Pronounced fit for service

Murray Ferris

Murray Ferris is a social animal. Not surprising really . . . his dad was a Lion.

It’s the sort of crack that would draw a groan even from Murray — teller of a thousand radio fishing report jokes — but it’s also true.

The Rotary Club of Gisborne made him a Paul Harris Fellow last month. It’s an honour Rotarians bestow, more often than not, on other Rotarians. But they are free to honour those outside Rotary who contribute to the service organisation’s ideals of international peace and goodwill, and service above self.

Murray is not a member of Rotary but he has served on numerous community organisations and, until it folded, he was in the Gisborne Kiwanis Club for over 40 years.

In the 2011 New Year Honours, he was made a Companion of the Queen’s Service Order, for community service.

Tasks like construction of a cabin on Block 93 at Matawai for the New Zealand Mountain Safety Council, or the building of a kayak club base at Anzac Park (both Kiwanis club projects); fundraising for children needing life-changing operations; being chairman of the organising committee for the first two Relay for Life Cancer Society walks; advocacy for the rescue helicopter trust; being master of ceremonies for the Fight for Life; taking a busload of six-to-12-year-olds for a day fishing near Rotorua . . . that list is not exhaustive, but representative of his input.

To listen to Murray, you’d think that community spirit was catching, like a feel-good cold.

A third-generation “Gisbornite”, Murray had a father, Lance, who was in Lions and a mother, Betty, who was active in the community through women’s institute and church groups.

“And later I worked with Max Stephens at Te Rau Press and Michael Muir at The Gisborne Herald, both community-minded in their outlook,” Murray said.

“I have been in the company of passionately community-spirited people all my life. It has to rub off.”

And yet he has seen a drop-off in volunteerism and service clubs that he feels will ultimately affect the most vulnerable in society.

“It has never been easy to attract people to these organisations,” he said.

“You have to be the right animal. Some people just aren’t into that stuff; it doesn’t mean they are not good people.

“We have got to the stage where we have stopped asking, because we get the same excuses . . . they’ve got a mortgage, a family, they work seven days.

“A guy said to me a few months ago — and I think he is right — that it’s the commitment thing. If we said we were having a clean-up of the Waikanae Stream and we wanted a hand, a lot of people would turn up to help. The problem comes if we say they have to do that next week, and the week after, and the week after that. They don’t want that tie.

“And there is a cost. A lot of these organisations used to be supported by businesses who wanted their senior staff to be in Lions, the Kiwanis or Rotary, and would pay their subs. It was networking. People would come to Gisborne on transfer and being in a service club was a great way of getting some ‘instant friends’. It was a wonderful way of being introduced to the community.”

It was sad that while society was under pressure to provide for those who would not provide for themselves, those unable to help themselves were less likely to receive volunteer support from a dwindling service club membership.

The irony was that being active in the community was not just rewarding; it was enjoyable.

“It’s not all about the work,” Murray said.

“It’s also about the camaraderie, the friendships. We are social animals, and in these organisations we meet people — inspirational and talented individuals — we’d never meet otherwise. It’s great.”

Benefits for community and workAnd this being a social animal had benefits both in the community and at work.

“It’s nice when people know you personally. It helps immensely when you are fundraising. And through talking face to face with customers you become friends, maybe not close, but friends rather than just business acquaintances.”

Murray, 65, retired four years ago from his position as manager of Te Rau Design and Print.

“I always said that when I had more bad days than good ones, I’d be out of there.”

It was anything but sudden, though. He gave a year’s notice.

The printing industry had not been his first choice as a career. Like his father, he had a passion for the outdoors.

“I wanted to go into the Wildlife Service,” Murray said.

His father arranged for wildlife ranger Peter Fisher to visit.

Murray had sat School Certificate twice, gaining fewer marks the second time round. Hearing that Murray would be leaving school with no qualifications, the ranger told him he had virtually no chance of getting into the Wildlife Service.

Te Rau Press owner Max Stephens was the brother of Murray’s mother, and Murray had worked there after school, as a floor-sweeper and delivery boy.

“I started at two shillings and sixpence (25 cents) a week as a delivery boy. I remember getting another shilling and thinking I was made.

“All my mates had after-school jobs as well. We’d meet at the Americano burger bar in Lowe Street for a punnet of chips, and shoot the breeze about our day at work.”

Max Stephens offered him an apprenticeship as a hand bookbinder. Over the next five years, Murray learned his trade from three of the best bookbinders he had seen “even to this day”: Dick Comber, Lance Jory and Lindsay Crichton.

“We did all the law books for the lawyers and the court. Ledgers were half-bound or quarter-bound in leather.

“Because we were a small company, our apprentices had wider experience and were more resourceful than people who had trained with, say, the Government Printer. Our apprentices — and the Herald’s — all used to do well at the trade school block courses.”

Top national apprenticeSo well, in fact, that Murray topped the country as an apprentice.

But after he completed his apprenticeship, he volunteered to take the place of a sales representative who had left.

“I felt we weren’t getting our share,” he said.

He learned the value of cold calling — turning up, meeting the customer face to face — and was on the road selling for 12 years. He had called on Bay Milk Supplies in Edgecumbe for months without success, and then one day was called in by a staff member who had just been made purchasing officer after the previous incumbent left suddenly. The three hours Murray spent with the new man resulted in a lot of business for Te Rau, until the milk factory was extensively damaged in the 1987 earthquake.

“I would always say we were not there to knock out the local guys,” Murray said.

“But there was always stuff we could do that they couldn’t.”

The Gisborne Herald bought Te Rau Press in 1985, and Herald managing director Michael Muir made Murray manager at Te Rau. Some on both sides of the merger initially felt uncomfortable about “sleeping with the enemy” but things settled down. Murray’s wife Leslie also worked in the business until she retired this year.

Outside work, Murray became a member of the National Party after Bob Bell (Gisborne MP from 1975 to 1984) told him he detected “a tinge of blue” in him, and asked him to deliver pamphlets.

He was campaign chairman for Wayne Kimber and has been chairman of the Gisborne branch. These days he helps out mainly at election time.

“People say we shouldn’t talk about religion and politics,” he said.

“I think if we talk about this stuff we are better off, as long as we are big enough to admit we don’t know everything.”

Murray is the eldest of three brothers. When he, Ian and youngest brother Peter would go hunting, Murray was always at the back.

His weight never stopped him doing anything, “but it made it hard work”.

That changed when he had a Roux-en-Y gastric bypass.

“Effectively I had my stomach capacity reduced to the size of a small pouch,” he said.

“It was a life-changer. I have so much energy now.”

These days he does odd jobbing, a bit of work for the funeral directors . . . all sorts of little part-time jobs.

“I love them because I don’t have to do them.

“I am slowing down a bit but that doesn’t mean I don’t have the same passion for causes. I don’t go out looking for things, and I’m a bit selective about what I get deeply involved with.

“I enjoy writing letters to the editor, too. Sometimes they are pretty tongue-in-cheek, but when I see something I think is wrong, I’ll write.”

Now with both Murray and Leslie retired, they have more freedom for travel. Elder son Scott, 39, is a builder/joiner in Waitotara, while Mark, 36, is a musician in Sydney. Grandchildren at Waitotara sweeten the travel deal even more.

For the immediate future, Murray is looking ahead to the elections for Eastern Fish and Game Council, which he chairs, but says he is relaxed about the outcome.

“If I get re-elected, I’ll carry on.”

It’s not as if he is stuck for things to do.