Peter Gray

Life With Kermie

15 Apr

28th June 1958 – 28th March 2023

PROLOGUE

Peter Gray was a mate of mine for over 45 years. His involvement with the trucking industry was for only a few short years, as National Advertising Manager of Truckin’ Life Magazine. Truth be told, Pete was terrified of trucks. If we were on the road and I’d pass a big rig, he’d almost crap himself. As it was always me behind the wheel - the reason for which will become apparent as you read on - I’d go out of my way to try and wedge us between two B-doubles. Good mate me!

I read in a book recently that we all create waves as we live and that, upon our passing we are remembered until the ripples fade away. The beauty of the written word is that it propagates those ripples down through the ages. Whilst the words are there, so are the ripples, and we remember.

In Peter Gray we will probably see a little bit of ourselves both good and bad. I know I do. Peter David Gray passed away on Tuesday, 28th March, 2023, aged 64 years.

The ripples he leaves behind will be with me forever. . . . .

**Korchy, Kermie, Pete Gray. The Friday Mother’s Club**

Peter Gray, Paul Korch and me, Graham Harsant – The 3 Musketeers, The Friday Mothers Club. Three fairly different blokes who met in the early 70’s, just clicked and stayed mates from then on.

The Advertising industry of the 70’s and 80’s was mostly spent in the haze of cigarette smoke and the fog of alcohol. That’s what the ad industry was back then, and it’s how we worked, and generally prospered…..

Some of you may have seen the Netflix series, Mad Men. Mad Men is a story of the ad industry, set in the 1950’s and 60’s and to most, would appear to be a story of excess. I watched the first couple of episodes and gave it away as not being excessive enough - certainly when compared to the industry in the ‘70’s that I experienced and shared with Pete.

I’d moved from Melbourne to Sydney in 1972 to work in Channel 7’s Sales Department and met Pete shortly afterwards.

Ahhh – the Sydney Advertising scene. If you think that ‘The Canberra Bubble’ is a bubble, then you have no idea what a real bubble looks like. The Pollies bubble is a mere dribble on the bottom lip, where the Ad industry was more like that old Hubba Bubba commercial: “Big Bubbles – No Troubles”.

Peter was the master of the double entendre. “The Bubble” would never do, so he re-christened it The Wonderful World of Wank.

He had ‘Gray-isms’ for just about everything.

**On a gliding weekend. Once was enough for Pete!**

Pete’s career in ‘The Wonderful World of Wank’ began at the Ad Agency, Hansen Rubensohn - McCann Erickson simply known as McCann’s.

He’d been working part time at a Maccas - or more possibly a KFC and was sick of picking the maggots out of the green chook to adhere to the business policy of waste-not, want-not. How he gravitated to advertising is lost in the mists of time – and we lived in very misty times - but at McCann’s he ended up.

He began his career there in the Media Department – and he started as he intended to continue - with the Long Lunch!

I mean, that’s where friendships were made and deals were done – and it’s where Pete lost his first job only a few months after having joined the company. Along with Mark Chesterfield and another couple of workmates, Pete was sitting enjoying a beer or three after having worked their arses off for weeks on some piece of business when the Media Manager - one Les Donald - turned up and ordered them back to the office. A beer or three and being overworked brought a response of, “Fuck Off!” And the four of them were summarily sacked on the spot. (All four of them went on to great success in the Ad biz.)

Not one to dwell on such simple things as being sacked, Pete soon found himself at a smaller and much more convivial Ad agency – Quinlan, Malanot and Stott. Jim Quinlan, Mike Malanot and Norm Stott were themselves masters of the Long Lunch, and so Peter was not missed – as however long his lunches might be, he could usually count on being back in the office before any of them.

It was at QMS that he really learnt the tradecraft of advertising – and long lunches - under the watchful eye of Maggie Polling. Maggie saw in Pete a razor sharp mind perfectly suited to the cut and thrust of the industry.

Whilst loving the camaraderie at QMS, Pete soon realised that if he wanted to have a really long lunch with no repercussions from management, then he was working on the wrong side of the industry.

