Remembering Tim Hargreaves

Tim Hargreaves attended Malvern College from 1952 to 1956 and was a member of House No.6. He was a House Prefect and a Boxer.

After leaving Malvern, the College Register of OMs for 1977 records Tim as “a Stowaway, smuggler, truck driver, explorer, builder, and unsuccessful writer (sic)”. By 1977, he was married with two children, and had already settled into his new home in the remote region of Shark Bay in Western Australia, where he remained for the rest of his life until his passing on 21 August 2025.

Tim was born in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1938 and moved with his family to Jersey in the Channel Islands at age 12.
After completing his education at Malvern in June 1956, he joined the English 10th Parachute Regiment, where he earned the nickname “Tiger Tim of the 10th” before eventually settling in Shark Bay, Western Australia.

Rejecting a potential office job at HSBC, Tim spent seven years travelling the world. His diverse jobs included selling ballpoint pens in Moscow’s Red Square, working as a film extra in Hollywood, serving as a merchant seaman and a carpenter, and working on a road gang for seven years.

During his time living in Shark Bay, Tim was a small-town journalist and author, writing the book Dolphin Bay: Yarns and Other Madness from Australia’s Remote North West” (2008) and publishing the Shark Bay Herald.

He became a “local legend” for his craftsmanship and community service. In 1974 Tim built the Old Pearler Restaurant in Denham, which is claimed to be the only restaurant in the world constructed entirely from
coquina (shell) blocks. He also built his own home from rammed earth. He was known for supporting the “underdog,” registering his property as the Shark Bay Crisis Centre and providing caravans for those needing
emergency accommodation. He served as a local councillor for the Shire of Shark Bay (2007–2011), often taking a vocal stance to hold local government accountable. Even after his formal term, he remained a fixture at council
meetings well into 2024, frequently using Public Question Time to advocate for social and community support for the town’s most vulnerable residents.

Tim was a committed Christian and served as a lay preacher, leading Sunday morning services on the Denham beachfront – a gathering he famously called “Australia’s cheapest church to run”.

His death was widely mourned by the Shark Bay community, with a memorial service held on Saturday 30 August at the Denham Town Hall to celebrate his remarkable life.