for Michael Gordon: 'Decency coursed through his veins', by Fergus Hunter & Simon Balderstone - 2018

16 February 2015, MCG, Melbourne, Australia 

Fergus Hunter is the son of Simon Balderstone, a lifelong friend of Michael Gordon's, who also spoke beautifully at the memorial. (see below)

Most of the people gathered in this room today are probably here, ultimately, because of words. Powerful words and beautiful words and words of consequence – this was the life’s work of Michael Gordon, the man we loved and admired.

And it’s words that have really vexed me leading up to this because I’m not sure I can muster them to do justice to Micky. Funnily enough, I felt a similar unworthiness when sending him pars for the stories we worked on together over the last few years – stories and years that I treasure.

It was my great luck to have Micky around my entire life. He was like a brother to my father for over 40 years and, as a result, like family to me. He was a constant.

The last time I was in this room was three years ago for Harry’s service. Now Scotty – as is his right – has snatched one of my references and themes here. But I would add that Micky on that day also spoke of Harry’s humility and his ability to mix in any company as well as what Scotty quoted.

That same day, Les Carlyon said this about Harry. He said he could scold in print without being mean, he said his was always a human voice.

And the reason I quote that, again, is the obvious one: they’re describing Micky as well.

He was born from decency, he married it, he surrounded himself with it, he passed it on. Decency coursed through his veins. It twinkled in his eyes and radiated from his easy smile. It imbued every word that came out of his mouth or that he bashed out on a keyboard with those index fingers. When he gave you a famous Gordon hug, decency enveloped you.

That trait – and many others – guided him as a journalist and as a person, two identities that were pretty well intertwined.

A special achievement of his was to spend two decades examining Australia’s two darkest and most challenging issues and still emerge with the respect and admiration of a broad spectrum of people. Debates around Indigenous affairs and refugees are highly emotive and deeply complex, they make people very uncomfortable. But at the end of it all, Micky earned tributes from people like Tony Abbott right through to detainees on Manus Island.

You only achieve that by being as intensely respectful and likeable and reasonable and fair, as decent, as undeniable as Michael Gordon.

That weight also meant a lot of his stories on these things got a run or a better run because it was him writing them. He single handedly elevated important issues. That’s how he used his power. That’s what we’ve lost.

Micky was a lot of things to me. He was boisterous yum cha on grand final weekend, he was the papers spread out over the dining table, he was live music in St Kilda, he was bizarre IT issues in the office (I was only occasionally frustrated by that). He was Melbourne, he was The Age, he was football.

While he was like a second father or uncle for much of my life, I got to have him as a professional mentor and counsellor these last four years, a role I know he played for so many people. There was special poetry for me to get those bylines with him because my dad got those byline with him decades ago (not to age you, dad).

There was a column Micky wrote in 2016 that he was obviously very pleased with – he had that chuffed, humble, satisfied feeling about a column. It seems like he may have mentioned it to a few people. It was on the first anniversary of Malcolm Turnbull’s prime ministership and the main point of pride was that he had snuck in a couple of Neil Young references. You have probably picked up the Neil Young theme in the speeches.

“It’s better to burn out than to fade away,” he quoted.

The Saturday before last, Micky’s body – inexplicably, shockingly, unfairly – decided to burn out. This special man, this giant, didn’t fade away at all. Of course he didn’t. He inspired, scrutinised, and loved right to the end.

Simon Balderstone:

I think I made a strategic error, speaking after Paul (Kelly) singing, especially that song. But seriously, it’s great to follow my troubadour hero, as it completes a Keating – Mabo – Yothu Yindi – Paul Kelly - Mickey – Indigenous circle for me.

There are a thousand stories, a thousand memories, a thousand adjectives to put forward about Mickey, but I just want to in a few minutes provide a bit of a sketch pad, a bit of a framework and outline for you all to colour in, in your own ways.

It was obvious, right from the start, when I first met Mickey when he was the junior at the Industrial Relations round, at Trades Hall, and I had just started at the Age - 1977 – that he was going to be a top journo…and a great friend. I was drawn to that amiable, natural charm…the charm he showed towards everyone – no matter what their station. 

All the qualities he had, built on one another over the decades.

He was always, to so so many, a great role model, a great mentor, adviser, helper, friend…as an example, the parliamentary press gallery is pretty often dog eat dog, but Mickey got on with everyone.

He was chirpy but not cocky.

He was a worker bee, but definitely never a drone!

He was, as we’ve heard, seriously competitive, but not aggressive about it - well, occasionally in Sun vs Age footy matches! Also during runs around the lake, …he’d insist on doing interval work, and constantly broke the group ban on surging.

