Sam Sharp
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Sammy Sharp
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Sam and Avril
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Biography
After emerging from my nine months in the Army spent at Walvis Bay, for the first time in my life I felt totally lost. Up until then each year of my life had defined the activities of the next, and I had not been required to make any decisions. I had displayed no special aptitudes at school and had no notion of what would come next.
My mother had the idea of taking me to the Department of Labour in Newtown where I would do an aptitude test. It was a significant day. It would lead to a career, a life partner and new countries to explore. The advisor, a young Jewish woman, subjected me to a variety of tests, and as I answered them, it began to dawn on me that I wanted to study the sciences. The revelation is as vivid to me now as it was then. And it was a revelation because this kid failed science in Form 4.
Fortunately, at the start of the matric year, following the lead of my friend Selwyn Rabins, I had begun to work hard on maths and together we tackled old papers throughout the year, encouraged by Peewee Pearce. Selwyn had ended with a distinction in maths. I had gained a passable C, good enough to be accepted in a science degree, beginning in February 1971.
I cut a holiday short in Cape Town to return to do a bridging class in maths. On the first day I noticed this pretty blonde girl. A lot of guys were making a fuss over her. When university started in full, one day I was having a problem with one of the maths questions and a friend pointed to the same girl saying she was smart in maths and could help. She was, she did and I got to know Avril Bloom from Northview school. I became very interested in her but she had a boyfriend whom she soon dropped in my favour. This was an unexpected success for a guy who only asked girls to dance at Barmitsvah parties for fast songs.
Avril and I have been together ever since. We married in November 1975 and our elder daughter Lauren was born the following year (September for those of you who are wondering!) Yes, I was a father at 24 before I knew who I was.
But to return to 1971. Early in the course the regular Applied Maths lecturer was away and we were told that the class was to be conducted by the head of the department. In walks this tiny bespectacled guy, aged 29 and the youngest professor at Wits at the time. He walks to the front of the class to ask where we are up to in the syllabus and proceeds to absolutely dazzle everyone with a spontaneous lecture so brilliant, so absorbing and so inspiring that it literally changed my life. I knew that day I wanted to be an applied mathematician. His name was Tony Starfield and he remains a mentor and friend. He has recently retired to live in Texas. To this day, I am in awe of the ability of science to describe the behaviour of complex systems, from the cosmos to the economy, with symbolic scratches on a piece of paper.
I completed a Bachelors in Science, and then a Masters under Tony. He was also a professor at the University of Minnesota where he spent half his time and I followed him there in 1977 to enroll in a Ph.D program. It was a way to leave the country, which I was desperate to do and also provided a career path that I was seeking.
The first few years there were extremely difficult for Avril. The climate in Minnesota in winter is second only to Alaska and parts of Canada but much colder than Toronto. She was stuck at home with a small child and due to visa restrictions unable to do any kind of work. She was torn from her close family, placed in an alien environment devoid of Jewish life. One of her early acquaintances asked her whether being Jewish meant you were in the Mafia!
Things got better. My second daughter Joanne was born in 1981. Eventually I graduated, we moved to a Jewish area, joined a Conservative shul and developed good friendships. I got a job at the University teaching undergraduates and we stayed for another five years. This was the time that IBM released its first Personal Computer. They funded my job and provided 45 computers to the university in a project to determine what could be done with these in the educational sphere. Under the leadership of Alan Wassyng, a South African friend and colleague from Wits, I belonged to a team which developed educational software which was ultimately distributed by IBM to Universities.
By 1987, Avril?s family had migrated to Australia and in August of that year we made the move to the big brown continent, without having ever been there. Arriving without a job, I did the only thing I knew how to do which was to teach. I formed a training company and began conducting courses in desktop software programs. We still do this kind of work today but have progressed into areas like project management, decision making and risk management and provide consulting services too. I enjoy the teaching and have run more than a thousand workshops and have met some very interesting people. The interaction with curious and open minds is one of life?s joys.
