Our inspiration: 10 stories of South Australians’ courage and integrity
In a year like 2020, we all need to be inspired. By people who care. People who fight the odds. People who break barriers. People like these.
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In a year that has been tougher than most, The Advertiser today honours 10 people from all walks of life who have inspired us this year. Courage has been their hallmark – here are their stories.
NICOLA SPURRIER
SHE may be the public face of South Australia’s rollercoaster coronavirus battle but the state’s COVID-19 health chief feels a sense of privilege in helping keep us safe.
Whenever SA Health’s Professor Nicola Spurrier has spoken publicly – almost daily since February – we’ve listened to her calm, experienced and empathetic briefings or the occasional headmistress-like scolding.
“At the beginning of this year I never would have imagined finding myself and my team in the midst of managing a global pandemic,” Prof Spurrier said.
“I think we can all agree COVID-19 has been a rollercoaster for everyone and it has truly been a privilege to support the health and wellbeing of South Australians.”
While the chief public health officer has been instrumental in leading SA’s pandemic fightback, she’s inspired us to practise better hygiene, social distancing and healthy living.
We also understand the importance of the COVID test.
“I would like to thank everyone for their efforts this year to protect each other from the spread of COVID-19 in our community and for continuing to follow public health advice,” she said.
Despite being arguably SA’s most recognisable person, the mother of three, 53, remains shocked at her high profile, at being stopped in the street or sparking various social trends.
But the paediatrician dismisses any personal kudos. She praises her colleagues, and the community’s spirit, arguing it has been the state’s collective team fight.
“You can only fight a pandemic by working together and I acknowledge the kindness, patience, resilience and community spirit demonstrated by all South Australians,” she said.
– Andrew Hough
TANYA HOSCH
TANYA Hosch is a trailblazer in every sense of the word and hopes her journey to the AFL executive serves as inspiration and encouragement for others when walking their own paths.
Ms Hosch is the first Indigenous person and just the second woman appointed to the AFL executive team, having served as a leader in sport, social justice and public policy.
From pursuing constitutional recognition for Indigenous Australians to tackling racism by championing the cause for a statue of Nicky Winmar in Perth and an official apology from the AFL to Adam Goodes, Ms Hosch’s contribution has been recognised with her being named SA Australian of the Year for 2021.
In her role as general manager of inclusion and social policy with the AFL, Ms Hosch also helped found advocacy organisation, the Indigenous Players Alliance. She engineered a new respect and responsibility policy enabling women to seek redress for unacceptable behaviour.
She said she was honoured to be included on the list of inspiring South Australians.
“It’s always surprising when you are referred to as ‘inspirational’,” she said.
“Inspiration comes in so many forms and through so many people and many of these people are unnamed or go unrecognised.
“I don’t take being on this list for granted; I’m inspired by so many people in my life that if I can reciprocate in even a small measure then it’s a privilege.”
– Reece Homfray
THE PENHALLS
ANNA Penhall and her husband Scott could have gone to pieces and shut out the world when she was diagnosed with motor neurone disease, an incurable killer that progressively robs the body of all muscular functions.
Instead, the couple and their three children stayed positive while raising awareness about MND – and money to help those unlucky enough to suffer from one of the cruellest diseases.
“We’ve always been glass-half-full people,” said Mr Penhall, speaking for Anna who died peacefully on December 16, aged 49.
“You could get very negative about it and say ‘why me?’. But Anna didn’t do that, and we haven’t done that as a family.
“We spoke a fair bit back then about what it all meant, and how it was really about the kids and living life still.”
They also wanted to help others. Mr Penhall paid for a video of Anna’s journey which has raised $32,000 for support group MNDSA and $10,000 for Laurel Hospice at Flinders Medical Centre.
Mr Penhall, with carer Jess, focused full-time on supporting his wife, a nurse who first showed symptoms two years ago before quickly losing her ability to speak, swallow, and then move. But her mind remained fully functional.
“Anna was inspirational in her fight and ability to smile in the face of adversity,” Mr Penhall said.
“Life was extremely hard for her – she was unable to do the simplest things.
“But her determination and courage to tolerate everything the disease threw at her gave me and others the strength to do all we could do to assist her fight the good fight.”