He was a sentimentalist, with traditions and routines - exercise routines; Grand Final weekends; cloud swallow dumplings; special lunches - carrying on Harry traditions – incl. the Harry lunch….we talked only two weeks ago about how we’d missed last year’s GF weekend but there was no way any of us were going to miss this year’s;  well before that, music weekends in Sydney , with the Cyril B Bunter band and a fledgling group called the Oils ….and special holidays, like Christmas or New Year at Currumbin; Bells Easter weekends – all we consumed were fish and chips and beers; and the weeks at Byron, or Noosa …

…. but as well as being a sentimentalist and loyal, …. he was also, always, open-minded, fresh-minded, for trying something new … (including being a pioneer when it came to surfing journalism, whether it be through Backdoor, or his column) ….

That applied to his music too – he had traditions, favourites…such as Neil Young of course, and The Beach Boys, esp. Brian Wilson, but was always on the lookout for new stuff too, to embrace. -  and he could spot talent too…. Way before she was famous, he spotted Tracy Chapman, singing in a bar in New York, and likewise, in the 80’s, with Paul Kelly, as Jim mentioned. He rang me from New York to tell me about this singer/songwriter, and how he’d just had a kick of footy with him in Central Park!

Micky was gentle and calm but also busy, even frenetic, (especially during what I called his “Club Mickey” days and routines, with activities, routines.…all day, somewhere, an activity to fit in, join in or do….…

He was never a showman - Mickey never made himself the yarn… Yet, as Paul Keating said…not a voyeur, but a participant in the best possible way… that phrase about of yours Paul, I know resonated deeply with Mickey….

He was worldly and wise -  but sometimes so sweetly naïve in his calmness:

When he was in Port Moresby for the South Pacific Forum in 2015, down a very dark road, one night…he and some colleagues were trapped by a RASCALS roadblock, made of 44-gallon drums …blocked in, with the driver desperately going this way and that to try to escape, the RASCALS closed in…Mickey wrote an “armed mob running towards us, pelting us with rocks” …wielding guns, knives. What Mickey didn’t write was that he said: “I’ll get out and calm them down”! –  there was a cacophony of “No way!” - No way Micky:  not everyone is always going to fall for that natural charm – The car blew a tyre, had its mirrors blown away, was damaged by missiles and clubs. But they eventually escaped, when a kind local moved some drums at a dark dead-end, and were protected again later by a copper with an M16 in his boot.

--

Micky got so many good stories, did so many great interviews, by being so decent and trustworthy…gentle, considered, he came away with much more information than some foot-in-the-door, badgering, Spanish-inquisition type journo…

…and also because of his trustworthiness - he never revealed a confidentiality, and “off-the-record” was “off-the-record” …one former polly said to me last week that Mickey never did the wrong thing, never went for target journalism, and always kept his sources secret (which made me realise that the polly must have been one!)

And even when he was naughty he was endearing…after very late nights at the non-members bar at Parliament House, Mickey thought the best way to avoid cops was to drive home to our house in Barrallier Street really slowly, creeping along the side of the road, even half off it…accordingly, the nature strips had to watch out, as did the shrubbery on them - and there was hell to pay on rubbish bin nights!

And Mickey has been so kind to me recently, when I’ve been a bit crook…. that lawn at Berrima which Ferg wrote about so well…the lawn Mickey mowed for us a couple of weeks ago…not sure whether to just let it grow now as a hay paddock, or mow it every second day to keep it Mickey perfect….

To Robyn, Scotty, Sarah, Sally, Johnny…all the family…you’re a remarkable family, full of kind, sweet, strong souls – and we’re there for you.

I’m trying to, as Mickey would say, “feel good, feel strong”.

Love you, Kid!

For Michael Gordon: "A defining column in the cathedral of Australian journalism and opinion" by Paul Keating - 2018

16 February 2018, MCG, Jolimont, Melbourne, Australia

Well, we're here to celebrate Michael's life and to mourn his passing, to pay tribute to his life's work, to regret his voice having been stilled. We're also here to share the grief and pass on our condolences to Robin and to his son and daughter, Scott and Sarah.

In a place of many pillars, Michael was a defining column in the cathedral of Australian journalism and opinion. He journalism was marked by its integrity and consistency, a point Jim has already referred to. Perpetually characterised by his own lack of self importance, his determination not to inject himself into his stories, the ability to stand back and talk.

He possessed journalism's most fundamental attribute — to dispassionately assemble facts, to present them in a digestible and intelligent way, to give the reader the credit of understanding their import, to allow the reader the opportunity to come to a conclusion without the story needing colouring.

Michael's journalism carried that quality of understatement, which over time engenders regard in a reader appreciative of fact and insight, particularly in the age of self-expression where bellicosity is too often the hallmark. it takes a strong presence of mind and sense of self to remain unharried, to remain both focused and content with one’s judgements. Michael's line was always marked by that focus and conscientiousness of purpose.

