A Remembrance of William H. Pitt
1912 - 2003

Nadine Stoner

[Reprinted from GroundSwell, 2003]

William Pitt, Nunawading, Victoria, Australia, died peacefully November 2 from complications from bowel cancer surgery in May.

Bill Pitt was a member of the board of Prosper Australia, previously named Tax Reform Australia. He was the longest serving Trustee of the Henry George Foundation-Australia and served both as Treasurer and President. He advanced his own money to buy 46 Hardware St., Melbourne, a Georgist landmark, after which the Henry George Club, of which he was a Director, bought it from him. The Club later sold it at a profit and 27 Hardware was purchased.

Bill was also a long-time member of Common Ground- USA and contributed articles periodically to GroundSwell. "Value: the Soul of Economics" was published in the Nov.- Dec. 1998 issue. "Thomas Shearman - Georgist or Infiltrator?" was published in the Jan.-Feb. 2002 issue. Bill Pitt attended Council of Georgist Organizations conferences in 1999 in Gaithersburg, MD (where he sat in on the pre-conference meeting of the Common Ground-USA Board of Directors.) He also attended the 1989 conference in Philadelphia/Arden. During his trips to the United States he worked in visits to American Georgists, including California in 1999 and to Chicago and Beloit, Wis. in 1989.

Bill Pitt was born June 29, 1912 in Warrnambool on banking premises originally built by his mother's grandfather. His father, Edwin Pitt, was the bank manager there. He attended State schools and then Xavier, a Catholic college. When he married Nell, he returned to his original Anglicanism. With jobs scarce in the 1920's land boom collapse, he accepted the office boy job at a trustee company where he gradually worked his way upward. Following World War II, in which he served in the Signal Corps, he worked for lawyers and in the investment field. He retired early to take care of Nell, who died in 1983. Thereafter he devoted himself almost exclusively to the "land reform" economics that had been the major public interest in his father's generation.

Bill Pitt is survived by four children: Evan Pitt (Eaglemont, Vic.), Mark Pitt (Duncraig, WA), Howard Pitt (Cammeray, NWS), and Mrs. Barbara Coker (Chirnside Park, Vic.)