– Roy Eccleston
PAUL FARAGUNA
AS he lay in his intensive care bed, having come perilously close to dying in the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Paul Faraguna was at rock bottom and struggling with hope against his coronavirus nightmare.
But he has slowly rebuilt his strength on the painful road to recovery from COVID-19.
Today, he is back to “90 per cent health”, having celebrated his 69th birthday mid-year and a Christmas he thought he would never see with his family, including his wife of 46 years, Robyn and two adult children.
“I am pretty happy with the way that things are,” said Mr Faraguna, of Rosslyn Park. “But there is always room for improvement. I am really hopeful of being 100 per cent soon.”
Coronavirus took a hard toll on Mr Faraguna, a retired railways technical officer, after he contracted it while holidaying on the Ruby Princess cruise ship.
He, his 64-year-old wife and two close friends eventually become part of the state’s cluster of 89 people infected on the ill-fated liner.
Having been the first patient admitted to the ICU, after five weeks in an induced coma, he was the last to be discharged.
Cheering staff formed a guard of honour as their “miracle man” left.
He counts himself lucky with a new lease on life. He and his wife have just returned from a holiday to the Eyre Peninsula and far West Coast. He also has walked the entire way to Mt Lofty.
Humble at being described as inspiring, he instead praises RAH staff and thanks people for their support. He doesn’t want people to underestimate how bad the virus is.
“I think the goodwill of people has been really good,” he said. “That is the biggest thing I appreciate.”
– Andrew Hough
COOPER SPILLANE
IN 2020, a sports-loving schoolboy – one any parent would be proud of and any coach keen to have in a team – captured our hearts.
It wasn’t what Cooper Spillane, 12, endured that touched us most, but his reaction to it.
Born without a fibula bone in his left leg and fed up with failed, painful leg-lengthening surgeries, the Highbury youngster opted to have his leg amputated in May.
His determination, and focus on getting on with life while dreaming of being a Paralympian was an inspiration to all who learned of his story.
In November, wearing the prosthetic leg he was still getting used to, he led an all-stars basketball team to victory in a charity match against the Adelaide 36ers.
A typical almost-teenager, Cooper, shrugged when asked how he felt about being named as one of SA’s “most inspiring people” people.
“It’s cool (but) I don’t think of myself as inspiring,” said Cooper, who now calls NBL star Jack McVeigh a good friend.
But he hoped his experience would give others hope.
“(I’d like them to know) that I can do stuff I couldn’t before and they could be the same … (and to be) grateful for what you have. I’m grateful I can walk now,” he said.
And what has the year taught him?
“(I’ve learned) patience … waiting for the surgery, waiting for my leg to heal and waiting to be fitted for my leg (and) to be patient learning how to move again with my new leg,” he said.
– Rebecca Baker
JOHN GLATZ
JOHN Glatz is lucky to be alive and he’s the first to admit it. The Oakbank racing legend won hearts and minds of South Aussies this year with his story of survival after the devastating Cudlee Creek bushfires.
The Woodside local sustained 60 per cent burns to his body when he passed out on his tractor fighting the December 20 blazes.
He credits his life to mate Adam Stone, who spent 20 minutes dousing him in water, before SA Police Sergeant Joe McDonald rushed him to hospital.
His injuries were so severe doctors had to resuscitate the 77-year-old on two occasions. Recovery was long and painful.
During a routine wound inspection, nurses discovered that Glatz had developed pseudomonas (a bacterial infection).
What followed was three hours of agony: “That’s was the only time when I said to my wife: ‘I don’t know if I can take much more’, but it turned out that I could and that’s an important lesson to pass on.”
Glatz is now turning his trauma into story of hope, having signed on mentor for other burns victims at the Royal Adelaide Hospital.
“It’s a bit like a peer program, as you do get a lot of people in there that can’t cope with the dressing changes and just want to give up,” he said.
“But you can’t give up, because if you do, you’re dead.”
– Lydia Kellner
ISOBEL MARSHALL AND ELOISE HALL
WHERE there’s a will, there’s a way – it’s the new mantra Young South Australian of the Year Isobel Marshall and business partner Eloise Hall will pocket from 2020 for 2021.
The 22-year-old friends co-founded TABOO when they were just 18.
The company sells ethically sourced, organic cotton pads and tampons in Australia, with 100 per cent of net profits going to a charity providing education programs for girls and women in Africa.
