The Blacksmith’s Daughter by Fay Berry 2013 © – Chapter 26 – 1956 -1957

This is how Jeff Berry came into my world and into my life.

Jeff always used to look so young that I everyone used to call him “baby-face.”

Jeff Berry and John Knowles tied for the JJ Macfarlane prize at General Motors Holden where they were both apprentices. At this stage they did not know each other and met for the first time on the platform as they received their awards.

James Herbert Berry and Olive Myrtle Berry (Clements) had two children, Jeff Berry, born on the 4th November 1936 and Robert Berry, born 28th January 1940. When Jeff was six years old and Robbie was 18 months old, their mother Olive died. Their father, James Berry worked at Holdens at the time, and almost immediately after his wife’s death, he went to work for Holdens in the USA. He left the two boys in the care of his sister Phosie and remained in America working for Holdens, for the following four years. He returned to Australia and rejoined his two boys when Jeff was 10 years old and Robbie was 6 years old, bringing with him a new wife, coincidentally, also called Olive. Jeff met his new stepmother when he was driven to Parafield airport one night and sat in the car as a small plane flew in. He watched as two people got out of the plane and walked towards his window. His father leaned his head into the window and said, “Hello Jeff and Robbie, this is your new mother,” and that was that! Then he and his new wife-to-be drove off in a second car and Jeff and Robbie didn’t see them again until a few weeks later after his father and “new” mother returned from a short honeymoon.

The children attended Grange Primary School and lived in a house their father built at Grange. After Primary School, Jeff attended Adelaide Technical High School and would have been there for some of the years that my brother Maynard also attended Adelaide Tech. Jeff joined the YMCA and entered a competition with the YMCA to find the best all rounder for that year. There were a number of areas that he had to excel in to win the competition and one of them was to write a poem. I have that poem. I found it kind of morbid. It was all about death. All of the above occurred before I knew Jeff and I began discovering information about Jeff towards the end of 1956 and into 1957. This is the story of how Jeff came to be a Christadelphian.

In 1956 and 1957 Jeff was working at General Motors Holdens at its Woodville plant as a fitter and turner. Jeff had never wanted to be a factory worker, he had wanted to be a doctor, but his father would not send him on to University. John Knowles was also a fitter and turner at GMH but Jeff and John had never met each other at work. However, in 1955 Jeff Berry and John Knowles jointly won the JJ McFarlane prize for excellence as apprentices at Holdens. A special dinner was held in honor of the apprentices who had excelled in their fields, and awards and prizes were presented on the night. When John and Jeff were presented with their award, a newspaper photographer took a photo and it appeared in the next day’s Advertiser.

John’s father, Eb Knowles was at that presentation dinner and because Jeff had tied for the same award as Eb’s son, he took a lot of notice of Jeff and remembered his face. Towards the end of the following year, the Adelaide Christadelphians put on a Town Hall lecture and Alan Dangerfield was the speaker. Eb Knowles was sitting in the hall when he saw Jeff come in and sit down. He recognised him as the boy who had won the prize that his own son John had also won. Jeff left the lecture immediately after it was over and Eb was unable to catch up with him, so he told his son John that “the boy who won the JJ McFarlane prize with you was at the lecture tonight.”

On the next Monday, John went looking for Jeff and found him and over time taught Jeff and his friend Keith Noble, who also worked at Holdens, the truth of the Bible, and so Jeff Berry and Keith Noble began attending meetings at the Adelaide ecclesia.

Jeff’s father receiving an award at General Motors Holdens.

Once again, at the time, I knew none of this but one Sunday night as I was walking in to the Adelaide Temple for the Sunday night lecture, I saw this boy walking into the meeting in front of me. I couldn’t see his face, only his back and I really liked what I saw. He was slim had black hair and very white skin, and along with every other girl in the place, I wanted to know who he was. So that is all I will say about Jeff at this stage, except I am going to include the poem he wrote for the YMCA competition.

Jeff’s biological mother with Jeff at Grange Beach.

Jeff’s brother Robbie. He was about 18 months when his mother died and about 6 when hes father remarried.

Jeff’s biological mother

Jeff’s step-mother with the baby that died shortly after this photo was taken, before she met and married Jim Berry.

Deliverance

Oh, hear me now and heed my voice;
Come, listen to my anguished tongue.
My heart cries out! This was its choice.
Death’s beckoning bell has long been rung.

My soul doth burn, it wastes away,
My very life from me does fly;
This crumbled ruin was once so gay,
These things of mine once stood so high.

The ways of sin have trodden down
The youthful blossoms of my soul;
A growth of sin does now abound.
The death knell of my life does toll.

My soul is aching for a breath
Of life, which only Thou canst give;
I need much strength for I fear death,
Reaper, com not, for I must live.

My eyes grow dim, my breath is weak,
My body shudders with the pain;
A hand to hold is what I seek
And one to make me whole again.

Come breathe on me, or I will die,
And fill me with Thy Spirit pure.
Raise me up for now I lie
Nearer to Death, this I am sure.

I have faith that you can end
The craving hunger of my heart.
This broken body you can mend
And restore each poisoned part.

From close beside me I can hear
A wondrous voice that comforts me;
It ends my sorrow, quells myfear,
Heals my eyes, and I can see.

This wondrous voice has now aroused
My feeble body and it lives;
No longer glistening is my brow.
And my soul loud praise it gives.

From out of blackness now I come,
From darkest prison and set free
Without a burden. Now I kneel
In wonder as I gaze on Thee.

“Forgive me, Lord,” was what I prayed,
And even as I spoke each word
I was forgiven and whole made;
My heart doth glorify the Lord.

So this poem Jeff must have written in 1955 a year or so before he came in contact with Christadelphians.