Friday, March 18, 2016

Reid brothers, Sri Lanka.



S. Thomas' College unveils photograph of Reid brothers

The photo of the Reid brothers has not come up.
Recall, Ronald was outstanding bat for St. Thomas 1956 or so.
Buddy and Ronald played for Ceylon in the 1960s.
Buddy was Ceylon Table Tennis Champ as well.
      Working as intern in his first year at Ridgeway Childrens hospital 1965, for the first time ever Buddy took to  Badmington with us. He said he never ever played it before.
From the first day, he was better than any of us.
The Health Dept Sports meet was due in a couple of months.
We got him to contest. He trained; improved with each game.
     Soon  we got him to play against two at once( R.S. Thiagaraja and me)!  
At the meet too he improved with each game. He had that  impossibly late long reach return, forte of his table tennis.
At the finals, he lost the first two to the reigning champ; but improving yet further, he fought it out to the last, losing 2/3.
He was runner up.
Given another half  day of practice, he would have won.
(R.S. and I were no slouches, being doubles runners up!)
Bet modest buddy (b simple)has forgotten all this by now!
Susiri Weerasekera.

By Corinne King, the daughter of the late Mr. D.N. Pereira

The “unveiling of that epic photo” of the 5 Reid brothers was taken on the 30th September 2012 by my husband - Ian, who when he requested the 5 Reid brothers to come over to stand in front of the College flag, it was mentioned by them all that -

(a)   they had never stood together as 5 brothers in a group,
(b)   they had never had a photograph taken of themselves in front of the STC Flag
AND
(c)   ironically,  they all automatically walked towards the flag in order of age and stood in order of age from the eldest Claude to the youngest Johann (Tiny).  The order being Left to Right:  - Claude, Ronnie, Buddy, Barney & Tiny

There definitely was a first in more ways than one and it was such a wonderful idea of my husband - Ian King - to initially think of getting all the 5 brothers together as it was quite a rare event to see them all attend any STC function.

This was the Charity Lunch function organized by Barney to sponsor a young lad at STC who was a budding cricketer!

So very happy that the photo is now proudly displayed in the Sports Pavilion at College. 

Congratulations to Milinda Hettiarachchi for expediting this situation which became an “epic” event to display an “epic” photo for all time!!

I am also attaching for good measure that “epic” photo!!

Esto Perpetua,

The Island : Sunday 6 March 2016.

The Reid brothers made a huge impact representing S. Thomas’ College. Mount Lavinia in cricket in 1960s and the school unveiled a photograph of the five brothers at the pavilion of the cricket ground yesterday during the second XI fixture of the Royal – Thomian. Claude, Ronnie, Buddie, Barney and Johann all played for S. Thomas’ with distinction. Johann, the youngest passed away two years ago. The other four brothers were present at the ceremony that took place during the tea break of yesterday’s play. The Warden of S. Thomas’ Rev. Marc Billimoria was present at the occasion.


 Photo below -  Reid brothers at STC Charity lunch, 30th Sept 2012 

Best regards
Dawood

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