Recently I came across this quotation from Soren Kierkegaard:

“Man’s eternal dignity consists in the fact that he can have a history, the divine element in him consists in the fact that he himself, if he will, can impart to this history continuity, for this it acquires only when it is not the sum of all that has happened to me…. but is my own work, in such a way that even what has befallen me is by me transformed and translated from necessity to freedom.” (Either/Or 2:254-255)

We all have a history. It makes us different from animals and gives us an eternal dignity. We can self-consciously give to it some purpose and meaning as a result of our choices which led us from our origins to new possibilities to where we are today. In my eighty fifth year I am prompted to look back on my life and consider my history, from whence I have come to where I am today.

Winston Churchill wrote about his childhood: “When does one first begin to remember? When do the waving lights and shadows of dawning consciousness cast their print upon the mind of a child? My earliest memories are Ireland.” (A Roving Commission, 1)

Malcolm Muggeridge wrote, “My life began in a small semi-detached house in Sanderstead, part of the dormitory town of Croydon. This was in 1903, when there were still traces of its village past.” (Chronicles of Wasted Time, 23)

My life began in a small hotel in Hokitika, a county town of 3,000 souls serving a gold-mining, timber milling and farming community at the mouth of the river emptying into the Tasman Sea on the west. On the east the Southern Alps mountain range was snow-clad most of the year. My parents took over the hotel in 1935 from my maternal grandparents who bought it in 1922. My great-grandparents were pioneer settlers of the town in 1865 and owned several businesses. My earliest memories are of living in a three bedroom suite on the second floor of the hotel with my parents and my older sister, taking my meals in the dining room, spending time with the staff in the kitchen and their sitting room, feeding the chickens, and chopping kindling for the fireplaces. Being born in 1941 I remember the Second World War and participating in the parade that celebrated the surrender of Japan on August 15, 1945. I was sent to kindergarten and then to primary school where I learned to read and write.

Next to the hotel were the railway lines and on the other side was the railway station reached by a pedestrian bridge. My bedroom looked out on the railroad yards where the train-trucks were loaded and unloaded with freight, sheep, or cattle. When the circus came to town I watched elephants, lions, tigers and other animals exiting their boxcars. On race days thoroughbred horses were led out of their booths. As my father was Vice-President of the Racing Club I spent some time at the race track where we would have tail gate picnics and watched the races. A relative had a harness horse, Grattan Bay, that ran trotting races where the jockey sat in a sulky behind it. As every town had its own racing club we would travel to each event during the year. The only reading my father did was the racing and sports pages of the newspapers. I never saw him read a book! He was an avid golfer and a member of the local lawn bowling club.

My father was also the Patron of the Excelsior Rugby Club for which he played in his early years. Photographs of the teams he played on adorned the walls of the public bar. I was expected to follow in his steps and played rugby all through school and eventually for that club after I graduated from university. Cass Square, where all the rugby matches were played was only a block away from our hotel. We would host visiting rugby teams at the hotel where they changed and showered after their matches at the facilities we had specially set aside for them.

My mother owned and ran the hotel. She was the business manager, kept the books, supervised the staff, ordered supplies, checked in guests, did the laundry and sent it out every week. I was given the jobs of ironing sheets and pillow cases on a rotary press, pumping oil for the water boiler, keeping kerosene heaters supplied, mopping floors, and cleaning bathrooms, as well as mowing the lawns. I was kept busy all the time. There was no home life as we lived our lives in public.

However I discovered comics, magazines and books. I would purchase all the boys’ magazines such as The Wizard, Beano, Rover and Eagle every week, and devoured all the Classics Illustrated Comics. After my mother put my light out every night I would read them under the bedclothes with a flashlight. I would regularly visit the local Carnegie Public Library and take out books by Frank Baum, John Galsworthy, Somerset Maugham, Dostoevsky, Enid Blyton, Baroness Orcsky, Agatha Christie and many others. I haunted my school library and became Head Librarian. I learned to love history and geography as well as English literature. One Christmas my parents gave me a ten volume set of The Children’s Encyclopedia by Arthur Mee which contained sections on Science, Biographies of famous men and women, interesting stories, world history, Art, Physiology, Horticulture, Countries of the world, Poetry, Electronics, Literature, Ideas, The Bible, and school lessons on reading, writing, mathematics, music and French. I still have them. They expanded my knowledge and gave me a thirst for more education. At school I found that I could not read the blackboard and began to wear eyeglasses which was a handicap when playing sports. Suffering from bronchitis and hayfever I was not as robust as I wanted to be and had to exert myself to prove my physical ability. No doubt that motivated me to become competitive and assertive. I excelled in track and held the school record for the quarter and half mile.

Ben Sasse, former senator from Nebraska 2015-23, in a speech accepting the Manhattan Institute’s Alexander Hamilton Award published in the Wall Street Journal, May 9, 2026 gives some starter habits for young people to cultivate. One is reading. Fewer than half of Americans read a book. Shorter attention spans are killing our imagination. Children need affection for books. We need to teach our kids to fall in love with reading and show them that the endless dialogue between ideas is more rewarding than the endless scrolling of social media. The second is hard work. This habit can start at an early age. Young men especially need work. Right now we are insulating our children from work, on average until they are in their mid-20s, and by then lots of them turn out not to be able to learn how to do it. I had the opportunity to read voraciously and to contribute to the family business through hard work. My early history introduced me to the tools that prepared me for a lifetime of productivity. I am thankful that God provided for me in those years. Our eternal dignity consists in the fact that we can have a history!