Stanley Bignell spent the last months of World War Two trapped in a prisoner of war camp. He spent the rest of his life embracing the wide outdoors, sharing his passions with a generation of Blue Mountains schoolchildren.
Mr Bignell, who moved to Hazelbrook in 1956, initiated and supervised the construction of netball courts at Gloria Park and then founded the Hazelbrook soccer and netball clubs.
He was also a manual arts teacher at Katoomba High, where he taught boat building.
But probably his greatest legacy was at Wentworth Falls lake, where he established the Blue Mountains Sailing Club and taught many local teenagers how to sail.
The lake was created by damming the Jamison Creek to supply water for the steam trains crossing the Mountains. But after the trains were electrified, the lake's quality deteriorated.
Mr Bignell's son-in-law, David Alston, said Mr Bignell thought it could be turned into a recreational place.
"He had the idea, let's drain the lake, take out all the reeds and the rushes and let's start a sailing club. He turned it from a muddy swamp into a place that's now a nature reserve."
Plans are afoot for Mr Bignell's legacy to be permanently marked, with a proposal to name the pathway from Sinclair Crescent boat ramp to Waratah Street after him.
One staunch supporter is Wynn Kirkham who addressed council on the naming proposal.
"I lived in Hazelbrook for 50 years. I saw first-hand what he did for the youth of our area."
She said there was no sporting club of any sort before Mr Bignell set up the soccer and netball clubs.
"He was a kind and loving man. He was good to his students, he was good to all the young in Hazelbrook. He was able to keep our youth off the streets and out of mischief,"
Mr Bignell's name had been raised when council invited suggestions for the new pedestrian bridge at Hazelbrook, which was eventually named after Private Ronald Field, the only Mountains resident killed in the Vietnam War.
The current proposal to name the walkway after him instead is on public exhibition at council.
