Helen George
Patron, Life Member and former Committee Member of WABC
She is a gracious, sincere and friendly club member- one who loves being involved in its day-to-day life and sets a fine example to younger members to come forward and join in. Moreover, she has been very closely involved with the club since its transition from the West Australian Bridge Association to the West Australian Bridge Club in 1974.
Helen was on the Council of WABA and then continued on the WABC Committee for 16 years, for most of this time as Secretary. She has vivid memories of being a two-fingered typist, preparing and collating copy for "Trumps Plus" and typing up minutes, agendas and
travellers on waxed sheets for duplication on a Gestetner machine. Her husband and helpmate, Mike, ran the machine which behaved very erratically and as Helen said rather plaintively - "What would we have given then for a modern photo-copier!"
Helen was brought up on a farm in the Chapman Valley, north-east of Geraldton and in early days was educated at home by correspondence with her mother. Later, she boarded in Geraldton and went on to train as a primary school teacher. It was at Teachers' College that she met Mike, a mature-age student who'd been farming at Arrino near Three Springs. They married in 1961 and taught together at Denmark on the south coast, then later, on two aboriginal missions at Cundeelee (north of Zanthus) and Mogumber, and then in Harvey before returning to Perth.
Mike had played auction bridge all his life, starting off with his two brothers playing three-handed "cut-throat" as it was then called! When they were first married Mike had a gang of bridge buddies who played regularly, and Helen's job was to make the coffee. She decided that it would be more fun to play and so Mike taught her Auction Bridge.
In 1970, Helen and Mike took a year off teaching to go travelling and returned to Australia on
The "Iberia". Here they were given the chance to learn Contract Bridge, got completely hooked. and started playing club bridge. They moved on from Goren and have very successfully played a basic ACOL system ever since. Helen enjoys bridge because "it is something we can do together which we enjoy, it's a great mind -game and hopefully staves off Alzheimers.'
With their friends, Carol and Derek Pocock, they have played as an unchanged team in the BAWA League Teams competition since it was started in 1975 - winning enough times to keep their annual "free" subscription to "Australian Bridge" valid until 2017.
Although Helen's main involvement in bridge is with WABC - she became a Life Member in 1990 and Joint Patron with John Ashworth in 1996 - she and Mike have also supported national and international competitions held in WA. They hosted a team from Macao for the Far-Eastern Championship and were on the hospitality desk almost every day during the ANC Congress in Fremantle last year.
Helen's other interests include travel which has seen her "Sail the Andes" in Patagonia, chat to the moais on Easter Island, enter the Arctic pack ice north of Spitzbergen, visit the longhouses in Borneo, fish for piranha up the backwaters of the Amazon and being hauled most unceremoniously from the raging white water when shooting the Pagsanjan rapids in the Philippines.
One of the biggest changes in the WA bridge scene Helen commented on was the change from WABA and the formation of BAWA and WABC in 1974. She recalls some very robust but healthy discussion at the time, but feels that this has led to the development of a very successful club in WABC.
Jenny Davy
June 2009 Edition of Trumps Plus
