Media giant Fitzie is farewelled

by RICHARD JONES

A FORMER Papua New Guinea Post-Courier managing editor was farewelled at a funeral service in Melbourne last Friday.

John Fitzgerald, universally known as Fitzie, was perhaps best known for his roles as chief-of-staff and editor of the Melbourne Herald and later as managing director of International Public Relations.

But he also played an important part in the lead-up to independence in PNG in 1976.

He took over as the top man at the Post-Courier offices in Moresby's Lawes Road when all sorts of political pressures, from outside as well as internally, were building in the nation's capital in the early 70s. He was managing editor from 1971 to 1974.

Fitzie was a stickler for correct use of English and had a passion for ensuring journalists in his charge spelt people's names the way those people used them.

I remember he, in company with the then Post-Courier editor Jack Pinkstone (later to be my first editor at the Bendigo Advertiser), imparting a bit of Fitzie magic. "People might not know a lot of things, Richard. They might not know much at all," Fitzie thundered.

"But they sure as hell know their own names and how to spell them. So in a story for God's sake make sure you spell the names right."

Sage advice indeed, and something I've never forgotten. Even when you've been interviewing someone named Jack Smith. "Now is that S-M-I-T-H, Mr Smith ?" you'd intone, using the Fitzie logic.

Of course in the Moresby context, and more widely in Papua New Guinea, it was essential to get people to spell their names - even write them down in your notebook. This was in the days before the ubiquitous hand-held voice recorder.

I remember the way Fitzie used to conduct himself at public functions. At one international boxing tournament at the Papuan Rugby League ground in Boroko where I acted as the MC, Fitzie was to present the winner of the main bout with his prize.

Before the action got underway there was a glitch with the tape recorded anthems - the Papua New Guinea one and the Filipino one. The music which trickled from the speakers dotted around the ground sounded like something from an outer Star Wars galaxy.

Everyone at ringside tried to stifle his or her sniggers, but Fitzie retained his composure. It was, after all, an international contest.

At Fitzie's funeral in East Malvern on Friday, his old mate Kevan Gosper of the International Olympic Committee presented one of the eulogies.

Gosper had flown back from Beijiing to be present. Everyone who had ever worked with Fitzie knows that Gosper's Christian name has always been Kevan, and not Kevin.

You could almost hear Fitzie in the background. "For God's sake in your stories, spell it right."

22 October 2007

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