Foreword

Keith's paternal grandfather, John Swan, was a builder who emigrated from the village of Orwell, near Cambridge in England in 1879. In the early 1880s he married Agnes Brown who was born near Lake Bolac in Victoria, the youngest of 11 children of Scottish 'bounty immigrants' who arrived in Australia in 1838. Keith's father, George, was born in Corowa, New South Wales, in 1887.

Keith's maternal great-grandfather, John Green, came to New South Wales in the early 1850s and taught in Anglican denominational schools in the Hunter Valley. John Parsons Green, Keith's maternal grandfather, was also a teacher when the denominational schools had been replaced by government schools. Keith's mother, Lilian Green, was also a teacher in New South Wales State schools.

Keith's first wife, Jean Varcoe, came from a farming and grazing family in the Hay-Hillston area of New South Wales. They had three sons and two daughters. Keith's second wife, Vera, is a university librarian who migrated with her parents from England in 1948. They have two sons.

Keith received his secondary education at Armidale High School and attended Armidale Teachers College in 1934 and 1935. He taught in various primary schools before enlisting in the RAAF in July 1941.

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