Long careers in journalism and the judgments which attend them are part of the skeins which form the fabric of the country and society. And the loss of any one, an important one, carries a loss to us all. This is why Michael's passing transcends even the primal loss carried by his family and friends.

He was always fascinated by ideas and as his career was fundamentally in political journalism, he was fascinated by political ideas. In my case, this brought him to extend his journalism to a book, which Jim has already mentioned, ‘A Question of Leadership’, which he had published in 1993. This was built around what journalists have since labelled my Plácido Domingo speech, the December 1990 addressed to the National Press Club, perhaps, not perhaps certainly my one and only unguarded speech to the gallery. And the cause of my unguardedness was the death of the secretary to the treasury the previous evening, who had returned from Melbourne to Canberra to participate in an athletics event, only to die tragically coming off the field. In the reflection and sombreness of it, the following night, I was not of a mind to offer an entertaining political speech when someone of such substance, conscientiousness and commitment had been taken from us.

So I focused on the topic of why we were all there. What would we doing there? What was the essence of our mission? What was our duty to public life? And what was the appropriate role of journalists in the political side show? And in the speech I spoke of participants and voyeurs — whether journalists wish to be part of an integral integral to the national project, or whether they wish to sit on the fence and remain voyeurs, to report the high points but too often in the context of sensationalism. Or were they going to be in it for the policy ride and share the uplift, the psychic income or then to be diverted by the then opposition’s alternatives?

I argued what was central to national progress was leadership. That politicians as a class change the world, and that good ones make it very much better.

That is providing they have support on the big upshifts —when we move the whole structure up. I was trying at the time to convey the righteousness of the project and the constructive role journalists had already played in the big reforms to that time, and to not now fall for what was then the Thatcherite agenda of the then opposition.

Well, this whole notion of leadership and the role of leaders and the co-option of the media in the project really got Michael's attention. Mainly for the reason he was already a committed participant, as both Jim and Robyn's remarks make clear, the patriot in him always willed him to the high road agenda. In reality, he could not resist it. The speech got me into great trouble, of course, because of my focus on leadership, where I had said that Australia had never had leadership of the kind that had been provided in the United States at critical by Washington Lincoln and Roosevelt. As it turned out, this caused certain offense in some quarters <laugh> that the United States had a deeper sense of itself than we had, and that it had snatched its independence had written a constitution to guarantee and protect it.

Nevertheless, Michael saw the Plácido Domingo speech as me laying out the contours of an even larger canvas than the reformation of the economy. And hence his book ‘A Question of Leadership’ was written to alert people to that possibility, to that likelihood. So when I became prime minister, it was no surprise to him that having given the country a new economic engine, I wanted to reorient Australia towards Asia, attempt a true reconciliation with the indigenes and embrace a Republic — to let the country discover its blood energy, to let us know who we are and what we are, to give us the power to head full steam into the fastest growing part of the world but with our heads held high.

Michael loved the whole set of ideas, from Mabo to native title, the throw to Asia and of course the Republic. He would occasionally opine what a terrible loss the shift to a Republic had been in later life in conversations I had with him, and agreed that Australia could never be a great country whileever it borrowed the monarch of another country. He understood that there are no queen bees in the human hive, and as Jefferson has said, a monarchy was, of its essence, a tyranny,

Michael believed in an enlightened cosmopolitan Australia, one at a point of justice with its indigenes, open to the world, and ready to embrace its vast neighbourhood. Like the rest of us, he had to end endure the provincialism and the halting progress, but he never stopped believing in the larger schematic.

We will truly miss him.

for Michael Gordon: "He would tap me on the shoulder and say, 'You're OK. You're strong'", by Ali Mullaie - 2018

16 February 2018, MCG, Melbourne, Australia

It is a great honour to be asked to share my story of my relationship with Michael Gordon.

I keep thinking and dreaming of Michael and the many things that were between us.

It is impossible to find the words that describe who he was to me.

He was the closest friend a person could have.

He was a father figure. A brother. A role model and he was my colleague when I worked at The Age in Information Technology.

He introduced me to his family Robyn, Sarah and Scott and I became a part of his family.

He helped me with job opportunities.

He was always there for me and I was there for him.

I could pick up the phone any time and speak to him.

We would meet for coffee, go for lunch and dinner.

He would take me on drives to Phillip Island.   

He took me to the footy and to the beaches where he went surfing.

He discussed his designs for the holiday house he was building.

He introduced me to the Australian way of life.

We hugged each other whenever we met.

We sent each other messages. When I was feeling down, he would tap me on the shoulder and say, 'You're OK. You're strong.'

We would talk about everything, or we said nothing and enjoyed each other's company. Or we would just have a laugh.

What can I say? We connected.

We first met on Nauru in the computer lab at Nauru College, where I was a teacher of English and computer science.

