A popular and humorous figure and an honorary life member of the Marylebone Cricket Club, Burke hid personal and financial worries while a member of the regular ABC commentary team for The Ashes Tests. In February 1979, depressed by marital problems, ill health and by the loss of some $153,000 in a 'disastrous gamble on the gold futures market', he purchased a shotgun from a Sydney sporting goods store and killed himself with it.
