Peter Nixon AO, who died last Thursday aged 97, was a tough old blighter.
A few years ago he was telling The Boss about the time he came off his quad bike, back in the 1990s: it cost him a kidney, twenty breaks to his ribcage, spinal damage, a broken sternum and a partially collapsed lung.
He was spraying blackberries on his East Gippsland property, north of Orbost; the bike had a 100-litre tank on the back and flipped over, dragging him down a hill with his foot jammed between the brake pedal and the frame.
“I could hear the bones breaking,” he chuckled.
But he wasn’t chuckling at the time – he was in serious trouble, finding himself upside down with the engine running, fuel spilling out of the petrol tank and the ignition out of reach. Somehow he managed to turn the key off.
He thinks he lost consciousness for a while, he didn’t know how long. He finally extricated himself from underneath the quad bike and found his mobile phone – he had one of the early models, but he couldn’t get a signal.
He limped up towards the top of the hill – “sheer agony” he said - until he could call his son Chris to rescue him. He was airlifted from Orbost hospital to Sale.
It wasn’t the first time Peter Nixon had been battered, but not beaten. At the age of 18, he sustained a serious hip injury while playing football and spent eight months in hospital recovering. In between the two events, however, he had a remarkable career.
Until last week, he was one of two politicians still living who had served under Liberal Prime Minister Robert Menzies, having won the seat of East Gippsland for the Country Party in the 1961 election. He went on to spend 22 years in Canberra – 19 of them with his party in office.
During those years, Peter served under five different Prime Ministers – Menzies, Holt, Gorton, McMahon and Fraser. He was variously Minister for the Interior, Shipping and Transport, Post-master General, Transport and Primary Industry.
Along with Doug Anthony and Ian Sinclair, he was mentored by our then Member for Murray and Deputy Prime Minister, the legendary “Black Jack” McEwen. It was triumph of succession planning that set up the Country and National Party for decades.
He was always a strong advocate for farmers and, during the Whitlam government in 1972-75, he encouraged his party colleagues to support Whitlam’s legislation he thought beneficial to the country, against the wishes of the Liberals. He was a longtime critic of the ABC, claiming it was biased against the National Party.
Peter left politics in 1983 and moved into the business world, while keeping an eye on his substantial farming interests - by then mainly run by his son Chris.
He was founding Chairman of Southern Cross Broadcasting during its growth phase, as it acquired Melbourne radio stations 3XY and 3AK and stations in Perth, Tasmania and Canberra. He became one of the four original VFL Commissioners and then the AFL, paving the way for the national code.
Peter was a lifelong Tigers fan: while boarding at Wesley, he would play football on a Saturday morning before heading for a league game in the afternoon. One day he and his mates ended up in the corner of the race at Punt Road, where Jack Dyer spotted them and dragged them into the rooms at half-time. They were hooked. Peter was Premier Patron of the club from 1981 until last week.
Whenever The Boss caught up with him at a game or a lunch, he would always ask about “Shepp” and what was happening in water management. And he would remind The Boss how he and his family retreated to the Snowy River for safety as the 1939 bushfires roared through. Woof!