My brother-in-law Ian Balsdon, who has died from the side-effects of diabetes aged 70, was an unassuming man whose career was spent largely in banking, but who gave a great deal to his family and the wider community.
Born in Plymouth, he was the youngest child, and only son, of Bill, an accountant, and Betty (nee Rennie). He was educated at Plymouth college prep school and then its senior school. A keen Scouter, he gained the Queen’s Scout award, the movement’s highest youth award.
Leaving school, he joined the old Westminster Bank (that later merged to become part of NatWest). It was during a residential banking course at the Oaken Holt training centre, Oxfordshire, in 1970 that he met my older sister Christine, whom he married in 1972. They went on to have two children, Sarah and Matthew.
For the bank, he worked in Devon, Cornwall and Bristol. After a transfer to its London headquarters, the couple moved to Hazlemere, Buckinghamshire. After nearly 30 years with NatWest, though, he was made redundant during the bank’s first cull of its experienced managers.
Changing direction, Ian first found work with the Freemantle Trust, caring for adults with learning difficulties, before returning to banking with Lloyds, working in the Great Missenden and Rickmansworth branches.
In Buckinghamshire, the family fostered nearly 20 children. Ian was a Scout and Cub leader, a school governor, treasurer for the local Mencap, and member of the local parochial church council. He played indoor bowls. Best of all he loved trains. Riding on them, watching them, reading about them. In retirement he enjoyed the camaraderie that came with volunteering at the Chinnor & Princes Risborough railway.
Two weeks before he died he had celebrated his 70th birthday with by taking a trip up the Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth with his nephew and great-nephew, and by wearing a Plymouth Argyle football club shirt to church.
He is survived by Christine, Sarah and Matthew.
