David Stow Asche
26 October 1931- 16 May 2001

My father, David Asche was born in 1931 in Hong Kong, where his father taught science and mathematics at a missionary school. His parents were  Harold Carsten John Asche and Mary Christina Paterson Asche (nee Adam).

The Asche family had arrived in Australia during the Victorian Goldrush of the 1850s and 60s, when Thomas Asche, a barrister from Oslo, Norway had come, as did so many, to seek his fortune (family legend suggests he may also have been fleeing the heartbreak of being jilted). Thomas did indeed make good, but not through finding gold. He had, at one point, a store on the goldfields and also a pub. A physically strong man, he won the store, or the money to purchase it in an arm wrestling match, at which he pretended initially to be weaker than he was in order to increase the betting odds. In many an Australian history book Thomas is described as a notorious 'Land Shark.'
He married twice. Most children of his first marriage, to Jane Weir, either died in infancy or produced no progeny. One or two became nuns I believe. His son, John William Frederick Asche, however, married and produced three children, one of whom, Harold Carsten John Asche became my grandfather. Thomas's second marriage, to Harriet Emma Trear following the death of Jane, produced a son, Thomas Stange Heiss Oscar Asche. Known as Oscar, he became a famous actor-manager both in Australia and Europe, where one of his (self-written) productions: Chu Chin Chow had the distinction of holding the record in England of longest running show. He also appeared in a handful of movies in the early to mid 1930s (including The Private Secretary, A Christmas Carol 1933 version and Don Quixote).Despite his great successes and marriage to one of the day's pinup girls, the actress Lily Brayton, Oscar gambled away his fortune on greyhound racing and, penniless in his final years was graciously taken in and supported by Lily from whom he had been divorced for some years.

Many stories from this side of my family are known to me through Oscar's autobiography, but of my grandfather H.C.J. Asche (or Jack, as he was called) I know relatively little as he had died a couple of months before I was born. My mother (his daughter-in-law) described him as 'cold.' By this I imagine she meant that he was reserved and undemonstrative,  a common trait especially amongst Asche males in whom the Myers-Briggs introverted, intuitive, thinking (INT) personality type is prevalent . A cousin of my father's spoke of him as penny-pinching. She remembers when visiting the house as a child being offered chocolate and being handed a mere one little square from a block. He also disdained frivolities such as make-up and fashionable clothes. He was religious and a tee-totaler. I have heard , though I cannot verify it, that Jack's father, John W.F. Asche was an alcoholic and a wife beater, if so the tee-totaling might have some relation to that. I don't recall my father saying anything negative about my grandfather, other than that he found it remarkable that a man of such intelligence could believe literally in the dogmas of Christianity. I did hear from my mother that as a young boy my father was forced to sleep every night outside on the porch because although there were sufficient bedrooms in the house, my grandfather insisted on retaining one as an office. My father was terrified nightly for years that bears would come and eat him while he slept. It was probably my grandfather's idea too to send my uncle John Paterson Asche as a six year old to boarding school in another province of China, an experience that is generally believed to have damaged him for life. My impression, though, is that my Dad generally admired and sought the approval of his father, recounting with fondness the father-son activities of his boyhood such as building crystal sets together.

My grandmother, Mary Christina Gladstone Adam was born in Greenoch, Scotland in the late 1890s. The Scottish family," Adam" is related to the Gordon clan and it's the Gordon tartan kilt that they wear when occasion calls for it. The 'Gladstone' middle name comes from the English Prime Minister of the same name to whom she was related (though I forget quite how). Her mother,  my great-grandmother, Mary Grace Paterson was first cousin to the poet, Andrew Barton (Banjo) Paterson, notable for penning one of Australia's best known (and least understood) songs "Waltzing Matilda." Actually he only wrote the words; the folk tune was already in existence.  Her father, -------------Adam was a minister, and Mary was, all her life, a quietly devout Christian. I don't believe I ever heard her talk about her faith, but if her habitually unruffled 'que sera sera' attitude had its roots there then it served her well.
Mary emigrated to Australia with her parents while quite young, although she never lost her accent nor her love for bagpipes and Scottish dancing. She was one of the early female students at Melbourne University. Though herself more artistic than intellectual, her family, like her husband's, prized such gifts; her brothers were prominent in the professions.
 Mary was an accomplished watercolorist and loved to travel, especially on painting tours which she continued to enjoy, along with playing golf, well into her eighties, leaving a legacy of dozens of beautiful paintings of various places she had visited. Like her mother who died aged 96 (and of whom I have some vague toddler memories) Mary lived into her mid nineties. The Gordon tartan was worn at her funeral and her grand-nephew played bagpipes.

