R.I.P. Ronald Kitching

The Australian libertarian movement has just suffered its biggest setback since the birth of Nugget Coombs in 1906. Ronald Kitching, our greatest letters-to-the-editor writer, died yesterday, aged 81, after a long, brave and arduous fight against government and other cancers. He is survived by 7 children, 10(?) grandchildren, 1(?) great grandchild and millions of other taxpayers.

The taxpayers work in many different industries, especially in the private sector.

As for his children specifically: Ronald Kitching’s family address book will attract large bids from mailing-list brokers, as there are so many of them, all succeeding in different industries all around the country. Kitching’s children work as everything from infants teacher in Tasmania, to power station operator in Karratha, to chief ambulance officer of the Rockhampton district. In light of this — and considering his dubious politics, the occasional appearance of his name in the papers and his history of welcoming thick accented foreigners into his home — it would appear that Ronald Kitching was the black sheep of the family.

He first came across the freedom philosophy reading Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged and Capitalism, the Unknown Ideal. Following Rand’s recommended readings led him to the Austrian school. He became such a big fan of the Austrian school of Ludwig von Mises, that, along with Roger Randerson and others he co-sponsored Hayek’s tour of Australia in 1976. Hayek and his wife stayed at his Atherton Tablelands property during a break in the tour to help with some farming. He attended many MPS meetings at Hayek’s invitation, and had much friendly correspondence with Antony Flew, Hans Sennholz and many others. He was well aware of the divide between the Austrian school and the Chicago school, and was firmly in the Austrian camp.

He has had long associations with such fellow Australian freedom advocates as Ron Manners and Viv Forbes. I look forward to learning more about how they met and worked together. Kitching met Roger Randerson after reading his magazine Forecast in the office of John Grover.

But Ronald Kitching was not only a preaching capitalist; he did have quite a career too. In fact, if you look closely at Julia Gillard, Tony Abbott or Bob Brown’s curriculum vitae, you will find that they have taken the opposite and opposing career path to Kitching.

Many of Kitching’s career achievements were with the company Glindemann and Kitching Enterprises.

Kitching’s free market advocacy and business interests overlapped, as they also did with his parenting duties, and also with his story-telling and pranks. In this ripper he tells of his run-ins with the Edufuhrer as he tried to school his children, with his own funds and teacher selection process. And in this gem he tells of how he found a copper ore body in the middle of a mining expo at a sports oval — note the nice political statement at the end of that one.

His book Understanding Personal & Economic Liberty was published in 2005. It is a great introduction to classical liberalism, and contains plenty of recommended reading and tips to finding books online. It is dedicated to Australia’s youth. (You can read Kitching’s brilliant introduction to the book here.)

He has been of great support and inspiration for me personally. It’s a pity Kitching couldn’t find anyone deserving of his impressive library: 27 boxes of books, including signed leather-bound Hayek and Hazlitt. But, rather than giving up, he has tried to force the issue, and hopefully one day Kitching’s faith will be justified. The library has been culled slightly and is housed at the Economics.org.au headquarters in Fox Studios, next to the SCG. There is 24-hour security, so bookings are essential.

Economics.org.au will make available online much of his work. Please feel free to share any of your memories of Kitching in the Comments section below, or email me it to post online or link.

In terms of his legacy, phrases like “Canberra Kremlin”, which he either coined, got from Roger Randerson or helped save from disappearing, ought to be in common usage. That would be a good start. Economics.org.au is working on it. As are a few other groups.