You’d have to expect to have done a fair bit in life to get to your 95th year on this planet.
Don Tier did that in spades; living a charmed but productive life that included, in no particular order, mathematician, Brigadier-General, screen printer and CONEHEAD.*
Don was born in New York City in 1921 to Australian Vaudeville parents and was exposed to
the good life from an early age. NYC in the twenties was the great age of flappers,
skyscrapers and Babe Ruth!
Returning to Australia in the 1930s, Don found himself on military shore duty in Sydney when war was declared in 1939. As a military cadet Don decided to join up immediately and was fast-tracked through the service, impressing one and all with his mathematical abilities. He soon became a Lieutenant. The Army at the time sent its best cadets, Don included, to London to learn the ins and outs of a new system . . . Radar . . . but that’s another story for another time.
Don began swimming at Manuka Swimming Pool in 1961 and that’s where our friendship first began. Don remembered me as a cheeky little boy with knobbly knees who was never out of the water.
Year after year, the Number One ticket holder was Don the Diver – he who broke the ice every year on chilly October mornings to start a new season. Don had the love and respect of one and all for his unbounded energy, his always sunny disposition, his grace and verve when on the diving board and his knowledge about everything in the known universe.
He and his good mate, Cecil Carr, would be found up the deep end discussing the universe and some, whilst happily treading water for half an hour.
MY MATE DON THE DIVER, never a sentimental bloke, HELL DON NEVER BOTHERED TO VOTE HIS WHOLE LIFE . . . would not want me to wax on an on. I can hear him now . . . ‘let’s open another!’ His credo is as good as anybody else . . . “CLEAN LIVING & WHISKEY”.
By John “Tav” Taverner
Vale Don Tier
Gertrude Ederle was a 19-year old in 1926 when she swam from Griz-Nez, France to Dover,
England in 14.5 hours, thereby beating by more than two hours the time of the previous 5 males who’d completed the swim. It was Gertie who taught Don to swim!
*CONEHEAD – an informal grouping of older (male) swimmers who loved treading water and discussing the world in the pool’s “philosopher’s corner”.
Friends of Manuka Pool 