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From the financial world to living off the grid
Sep 28, 2020
In mid-’60s Victoria, several companies dominated the oil industry, controlling supply, processing and retailing. Motorists welcomed XL Petroleum when it imported cheaper fuel from Singapore and operated its own metropolitan service stations, jolting the natural order.
Ian Sykes and Brian Fitzpatrick had started XL. They apparently built XL’s Fawkner outlet themselves, “helped by an Italian who knew nothing about concrete”, Fitzpatrick told university students in 1969, including the writer.
Half a century later, Ian Grant Sykes unexpectedly died in The Alfred hospital on June 4, 2020, after a heart attack. He was born in England to Gladys Edith Sykes (nee Grant) of Melbourne, and Norman Sykes, of Sale, Cheshire. A Melbourne University graduate, Gladys was a mathematics teacher.
Norman was a Royal Flying Corps fighter pilot late in World War I, whose cohort was leaving for Flanders as the armistice was declared. Norman became an aircraft designer for AV Roe (later Avro) at Woodford, near today’s Manchester airport and Sale, Norman’s hometown. Ian Grant Sykes was the second child of three; an elder brother had died in infancy. Ian and sister Leila attended school in Sale. He recalled damaging Nazi bombing raids nearby and otherwise carefree days.
The Sykes migrated to Australia about 1946, farming at Claude Road, Sheffield, Tasmania, en route to Cradle Mountain. Rugged Mount Roland dominates this beautiful valley, a staple landscape for calendars, chocolate boxes and tourist brochures.
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