{"id":492,"date":"2020-02-25T10:32:24","date_gmt":"2020-02-25T10:32:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/?p=492"},"modified":"2020-02-25T10:32:24","modified_gmt":"2020-02-25T10:32:24","slug":"a-eulogy-for-julia-swinburn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/?p=492","title":{"rendered":"A eulogy for Julia Swinburn"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

When Peter telephoned me and asked for\na favour, I immediately said yes. I think Peter sensed my panic when he asked\nme, as the favour, to deliver the Eulogy today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was both honoured and terrified to be\nasked to say a few words about Julia on this occasion.  Honoured, because I have known Julia for more\nyears than I care to remember, terrified, because I found it hard to find\nsuitable words to describe her. She was a so much a larger than life\npersonality.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Julia I knew would be very\ndismissive of anything I am about to say. I can hear her now at the back of\nthis congregation saying \u201cfor heaven\u2019s sake Ken<\/strong>, stop waffling and get on with it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although this is inevitably a sad\noccasion, we should also remember it as a happy remembrance of a life well\nlived. She certainly touched the lives of many of us here today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Julia was a Marmite personality. At\ntimes I have been on both sides of that argument.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sheila and I first met her 30   years ago, when we were all showing dogs on\nthe Gundog Import Register. Both our animals were very successful, so we were\nfriendly rivals and our friendship grew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A formidable opponent in an argument\nwith strong opinions of her own, but, underneath that formidable appearance\nthere was a very kind heart. Anyone who stood up to Julia earned her respect.\nShe found it hard to suffer fools kindly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Julia spent a great many years in the\nteaching profession. Strangely, although I have never been involved with\neducation, except in industry, I found our paths did meet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my working life I have spent many\nyears in Quality Management Consultancy. I ran many training courses for people\nwanting to enter that profession. Quality Management involves achieving\naccreditation to an international standard. This standard involves meeting many\nrequirements of that standard. One of those requirements involves what in\nengineering terms is called calibration. To ensure that all measurements made\nare accurate and reliable. When it comes to applying such a standard to\neducation it seems, initially, that this is not possible. However, as I had to\nexplain to my students many times, there is a way of ensuring that the measure\nyou apply, usually by examination, is to have all exam papers checked\nindependently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was where my path and Julia\u2019s met.\nShe was one of the independent assessors of the completed exam papers, papers\nfor exams such as GCSE or, in my Old Fashioned days, \u201cO\u201d and \u201cA\u201d level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She had interest in many breeds of dog.\nThe ones I most knew her for were Dalmatians. Kooikerhondje and latterly, Swiss\nMountain Dogs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Julia and Peter worked with the\nimporters of the first Kooikerhondje, Mrs. Molly Yates and her husband, Bill, together\nwith others to get the Kooikerhondje Club of Great Britain started. She held\nmany offices with the club and Preceded Peter as club President. Anyone who\nknows Julia when in positions of authority will know that she was staunch\ndefender of protocol and she and I had many healthy discussions in Committee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When she decided to call it a day with\nany official role with the club, I was the one who was in the unfortunate\nposition of accepting her resignation. In more recent times she was a great\nsupport to Celia Clarke and us to get the breed off the Import Register and on\nto Rare Breeds Classification. Julia, with Peter was responsible for producing\nthe breed standard as required by the Kennel Club even though one already\nexisted on the continent. We all know the KC attitude of not being invented by\nus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following this she was the first Judge,\never, to be asked to Judge the Kooikerhondje at Crufts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sheila had the honour of being asked to\ngo to Holland to choose a puppy for them from a litter at the famous Manusia\nKennel. We persuaded Julia to come with us and see the puppy first hand.\nLuckily she chose the puppy that Sheila would have chosen for her. (Sigh of\nrelief!!) The weekend turned out to be one that stays in the memory as\nthoroughly enjoyable and special. On the way home we stopped at a Dutch street\nmarket and as ever she managed to find dog memorabilia <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Julia cared very much for the health, welfare\nand selective breeding of dogs for health and temperament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, Julia has appropriately, met St.\nPeter, although many would say that she has been living with him for the 52\nyears of their marriage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before we all go our separate ways can\nI say, on the Marmite theme, please remember the things about Julia you loved\nand not <\/strong>the things that you may not have\nloved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now I can definitely hear Julia saying \u201cfor heaven\u2019s sake\nKen, stop waffling and get on with it.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ken Rees<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Peter telephoned me and asked for a favour, I immediately said yes. I think Peter sensed my panic when he asked me, as the favour, to deliver the Eulogy today. I was both honoured and terrified to be asked to say a few words about Julia on this occasion.  Honoured, because I have known […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=492"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":497,"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492\/revisions\/497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.kooikerhondje.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}