Advertising sales was where it was at. Ad sales was a job that expected you to take a client or media guru like Paul ‘Korchy’ Korch out – like every day. How good is a job where you can leave the office at 12.30, get back at 3.30 … or 4 … or sometimes not at all, and get a pat on the back as long as you came back with a signature that said that your company was going to make a motza of $$$$$ from such and such a client.

Of course they rarely signed up over that lunch but you’d tell the boss whenever you got back to the office that it was a lay down misère – and that was usually good enough.

**Weekend on a Halverson. Cap’n Pete ran us aground**

So Pete ended up at a Radio Representation company whose name escapes me.

I believe that it was around this time that we met, possibly via Korchy who was now with a major media buying company -Total Media. Or maybe we met over a bar and just hit it off. Whatever - there started a close three-way relationship that lasted over the decades.

Korchy was our client and Pete and I had the job of entertaining him with the aim of relieving him of his clients’ money. Pete did a bloody good job of doing just that – me, not so much.

Time passed and I got out of the industry and managed a pub in town for a year or so, where we put on the top bands of the day. Mental As Anything, Midnight Oil, The Angels and Cold Chisel were just some of the bands who graced our stage. It was a fun year but the hours were killing me and I yearned to return to The Wonderful World…

I’d applied for a job in sales with the, then new Better Homes & Gardens Magazine, and had missed out.

I remember it was a Monday and I’m behind the bar in the pub when PG strolls in for a catch up. I mention my disappointment at not getting the job and he tells me that the guy who did, knocked it back.

“Get behind the bar and serve this lot,” I yelled at him as I headed for the phone. So Pete finds himself on the wrong side of the bar- an unusual place to be for him. Long story short, I’m re-interviewed and snag the job. I’ve been forever grateful that Pete walked into the Civic Hotel that day.

Now there’s a hierarchy – or there was then – in Ad Land. And top of the tree was to get a job doing advertising sales for a TV station – except for one place – and that was Family Circle (of which Better Homes & Gardens was a part).

I’d gone to advertising sales heaven and felt it only fair that Pete should join me there.

A job became available with Family Circle and I pushed and pushed for him to be given an interview to no avail. Then Better Homes was looking for an addition and I tried again but still no luck.

Finally the company launched another magazine in TV Guide, with Chris Mosley at the helm. Mosley took the punt and gave Pete a job. The pair of them sold ads into TV Guide with great success – in fact so successful were they, that Kerry Packer who owned rival, TV Week, became concerned enough to spend two million bucks buying the mag, simply to close it down.

This of course left Pete and Mosley without a job - but boss, John Southam was as loyal to his staff as we were all to him. Mosely moved to head up BH&G, and Pete? Pete got moved onto Family Circle.

For someone they wouldn’t initially look at, he ended up as Circle’s National Ad Sales Manager. How’s them apples?

Now, for the first time in our careers, we had really good incomes and a serious expense account. We worked hard, we played hard and we always seemed to spend a little more than those good incomes.

It was not unusual to go to our respective accountants – Doobie for me and The Keg for Pete – and plead for an advance to take an important client to lunch. Often they’d reply, “Alright then, where are WE going?” ... and they’d tag along on our bill!

…So lunch would happen, we’d get back to the office for an hour or maybe two, then it was to the boardroom - which we called the Playroom - for after work drinks. More often than not someone would suggest going out for dinner to round out the night.

**Pete (L), Jane Henry & me at The Malaya Restaurant**

Many nights we’d head to the Station Hotel in North Sydney, which Pete in his own inimitable way had christened The House of Germs – because this was where the ad industry largely hung out. There, or at Dr Redbirds Wine Bar or Arthur’s Court we’d socialise some more and try to pull a chick – or they’d try and pull us. The ad industry back then was way ahead of its time in terms of equal opportunity.

I remember saying to him at Arthur’s Court one night that I should ring the partner and let her know I’d be late home – this was well before the mobile phone.

“Why get yelled at twice?” reasoned Pete with his impeccable logic.

We did this five days a week with clients, except Thursdays when many of us at Circle congregated at The Malaya Restaurant in Mount St to partake of their splendiferous delights. We’d be there so long that some days the staff would leave us to our own devices in terms of pouring a drink, whilst they’d nap on chairs, readying themselves for the night trade. Good days indeed!

