Andreas "Andy" Woonings
Job Description
Cooking, Seperators, Plant Engineer, Works Manager
Period
1951 - 1979
Andreas Woonings, (fondly known as Andy,) was born in Kampen, Holland in 1920. He trained as a Blacksmith and Welder. He joined the Dutch Navy at the age of eighteen and served in it during World War II, mainly on the ‘Heemskerck’. He came to Australia with this navy in 1942, and was stationed at Fremantle in 1943.
After discharge in Surabaya in 1948, he returned to Australia where he had already married in 1944. In 1949 Andy and his wife moved to Albany where he obtained welding work in a garage. He was offered a job as a welder with Cheynes Beach Whaling Company in August 1951, and in this capacity manufactured and erected much of the operating plant at the Frenchman Bay site under the direction of Norwegian Chris Bollerod.
At the commencement of the company’s operations in 1952 Andy was responsible for the cooking and separating processes at the whaling station, and was put on permanent staff a few years later. In 1960 he was promoted to plant engineer and works manager. He was involved in observation and plant buying trips to Tangalooma in Queensland and Durban, South Africa. In 1976 he became Assistant Manager of the station and remained with the company after the closure of the station in December 1978, supervising the dismantling of the equipment. He finally left the company in October 1979. He was Cheynes Beach Whaling Company’s longest serving employee.
Andreas "Andy" Woonings