My kids had flourished in the US primary school system but the high schools there were bad news at the time. Fortunately, both were young enough to start in primary schools in Australia and went on to one of the Jewish Day schools in Sydney. Lauren became a lawyer with a big downtown firm and Jo is an HR specialist, having gained a Masters degree in that area, and works for a different law firm but housed in the same building around the corner from my office. So they, Jeremy and I carpool (ok Lindsay?) and I get to see them all every day. This is a great and unusual privilege.
Lauren married Eli, an Israeli-born Australian-raised musician, graphics designer, web guru and all-round great guy in 2005. They have a two and a half year old son Jesse who is the joy of our lives. Jo is engaged to be married in January to Jeremy, also a great guy from a wonderful traditional family. He is a stock analyst but more importantly a sports nut so we have lots to talk about. Our kids and Avril?s family all live within minutes of us. Friday nights involve large and noisy traditional Shabbat dinners spent with the extended family and we are really blessed to have everyone around us, except for Avril?s Mom Sarah who passed away four years ago.
My parents migrated here in 1998. My dad is almost 92 and is writing a book on his wartime experiences, especially his escape from a prisoner of war camp and the wonderful Italian people who risked their lives to help him. He speaks fluent Italian and has been in recent touch by phone with one of those families. My mother is 86 and displays the same positive personality she always has.
Jeremy and I play tennis every week. I give him 29 years and he gives me a hiding. Also a sore back and stiff legs but we have a great time. I also play doubles most Saturdays.
Once a fortnight our philosophy discussion group meets. I co-founded this group in 1998 and it provides us the opportunity to worry about life?s really vital matters ? like in what way do numbers exist , or what precisely is the difference between believing something and knowing it, or do we have free will and if so how does the concept of personal responsibility make sense. Avril thinks this group has ruined me. We have read many of the classics. These include works by Spinoza, Kant, Hume and Schopenhauer along with contemporary thinkers, and although I can?t claim to have understood even a small portion of what they say, the mere exposure to their ideas makes one feel in the presence of greatness.
Avril loves ballet and attends classes three times a week and has done for many years. Or so she tells me. I have never seen her dance. Spectators are not permitted in the studio. Unless of course?.surely not! She coaches maths to kids in the afternoon and has about fifteen students. She is a very youthful looking 55 year old. Twenty million litres of moisturizer must do some good. She looks after Jesse once a week and people think she is the mom. They never think I am the dad. They think I am her dad.
Avril was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1996. The way she handled the whole thing was nothing short of remarkable. She was determined to minimize the effects on the kids and me. She endured the whole ordeal with great courage and thankfully has been clear of the disease since. She shed tears only once. That was when she realized she would have to stop dancing for a while.
We toil over a lifetime yet the things of real value are given to us: Our families and our friends. The re-discovery of you all has added immeasurably to this feeling and I have been on a high the past few weeks as a result of this contact, this renewed sense of belonging. Certainly we are all the product of our multiple migrant roots, fashioned by the values of our common cultural heritage. But perhaps we should not forget the very institution that has brought us together. King David had its faults but it must have done something right. I wonder what the school founders would think now if they were privy to this group. They may disapprove of the distance some of us have moved from the religion but would surely applaud the clearly apparent adherence to broader if not exclusively Jewish values of family, education and the clear sense of care and decency that permeate these pages. As someone pointed out on the 1968 site, even Sandler, that dictatorial despot, had the foresight to appoint some free spirits. I am thinking of people like Elena Thomas, Sue Fried, Luli Zampatakis, Rose Cohen, Bill Torbett and a few others. These people gave us so much, perhaps not the least of which was a glimpse of who we could become. I don?t know. But surely this site is, at least in part, a celebration of the part the school played in our lives.
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Sam Avril and Daughters Lauren and Jo
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Avril and Liam
Wife Avril
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Elder Daughter Lauren
Son in Law Eli and grandson Jess
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Grandson Jess
Sam and Jesse
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Younger Daughter Jo