The connection was instant. I could feel it. I was appointed his interpreter.

We spent a lot of time walking around the island.

He wondered if my name was Ali or Sir, because everywhere I went, the students called me Sir.

He saw how they ran up to me and how we walked together.

He saw that the locals respected me because I taught their children and because I was engaged with the community. He understood my achievement.

On Nauru, I taught myself English and Computer Science.

I did not waste my time. But I had no family. Michael could truly hear me. Until then no one outside Nauru knew me. No one had told my story.

And because he was there, and spent time with me and with those inside the camp and because he listened he wrote the truth about our despair and our aspirations.

He did not see me as a victim.

Our friendship had nothing to do with this.

It was not based on sympathy.

He was human and he saw me as human.

I want to get the words right as if Michael is listening and can feel what I am saying.

We were born in separate countries and came from different cultures.

I was Hazara but it made no difference.

Our friendship was not about the past.

It was about now and about the future.

It was about total trust and about two human beings.

Two Australians.

I deeply miss him.

For Michael Gordon: 'Mikey was a role model for humanity', by Sally and Johnny Gordon - 2018

15 February 2018, MCG, Melbourne, Australia

Sally and Johnny were Michael's sister and brother. Johnny's speech is a great example of an ad-libbed eulogy. He's allowed us to include his handwritten notes to illustrate.

Sally:

I’ll be quick as this is very much not my forte. Harry, Mikey and Johnny always have this bit covered. I’m the cheer squad and always just so proud.

We’re all here out of love and respect for Mikey.
He leaves a tremendous hole in our lives.
However, the overwhelming number of emotional and profound tributes has left me with two big hopes.

The first is that all of you who can pick up his baton, will do so.

I hope that many of you will be inspired by him, and then that you will inspire others, to do the stories often regarded as not very sexy. 

Give voices to those who otherwise wouldn’t have one as Mikey did.

As Fergus Hunter said the world desperately needs more Michael Gordons.

Now more than ever.

Take his torch and keep it burning

My second wish is that those of you who are in a position to affect change will work together, and work really, really hard together, to right the wrongs that have so unbelievably become the norm.

Only a few weeks ago Mikey so proudly, so humbly and so beautifully accepted his Walkley award in the company of his colleagues.

He later told me he wished he’d thought to finish with this gesture of support for his friends, the men still on Manus. 

That’s the essence of our brother. 
And we loved him like crazy.

Go well darling Mikey.
 

Johnny:

G'day everyone, I'm Mikey's brother. And how lucky can one guy be to have Michael Gordon as your big brother? It's like one of those [lucky] things you look back at from when you were a kid, "Like crikey, I saw Bob Marley when I was 12 years old!"

But anyway, I'm going to throw these things on [reading glasses] and try and not howl like a mutt. Alright, welcome all, that's what I write down to start with, and what a tidal wave of goodwill. 

Thanks every one of ya, hey Mark if you was looking through my eyes and just go, "giddy up" and thanks so much, so give yourselves a round of applause.

Okay here we go.

Mikey was a role model for humanity, but he was my role model as a kid. He taught me to surf, he was a top bloke, and he was much quieter than me, believe it or not. But you know what I always brought out that other side, a lot of people go, "Well, Michael, he's running on all twelve cylinders!".

Okay I've got two little things written down here. It says, "Police Rounds, Philip Island'

So when I was a kid, I'm learning to surf, I was just a youngster, right, and as you know Mikey was the journo and as a kid, he did it all [whole paper], but he used to do the police rounds. So I think it was something like a 2-11pm shift. So I'd get dropped in at flippin' Russell St., I don't know I'm like twelve or something, right? And Mikey goes, "You know, we can't split till eleven, so he's constantly on the beam, we got the police radios hummin' in the background and he was telling me, "Alright, it's a really big spoil - straight across the road there's the watch house. If you don't act like a kook, we can go over and use the coke machine." It was like ooooooh!

So anyways, when you're a kid right, nine o'clock, you feel like it's three in the morning right, so it's like 11 o'clock we finally get in the car, ready to go, and he goes, 'You know what, I'm tired, I've been working, we can't start the car right?" We had this little red Escort, right? So, I'm sitting next to him ... and the music would be pumpin' and then as you know he was a bit of a ... he loved his music so we had the killer music pumpin' down, but as a grommet I'm half on the nod, right? And he's trying to drive thinking 'if big man shuts up we gonna hit a tree' so it's a safety device to keep me awake.

So, I've just got a pair of shorts on, and Mikey would just go, "Bang!" and just give you the biggest slap on the flippin' thigh... and he goes, "how are the ham steaks now?" 

We had some incredible surfs together and the thing is too big brothers normally bar you if you're like two weeks older ... he was six years older than me, but I was in the posse and that's why I'm mates with all this mob too.

