Life of Mr. GEOFFREY LOWREY SPEAK O.B.E.
written by Christine Speak, wife of Mr. Speak
______________________________________________________________________________________________
Geoffrey Lowrey Speak was born 6 October 1924, attended Holy Trinity primary school in Halifax and was later a scholar at Rishworth School. He spent the war years as a teacher at Rishworth and although declared unfit for military service at the outbreak of war, owing to a double mastoid operation three years earlier, he was the school’s OTC officer in charge of weapon training. He had many stories of stepping into cold Welsh mountain tarns in January and running up the Snowdon mountain railway track.
In 1946 he went up to Selwyn College, Cambridge, to read Mathematics but decided after the first lecture that this was not for him and at the end of the first year switched to Theology. At Cambridge he took up rowing and was for a short period Captain of Boats at Selwyn. He reached the last eighteen in the selection for the Boat Race Crew of 1951. He met his future wife, Christine, at a Student Christian Movement study group in 1948 and they were married in August 1951. It was a very happy marriage.
After being accepted for ordination he completed his training at Ridley College, Cambridge and was ordained deacon in Wakefield Cathedral on Trinity Sunday, 1951. During the three years spent as a curate in Sandal, Wakefield, they met Bishop R.O.Hall of Hong Kong who, knowing they were interested in serving overseas, told them that when they came to Hong Kong they would be going to St Paul’s College. It was easier to go than to argue with ‘RO’ and they arrived in Hong Kong in September 1954 with their three-month old son. It took four to five weeks to sail to Hong Kong then; when they left in 1985 it took 12 hours by air to return to England!
In 1954 Hong Kong was a refugee centre reeling under the influx of people after the Communist takeover of mainland China, and American sanctions on trade with China during the Korean War. The provision of education was a priority and a challenge to be met. Geoff threw himself into all aspects of education and was appointed headmaster of St Paul’s College in 1959. He occupied many voluntary, non-governmental posts such as Chairman of the Grant Schools’ Council, Chairman of the Hong Kong Examinations Authority and member of the Court of the University of Hong Kong. He also acted as the Bishop’s representative as one of the managers of several Church schools. The Bishop’s remit at that time also included a group of Communist Schools! Education was expanding rapidly and Geoff felt that the prestigious schools should lead the way in quality education. From a two stream school St Paul’s grew to a six stream school in less than five years with classes continuing as the new school was built around the old buildings - with all the consequent upheavals. The school continued to be - and still is - one where human concerns and values were important, where academic achievement was encouraged but where people and their contributions mattered greatly. Many of the foremost citizens of Hong Kong today are alumni of St Paul’s - including the Archbishop Emeritus and one of the Bishops.
In the 1960s the ingenuity and hard work of the people meant that Hong Kong shared in the wave of prosperity of the industrialised world and in 1965 the Bishop urged him to be responsible for building up an organization to cater for the ever increasing needs of the children of expatriates who were arriving in large numbers as Hong Kong thrived. The English Schools’ Foundation came into being in 1967, starting with three forms in a Secondary school on the island and two in a Primary school in Kowloon. Today it has five Secondary and nine Primary schools with over ten thousand pupils. Starting as the first head of Island School he later became the Secretary of the Foundation. In 1970 he was awarded an OBE for ‘services to education’. Geoff was a pioneer, a builder and a visionary. His work will live on not only in the concrete of school buildings but in the high standards he expected from everyone he worked with. He possessed a fine critical brain and was always able to get to the centre of a problem. He was a logical choice for membership of many of the Education Commissions and contributed to several Government Green and White Papers.
Although from 1954 onwards his work was purely educational he was occasionally called upon to take services in St John’s Cathedral where he and Christine, together with each child as it reached the required age, sang in the Choir. He had an excellent voice: singing and music were among his chief interests. A firm supporter of the ordination of women he was proud to have assisted in the ordination in Hong Kong of the first two women to be ordained priests in the Anglican Church. (Although the ordination by ‘RO’ of Florence Li Tim-Oi in 1944 to serve the needs of Japanese occupied Macau may be said to claim that honour.)
As so many people have said, he was a gentle-man. His family always came first in anything he did and they spent many happy family holidays visiting parts of Asia, Europe and the States when on leave. He was always there with wise advice - and sometimes stern admonishments too.
Walking was also one of his favourite past times and when they retired in 1985, given their joint interest in the countryside, it was logical to live in a village. In Donhead St Mary they soon made many friends and Geoff was a familiar figure walking the lanes with Ginny (the German Shepherd they brought from Hong Kong) and later Ben, the enthusiastic black Labrador. His financial acumen soon made him in demand for Treasurer of the local Church, the North Dorset (Citizens’ Advice Bureau) and also governor of the local school. He was President of the Rotary Club of Hong Kong and soon after joining the Shaftesbury Club was also President of that. After coming to Donhead he and Christine both learnt to ring the bells and enjoyed contributing both to that, to the local choir. He died on 13 March 2000 following a heart operation.
