Youth
Welensky was born in Salisbury, Southern Rhodesia. His father was of Lithuanian Jewish origin, hailing from a village near Wilno in then Russian-ruled Lithuania, who settled in Southern Rhodesia after first emigrating to the United States and then South Africa, while his mother was a ninth-generation Afrikaner who was of Dutch ethnicity. Welensky's mother died when he was 11, being treated by Godfrey Huggins, a doctor who was later to become the Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia.
Although not of British ancestry, Welensky was intensely pro-British, a distinctive sentiment among Rhodesians. John Connell, in his foreword to Welensky's book 4000 Days, states, "Welensky, who had not a drop of British blood in his veins, shared this pride and loyalty to the full."
After leaving school at the age of 14, Welensky found employment with Rhodesia Railways as a fireman, while putting his physical strength to work as a boxer. He rose through the ranks of Rhodesia Railways to become a railroad engineer and became involved in the trade union movement, becoming leader of the powerful European Railway Workers Union.
While working on the railways, he became the professional heavyweight boxing champion of Rhodesia at 19 and held the position until he was 21. During this time, Welensky met his first wife, Elizabeth Henderson, who was working at a cafe in Bulawayo, Southern Rhodesia at the time. They married after a two-year courtship.
Read more about this topic: Roy Welensky
Famous quotes containing the word youth:
“The youth gets together his materials to build a bridge to the moon, or perchance, a palace or temple on the earth, and, at length, the middle-aged man concludes to build a woodshed with them.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)
“And, oh God, in my misspent youth as a housewife, I, too, used to bake bread, in those hectic and desolating days just prior to the womans movement, when middle-class women were supposed to be wonderful wives and mothers, gracious hostesses.... I used to feel so womanly when I was baking my filthy bread.”
—Angela Carter (19401992)
“We live in an age when to be young and to be indifferent can be no longer synonymous. We must prepare for the coming hour. The claims of the Future are represented by suffering millions; and the Youth of a Nation are the trustees of Posterity.”
—Benjamin Disraeli (18041881)