Okay, the next story, [reads note] we gotta here, it says table tennis right? And Michael, he was like the most competitive fruitcake, right? So we had the table tennis at my joint and as he'd get more focused, because he might be like two points ahead, it's like 'don't get mad, get even.' But he sounded like flippin' Jackie Chan or something on flippin: "whaaaa, woo oo, kneyah," So even weeks after Michael had left, Harris and I'd look at each other as we walked through the corridor and just go, "kneyah!" -  and we knew that was Michael's backspin right?

Okay, there's my two casual stories, okay [applause] No no, you're not out of jail yet! [laughter] Okay, back to the notes, here we go.

Birds of the same feather flock together and that's why his family are absolute legends and you know what? His mates - all flippin' legends. Everyone here, you're flippin' legends because you're part of our flippin' mob, right?

And even on that day where we lost Mikey, he was surrounded by legends. You know, these people were black belts of their field and I just wanna give them an ocean of thanks. There's one guy called Nathaniel, I've got him in my phone as "The Man," so let's just give him a round of applause for doing what he did.

I turn the page.

My aboriginal bras have told me their ancestors from The Dreamtime will guide Mike through his journey. Go well, my bra.

Johnny, Sally, Harry, Michael Gordon

For Michael Gordon: 'I always thought of him as like a man putting the shattered glass back together' by Don Watson - 2018

15 February 2018, MCG, Melbourne, Australia

I'm very conscious of the fact that I'm just about the last thing standing between you and the bar, so I'll be quick. But I've learnt more about Mick in the last couple of hours than I ever thought I'd know.

I first met Michael in the Hot Man Bar in Jakarta. Not the sort of place you'd expect to meet a Hawthorn supporter, I thought, but it is as it sounds, a low and seamy dive, where we'd all been led by some dissolute embassy official, the tropics or something.

I remember as many people have said today, and I've been looking at it all afternoon [photo on screen], I remember his grin. That sort of hope-affirming world-reforming grin. Anyway, Mick's behaviour was of course beyond reproach and as it was for the next 25 years, and as it always was, impeccable.

In Canberra, just to try and put myself in context, I realise I didn't know him anywhere near as these people who've known him so well for so long.

In the Keating years we used to meet most Wednesday nights at the Tang Dynasty. It was known as 'The Fang', for good reason, and we always drank at least one or two bottles of Cape Mentelle Sauvignon Blanc. If it was a 'two' night - something about that se'nd bo'l which gives you a shocking hangover - I don't know what it is. It wasn't a power dinner in the sense - for instance up at the Ottoman Richo [Senator Graham Richardson] might be sitting down with Laurie Oakes. Ours was a pleasant little affair, there was no power around really. But sometimes ... with Mick you were never conscious of power, but it was there.

But sometimes in his Saturday column he'd refer to a 'Labor insider'. Or 'sources close to the Prime Minister'. I'd have to concede very modestly that, that might have been me. For years afterwards when we were back in Melbourne and he was writing, he'd ring on Thursdays,very often when he was writing his Saturday piece. Even after I could no longer be described as close to - pretty well anyone.

He'd flatter me by asking what I thought, and read his column or a part of it out to me. And invariably after I'd hung up I'd feel like this raving soap box fool who couldn't stop - a dogmatic, a tribalist, an unbalanced person. All I could hear was my own voice coming back, and of course Mick had hardly said anything, he's just waiting. It took me a while to get over it each day.

Mick of course was a balanced person. Since his death, and after he left The Age, 'balance' is probably the word along with 'integrity' that has been most used most often, to describe him. It never seemed to me that his journalism was balanced in the way that critics of the ABC talk about balance. For instance if you have a highly qualified scientist on, then you must have a complete nong on the other side as well to balance it up. Or two people from the IPA, will provide the same balance basically speaking.

Mick's idea of balance was different and I've been thinking about this a lot, and it came from his nature I think. Several people today have been trying to work out where this innate decency in Mick came from.

It was that ... I think it was because of the way the world appeared to him, and I think it was reflected also in those broken staccato sentences in which he spoke. He very rarely finished a sentence, Mick, if you broke it up. And some he didn't even start, they just ... when he was talking, he was like a sort of Victa with a bad carby. But you were never in any doubt about what he was saying, but he wasn't going to get a gig on Brideshead Revisited, or something like that.

It was a bit the same with reading him, that you never felt that he was offering you the whole answer, because I think he didn't really think there was a whole answer for anything. You could read Mick on a Saturday and sort of long for some sort of brutal flourish, some elegant ending that would sum it all up for you. But he always denied you that satisfaction, and I think he was right to do it. Because I think what he saw in politics and the world itself was too complex and multifaceted. The motivations were too obscure, the deceits too general, the personalities too hard to fathom, too hard to judge, too much of the past was flowing through it that wasn't actually past ...

