Last post for proud Jeppe Old Boy

The first piper to train at the Jeppe High School for Boys, and a Kensington resident, Frank Richardson passed away on March 18. He died at the age of 87. Pipe Bands of South Africa announced that they had lost an amazing man.

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The Jeppe Old Boy was not only the first piper to train at the Jeppe High School for Boys. He was also the first to receive his bagpipes in the newly formed Jeppe Pipe Band.

Pipe Major Willie Kinnear taught Frank to play the pipes.

He was also a keen sportsman and his name is well-known within the Jeppe athletics community.

“I first came into contact with Frank nine years ago when I had just taken over the reins of the Jeppe Pipe Band,” said master-in-charge of the Jeppe Pipe Band, Damien Pitman.

“I was a student-teacher at the time and had help from Craig Holz, the then chairman of the newly formed pipe band patrons committee.

“We had reached out to past members of the band to explain to them that we were in the process of rebuilding the band. We appealed to the Old Boys for donations for instruments, or monetary contributions towards the funding of new uniforms,” said Pitman.

He said Frank was one of the first people to respond to the appeal.“It was then that we learnt of Frank’s special history in the Jeppe Pipe Band.”

He described Frank as an incredibly humble and well-mannered gentleman.

“I had many telephonic conversations with him, and every time I finished one of those conversations I was overwhelmed with a sense of pride. I realised we were lucky, as the Jeppe Pipe Band, to still be in contact with one of the founding members of the band.

“Frank was extremely generous to the band in the last couple of years. He often donated large sums of money towards the band’s exciting ventures.

“The band has travelled to Switzerland twice in the last three years to perform in the world-famous Basel Tattoo, only the second school band in the world to do so,” said Pitman.

“Recently, Frank heard that the band is in the process of purchasing 25 drums from Scotland. Straight away he offered an extremely generous monetary contribution towards this cause – the drums are due to land in South Africa in a month’s time,” said Pitman.

He said Frank was passionate about the band and was constantly in touch with all that was happening.

“Until three weeks before his death, Frank was in communication with the band, and was very keen to find out when and where the year of the‘nines’ reunions would take place as he matriculated from Jeppe in 1949,” said Pitman.

He said Frank was the leading example of the Jeppe Boys prayer.

“Our school prayer asks us to ‘perform our duties with kind faces’. Frank was a leading example of this. He was a kind man who always put the interests and needs of others before his own.”

“Jeppe High School for Boys offers their sincere condolences to the family of Frank and we ask you to remember the school motto in this time of grief, “Forti Nihil Difficilius”, which translated from Latin, means “Nothing is too Difficult for the Brave”,” said Pitman.

A memorial service was held for Frank in Cape Town on March 22.