Often on a Friday, Pete would stick his head in my office and say, “Wanna do Charlie’s for lunch? Give Korch a call.”

“Charlies” was short for Charlie Chan’s - whose name was actually Matthew - and the restaurant was the famous and expensive Peacock Gardens in Crows Nest. Did we care about the cost? Of course not, it wasn’t our money.

Occasionally – very occasionally - one of us might even bring along an actual client (other than Korchy, who we couldn’t claim for every week) to give some authenticity to what became known as ‘The Friday Mother’s Club’. We’d rotate on picking up the bill. Much later when both Pete and I had fallen on harder times, Korchy was magnanimous in returning the favour, bless him.

Those days would start with a few drinks at the bar before sitting down, whereupon Korchy ordered a bottle of an excellent wine, Wirra Wirra. The staff soon became used to this and Chinese waiter, Ricky would seat us and say, “Ah so, Walla Walla for you?” His pronunciation was the main reason that we stuck with that wine for years. It was good but.

Again, Korchy usually ordered the meal which consisted of too many dishes to count and far too much to eat – but he and I made a good fist of it. Pete on the other hand would eat a steamed dim sum and wonton or two, a handful of snow peas – his nod toward a balanced diet, and we’d get down to solving the problems of the world – yep, that world…The Wonderful World of …

Usually it was Pete and Korchy holding court. Pete would get well worked up over something and Paul in his ever calm and smoothly delivered tone would answer quietly and succinctly, which just got Pete even more ruffled. More great days. . . . .

I’d just made the biggest sale in BH&G’s short history and was justifiably very proud of my achievement, crowing about it to anyone who’d listen around the office. Late that afternoon I get a phone call from the agency saying that they were pulling out of the deal.

“Why,” says me.

“Family Circle have come back with a much better offer and their circulation is bigger than yours. Sorry.”

Now, I go ‘off’ once in a blue moon but man, did I go off that day! Jack Southam was in his office at the other end of the building and told me later he wasn’t brave enough to leave it. I stormed into Gray’s office, steam pouring out my ears, threatening to rip his fucking head off! I mean I was seriously going to damage the bugger!

“Sorry mate, business is business.” He laughed which made me even angrier if that was possible. Then I heard laughing behind me and turned to see half the office there cacking themselves. It was a huge setup. I never crowed about another sale.

There was an ad industry netball comp and Christine Burns, along with a couple of other girls at Circle decided it sounded like a good idea. They were short a few ladies so Burnsie rounded up a few mates to become honorary ‘employees’ of Family Circle. One of those ladies was Pete’s younger sister, Carmel, and another was one Dottie Broome.

**Me left, Pete right, Dottie next to me, Carmel bottom right**

Pete took one look at Dottie and decided she was for him. Dottie, on the other hand took a lot more convincing….

The team needed a coach – Peter, and a manager – me.

Our job was to join them at training with a slab of beer, sit on the grass drinking it and yell encouragement at them. It was a good gig watching all those long legs in small sports skirts running around the court.

That first year the Mag’n’tisers as they were called won what was a deadly serious competition. The Grand Final was played on the same day as a ball to be held that evening. Win, lose or draw we were going to celebrate in style so we ordered cabs for all the girls to get there and for ourselves a Rolls Royce – cos we were the coach and manager you see.

**Ah, The Wonderful World of… (No idea who the bloke on the right is. Possibly our chauffeur)**

I remember going to the drive-through at the Cammeray pub and ordering the biggest cigars we could find. Bloody resplendent we were in the team colours as well: White tails, with a lime green handkerchief hanging out of the pocket, pink shirt and pink shoes. Even had a Family Circle photographer set up to take pics as we arrived at the venue. Told ya it was a Wonderful World of Wank!

Pete and Dot got married at Luna Park. Why Luna Park you may ask? “Just for Fun,” was Pete’s response at the time. Vern Bowrey and I delivered Pete and his best men there in our matching yellow JX-S Jaguars, replete with black wedding ribbon. I guess neither the venue nor those ribbons were a good omen.

The marriage was faltering and Dottie ordered Pete to attend marriage counselling. Korchy and I were at Charlie Chans waiting for him to arrive from the session. He eventually turns up, orders a beer and sits the - unusually quiet.

After a bit Korchy asks him, “So, how did it go?”

