probus cluB Kapiti central - JOHN DOUGLAS PUBLISHING: Publisher of Military History Books

probus cluB Kapiti central

22/2/2021

Lieutenant Colonel (Rtd) Tony Howell MC, was the guest speaker at the Combined Probus club of Kapiti Central on the 9th Feb 2021.
He had served as a platoon commander with V2 Company in the Vietnam War. Tony gave the 111 attendees an hour-long overview of the leadup to this historical conflict, the battles and its final conclusion. Slides were shown throughout, some previously unseen.
Tony was quick to praise the men in his platoon for their stellar professionalism and his humble persona throughout captured everyone’s attention.
Afterwards many were moved to silence and contemplation as they relived the effects on their generation. The appreciation of his excellent presentation so humbly portrayed was testament to the calibre of the man. It was only at the conclusion that a member of Probus made it known that Tony had been awarded the Military Cross for bravery.
Tony is the published author of ‘Jungle Green Shadows’ which is to be followed up by ‘Vietnam ANZACS’ due for release midway through 2021.
A list is already forming of those who want to secure a copy.

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A WORD FROM BOB

Some people just love books. Not just reading them, but also twittering over them, feeling them, sniffing them… A lot of this kind seem to end up somewhere in the book business.
One such bloke is Bob Anderson (left). He’s a real book man, is Bob.
He started out as a lithographer who set up his own business in Christchurch doing typesetting, design, film and litho, the kind of business that proliferated in the years before digital came along and dealt many of them a death blow. Bob built working relationships with a few publishers, and even set up in Fiji, courtesy of that country’s government incentives, to service the Aussie market as well.
In 1991 he became a print consultant, but all the time Bob was getting deeper into books. All told he reckons he’s been involved in the production of the best part of 1000 books. Since 2000 he’s been a full-blown publisher — with a very special niche, that trades on another side to Bob Anderson. He is, as he loves to remind anyone sharing a drink with him, probably the only living person to have served in the New Zealand Army (2nd and 3rd Battalions) THREE TIMES.
It is a long and hilarious story of how that came about (perhaps Bob will tell us in a book sometime) but suffice to say Bob has a lot of friends in the New Zealand Defence establishment who value his commitment to producing quality books. They know him across the Tasman, too. It’s almost got to the stage where if it’s anything to do with ANZAC, Australian or New Zealand military events, it has to have Bob’s imprimatur on it.