Swanwick Star Issue No. 2 (2009)
Berta Tiller (on the tenth anniversary of her death)
Berta was born Sep. 6, 1913 in the village of Neuhofen, Lower Austria. Her father died when she was still a child and she and her mother then moved to the nearby town of Waidhofen. There they came into contact with a residential community of local intellectuals and artisans keen on exploring new ways of living and thinking, and who were attracted to the ideals and ideas of the Theosophical Society that, at the time, had a large international following and had declared Krishnamurti (or K) to be the vehicle for the World Teacher.
Berta, from age 10-16, grew up in this environment and also spent some time in Vienna in the care of John Cordes, then secretary of the Austrian Theosophical Society. Her and her mother’s first contact with this community had been through a relative who was himself a deacon in the Liberal Catholic Church, a theosophical offshoot of the Catholic Church and who later became a leading figure in the International Vegetarian Union.
Krishnamurti himself attended the 1923 International Congress of the Theosophical Society in Vienna and then was invited by John Cordes to spend some time at the house of a friend of his in Ehrwald, a village in the Austrian Alps. Berta’s mother had volunteered to help with the food preparation and Berta accompanied her. There she first met K in person, an experience that had a great impact on her. In fact, one of the most fascinating stories Berta told a KECC Director was about how she had gone alone on a hike during her stay there and got hopelessly lost. Suddenly, K. seemed to come out of nowhere appearing before her on the same path. He walked with her down to the train station and made sure that she got on. Once on the train, she looked out the open window to thank him, but he had mysteriously disappeared!
In later years she, with her brother Tony, would several times attend the Ommen camp talks in Holland where she, after the talks, would be invited to join K and others at mealtimes and social events. She also spent time in England to attend classes by Maria Montessori and completed her Montessori training. After WWII she attended K’s talks as often as she could, mainly in Saanen (Switzerland), but also in Brockwood (England) and Ojai (California).
In 1955 Berta emigrated to Canada with her son Ralph and became a teacher in Montreal. Following her deep interest in K’s teaching, she became actively involved in the Krishnamurti Information Centre of Montreal during the ‘70s and helped organize regular video showings at Concordia University. In 1979, she met Dr. David Bohm, a world-renowned theoretical physicist, while he was on a lecture-tour of Canadian Universities. He embarked upon this tour at the specific request of K. who wanted him to spread the teachings across Canada like a prairie-fire. Dr. Bohm was also accompanied by his wife, Saral, and one of the Directors, Sarjit Siddoo. The tour included Malaspina College in Nanaimo, UBC in Vancouver, Red Dear College in Alberta, UM in Winnipeg, an interview with Dr. David Suzuki in Toronto, and CU in Montreal. Berta was one of the prominent organizers of events in Montreal which included a week-end seminar at Lacolle House in Concordia University.
In 1982 she moved to Victoria, B.C. where Ralph and his new wife were living at the time. Continuing her passion for K’s teaching, which she had found invaluable in her own life, she played an active role in supporting and helping administer the school’s successor, the Swanwick Centre in Metchosin, until a stroke in 1989 partially disabled her. She died 10 years later in Victoria, on May 2, 1999 and a tree in her memory has been planted at the Centre.
