Kenneth Odell
Ken was born in 1923 in a flat above a furniture shop in the Holloway Road, North London. His Dad was a bus driver who had returned alive from the First World War after driving troops across France. His Mum was a seamstress. His older brother Jack, 3 years his senior, was a naughty boy who got expelled from school at the age of 13.
Ken attended Tollington Park school for boys, which was evacuated to Bucken, near Huntingdon, at the start of the Second World War. In 1941 he gained employment at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia in the City of London, just in time for the Blitz. His brother Jack had joined the army, and as soon as he was old enough to join up, in 1943, Ken joined the Royal Air Force. He volunteered to be a pilot and was sent to Miami in Oklahoma USA for pilot training. His first solo flight was in February 1944, and he was awarded his pilot’s “Wings” on the 26 August 1944 at the age of 20. He qualified top of his class and it was recommended that Pilot Officer Odell become a Flying Instructor. I think Miami USA was a period of his life which he enjoyed immensely, judging by the amount of time he spent reminiscing about it in later life. He kept in touch with the families he met and the friends he made there throughout his life.
In October 1944 he returned to the UK to complete his Flying Instructor Training. Having qualified in Tiger Moths, newly promoted Flight Lieutenant Odell trained many new pilots, some of whom did not survive the war, and he often spoke of them fondly.
Towards the end of the war, Ken was posted to RAF Panshanger, near Welwyn Garden City. On VE Day, whilst crowds were celebrating and dancing in the streets of London, he was duty officer at the otherwise deserted air base and ended up going to bed at 9.30, one of the most miserable nights of his life.
Ken was finally demobbed in February 1947. The following year he joined the RAF Volunteer Reserve which allowed him to keep flying until 1953. He held a private pilot’s licence until 1976.
Ken’s flying Logbooks closed in 2009 when his lifetime flying totalled 1,200 hours and 35 minutes. However, he still flew occasionally with Operation Propeller and in 2015 he was taken up in a Tiger Moth again, at the age of 91, an astonishing 72 years after his first flight in one.
Before the war, he had met Diana, who was to become his wife of 73 years. His brother Jack had also met Diana’s sister Joan, and there was a grand double wedding in March 1945 in Muswell Hill, with men and ladies in their military uniforms and the brides and bridesmaids in borrowed outfits thanks to rationing. The wedding photos show the windows of the houses taped up to protect against bomb damage.
After being demobbed, Ken re-joined the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. His son Stephen was born in 1947 followed by daughter Lesley in 1950. Working for the bank must have seemed very tame after being a pilot, but the wages were good, and he saw himself progressing up the banking career ladder with a generous company pension at the end of it. But that was not to be.
Ken’s brother Jack had started working at Lesney Products, and the birth of Matchbox Toys in the 1950’s had heralded a change in the family fortunes. Ken told me that Jack phoned him one day and said: “I’ve bought you a toy shop”. So Ken and Diana became the proprietors of Roberts Toy Shop in Palmers Green. I remember visiting the shop when I was little. What fun to have an aunty and uncle who owned a toy shop!
As the Matchbox empire continued to grow, Jack decided that he needed an office manager, so the toy shop was sold and Ken went off to work in the Matchbox Toys factory in Homerton, East London, in the accounts department. I worked there myself in 1977 and 1978, and Ken was my boss as well as my uncle and my godfather. He was very careful not to show me any favouritism over the other staff.
After the collapse of Matchbox toys in the 1980’s, Ken was again called up to run the accounts department at Lledo toys, his brother’s new fledgling company, in Ponders End, Enfield.
When Ken wasn’t at work, he was involved with community life revolving around St Thomas’s church in Oakwood. He sang in the choir, helped run the Scouts and assisted Diana in her role of Girl Guides captain and commissioner. He was dragged off to girl guide camps and kept busy digging latrines and doing all the manly jobs which only men can do.
His other love was his garden. The vegetable patch at Culgaith Gardens was always groaning with produce, and as many of you know, he had a knack for growing prize-winning dahlias.
As a child and a teenager, I was often sent to stay with Diana and Ken when my parents were away, and those weeks were some of the happiest of my childhood. We used to play board games, cards and dominoes with Aunty Dutchie and Uncle John, and we travelled all over Spain and Portugal in their Volkswagen camper van. There always seemed to be parties going on in the garden at Culgaith Gardens, with family, friends, neighbours and dogs mingling on the back lawn, eating and drinking.
Ken used to travel to the USA every summer to help look after his grandchildren, Caren and Kirsty, and always harboured a dream of living in the USA. Sadly, it never came to be.
After retirement, Ken and Diana made the decision to escape the urban sprawl of Oakwood and retire to the rural idyll of Edith Weston, where they quickly made new friends and became involved with village life. They still loved travelling and going on cruises, and even made it to America for their grand daughter’s wedding in 2014. Ken enjoyed attending lunches at the Aircrew Association at RAF Cranwell and meeting his friends at the Probus Club.
It always seemed to me that Ken was the quiet one of the couple. I think that was because, for most of their married life, Diana probably wouldn’t let him get a word in edgeways. Since her death in 2018, he seems to have talked non-stop, and I feel I have got to know him even better, as we have had the time to sit and reminisce about his past and our family history.
Ken had a wicked sense of humour, and the last few years has enjoyed the company of his carers and many friends and neighbours who popped in to see him and keep an eye on him. Particular thanks go to Helen and Gary (he used to call Helen “Hell on Earth”), Farmer Judy, neighbour Peter, and carers Ingrid, Rachel, Pirette, Ewelina and Nisha. He liked to boast that he was always surrounded by women and was a terrible flirt, right to the very last!
Ken enjoyed life right up until his last two weeks. We organised a surprise party for him at the pub for his 95th birthday, which he pretended he didn’t like, for the first 10 seconds. Even as his world became smaller, he still enjoyed the company of other people and was always welcoming, even on the days when he didn’t feel too good. He took pleasure from his garden right up until his last days.
He has been a fantastic role model to me, my children and his children, grand- children and great-grandchildren. He was like a second Dad to me and I miss him every day.
May he rest in Peace.