“I came third,” he responded.

Around this time Pete had decided he needed to get into some real estate but money for a deposit was a problem – he had none.

He thought on it for a bit and went to the Family Circle accountant, Keg, who had been hounding him for ages to do his bloody expenses. “I’m gonna do my expenses mate,” he said. Turned out to be a great form of enforced saving because those expenses were plenty for a deposit on a neat little joint in Newtown.

Time moves on and Pete moved along with them. He’d been approached by the (then morning) Sydney Sun Newspaper to head up their sales team. It came with a Deputy Publisher title and at 26 years of age Peter Gray was the youngest ever to hold it.

Then Sky Channel came calling for him to head up their site sales. This was when Sky was just a racing channel. When he joined them they had some 300 sites – that’s pubs and clubs - signed up. At the end of 12 months he had thousands more which was no mean feat.

While I’m ashamed to admit it, we all drank and drove in those days. I never got caught but Pete did – fairly regularly.

The 5th and last time he got caught Driving under the Influence, he wasn’t!

At Tocumwal on the Murray River, he’d had a few and – having finally learnt from experience - decided to kip in the car for the night. He hopped in, laid the seat back and dozed off, only to be woken by the local bill some time later. He was in the front seat and the keys were in the ignition.

“Bloody unfair!” he said to me later. “Do the right thing and it was still wrong!”

That was the last time he got behind the wheel of a car and he never missed it.

He was with Leandra Cowan at this time – and it was then that he met Leandra’s then two year old son, Harry. That he loved Harry and regarded him as another son is illustrated by the fact that Harry was at Pete’s funeral all these years later, along of course with Pete’s son, Kyol.

When Kyol was very young he hung out at Peter’s home in Cammeray a couple of times. Peter would finish his drink and Kyle would ask,

“Do you want another milk, Daddy?” Then he’d go to the fridge and get him another Toohey’s.

After Sky, Pete decided a break from the industry was needed and so he bought a little nursery in Newtown which was (surprisingly) successful. Honestly, I had no idea he knew anything about plants – but he did!

In his own inimitable fashion he came up with a great name: Gone to Pot, subtitled: Get Into my Plants.

Always with dreams of building an empire he bought a second nursery in the leafy and extremely expensive Sydney suburb of Hunters Hill.

That’s when the little Irish bastard, Murphy decided to come and hang around with him for a bit. I kid you not, it rained all weekend, every weekend for a full six months. Who goes to nurseries when it rains? In Pete’s case, nobody.

We both fell on some hard times but luckily not at the same time. When he was out of work I’d ring for a chat (I’d moved to Victoria by then) and throw a few bucks into his account. Other times the situation was reversed and Pete would do the same for me.

. . . . . . . .

I was playing Mr Mum when he rang me and asked if I’d like to do some ad sales for a ‘dinky truck magazine’ he’d started working for. A week later I was back in the fold so to speak, and Pete, me and Editor, Jim Gibson were having a ball with the doyen of trucking magazines – Truckin Life.

**A couple of the creative ideas we came up with for Truckin Life: A CD and Driveline, the Freightliner magazine**

Pete would come down to Melbourne to do some sales calls with me and after a couple of visits I suggested that driving all the way to Melbourne each day to pick him up, then to travel to the north-eastern suburbs – from whence I’d come - and where many of the clients were, was a pain in the arse. “You should stay at Healesville. It’s a good little town with a great old pub,” I told him.

That won him over instantly and the next time I picked him up at the airport, we did a couple of calls on the way and kept going to Healesville.

As we hit town he sees the Healesville sign and instantly renamed it ‘Hooterville’. Hell - One local, Sean Denny went so far as to have it tattooed on his arm and called his business Hooterville Trucking. Now readers of Truckin with Kermie know where the name came from.

We pull up outside the Grand Hotel and that became The Hooterville Hilton. His room – which was the biggest, and boasted a big rear-projection TV with a door that led straight onto the balcony bar - that became The Presidential Suite. I told you he re-named everything.

He soon started coming on a Friday where we’d do our calls in the morning and spend the arvo and night with the locals at the bar. That was so he could stay the weekend because he loved the live Sunday music on that balcony. He fell in love with a regular band, Ruckus. “Reckon we should get them a sponsor Big G (my nickname before Kermie),” he said to me. “That’s a job for you.”

