ROMFORD, UK – Pro Hockey News were sent the following obituary from a family friend of Dave Tottman’s, who sadly passed away on August 2nd. On the eve of the ENL season starting, Pro Hockey News felt now would be the right time to publish it. Here it is, in full an unedited: Dave Tottman was born in Woodford, Essex some 58 years ago on 21st February 1953, Coronation Year. His family lived in Walthamstow and his father worked in the huge Enfield Rolling Mills, a work place that would later see Dave as an apprentice. His mother was a managaress at a butcherʼs shop. Dave was to be their only child but he had a great many Aunts & Uncles that lived nearby and he spent a good deal of time with these relatives over his early years. As a child he learned to play the piano and later took up the saxophone. He grew up to be a keen and talented sportsman and loved football, playing for his school and being selected as team captain. In his teenage years he joined the Chingford Amateurs and was their youngest player but with work came commitments and shift patterns did not always agree with football and so he chose to forgo the opportunity of joining the youth team at Tottenham.
Commanding respect from everyone on the ice
Work was an engineering apprenticeship, a full 5-year term needing to be served before reaching his qualification as a skilled tool maker. He was proud of his achievement and that of British engineering as a whole which he believed reached a pinnacle with the production of the record breaking supersonic Concorde airliner. He later worked for Rolls-Royce aero engines and was involved with their Concorde Olympus engine project. After this, in 2008, he joined Havering College of Further and Higher Education and Havering Technical College as a work based learning assessor being keen to pass on the benefit of his engineering skills to the students. Dave was also a keen motorbike enthusiast, as had been his father. His pride and joy was a Norton Commando 750 which was not only a British machine but sounded like a proper bike should. Learning to ride such a device was not without some hair raising moments including the discovery that the Norton did not have a tight turning circle. Proudly riding his new bike down the road, he spotted a friend walking on the opposite pavement; he waved and attempted a U-turn, only to find himself mounting the opposite pavement and driving up the front path of a house. The bike finally made way for a practical family car when Dave married Cheryl and then become a father. This was around the time they moved to the Romford area. He had two daughters, Joy and Claire and was devoted to them both. At Christmas he insisted on wrapping their presents and knew that he would later need to call on his engineering skills to help his daughters assembly a variety of Barbie, kitchens, motor homes, horse boxes and dream bedrooms. He helped youngest daughter Claire to find a riding stable yard when she started horse riding and when Joy became involved in ice hockey as a young player he became a referee when he learned that her team was struggling to find someone to oversee their games. This move to ice hockey largely took over from his love of golf. Other interests included playing chess and as a keen photographer but he was also well known for his colourful clothes, especially his leather jackets and cowboy boots leading to a boy at Joyʼs school asking her why her father dressed like that. Her reply that “because he was not a boring old fart like your dad”, probably sums up Dave as he did have his quirky side. He loved to bargain for items in shops that most people would happily pay the marked price for. He was a great talker and at major sporting events and at pop concerts he usually managed to get a back stage pass so that he and Joy could actually meet the stars. He also seemed to have a need to collect mobile phones preferring always to have the most up to date model and was seldom without 3 or 4 phones on his person, something that airport security guards could find rather alarming. Card tricks were another pastime and he seldom missed an opportunity to demonstrate these to an audience be they friends or strangers. As pets he owned a pair of talking parrots. Eldest daughter Joy became his golf caddy at an early age but was not allowed on the greens as she didnʼt have proper golfing shoes. When she showed an interest in skating, Dave told her that she had to choose
Dave was always up for a laugh and would do anything to get a smile
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