Fred was a kind and true friend
FREDERICK James Mallyon was born on May 24, 1927 in Chelsea, London.
He was the fourth son of William and Elizabeth Mallyon.
His siblings were Wilfred, Sydney, Albert and one sister Hilda.
He spent the first few years of his life in Chelsea – his father was a Grenadier Guardsman whose duties included guarding the Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London.
Fred was eight-years-old when his father retired from the army and the family moved back to the village of Hadstock, situated on the border of Essex and Cambridge, which was the traditional home of the Mallyon clan.
Fred attended school at Hadstock and finished his education at Linton College Cambridgeshire.
He began training as an agricultural engineer, working for a large farming company in Cambridgeshire, subsequently earning promotion to workshop manager.
In October 1952, he married Jean Eileen Wayman and they began their married life at Linton, Cambridgeshire.
In 1957, they migrated to Australia and began their new life at Dalby in Queensland, where Fred was employed at Napier Bros Foundry.
He began working in the experimental department, where he helped develop a can cutting machine.
Ten years later, he had worked his way up to chief works inspector.
During their time at Dalby, the family had increased to four with the birth of Timothy in 1965 and Brian in 1968.
Sadly, their daughter Anne, born in 1967, died when she was three-months-old and was buried at Dalby.
In 1968, the family moved to Chinchilla, where a partnership with Joe and Diane Duff created the manufacturing firm of Malduf Products.
During the following 30 yeas, the firm manufactured all manner of grain handling equipment, grain and molasses feeders and undertook general repair jobs for farmers and the local population.
Fred was designer for the firm.
His design for a spring loaded molasses licker and a grain feeder was taken on board by the Queensland Primary Industries Department.
Fred was initiated into the Dalby Services Memorial Lodge in 1962 and after moving to Chinchilla he affiliated with Burstow Lodge, reaching the top office in a number of Masonic degrees.
In 1997 Fred suffered a heart attack and that same year underwent open heart surgery, requiring five heart bypasses.
That year marked the beginning of a number of health problems and in 2003, Fred and Jean made the decision to sell their lovely new retirement home in Chinchilla and move to Toowoomba.
Despite declining health, Fred continued social activities.
He affiliated with Toowoomba Daylight Lodge and Toowoomba Chapter of Order of The Eastern Star, where he served three terms as worthy patron.
Fred could not bear to be inactive.
In retirement, he decided to try his hand at making furniture.
As in everything Fred did, he strove for perfection.
Lacking the proper equipment, nevertheless he managed to produce some beautiful and unique household and office furniture from recycled timber.
The furniture thus produced is used and treasured in the home to this day.
Fred’s credo was “waste not, want not” and he saved almost every offcut of metal and timber, believing he would find a use for it.
His two sheds were like Aladdin’s cave, filled with all his saved treasures.
His genius was such that he was able to make necessary repairs to the home.
He made much of the
equipment required in his workshop.
He paved the areas around the house and tended a vegetable garden and loved nothing more than collecting seeds and cuttings and producing plants and shrubs.
Another retirement activity was learning to use a computer.
Fred was entirely self-taught and soon mastered many programs and formats and was able to offer help and advice to family and friends.
Fred was also a talented musician, again, self-taught.
He could play the piano, electronic organ, keyboard and accordion.
He had a fine singing voice, which was on display during his time as a member of the Chinchilla Choral Society.
Sadly, a complete loss of hearing in later years put an end to those musical and performance activities.
Fred suffered many health problems; his deteriorating heart condition necessitated a pacemaker implant, he developed prostate cancer and he had three life-saving bowel obstruction operations.
He bore all his trials with stoicism, but ischaemic heart disease deprived him of mobility and he entered Blue Care Residential Nursing Home in June of 2016.
How can one capture the essence of this man into words?
In his own modest way he was a natural genius with an innate ability to work his way through all manner of problems.