A gentle giant who was a fount of knowledge
HARRY BUSHBY WILL BE REMEMBERED FONDLY BY HIS FAMILY AS A KIND MAN WITH AN ENQUIRING MIND WHO WAS DEVOTED TO HIS WIFE, DAUGHTER AND GRANDCHILDREN
HARRY Stephen Bushby was a giant of a man in every way.
At 6ft 4in, he towered above many, but he was blessed with a gentle nature and great kindness.
His daughter, Joanne Maskell, says, “I know I’m biased – I was always Daddy’s girl – but he was a special person, one who always tried to see the good in everyone and believed everybody should be given a second chance.
“He was a gentle giant. He saw the world differently, and noticed things that others might walk past, like the first snowdrops or bluebells. Dad passed that on to me and my boys.”
Harry was born and brought up in Broadway West, Dormanstown, one of two children of fisherman Harry Bushby Senior and mum Nancy.
An intelligent boy with an enquiring mind, Harry achieved the grades to earn him a place at grammar school, and never lost his thirst for knowledge or desire to learn.
“He was a walking encyclopaedia. It didn’t matter what we asked, he’d know the answer,” says Joanne. “He always had his dictionary and atlases by his side. My sons – his grandchildren, Corey, Callum and Ray – would look
something up on Google to see whether he knew it. And he always did.” After leaving school at 16, Harry first went to Dorman Long, then British Steel, working in the beam mill for more than 30 years. “Dad worked really hard and I always had this image of him cycling to and from work with his
hessian haversack,” says Joanne.
In 1965 he met Irene, whom he vowed he loved “from the first time he saw her”, and they married in 1966. “There was a big height difference because Mam was only 5ft, so Dad always put her on the bottom couple of steps to give her a kiss before he went to work! She was his world. He didn’t care where they were as long as they were together
– that was all that mattered.”
And when Joanne was born in 1973, the couple’s world was complete.
“We lived in Tees Road, Redcar, all my life, and the street was like a family,” says Joanne. “Our house was always open, full of love and laughter. I had an amazing time.
“Mam and Dad never drove, but each summer we would go to Hutton Sessay near York, and we’d go fruit picking. Dad loved tayberries and loganberries.
“Later they stayed in a cottage in Thirsk and the lady who owned it rescued owls, and me and my family would go with them. Mam and Dad had travelled the world before I was born, to Austria and Monaco. Dad was full of life.”
After redundancy from British Steel, Harry never worked again, although he umpired for the local cricket team, and volunteered for the Mining Museum and Coatham Primary.
Harry died in hospital after breaking his hip in a fall. “But Mam said to me, ‘Do you know, we had a really good life,’ ” says Joanne. “What more could you ask for?”
I know I’m biased, but he was a special person who tried to see the good in everyone. Joanne, Harry’s daughter