Ian F. Galpin (1949 - 2010)
Ian’s friends and ringing acquaintances were shocked and saddened to hear of his untimely death. He had been a ringer from his teens, particularly enjoying combined canal and ringing holidays in his university days. During his 25 years working for BT in London he rang regularly at several towers including Clerkenwell and Holloway, and was tower captain at St Bartholomew the Great’s pre-Reformation five for some seven years. A committed Christian, he was also a member of the congregation here.
Ian was born in Yeovil on 1st February 1949. Because of his father’s job he had a peripatetic education, including Cirencester and Newport, Gwent.
He was apprenticed to the GPO (later British Telecom) in 1966, and they put him through Southampton University, where he gained an MSc in Electrical and Electronic Engineering in 1970. As a part of his apprenticeship he was sent to Norway on a work experience exchange, and fell in love with the Hurtigruten Coastal Express ferries: a lifelong yen to sail on them was finally fulfilled under the Aurora Borealis on his 60th birthday in 2009.
After what has to be called a whirlwind courtship, he married Kelly in October 1981, moving to St Albans in early 1982, where they both rang and worshipped at St Alban’s Abbey, and Ian held various offices in the Cathedral Society over the years, including treasurer and deputy ringing master.
In addition to ringing, he enjoyed photography, steam trains, Gilbert and Sullivan, classical music, and mountain walking, with nearly annual holidays to the Swiss Bernese Oberland featuring large in his and Kelly’s lives. (She grew up in the mountains of Colorado, and had to get her fix of mountains.) Later they discovered the attractions and archaeology of Italy and Greece, and added them to the itinerary.
Having accepted voluntary redundancy in 1994 during BT’s massive downsizing exercise, Ian took a post nearer home as Programme Manager for the Herts Constabulary, later spearheading that organization’s implementation of the emergency services’ Airwave Radio project.
He eventually took early retirement and relished travelling around Europe, Egypt and the American West with Kelly. After scoffing for years at the very idea of cruising they embarrassedly discovered that they particularly enjoyed cruising on the Saga ship Spirit of Adventure, which took them over the years
to Egypt, Jordan, large portions of the Mediterranean, the Baltic Sea and St Petersburg, Norway and the North Cape, and, most recently, Istanbul and the far reaches of the Black Sea. When not travelling, he taught himself digital video editing, whiling away the long winter days and evenings adding sound tracks and creating DVDs of the holidays, and was happily engaged in that pursuit when he suffered a stroke on New Year’s Eve. He died four days later.
Two quarters were rung in Ian’s memory by friends, some of whom had known him for almost forty years, and who will remember him fondly for his slightly quirky character, his quiet kindness, his delight in laughter, and his infectious chuckle. May he rest in peace.
Wendy Gough
