On 6 July 2009, Kenneth William Youings, FRPharmS, aged 92, of Beggars Roost, Cockhill Elm Lane, South Cary, Castle Cary, Somerset BA7 7EZ. Mr Youings registered in 1938.
Tributes
BRUCE RHODES writes: So Ken Youings has died at the good old age of 92. The trouble with dying at such an age is that you have outlived most of those who knew you well but it is still worth paying tribute, not only for family and friends but also to indicate to the younger members of the profession the size of the debt they owe to men like Ken.
I moved to a pharmacy in Wincanton, Somerset, in 1957 where I became a junior director and Ken managed a pharmacy owned by Jack Bond in Castle Cary, half a dozen miles down the road.
We both attended Somerset branch meetings where we got to know each other and Ken became chairman and I the secretary. We did not have to enthuse each other about the profession; it came naturally.
We organised the branch, we represented it at branch representatives’ meetings and annual general meetings, and we made sure that a good number came up for the special general meeting about trading restrictions at the Royal Albert Hall in 1965, which we both agreed was the most exciting professional meeting of our lives.
We spent so much time on the profession that the next logical step was for Ken to stand for the Council in 1972 and for me to join the Society staff as an inspector.
Ken would always maintain that the main reason I got the job was because he wrote my testimonial, of which I still have a copy, and there may be some truth in that. Ken never doubted his own judgement — he did not suffer fools (among whom he included incompetent pharmacists) gladly and was always prepared to speak his mind.
After some time as an inspector I came into the office in Bloomsbury Square and was made assistant secretary where one of my responsibilities was the Agricultural and Veterinary Committee, which was dear to Ken’s heart.
By this time Ken, with Jack Bond and the local veterinary surgeons, co-operated in establishing Centaur Services supplying to the veterinary profession, and we met frequently as good friends and professional colleagues. However, we were not without our differences of opinion, he being pragmatic and me aspirational.
The last time I saw Ken was at his 90th birthday party when he was in good form. We always kept in touch because we had so much in common — we had a shared faith, (Ken sang in his local church choir), an active involvement in scouting (Ken was the Cary Group scoutmaster) and a belief in the future of the profession — and in all these spheres he left his mark. He even gave a pharmacy lecture in France in French, improved by a good West Country burr.
The world is better for Ken’s contribution and he will be missed in so many spheres but our loss is as nothing compared with that of May and the boys, to whom we extend our sympathies and thanks. Ken would be pleased there is still one Youings left on the Register.
Long-standing Somerset stalwarts of the branch such as Jack Bond and John Clarke would have written this tribute probably more eloquently but no more sincerely — sadly they are dead and gone.
However I am sure they would have joined me in saying “Ken, rest in peace and rise in glory” — well earned.