In other words it was just like life.

And that's the way he wrote about politics, like a man ... I always thought of him as like a man putting every week putting the shattered glass back together, as much as of it as he could. Week after week, month after month, year by year and so at the end he had left, what Paul Keating said, was a mountain, a formidable record of what went on in politics and policy and public life over so many decades.

That's a serious accomplishment.

The other word they used all the time is integrity. Now integrity's not always what it's cracked up to be. It means absolutely nothing in a mission statement. It's equally pointless as a company value, and not to be, read it and you know you can't trust them. But more generally and not infrequently in this town it's worn to mask moral or social superiority. It's a bit like a tiara, or an RSL badge or something. It doesn't actually share a room with hypocrisy, but it's on the same floor.

But Mick's integrity came from a different place I think, that's the whole thing. Somebody was talking before about decency, it might have been Fergus. And Fergus it's fabulous to see you because when you were four, you came into my office, that's the last time I saw you, and you pulled the plug out of my computer when I'd just finished a speech. Bauldo (Fergus's dad] was there, he did nothing about it, and there was no back up and that was the end of it. Four hours work. I still get shivers when I think about it. You might have only been three it's alright.

You know the thing about Micks integrity is it came from ... I mean you can hand integrity down but ... you have to be able to take it up yourself, I believe. I think Michael's integrity stemmed from the fact that he actually felt things very deeply. He was vulnerable, I've seen him, as they now say, 'tear up' many times over things I wouldn't have expected. He felt things, he felt hurt himself and he felt it when he saw the hurt between other people. I think that's what his integrity consisted of, that what was good and fair was everything, and should be encouraged and rewarded. And when it wasn't he was hurt.

He was ... I was looking at him before [gesture to photo], he was a Celt after all. His name was Gordon, and he looks like a Celt the more I look at him. So behind all the balance and the evenness and the integrity and the decency in Mick, all these great qualities was passion. He was an incredibly passionate person.

He channelled most of it into Hawthorn, but not all of it. He actually converted me a bit to Hawthorn, I never thought it would happen. But gently over many years he did. He and Cyril Rioli.

So Mick would go off to some .. with this sort of, this 'interior Mick' he'd go to off some blighted Aboriginal community, or to Nehru, or Manus, and do his best to make the case for the dispossessed and maltreated. Say with all his usual balance, 'in the light of this how can we say we are good?'

I think that's what he did, that was the question he was asking us all the time in those essays he wrote.

Now no doubt Mick would be gratified that politicians from all sides have come to praise him now he's dead. We were all of us glad that they did and I don't doubt their sincerity. It would be even more gratifying if they tried to be a bit more like him. Imagine that. I just have one more thing.

I'm sorry, I know, Tim Costello's is going to be doing the prayers but there is this one, it's secular, so don't panic. It's by a Scot called Don Paterson who's a fabulous poet, it's called 'Funeral Prayer'. He says:

Today we friends and strangers meet
Because our friend is now complete.
He has left time, perhaps we feel we are the ghosts and him the real
So fixed and constant does he seem
So star like
May the human dream arise again to find him woken
At it's heart that it be spoken
Once is as miraculous as a thousand times
What utters this by nature told the trees and bird
And bright stars
Yet of all the words we knew his name was the most dear
We give thanks he was spoken here.

for Michael Gordon: '13 days ago my Dad’s big, beautiful, generous heart suddenly stopped beating', by Scott and Sarah Gordon - 2018

15 February 2018, MCG. Melbourne, Australia

Scott:

Good friend and longtime colleague Tony Wright, closed out his June 2017 tribute to Dad upon his retirement at The Age with the following observation:

"As he leaves Fairfax, there are two recent portraits of Michael Gordon that capture a contentment that transcends journalism.

Not so long ago, he sat on a beach in Sierra Leone with his son, Scott, who is an aid worker in that west African nation battered by civil war and ebola.

They shared a beer and the love of a father and son and watched the sun setting on the waves, a few surfers out for the last break of the day.

Only a few weeks ago, Michael held a tiny baby in his arms: his and his wife Robyn's first grandchild, son of their daughter Sarah. 

The baby is named Harry, after Michael's own late father - himself a legendary journalist - and all who knew the Gordons had held their collective breath for weeks, willing little Harry, born 10 weeks prematurely, to battle on. He had, and his grandfather, the most decent of men, was finally able to hold him, the Gordon story continuing.”

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When Dad stood here 3 years ago and delivered his father Harry’s eulogy, he noted that Harry was blessed to have two innings in life. Dad’s retirement from The Age marked the beginning of his second dig... the back 9 and he was ready for it. He was excited and he was happy. 

