If you are an avid reader of honeymoon literature , then the above presentation copy , signed by the author, published in Brisbane in 1928, in the current offerings of Douglas Stewart Fine Books, Melbourne, for $550, is your cup of tea , desirable Christmas reading .
It was written by adventurous Brisbane born schoolteacher Muriel Dorney, dux of her primary school,who missed out obtaining a teaching post in New Guinea before marrying.
The dangerous 1926-l927 honeymoon trip of 6000 miles she and mechanically minded husband John made was in the first Willeys Overland Whippet uncrated in the Queensland capital. The shortage of petrol outlets in those days was a problem for the couple. They headed north-west to Longreach ,Cloncurry, Avon Downs in the Northern Territory, Victoria River Downs, Daly Waters, Katherine and Darwin .
From there they went west to Broome ,down south to Perth via Marble Bar and Peak Hill ,east to Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie ,across the Nullarbor via Fowler's Bay to Port Augusta in South Australia ,then on to Adelaide ,Mount Gambier, Melbourne, Bendigo, Albury, Canberra,Sydney ,Newcastle ,Armidale ,Grafton and home to Brisbane where they were received by a large crowd .
John Dorney was born at Rockhampton ,Queensland, to Irish immigrant parents. He worked with his father as a horse boy on Maneroo Station, Longreach, and also in a local cordial factory where he lost the sight of an eye in an accident .
Rejected for military service, in l915 he joined the Western Motors company at Longreach in the early days of motor transport . In l918 he started the firm White and Dorney in Rockhampton, which had the only petrol bowser in town .
He met Muriel while trying to sell her a car in Brisbane . According to a fact sheet the couple worked at Goondiwindi, Charleville and Maryborough . By 1933 they opened their own garage , a Ford agency, in Chinchilla, which they ran for 27 years.
John Dorney was a foundation member of the National Council of Ford Dealers Australia ,was involved in politics and chairman of the Chinchilla Shire Council , where he served from l949 to l968 when he died . There is a memorial clock in his name in Heeney Street .
UPCOMING : More interesting offerings from Douglas Stewart including the photographic collection of another schoolteacher who worked as a missionary in the Trobriands early in the 20th century and wrote home about the plight of women .
