Alan Keith Croft (1948-55) 24.04.37-17.11.10
years of WW2. Commissioned in the Indian Army he was seconded to the 2nd Punjab Regiment based at Peshawar with most of his service on the Northwest Frontier. Having married Shirley, whom he had met on a troop ship to Bombay, he went to Selwyn College, Cambridge, to read classics. On graduation he worked for his father-in-law in MK Electric and later moved to Bath and Portland Stone. The marriage ended in 1963 and he then moved to Kent to Goudhurst where he set up his own PR company and married his second wife, Anne. He loved a good meaty discussion, even if it sometimes led to an argument, and also travel specially to France where the wines and cuisine were another of his passions. So too was music, some of compositions were performed by the Selwyn College choir, and he formed the Esterhazy Singers who delighted the people of Kent with their concerts, choral muses – and cricket. He also was involved in the development of the Goudhurst Recorded Music Society. A keen churchman, he was keenly involved in the parish link with a theological college and church in Sri Lanka and made a memorable parish visit there. Friends have described him as a Renaissance man and a polymath for he had an amazing intellect and real knowledge of a wide range of subjects. Mike Cormack came to Dulwich from Kite Hill School, Purley, and his years there in Marlowe were happy ones, doing well at O level but faltering slightly at A level, as in the intervening time he had discovered girls. On leaving school he worked briefly at the Bank of Montreal, before finding his niche at IBM, where he worked for 30 years, spending some years in the USA and France. Following retirement in 1991, he ran a small consulting business from his home in Chichester, where he lived with his wife, Anne, whom he met on the ski slopes of Austria, and daughter, Emma. He also enjoyed squash and sailing and had a lifelong love of theatre, opera and ballet, having taken part as a teenager in a number of amateur dramatic productions. He had been an irregular attendee of the OA lunches in Chichester, often forgetting the event, so when Brian Capon decided to step down as organiser in 2001 he thought that if he gave the responsibility to Mike he would probably remember to go, and it seemed to have worked! He enjoyed thoroughly the contact with the Alleyn Club and meeting up with old friends and making new ones. Preparation had been started for this year’s 21st Chichester lunch but he died early this year and was very pleased that Chris Field had agreed to run it for him. Michael Richard Cormack (1953-59) 25.03.42-12.01.12
Alan Croft came to Dulwich from Mitcham Lane School in Streatham. After leaving Dulwich, he went to study architecture at the Bartlett School of Architecture, part of University College, London. After graduating, he spent two years in Canada designing pavilions for the Canadian Expo held in 1967. Returning to the UK, he married Jill in 1969, and they lived in Twickenham, West London all their married lives, producing a son and a daughter. He worked as an architect, mainly on social housing schemes, for the Greater London Council (GLC) until it was abolished in 1986 and he then worked for Hounslow Council, where he designed schools and day centres. In retirement, his main interests were travel, photography and DIY and they travelled all over the world, diligently planning the trips in the local library and on the Internet with great precision. As lovers of good food and wine, their trips frequently included visits to Michelin-starred restaurants. He loved both old and more modern buildings, extensively photographing them and then printing all his own photo prints. Latterly, they both gained tremendous pleasure from their three small grandchildren. He developed Parkinson’s Disease from 2007 and eventually died from complications associated with that illness. John Ellis came to Dulwich from Brightlands and was in the 3rd XI. Volunteering for the army, he was commissioned in the Royal Engineers and served as a bomb disposal officer in France and Germany and later in Palestine, where he was awarded Oak Leaves for Valour. Having been at the British School of Building, his working life was spent mostly in the construction industry. A few months after the end of the Second World War he married a former JAGS pupil, Monica Cox, and their long married life of over 65 years was spent at Dulwich, Bath and for the last 36 years at Exmoor in Devon, and he always showed a keen interest in the College and its activities. John Englefield came to Dulwich from Monkton Combe School and was a staunch member of the 3rd Scout Group. He went on to study engineering at King’s College, London, before working for Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company at Chelmsford. Later he worked in the United States and in Hawaii where he met and married his wife, Juanita. Moving to New Zealand, where they brought up their two children, he worked on the communications side of its airline. They John Herbert Ellis (1938-40) 21.04.24 – 18.02.11 John Henry Englefield (1947-55) 09.01.37-19.04.11
36 Obituaries
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