Swanwick Star Issue No. 1 (2008)

Year 2008 in Review

Gladys Gertrude Clauson Oct. 12, 1912 – Dec. 04, 2005

This is being written to honour an exceptional woman who lived a secluded life and yet had the foresight and immense generosity to leave her lifelong savings to a legacy which will allow others, like herself, to deeply explore the truth within each one of us. Without Gladys Clauson, it would not have been possible for the KECC (the Krishnamurti Educational Centre of Canada) to reopen its doors.

She was born in Eckville, Alberta. Her parents were Roman Catholics and her Dad was American and her mother, English. Gladys was an accountant by profession.

We, of the KECC only got to know about Gladys in the late nineties when she began to send us a yearly donation of five thousand dollars which was more than anyone had ever given, so we were curious to find out who this person might be and discovered that she lived alone in a small condo not too far from our head office in West Vancouver.

Seeing how elderly, frail and isolated she was, we offered to take her shopping for groceries, which she readily accepted…(her driver license had expired and she could no longer drive her own car). We even contacted the Municipal health authorities to give her assistance. They came and worked out a schedule to take care of her everyday needs but she flatly refused their offer. Gladys did not want to do anything that would jeopardize her independence.

Only once, after much persuasion, did she agree to accompany us to Victoria to visit the Swanwick Krishnamurti Study Center and see it firsthand. She had never attended any of our seminars or workshops. However, she was delighted that she had come and walked all around the 32 acre waterfront property and immediately fell in love with its charm and location, its gardens, fountains, and panoramic view of the distant snow covered Olympic Mountain range across the Georgia Straits. Her will requested that her ashes be scattered at Swanwick, which was duly done with the reading of a passage from Krishnamurti.

To us, she remained an enigma, shrouded in mystery and it was not until our office was contacted of her demise in December 2005 and told that one of our directors had been named as the sole executor of her will, that we finally got an insight into her life.

While vacating her premises, we made a complete inventory of her library of books, journals and tapes in her small condo and found a truly remarkable and unusually deep thinking woman who not only explored the vast potential of the human mind but also had great wit and a sense of humour!

Most of the books were those written by J. Krishnamurti as well as other eminent thinkers who had had dialogues with him: Dr. David Bohm, Dr. Allan Anderson, Dr. Rupert Sheldrake, Julian Huxley, etc. Among the other books in her library were those of Buddhism, Zen, Cunfucius, Ramana Maharishi, Dr. Paul Brunton, Bertrand Russell, Dr Albert Einstein, Alan Watts, the Dead Sea Scrolls, etc. Browsing through her library revealed that this was no ordinary woman.

We end this by saying: Thank you, dear Gladys for making it possible for others, like yourself, to explore the limitless human mind.