Locally, TABOO has partnered with Vinnies Women’s Crisis Centre to provide free access to pads and tampons to women in emergency accommodation, the NPY Women’s Council and Red Lilly Health.
“The pandemic, despite its huge challenges, has taught me some valuable lessons and encouraged me to shift my thinking in ways that I wasn’t expecting,” says Ms Marshall, from Adelaide’s inner southern suburbs.
“I have … learnt that where there’s a will there’s a way,” says the TABOO director of health and education.
“Borders and restrictions have not stopped us from reaching out to school students! This year we have started zoom presentations and that has taken us on an amazing learning curve and opened up many opportunities.”
– Rebecca DiGirolamo
MEGAN SCHUTT
DESPITE the pandemic shutting down women’s cricket globally for six months, it’s been a big year for Aussie bowler Megan Schutt.
From winning the Twenty20 World Cup in March in front of a record crowd of 86,174 at the MCG, to captaining the Adelaide Strikers Women’s Big Bash League team for the first time in October, to continuing to spread her messages of tolerance, love and equality to her 57,500 worldwide Twitter followers, the South Australian has finished 2020 ranked in the top three bowlers in the world in both 50-over and T20 formats.
The year started well for the 27-year-old inswinger when she bowled the first over against India in the T20 World Cup final on March 8.
On International Women’s Day, Australia set India 185 runs for victory, before India crumpled, bowled out in the final over for only 99 runs.
The huge crowd set a new Australian record for the highest attendance at a stand-alone women’s sporting event, as well as the highest ever crowd for a women’s cricket game played anywhere in the world.
Schutt posted career-best figures of 4-18, including snaring the critical first wicket for the Aussies, as Australia won back-to-back T20 World Cup trophies.
Schutt laughed afterwards: “I said to (my wife) Jess, ‘I’m sorry babe but this tops the wedding – this is the best day of my life’.”
– Liz Walsh
JULIE-ANNE FINNEY
IT’S BEEN a big year for Julie-Ann Finney, a crusader against suicide, and yet, she says there’s still so much more to do in the name of her late son.
The mother of navy petty officer David Finney, who took his own life in 2019, has moved her fight for a royal commission into veteran suicides closer than any before her – and there have been many.
Ms Finney has amassed almost 385,000 signatories to her cause and recently fronted a senate hearing to explain, again, why nothing less than a thorough, independent investigation into why our Defence personnel keep taking their own lives will do.
Her evidence, with so many others, has persuaded the Senate not to support the Federal Government’s alternative to a royal commission. The government is not giving up, vowing to use the summer break to shore up support.
“My son is dead. I have to live with it. That is my story …. We need an investigation,” Ms Finney said last month in Canberra alongside Labor leader Anthony Albanese.
She has learnt she can’t afford to mince words if she wants to get the message across to political leaders, media and wider community.
“So many institutions have attempted to give veterans a ‘less than’ solution when it is clear that those solutions will do nothing more than attempt to appease those of us fighting,” she said.
– Rebecca DiGirolamo
BRAD EBERT
Brad Ebert’s final on-field act as an AFL footballer was emblematic of the way he played his entire 260-game career. It was courageous, tough, team-first and inspirational.
With Port Adelaide trailing Richmond by four points with six minutes left in the last quarter of their preliminary final at Adelaide Oval in October, Tigers forward Jack Riewoldt looked set to mark the ball 20m from goal.
Ebert intervened, running with eyes only for the footy to spoil Riewoldt and save a likely goal to keep his side in the contest. It would have been a valiant act for any player but for Ebert, it was particularly brave.
He had suffered from concussions in the past two seasons, sidelining him for stretches and leading to him wearing a helmet in matches.
His head landed heavily in the contest with Riewoldt and he became groggy, and had to be helped from the ground.
Ebert’s desperate effort could not push Port Adelaide to victory – it lost by six points – and the club announced his retirement after the match, citing the need for him to put his health and his family first.
The 30-year-old bowed out of the AFL unable to add to the Port Adelaide premierships won by his uncle, grandfather or great-grandfather.
But Ebert’s final passage of play further cements his legacy at Alberton and will long live in the memories of fans as an example of someone rising to the occasion to do their utmost for their team.
Named one of South Australia’s most inspirational people, Ebert said, simply: “I’m honoured to be on the list.”
– Matt Turner
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