Sqn Ldr Anthony Hugh Currey Back MBE AFC
Forgive my putting this in the Military Aviation forum rather than the history or 'where are they now?' one, but I suspect that there is slightly more chance of a PPruner who knew Tony Back frequenting this forum than the others.
Tony - or Mr Back as he was known to me, for his was one of my school masters - was born in South Africa and after taking a Double First in Maths at University in his home country, came to the UK and did a postgraduate degree in Aeronautical engineering. He joined the RAF after he'd finished his degree and served from 1953-1969. He was at CFS in the mid-50s and then went on to Hunters, serving in Germany and the UK. When he left the service, he went into teaching, first at Wrekin College and then - when compelled to retire as per his contract in the days when this was not against the law - spent a further five years at Queen Mary's Grammar School in Walsall. Several of his former colleagues (and my former teachers - the Pavlovian reaction of responding to their requests remains strong 30 years on...) would be delighted to learn more. He impressed his students and colleagues, but most definitely hid his light under a bushel - much of the known detail about him had to be pieced together for his retirement tribute and then his obituary, and its accuracy in some places isn't certain.
It appears that his MBE was awarded for his being part of the leadership of the joint mountaineering expedition to South Georgia in the 1960s, and he was an enthusiastic skier, mountaineer and sailor. I believe, from a solitary online source, that his AFC may have been awarded as a result of his work as a Flight Commander on 92 Squadron (which he left in 1959)..
If, by chance, anyone does know of him and might be able to confirm any details this would be most gratefully received, since there is an aspiration to pay a small tribute to him in the alumni magazine to mark what would've been his 90th birthday and to let his pupils know that their suspicions he had an interesting and impressive hinterland were correct. Thanks.