"I was talking to him yesterday,” Tony Wright was quoted over the weekend, "he had his surfboards on the roof and was looking forward to a very pleasant weekend out there around the beaches and he was as happy as I've heard him for a very long time.” 

For me Dad’s happiness at the time of his death was perfectly captured in a video sent to me by one his many unofficial god son’s Simon Bramwell. It was during the recent Christmas New Year break and the video showed Simon on a perfectly clear summers day with a light north easterly blowing walking down the pebbled path at Millhouse (our affectionately named beach house) to Dad’s vege patch at the bottom of the hill. 

Dad and his father Harry had long shared a passion for gardening and growing vegies since Dad’s teenage years at Mount Martha. Both approached growing vegies with the same unwavering enthusiasm as they did journalism. Never to be disheartened. 

Just like the journalism gene, I missed the gardening gene. I would often frustrate Dad when he would ring from Melbourne or out of town and ask, "How is the garden looking Scooty?" I would peer out the window at Milhouse and say enthusiastically, “gee mate, I don’t think it has ever looked better!”. Inevitably Dad would return some days or weeks later to find the garden had not seen any attention since his departure and weeds had taken over.  

While Dad and Harry never questioned my career choice to become an auditor (although I later did), Dad still harbored hopes of me finding the passion for gardening and his beloved vege patch.

Aside from Journalism and gardening, I don’t think there was a passion we did not share. 

On my long transit home, I re-read the eulogy Dad prepared for Harry. In many ways this could have been Dad’s eulogy if you only changed the names, they shared that much in common.

In describing Harry, dad wrote, "What sort of father was he? Most of all, he was passionate, someone who greeted each day with enthusiasm and a sense of adventure, generosity and optimism – traits that never left him. He was proud of his kids and loyal, too.

Over the years, Harry became more a sibling than a parent to us kids and even our kids…, and Johnny, Harry and I were the Gordon brothers. 

Close friend and Age colleague John Sylvester, described Dad as a "serial hugger" in the paper last week. Hugging is a defining characteristic of the Gordon brothers, and kissing also. At Harry’s Queensland funeral, I remember Dad’s brother Johnny proudly boasting of how the boys would always kiss each other on the cheek.

One thing the Gordon brothers would never do … is forget to tell you how positively they thought of you. Harry, Dad, Johnny … and I like to think myself … have never been afraid to tell people how much we love them. Whether it’s

·       a waiter at the Chinese Restaurant;

·       a friend of a friend you’ve just been introduced to;

·       someone you’ve shared a moment with in the water;

·       or your dearest and dearest.

We tell them, you just can’t risk not.

Whenever the Gordon brother’s have a beer we affectionately clink both sides of the stubby as if to signal something special (pause) sometimes Dad and I would even clink 3 times on surfing holidays or after a Hawthorn flag in the Blazer Bar. These moments make up my fondest memories.

Sarah and Jimmy, let me know when little H is ready and Johnny and I will be sure to pass on the tradition. 

While Dad’s second dig was unfairly cut short, his first innings was long and accomplished with plenty of well documented runs on the board. In reading the tributes that have flowed in, I was taken by that of Orietta Guerra. I’ve never met Orietta, like many of those Dad influenced, I only hope you are here so we can share stories afterwards.

In her tribute Orietta says, “I have spent the past 24 hours questioning how I, we, can all be kinder, nicer, better. More like Michael Gordon.”

For many of us, and I suspect for you, Dad’s positive influence has long since taken affect. We are all kinder, nicer and better for having Micky around. Dad was a molder of good people and so many of you in the room today are testament to that. He gave us all the tools needed to be better. And better we are and better we will be.  

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When Simon reached Dad’s veggie patch he was carrying two ice cold beers. When the camera first pans to Dad, he is hard at work turning over soil wearing a ridiculous wide brimmed hat complete with fly net. Then once Dad feels Simon’s presence he looks up and greets the camera with a full body smile. Next the video cuts to a snippet of Simon, mum and dad enjoying cold drinks and the afternoon sea breeze on Milhouse’s deck. From Simon’s short video, it was clear… Dad was exactly where he needed to be.

Two weeks ago I read out my 2018 goals to mum and dad over the phone from Sierra Leone. Number 1 on the list was to surf more with those I love surfing with. 

Dad and I didn’t get to paddle out together in 2018 but we will forever be sharing the ocean. 

For me, Nick McKenzie summed this up best, "Died in the ocean, sun on his back. What a wave you rode Mickey, what a wave…"

Michael, Scott, Robyn and Sarah Gordon

Sarah:

13 days ago my Dad’s big, beautiful, generous heart suddenly stopped beating. And we didn’t see it coming.

So many times over the past two weeks, as I’ve howled, hurt or hoped, I’ve wanted to call Dad. He would be able to help.