David Stow Asche, my father, was the youngest of three children. All three were very intellectually gifted; a quality valued in the family. Elder brother, John Paterson Asche and sister, Mary Grace Asche (later Whyte), both became medical practitioners. At around age of 15 or 16 David won a scholarship entitling him to attend any university in the world. Although at the time the parents were still living in China (they had been evacuated during the Japanese occupation but came  back to teach again after the war) David chose to attend Melbourne University because his brother John was studying there and it was thought that John would be able to look out for him. But elder brothers frequently have agendas which conflict with such a role and David's major difficulty there, even had he discussed it might not have been within John's power to solve. Already younger than the average first year student, David was also, like many people who are going to be very tall, a physically late bloomer. Thirdly, he was having to share classrooms, dormitories and showers with an older than average group: soldiers returned from WW2 taking up the opportunitiy of government funded university studies. These were 'real men' who made young David feel like a puny boy and he told me that the feelings of inferiority affected him and impacted his relationship for a very long time. The experience also affected his studies, as he would miss morning classes to wait use the showers after everyone else had departed.  Initially he had enrolled in engineering, (his father's suggestion) but, after failing first year eventually switched over to Pure Mathematics, which there was part of an arts degree. In the last year of his life I asked him about his reason for having chosen Mathematics. I had always assumed that he had a particular attraction to the subject, perhaps its beauty, which even untutored I could sometimes appreciate. And while he did have the sort of mind that enjoyed problems, puzzles and patterns he told me that the real reason he chose Pure Maths was because he found he was good at it. He might as easily, he said, have enjoyed a career as a botanist or biologist. David could find almost anything interesting and tried his hand at many things for fun: knitting, leatherwork, mud-brick making, pottery, drawing, writing, bread-making, wine-making, silver crafting, sewing and many others. He had no qualms about attempting so called women's hobbies and was an involved participatory parent in my infanthood. He also played classical piano quite convincingly. At university he joined the drama group and for a short time a Christian fellowship and the communist party. He told me, with amusement, of an incident in which he was asked to lead a religious service, including the giving of a sermon. The sermon was a great success for which he was roundly complimented, but he wondered what the reaction would have been had the group been aware that he had put it together mostly from bits and pieces of various hindu, sufi and other non-christian texts. David's membership of the communist party, though short-lived, incensed his father , as did his fondness for alcohol. For these reasons my grandfather later cut both my father and uncle John out of his will, leaving everything to the daughter, who was living a far more upstanding life as the wife of a Presbyterian minister.

.After obtaining his BA he spent some time teaching Mathematics at high school level, including a stint at a girls boarding school. It was there, in the maths class he taught that twenty-three year old David Asche met a fifteen year old student by the name of Anne Raws. She was bright and unusual. Although obviously from a well-to-do family, she liked to go about barefoot and seemed not to notice his scruffy attire. Like himself, Anne had the capacity to enjoy learning for it's own sake and seemed to find his conversation fascinating. She paid more attention in class than most of her classmates and had clearly been impressed by his memory feat of writing PI to 100 decimal places on the blackboard. Her natural uncurbed enthusiasm for topics that were dear to him: music, literature, art have the first time David had received such positive female attention and must have been a panacaea for his inferiortiy complex