A Remembrance of Harry Ball-Wilson

Mildred, Matty and Juliet Ball-Wilson

[This biographical sketch was prepared by Mildred, Matty and Juliet Ball-Wilson shortly after the death of Harry Ball-Wilson, who died the 10th of February, 2000]

Harry was born on 2 February 1916 in Fulwood, Preston, Lancashire, the middle son, of Thomas Francis and Annie Lydia Wilson. He left Preston Grammar School at sixteen to join the Preston Gas Company. At twenty one he got a job in sales with a territory of Northwest England.

With the advent of World War II he volunteered for service with the R.A.F. where he flew Spitfires and Hurricanes. He was one of a few daring pilots to survive the M.S.F.U. where "with a flash and a bang" planes were catapulted off the decks of ships, earning him the nickname, "Flash Harry." Later, he was seconded to, then after the war he joined, B.O.A.C. in London where he worked in Operations Planning & Work Study.

In 1952 he married Margaret Turner, an Architect and Westminster City Councillor. They had two daughters Matilda and Juliet. He took an early retirement in 1971 to care for Margaret when she tragically contracted Alzheimer's disease. During this time he jointly founded Participation Consultants, Ltd. which he was involved with for seventeen years.

Harry always had a keen interest in improving the world. He was a fellow of the Institute of Management Services (IMS), a member of the European Institute of Industrial Engineers (EuroIE) and he followed his old colleague Louis Kelso as Coordinator of the Economics Commission of the World Government of World citizens (www.worldcitizen.org). He was involved in gaining NGO status for the Electoral Reform Society of Great Britain and Ireland, also the International Union of Land Value taxation and Free trade.

He was three times a Liberal candidate for the UK parliament, finally in 1979 for the City of London and Westminster South. He was very involved in the Trade Union movement. For ten years he ran the London centre for the IMS and he initiated and ran the international effort of the Wider Share Ownership Council.

Harry believed that it was Margaret's spirit that led him to his second wife, Mildred. She and Harry were married in 1991 and lived very happily in Hawaii for his remaining years. During this time they traveled extensively, visiting family and friends and attending conferences all over the world. He dedicated his last years to addressing man's inhumanity to man, in particular to furthering the Henry George concepts in tax reform; the adoption of a Preferential Voting system; the use of Esperanto; Women's rights and World Peace.

He lived life to the full until his last days. His openness to a wide range of spiritual influences was a comfort on his recent diagnosis of terminal liver cancer and he died peacefully at home aged 84 years.

Harry's greatest contribution to posterity may be in the impact of his ideas in his later years. He sought many contacts and discussions with policy makers in and beyond government in Britain, Australia, USA and elsewhere. He shared with pioneers of ideas like Einstein and Mandela a dream of a future human family with equal opportunity, a global system of justice and freedom from want, fear, intolerance and ignorance. In this year of the UN Millennial Assembly the greatest ever conference of non-governmental organizations will be at the UN in New York. Some of the delegates will be aware of Harry's call for a panel of respected world identities to further the growing demand for a more democratically representative, open, accountable UN. This is only one of many moves that may yet achieve his dream while some of us still live.

His life will long be valued and warmly remembered. Harry was a man of great tenacity, vigor and compassion, the world owes him much. Harry was also a devoted family man who is survived by wife Mildred, two daughters, Matty and Juliet and five grandchildren: Katherine, Nina, Lucy, Louise and Hamish.