and skipper a boat around the Greek islands during the whole of the second year summer holidays. Now I just charter a 'bare boat' (no skipper) occasionally, mainly in Greece & Croatia, with my family (we have two sons and five grandchildren who all love sailing)

My time at the College was a happy one; I was a fairly average cadet, but I did win the industry prize in the 5th form (for working the hardest), and was Captain of Tennis for a couple of years. Although the academic standard at Pangbourne wasn't very high at the time, we were taught discipline, and kindness, both of which seem to be lacking in today's world!

After Pangbourne, both my father and I had careers in Civil engineering, and after 6 years working in the Middle East. where I met my lovely wife, Claire, we came back to Sussex and set up a successful house-building business. We have now passed this on to our youngest son., I became a Christian whilst reading C.S. Lewis's book 'Mere Christianity'. It was the best thing I have ever done in my life, and I know that worship, and singing in the Pangbourne choir had a part in it!

My wife's great great grandfather went out to the Falklands in 1842 to set up a fish processing factory. This wasn't very successful, but dealing in cattle hides, and sheep farming were, and after 10 years John Dean bought Pebble Island. This is where the SAS came to at night in their canoes (any OPs amongst them?), placed explosives on 11 of the Argentinian planes, and withdrew the same night whilst watching the firework display! There are still remains of some of these planes beside the present grass runway. Claire's father was running the sheep farm at the time and was able to identify various buildings on the island from satellite photos relative to the raid. Claire now runs the company, but none of our grandchildren are interested in taking it over so we are in the process of selling Pebble, which has been run by tenant farmers since 1994. Prior to that we employed farm managers and shipped all the materials they needed from the UK. 

As you can imagine, the services we have attended in the Falkland memorial chapel have been particularly moving for us. Well done to those involved in getting the chapel designed and built.