Vale Mervin Pilcher, 88 Fond so long to ‘Mr Fixit’
FAMILY and friends have paid tribute to a legend of North Queensland, electrical engineer, former councillor, loving father and grandfather and “Mr Fixit”, Mervin Morgan Pilcher.
Mr Pilcher passed away in Townsville on July 5, aged 88.
He was born in Charters Towers on April 2, 1931, the second son of Leon and Elizabeth Pilcher. He grew up on the family farm, Capeville, on the banks of the Cape River near Pentland.
His was educated at Pentland State School, riding 10km daily to school, before attending All Souls College in Charters Towers to age 15.
His education was cut short because his family could no longer afford to send him to school and he returned to work on the farm and help his brother Elvin cut timber.
Wanting a better future, he completed a wireless radio course and ran a radio repair business. His electronics skills were well known throughout the Pentland district.
Even in recent years, people would bring their old radios to his Fairfield Waters home in Townsville seeking repairs and restoration.
He worked as an electrician at the uranium mining town of Mary Kathleen and from then spent two years living and working in England.
It was during this time that he met his future wife, Margrit, a Swiss trainee nurse at the German Hospital in London. They were married in Pentland in February 1962.
He operated a mail postal run to properties northwest of Pentland, making deliveries in an old Bedford truck or one of his many VWS.
With a young family, Mr Pilcher not only worked the family farm but started fulltime work at the Cape River Meatworks, completing further studies to become a process plant engineer/shift engineer, and later being promoted to chief engineer.
During this time he was elected to the Dalrymple Shire Council (now Charters Towers Regional Council), serving from 1973 to 1976 and again from 1981 to 1988.
He was instrumental in establishing the airstrip and swimming pool at Pentland.
All his homes had an electronics workshop. He would order components through the mail and make various gadgets. Every family member had a homemade digital clock. He made a digital gauge to measure rainfall.
He was known as “Mr Fixit” and would always carry a pen and small screwdriver, handy for unexpected repairs.
When the Cape River Meatworks closed in 1989, he transferred to the Stuart meatworks south of Townsville and was one of the last shift engineers to work at the Ross River meatworks.
Retiring in 1998, he moved from Alligator Creek to Fairfield Waters.
He didn’t slow down in retirement, becoming part of the Wulguru Uniting Church community, serving as an elder on the church council and running the Kids Club with Margrit.
He was involved in Stable on the Strand, providing his generator, power boards and extension cords.
A long-time associate, Rangewood resident Ken Knuth, described him as a rare and wonderful man.
“He is probably the only man I knew who knew the practical side of engineering as well as the academic side of the game, a rare mixture,” Mr Knuth said. “We all learned a great deal from him.”
At his funeral, his family said he made a positive impact on many people and possessed a technical mind that was ahead of his time.