AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN UNKNOWN MAN

My most recent book, Autobiography of an Unknown Man was written for my grandchildren in the hope that they will one day read it. It records my family history and the course of my life from my birth in war torn England in 1941 to my retirement in Thailand in 2013 after a 50 year career in the construction industry. My life was somewhat different from the lives of most of my peers and the book puts it in perspective by correlating it with events that happened both world wide and in Southern Africa during my lifetime. My family emigrated from England to Namibia in 1951/52 and I grew up in a small and very isolated diamond mining town called Oranjemund. Life there, despite restrictions related to entering and leaving the diamond mining area or "Sperrgebiet" as it was first called by the German colonizers of Deutche Sudwes Africa, was free. As children we were free to roam the Namib Desert, the Orange River Estuary and the Skeleton Coast and mix with the abundant wildlife we found there. The story records my and my friends activities, amusements and way of life we led which, with no telephones, no TV, no computers, not even refrigerators, was vastly different from the lives of children today. The story follows my boarding school and university days, my rapid ascent, post university graduation, of the construction business ladder, the development of my own company during the South African/Angolan Border War, my successes and failures in the construction industry including building throughout the South African/Angolan Border War and being land-mined, attacked by rocket and mortar fire and ambushed, the acquisition of my own aircraft, learning to fly it and crashing it in a whirlwind and my own anti-landmine vehicle. The book records the collapse of my company due to the international financial sanctions imposed on South Africa and its mandated territory, South West Africa (now Namibia), the resulting damage to my health and family relations and my work in the Far East and Middle East in the 20 years that followed, up to my retirement in Thailand. 

If you like this book you may be interested in acquiring more of my books including recipe books and joke books all published on Gumroad and listed under Other Books on the last page of each of my published books.