King Edward VII School has lost a legendary teacher in Christopher John Moffat. Mr Moffat taught at King Edward VII from 1984 until 2004 when he took early retirement. Mr Moffat joined King Edward after teaching at Umtali Boys’ High, Prince Edward School and Ellis Robins School in Zimbabwe.

Mr Moffat was Head of Buxton House for many years as well as Head of Boarding. Chris, as everybody knew him, was a legend in the classroom and was a famous ‘talk and chalk’, his favourite piece of chalk being yellow which was evident on his ever present blue pants. Nobody dared to not listen in his class as he was not only a great teacher but an imposing man at 6’3″ tall, had a deep voice and a wicked set of side burns. He had a great sense of humour and could tell the boys many a story about Africa. Chris was firm but fair in both the classroom and hostel.

He was a mentor to many young teachers at King Edward VII School. No task or challenge was too difficult for Chris. He was a cricket man and when he was asked to take over the rowing he had the club winning the South African Schools’ Rowing Championships within his first year in charge in 1986. His expertise didn’t stop there and he was able to coach ‘A’ team rugby all the way down to the 9th team. Nobody could forget his ‘dead ants’ drill and the famous ‘Mashonaland maul’ when playing in the lower open rugby teams.

Chris Moffat’s passion was athletics and when he took over in 1989 after ‘back to back’ losses at Inter-high he went on to win no fewer than 10 Inter-high athletics meetings. He always admired the middle distance athletes and believed that they were the ‘tough men’ of the athletics team and the real unsung heroes of the School.

King Edward VII School says goodbye to a teacher, mentor, coach and friend and our thoughts and prayers are with his family in their time of need.

A parting thought of Chris Moffat would be his favourite saying, from a 1980’s television show Hill Street Blues, ‘gents….do it to them before they do it to you’.

Tribute written by: Mr Simon Thorne