There was a time when you could just walk into Downing Street have your photo taken shaking the hand of your wife’s cousin. That’s me on the left in 1970.

By the time I reached 1954 in the second book of my family history I realised that I had too material for one book covering the years 1946-1958. Besides, the years 1946 to 1953 represented a neat self-contained phase in my life, the life of my family, and the social history of Australia. Australia was recovering from the war years, society was on the move, and American influence in all spheres of Australian life was increasing. There was also a shift or an increase in my consciousness of the world around me. For these reasons I decided to close the second book at the end of 1953, and prepare a third book covering the years 1954-1958. The third book will bring me up to January 1959 when I was on the point of starting high school.