Norman Apsley
Working for my Gold DoE Award, as a teenager, was key to my career in Science and Entrepreneurship.
It was at the beginning of the Award’s second decade in the mid-1960s, that one of my teachers, Robert Knox, at Larne Grammar School, suggested I begin the Award. The venture had just become feasible because our local Antrim hills had been approved for the expeditions. “Knoxy” was prepared to take the trouble to lay out challenging routes, often for the first time, and with interesting way points that were themselves an education into our national past and present geology.
I was a keen rugby player and Boy Scout, already in the firsts and with my Queen’s Scout badge well underway. While I regard these separate pursuits as important as classroom to my career path, it took the convergence of the four sections of the award, Service, Fitness, Project and Expedition, to pull them together into a total life-changing experience.
For me the key addition to my normal life was Service. I was presented with the opportunity of becoming Akela to my former Cub Pack. I began disastrously, losing half the pack in the first month, but with help from other leaders, grew the pack to double its original number within six months. I have heard reports that I changed the lives of some of my young charges. It certainly changed me by teaching me more about practical leadership, than many of the expensive courses that I would undergo in the rest of my career in science and entrepreneurship and for which, I was granted an OBE, a DSc and Fellowship in the Royal Academy of Engineering (another of HRH’s great interventions).
I would be in HRH’s presence on several occasions in later life but never took the opportunity to thank him for his brilliant creation. May this piece serve as my testament of thanks, as He rests in peace.
It was at the beginning of the Award’s second decade in the mid-1960s, that one of my teachers, Robert Knox, at Larne Grammar School, suggested I begin the Award. The venture had just become feasible because our local Antrim hills had been approved for the expeditions. “Knoxy” was prepared to take the trouble to lay out challenging routes, often for the first time, and with interesting way points that were themselves an education into our national past and present geology.
I was a keen rugby player and Boy Scout, already in the firsts and with my Queen’s Scout badge well underway. While I regard these separate pursuits as important as classroom to my career path, it took the convergence of the four sections of the award, Service, Fitness, Project and Expedition, to pull them together into a total life-changing experience.
For me the key addition to my normal life was Service. I was presented with the opportunity of becoming Akela to my former Cub Pack. I began disastrously, losing half the pack in the first month, but with help from other leaders, grew the pack to double its original number within six months. I have heard reports that I changed the lives of some of my young charges. It certainly changed me by teaching me more about practical leadership, than many of the expensive courses that I would undergo in the rest of my career in science and entrepreneurship and for which, I was granted an OBE, a DSc and Fellowship in the Royal Academy of Engineering (another of HRH’s great interventions).
I would be in HRH’s presence on several occasions in later life but never took the opportunity to thank him for his brilliant creation. May this piece serve as my testament of thanks, as He rests in peace.