“Ah, yeah. Thanks for that mate!”

It took me a year but I finally convinced Freightliner to take them on and Ruckus toured the country under Freightliner’s sponsorship.

After a particularly heavy session one Saturday night I turn up on the Sunday looking and feeling like shit. “Welcome to my world,” says Peter wryly. Again, they were great days indeed.

It was at Truckin Life that he hired the little pocket rocket, Barbara Cosmelli to work on ad sales with him, and as they say the rest is history. Pete and Barbie became an item in double quick time and remained so for 17 years until his passing. Barb enjoyed the good times with him and was there all through his toughest days. I know he could have not faced his uncertain future without Barbie, and for that, I thank her.

Like every job he took on, Pete approached Truckin’ Life with gusto. Anyone in the transport industry with whom he interacted during those years would not have forgotten him.

Truckin’ Life was taken over by News Ltd and Murdoch’s yes men were trying to push him out the door. He was called into a meeting at which a strange woman was sitting.

“Who are you?” Pete demanded.

“I’m the head of Human Resources,” she replies.

“Human Resources!” yells Peter. “You’re just a fucking overhead! My department makes the money, your lot just wastes it!”

That was a meeting he was never going to win but he wasn’t going to go quietly. He was never afraid to front up to the so-called powers that be. He’d stand up to anybody, from the chairman of the board down, if he believed in something, and he’d back his staff all the way.

There’s so much more to tell….

There was Shop n Win – a brilliant magazine concept he came up with that could have made a squillion.

There was the Satellite Telecast of a Cliff Richard concert (it was meant to be a Dire Straits one) – which was a first for Australia. Unfortunately few wanted to go to a club or pub to watch Cliff.

The problem was always in trying to put together a champagne idea on a beer budget, but that never deterred Pete who would always come up with yet another.

There was the time The Yellow Pages – remember that massive book – invited him to interview for the role of Sales Director. Thirty seconds in, he knew it wasn’t for him so at the end of the interview when they asked if he had any questions, he replied, “Just one….have you got your heart set on yellow?” He didn’t get the job….

Peter Gray had the sharpest mind of anyone I’d met. His lateral thinking was second to none. You could give him a square peg and he’d make it fit into a round hole. His sales ability was up there with the best and he made a lot of companies a lot of money.

He was a master salesman. His enthusiasm for a project was infectious and he always had many willing followers – me included. He was quite frankly a genius in his field, and like many geniuses he was also a bit flawed.

He hated technology. He told me he’d never turned on a computer cos he didn’t know how and had no intention of learning. The Nokia mobile was an acquisition he gained under duress. He’d much rather have communicated with smoke signals. I don’t think he ever learned to send a text message. I’d tell him I’d send him a photo and he’d say, “Don’t bother. Wouldn’t know where to find it.”

He was a voracious reader and carried a book with him everywhere. I suggested he buy an E-reader. “Wouldn’t know how to turn it on,” re replied.

When the world had turned to slide presentations Pete stuck with his flip charts, which he used with great success.

Peter loved kids – no matter their age they were always ‘the kids’. He adored Michaela, his sister Carmel’s daughter and christened her Sharky – presumably because she was good on the tooth.

He loved his boys, Kyol and Harry

He was Godfather to my Tom and Nick. In every phone call he would always ask how they, and older brother Steve were doing – and he was genuinely interested.

Many of us went through those halcyon days in the ciggy haze and alcohol fog. A few of us made it out the other side relatively intact through pure luck and possibly the right genetic make-up. Pete was not as lucky as Paul or me.

But geez we had some good times both in and out of the office.

Would he have changed the past given the chance? I very much doubt it. It was a vibrant time to both be alive and to work in the industry we did. The years at Family Circle alone made it all worthwhile. For over 45 or more years we were joined at the hip.

Through all those years when we were all together and after I moved interstate, we three musketeers always remained just that. It was a bond never broken by distance or the more sporadic phone calls.

These last few years when we spoke, he was always glass half full, no matter what he was going through.

The Friday Mother’s Club is one member short and life is forever changed.
Rest in peace mate. I love you, brother.