Kevin Cooke

Born 1931

Nowra NSW

……. “Love to have a beer with Kevin, Kevin’s my mate!”

Born in Nowra in 1931, Kevin had 3 brothers, he told me however 2 of them are up in heaven. At 26 Kevin was married to Noleen at the Nowra Church of England, they had 2 sons and Kevin is now a great grandfather to 8. Kevin started working back in 1946 and by 1976 had borrowed the tidy sum of $40,000 from the Commonwealth Bank to purchase the local Ampol Service Station.

Kevin was clearly proud to tell me that he was still driving and wanted me to guess his age. At 86 years young Kevin spoke of his love for horses, particularly the trots, and his passion for music, notably guitar. This was evident when I arrived at Kevin’s place and could hear country music blaring from the bottom of the house. At first, I was a tad confused and thought I may have the wrong house as there was a car in the driveway with a car seat in it and the stereo roaring. Next minute a man walked out holding a guitar, he was a music teacher, and he confirmed that “Yes, you have Kevin’s place”. What a character I found when I entered. Kevin had the country music channel, loud and proud, on the TV and was a real cheeky, happy man who was clearly living his life to the fullest. His favourite song is ‘My old man’-Zac Brown Band. He reckons the secret to a full life is not smoking and drinking ‘Melbourne Bitter’. His most memorable time was when he became a golfing veteran and was playing a round with a guy with one eye, “He’d keep mumbling, where’d she go”. Kevin told me, “he was a good player, but not as good as me!”.

Kevin’s favourite politician was John Howard and as such he thinks the best years in Australia were when he was Prime Minister. He credits learning to fish as the best thing his parents taught him, and he told me he was raised well by his family. When I asked Kevin what he would change about modern society he quickly responded with “No drugs”. I was curious if there was anything in his life that Kevin would do differently, he told me that he made his money in real estate and that he didn’t think there was anything he would change.

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