The Salopian no. 160 - Summer 2017

OLD SALOPIAN NEWS 61
Nic Coward (DB 1979-84) has been
appointed as the first independent
Chair of England Golf, the governing
body for amateur golf in England which
was formed in 2012 by a merger of the
English Golf Union and the English
Women’s Golf Association. In a 20-year
career at the top levels of British sport,
Nic has been the General Secretary
of the Premier League, the chief
executive of the British Horseracing
Authority, joint chief executive of the
Football Association and a director of
Wembley Stadium. He has also been a
non-executive director of the FA, was
treasurer of the CCPR (now the Sport
and Recreation Alliance) and first chair
of the global Sports Rights Owners
Coalition. He now consults to a number
of sports and entertainment businesses
in the UK and around the world, as well
as having non-executive roles away
from sport.
in Maun, Botswana, the gateway to
the Okavango Delta. Following their
second wedding ceremony which was
held in the Okavango Delta a couple
of months after their UK wedding, and
conducted by a local Khoi San tribe
with whom Rob has worked for 13+
years, they now organise weddings for
other couples in the Botswana bush,
alongside their luxury mobile tented
safaris. Recently they have extended
their business from tourism to include
property and investment in the country
as well. They are always on the look
out for bright and motivated young
people to volunteer on gap years,
summer breaks at university, or on
placement years, to come out and join
them for a couple of months, bringing a
useful skill set whilst gaining exposure
to the tourism industry. Rob can be
contacted on rob@golden-africa.com.
always travelling and exploring – be
it the street corner or the most remote
places on earth – with a sense of
curiosity. I’ve found Southern California
to be a perfect base. While we have
access to some of the best production
minds and facilities in the business,
we also live next door to mountains,
oceans and deserts that couldn’t be
sufficiently explored in ten lifetimes!
Simon Frew (PH 1982-87) In April
2017 Si Frew moved to the Cayman
Islands, where he is working as a
Banking Consultant for CIMA. This is
the view from his new home on Seven
Mile Beach. He can still be contacted
via his travelblog www.sifrew.com.
An everyday shoot in LA in a flashy car
Iain Nelson (Rb 1993-98) is engaged
to Brooke Ross. Their wedding will be
on Long Island in May 2018. Iain is a
management consultant and Brooke is a
writer and magazine editor. They live in
Brooklyn, New York, with Scallop, their
basset hound.
2000-09
1990-99
Rev Andrew Towner (Rb 1990-95)
worked as a Maths teacher and CCF
officer for five years before joining the
Church, which he now serves in parish
ministry. He is Chair of the Carlisle
Diocesan Board of Education, as well as
Board of Finance Trustee. He is married
to Katie and they have three young
children aged seven, five and three.
Robert Barber (SH 1995-97) After
leaving Shrewsbury, Rob went on to
UWE in Bristol to study Business. Since
the beginning of 2004, he has been
living in Botswana and running luxury
safaris throughout the country with his
company Golden Africa. He married
Charlotte Bennett-Diver in Downe, Kent
in February 2016, and they both now
live and work running the company
An image taken three hours from Los Angeles on a
location scouting trip
Dominic Gill (G 1993-98) writes: I’m
currently living with my wife in Los
Angeles, California where in 2011 we
founded Encompass Films together.
This is a film production company
born out of the ITV documentary ‘Take
A Seat’ about my 20,000-mile ride on
a tandem from Alaska to Argentina
inviting strangers to join me on the
back seat. Much of our time is spent
travelling telling the stories of brands or
individuals, the common thread always
being a sense of adventure in the truest
sense of the word: not necessarily
scaling mountains or jumping off them
(though it often involves that!), but
Alastair Newman (I 1996-2001)
writes: After nearly 11 years working as
a patent attorney in London, I shall be
returning to University in Cambridge
this September with my wife Serena and
children Sebastian (4) and Genevieve
(1). I’ll be training for ordination as a
Church of England priest at Westcott
House and Robinson College, where I
originally read Chemistry 15 years ago.
This is a really exciting change, and I
can’t wait to see what the future holds!
Stephen Wood (M 1998-2003) and his
wife, Catherine, are happy to announce
the arrival of their son Hugo William,
born 28th January 2017.
Tom Gerrard (SH 1999-2004)
announces his engagement to
Katherine Teasdale. They met at
Durham University and are getting
married in September in Wiltshire.