Family
Shirley was the only daughter, the second of five children. She grew up on the family farm east of the wheatbelt town of Pithara, Western Australia.
Her father, Dave Strickland, while a worker at Kalgoorlie in the goldfields of Western Australia, Australia was also an athlete. He was unable to compete in the 1900 Summer Olympics because he lacked the money for a trip to Paris. Instead, in 1900, he directed his efforts to the Stawell Gift 130-yard (120-m) foot-race, winning in 12 seconds off a handicap of 10 yards. His performance was considered to be as good as Stan Rowley's times, which won the Australian amateur sprint titles that season. (Rowley went on to win three bronze medals in the sprints at the 1900 Paris Olympics). Dave Strickland subsequently went on to play one senior game of Australian Rules football with Melbourne-based VFL team St Kilda in 1900 and six with WAFL club West Perth spread across the 1901 and 1909 seasons.
Her mother, Violet Edith Merry, was American-born with a British mining engineer father and a Norwegian mother.
Read more about this topic: Shirley Strickland
Famous quotes containing the word family:
“In the years of the Roman Republic, before the Christian era, Roman education was meant to produce those character traits that would make the ideal family man. Children were taught primarily to be good to their families. To revere gods, one’s parents, and the laws of the state were the primary lessons for Roman boys. Cicero described the goal of their child rearing as “self- control, combined with dutiful affection to parents, and kindliness to kindred.””
—C. John Sommerville (20th century)
“We have a great deal more kindness than is ever spoken. Maugre all the selfishness that chills like east winds the world, the whole human family is bathed with an element of love like a fine ether.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I think the ideal situation for a family is to be completely incestuous.”
—William Burroughs (b. 1914)