He was the Dad that was always there for me, my thinker, my friend and my protector.

He was the Dad who always told me, “Don’t worry. It’s all good. Have I ever let you down?”

The word mentor has been used so much over the past two weeks to describe Dad, and I feel so very blessed as he didn’t just mentor me in a professional sense, he mentored me in life.

Perhaps that is why I’ve found it so hard to come up with the right words today. Dad was our narrator and now I’m lost for words. He was the person that provided me with so many.

He taught me so much and I hope I can pass on these special qualities and values to his grandson, Harry, who he loved so dearly.

Dad, I could be sad, that I didn’t get the chance to say goodbye or get one final trademark “Micky” hug.

Dad, I could be sad, that I didn’t get the chance to say how proud I am of you and how much I love you.

I could be sad, that I didn’t get the chance to thank you for everything you have done for me and our family.

But you wouldn’t want that.

Just two days before Dad’s big, beautiful generous heart stopped beating, he came to our place for dinner. He stood outside with a beer in hand. We were listening to Jimmy’s latest playlist and admiring our new deck, as the sun went down. He had Harry in his arms and a big grin on his face. He was happy. Oh so happy…

Dad, I didn’t get the chance to tell you that night, so I’m telling you now.

We are going to be okay. We are going to be okay because you showed us the way. We are going to be okay because you have given us the gifts that are more precious than anything in this world.

Whenever we were heading off to a big event, you would calmly say: “Feel Good, Feel Strong”.

Dad, I’ll try my very best. I love you.

Related speech: Friend and colleague Martin Flanagan delivered a typically beautiful and emotional eulogy for his first editor at The Age. " Michael Gordon may be the most sensitive man I ever met. When you spoke to him, you could hear the words drop inside him. Like coins in a slot machine." Read and listen here.

for Michael Gordon: ' His smile came from deep down, like the sun appearing over a horizon', by Martin Flanagan - 2018

16 February 2018, MCG, Members Dining Room, Melbourne, Australia

Michael Gordon may be the most sensitive man I ever met. When you spoke to him, you could hear the words drop inside him. Like coins in a slot machine. If you said personal things about him, he would blush. His smile came from deep down, like the sun appearing over a horizon. If you asked him a question, there was always a pause, then a slight stammer preceding a rush of words. But not many words – he was a clear, precise thinker. And that was how he wrote – clearly, precisely.

I knew him in two ways. The first was as the sports editor when I arrived at The Age in 1985. He gave me a nickname – Flanners – which I still meet daily. He gave me my break as a sportswriter in sports-mad Melbourne. He made me feel that he loved what I did and I loved doing it for him. That never changed, regardless of our positions on the paper.

We separated from The Age at the same time, mid-way through last year. For my farewell column, I had a number of ideas. He told me which one to write – a story about my brother, Tim. I always did what he told me or asked me to do. He asked me to go to the office on his last day so I did that also. We left the building together.

He said we both got better as we got older. I certainly thought he did. He became more his own man, dared to do stories that weren’t going to get clicks on-line. At a time when - for some - clicks on-line were the measure of a journalist’s worth. He wrote stories about refugees, powerless people none of us really want to know about because the subject is threatening in so many ways.

What is remarkable about Micky’s journalism is its consistency.  He wrote about football, he wrote Aboriginal stories, he wrote about Canberra politics, he wrote about Manus Island refugees, and the subjects of all those very different stories seem to agree that he treated them fairly and well. Somehow his method successfully negotiated the difficulties peculiar to each area. That’s very rare, I reckon.

Alastair Clarkson is the dominant AFL coach of this era. No-one has come near to Michael’s portrait of Clarkson in his book, “Playing to Win”. The day after Micky died, I received a text from Patrick Dodson’s office. When will Kumunjai Gordon’s funeral be? Kumanjai. An Aboriginal term of respect for the recently departed. Both a Labor and Liberal Prime Minister have spoken of him since his death; a refugee on Manus Island said he was the one great Australian man he met.

What was the secret of Michael Gordon’s success? He was humble with a capital H, never opened his mouth before thinking, asked intelligent questions, never lost sight of those basic human truths the Americans describe as self-evident - and he reported his findings in an easy-to read way.

Last Sunday, I met a former Age employee at the supermarket. She was immediately tearful and I knew why – Michael Gordon. “I didn’t really know him,” she said. “It’s what he represented”.

We live in the era of fake news. There was not a single fake particle in Michael Gordon, and that was recognised in places as far apart as the Lodge in Canberra and the Manus Island Detention Centre. His life stands as an example of what journalism can be and do.

Related speech: Sarah and Scott Gordon also delivered amazing eulogies for their father and shared them with Speakola. " 13 days ago my Dad’s big, beautiful, generous heart suddenly stopped beating. And we didn’t see it coming. " Read and listen here.