FROM missing the Melbourne Olympic team by the blink of an eye, moving cities to have more time for his children and giving away his job after a cost-cutting plan was ignored.
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There was much more to Indigo councillor Don Chambers than was widely known as 450 mourners discovered at his memorial service at Rutherglen on Monday.
Son Mark Chambers reflected in his eulogy on his father's athletic ability and how it nearly saw him become an Olympian.
"Dad was a champion hurdler at school...and it is one of his greatest regrets in life that he missed out on a spot in the '56 Olympics by 0.1 of a second," Mr Chambers said.
He recalled how he and his four siblings grew up with their father working for industrial company CSR and they returned to Melbourne from Sydney after his daughter complained about his absence because of commuting.
Don Chambers then left the firm for Rutherglen in 1982 after his plan to save jobs through other means of cost saving was rejected.
Mark Chambers pondered Cr Chambers' National Party candidacy in Indi in 2001, suggesting his father had not sworn enough to be successful in federal politics.
He also told of how Cr Chambers had been given a list of tasks by his dying wife Margaret in 2012.
They were erecting a possum road crossing, standing for Indigo Council, revegetating Rutherglen's gold battery and removing trucks from Rutherglen's centre.
Mr Chambers read a tribute from Cr Chambers’ fiancee Lori Templeton Abanese, who he had been visiting in Rome when he died on October 11.
"To know Don was to know the true meaning of the word love, that love which encompasses humanity, that looks on tempests and is never shaken," Lori wrote.
"This sentiment gave him the motivation in his private and public life, to keep things beautiful and change things for the better."
Brother Bill and grandsons also paid tributes and sibling Jim gave a bible reading during the two-hour service at Rutherglen Memorial Hall.
