Legend & Legacy – David Chitty

As those of us who were privileged to know David try to recover from the loss of his death just before Christmas, I wanted to put down some of my own memories of our departed friend, with a view to gathering thoughts from his university friends, and in due course creating a lasting tribute to him from the Cripps Hall Association.

Brian Peat has already shared some lovely reminiscences, and hopefully with this effort and other memories.  I’m sure Barbara, Ian, Mark and people from David’s other ‘walks of life’ will recognise much of what follows!

I first met David as a new Law undergrad coming into Cripps Hall in 1971, probably in the Dining Hall, and definitely to the accompaniment of much laughter! David would have been in the second year of a Biology Degree, so was well-established on the Cripps scene. I was immediately struck by his welcoming if slightly halting tones, a ‘larger than life character’ even then, and in more ways than one!

Invariably, when he joined a student gathering, the cry would go up: “Chitty”, but it was always taken by him in good part.

Not for David the sports field or the squash courts; for him it was the witty repartee and the quick riposte, though never delivered with the slightest sense of malice or unkindness. I remember well his response to one uppity undergrad, (no names no pack-drill!), that “manners cost nothing!”

Behind that jovial personality, however, dwelt a serious sense of purpose and of fairness.  In his service to The Cripps Hall Trust as a trustee over many decades and to the Association, he was unfailingly supportive to his chairmen, George Gubas and Pete Winterton, and his other committee colleagues.

As well as being the Association’s main contact with the founding Cripps family, as the Trust’s Asset Manager he led the oversight of the narrow-boat investment which for many years provided the Trust with the bulk of its income. Not for nothing did David relish the title: ‘Admiral of the Fleet’, though it didn’t stretch to wearing uniform!

But it was never about David himself. For example, up to a year or so ago, he fulfilled a role dealing with student and alumni applications for grant aid by the Trust, a prime example of his emphasis on helping others.

That approach and his science background was channelled into a separate career in Health & Safety consultancy for schools. He also educated the writer in the niceties of Section 10 of the Equality Act 2010 having a hand in drafting Trust policies in that area; always done with good humour.

This approach was extended to his teaching career, in later years tutoring many A-level students in Maths and Sciences, and even, I believe, remedial Maths for first-year students at Warwick University. On a visit to his and Barbara’s house a while back, he delighted in opening a cabinet in his study and showing off boxes of Mars bars and Snickers, tools to incentivise his students.

Despite recent failing health, David continued to attend our monthly committee video calls; last meeting it was very sad indeed to realise there would be no David ringing round, (as ‘whipper-in’ as he called it), to make sure of a quorum.

All the above bear witness to his commitment, integrity and unfailing good humour; surely an example for us all.

David, God bless you.  Many people will miss you, but you will live long in the memory!

Peter Ware