Newspaper Article 2005 – Bay’s much-loved mouth behind mic signs off

Bay’s much-loved mouth behind mic signs off

THOMAS JOHN DEVONPORT
Dec 27, 1936 – July 19, 2005

Many who farewelled Tom Devonport at his funeral in Napier thought they knew just about everything there was to know about the former voice of radio sport in Hawke’s Bay – until they learned he had spent four years in a seminary.

It certainly came as a surprise to former Hawke’s Bay Today and Daily Telegraph sports journalist Russell Williamson, who knew the man for more than 25 years.

After delivering the eulogy at Tom’s funeral in St Mary’s, in Greenmeadows, he asked: “Can you imagine Tom as a priest?”

Few could, for the most vivid memories were of him dashing from sportsfield to sportsfield on Saturdays, or of his 40 year-career in the retailing and marketing career which he began after leaving the seminary in Christchurch to return to his hometown, Greymouth, and work for Woolworths.

The radio thing started about 1966 when he began doing a Friday night local sports show with Neville Madden. He did the Saturday afternoon scoreboard for more than six years before the arrival of John McBeth as Radio New Zealand’s first fulltime “sports officer” in Napier.

A Daily Telegraph story announcing the change in 1978, was wide of the mark in saying sports fans would miss the broadcaster it referred to as “The Mouth”, for he became possibly even more familiar in the “radio car”, buzzing around fields throughout the afternoon while everyone else played.

He still played sport, however. He was a good squash player and was involved in masters running, taking part in the Queen’s Baton relay leading up to the 1990 Commonwealth Games in Auckland.

While never a radio fulltimer, he covered national events such as the annual Dulux six-day cycle race from Auckland to Wellington, and the Heatway motor rallies, and saw as one coup an interview with Lord Vesty at a polo tournament in Hastings.

He had grown up with a brother and sister in a Catholic family of Greymouth carpenter Jack Devonport and wife May, in which it would have maintained tradition for the eldest son to go into the seminary.

Daughter Kerre says: “I think he would have made a great priest.”

“He was enthusiastic, thoughtful, compassionate and loved being involved with everyone else,” she said.

The start of his journey to the North Island came when he left Greymouth, on transfer to Christchurch. He then worked in Dunedin before moving to Hawke’s Bay in 1958. It was after starting a new job with the Reliance Tyre Co that he met Lorraine Logan, a workmate whom he married in 1961.

They ran Davenport’s Food Market in Clive Square, opposite what is now the entrance to Countdown Foodmarket, while before his retirement in the mid 1990s, he developed the Eta franchise in Hawke’s Bay and was a marketing manager for the Hawke’s Bay Milk Corporation.

Athletics had been his big love in sport, versatility the name of his game.

For example, according to a folder of certificates from his early achievements, on October 2, 1955, he and Dave McKenzie, later to become one of New Zealand’s top marathoners, ran a Greymouth Amateur Harrier Club record for the West Coast open two-man relay, over 13 miles (about 21 km).

Then on January 25, 1956, he and three Greymouth Amateur Athletic club team-mates won the West Coast senior 4x110yds (4x100m) title on the track, also in a club record time.

In the North Island, he wasted little time getting into action, and after a season in harriers, led-off the Hawke’s Bay provincial centennial torch relay from Parliament in November 1958, and then three months later beat nationally ranked Gisborne runner Tony Martin to win the Hawke’s Bay Gisborne 440yds (400m) title.

At the Napier Athletic Club, the Tom Devonport Cup is still contested in the men’s 100 metres each year, and there is also a Tom Devonport Cup in rugby, originally for competition between Marist and Technical Old Boys, where he had an interest in both camps – as a Catholic on one hand, and as a neighbour of the Tech club at Whitmore Park.

It was at the clubrooms his reputation for delivering a definite, forthright and enthusiastic point-of-view to anyone prepared to listen, would be made.

There were many significant moments, but one of the more pertinent came at the end of a Hawke’s Bay Sports Awards function in the clubrooms at the end of the 1980s.

A speaker had been Masterton mayor and international rugby referee Bob Francis, who had helped establish a Sports Foundation in Wairarapa. Aware of the increasing struggle in keeping the awards alive, and of a wider need to unify sports in Hawke’s Bay, Tom seized the moment, leaped to his feet and urged the Bay to follow the lead of its southern neighbour. While he wasn’t directly involved, meetings followed, leading to Sport Hawke’s Bay’s establishment.

Tom was an active harrier for years, was involved in the growth of basketball in Hawke’s Bay and attained a national refereeing badge, and into his 60s still pounded around the squash court – he was the Hawke’s Bay Squash Rackets Club’s over-60 champion in 1997.

His entrepreneurial skills saw him in such diverse roles as ringmaster with the Big Time Wrestling visits to Hawke’s Bay in the 1970s and calling the numbers at Tech’s popular Housie nights.

Aged 68 when he died. Tom is survived by mother May, brother Brian, sister Margaret, wife Lorraine, daughters Kerre and Loretta, and grand-daughters Gemma and Kaite, and grandsons Sam, Ryan and Scott.

Photo caption – LEFT SEMINARY: Tom Devonport.