HUNTER, Valma

Valma Hunter née Lock. Age 100.

A lifelong resident of Queensland: Alice Downs (Warrego Hwy), Brisbane, and Sunshine Coast.

Died 20 December 2020.

In 1935, at age 14, Valma Lock was awarded membership of the Royal Academy of Dancing during the first visit to Australia of an RAD examiner. She was a founding member of the Queensland branch of the Australian Society of Operatic Dancing (1937), the forerunner of the Queensland Ballet Society (1954) and Ballet Theatre of Queensland (1962).

Valma and her husband, Colin Hunter, owned and operated Press Clippings Australia – Queensland’s premier newspaper clipping service – in the 1970s and 1980s.

Valma was one of the last living first-generation descendants of a Boer War veteran (Corporal Joseph Lock, 5th Queensland Imperial Bushmen). She was a member of the Queensland Division of the Military Historical Society of Australia and was named an Honorary Life Member of the Boer War Association Queensland in 2019.

After Colin Hunter (10 Sqn RAAF WWII) died in 2009, Valma became a devoted member of the War Widows’ Guild. Valma’s immediate survivors are her daughter Diane Follet Melloy of Woombye, Queensland and her son David J. Hunter of Haddonfield NJ USA.

A memorial service and celebration of Valma’s life will be held when family and friends are again able to travel safely and be together.