I did my R.A.F. squarebashing at Bridgenorth in August, September 1958 and Austin was in the same training flight as myself. After a couple of days there, everyone was herded into a huge room and the general question was "who amongst you 'orrible lot are professional sportsmen?. Austin had just toured with the G.B. team down under, so of the six or eight people who stood up, Austin was the only 'International' representative on show. He didn't do a lot of squarebashing after that, I think the deal was--If you represent the R.A.F. on Wednesdays (sports day) you can turn out for St Helens on Saturday. That meant he was allowed off camp every weekend and we others got out of there once in the whole eight weeks. After that I believe he got a posting to Haydock, stuffy sod. A real nice lad, I'd love to get to the do and remind him about those days but I'm away on holiday and I'll miss the Grand Final as well.

It was good to have Austin's son play rugby league for the Under 16 team I was with (quite a few West Park boys including Andy Platt) Austin and his wife always gave us full support. I never saw Austin play but the book I do look forward to.