TERRITORY PUBS WITH NO CHEER

Popular Darwin hotel in busier  days

If, as sung by Ted Egan while beating on an empty beer carton, they  are bloody  good  drinkers in the Northern Territory, why  do  so many Territory hotels  run  into financial  difficulties  and  close?  The   latest   pub   tipped  to  close  in September  is  the  Mandorah  Beach Hotel , across  the harbour from   Darwin.  According to  the online newspaper, Wagaitear , now celebrating its 10^th year of operation, edited by veteran journalist Jack  Ellis ,  the  Mandorah  Hotel, on  the Cox  Peninsula,  run by the  same family for more than  40 years , is  ready to shout time please for   the  last  time and  is  likely to  be  demolished. 

The  pub was  built on  land bought from  Alan Carter  who  ran  Golden Sands  holiday resort in which the   honeymoon   cabin  contained   a   bed  with  a   sagging   mattress  and  cupids  galore  on the  cover.   Cupids   also   fluttered  on   the  curtains .  Linked  to   Darwin  by   ferry and  road , the  Mandorah Hotel  was   popular  with  Darwinites   who  came over  for  the weekend  to  fish and   drink. When  boats  carrying   refugees  from  Vietnam    started to arrive in  Darwin  in the   l970s  it was not uncommon  for  people  fishing  from the  Mandorah  jetty   to  be asked   by  occupants of  the  vessels for directions   to  the city of  Darwin . 

On one memorable  occasion, the occupants  of  a  boat were  firmly told to go  back where they came from , while  other  helpful people  said to  proceed straight ahead and   turn  left  at  the iron ore  loading wharf .   A   strange creature  which   became known as  the  Mandorah Monster  was  sighted on several  occasions   swimming   in  the area  in  the l950s and  60s and could have been  a marine version of a Pink Elephant .

There  was   disbelief  last   year  among   journalists  who  had  worked in  Darwin over the  years  that  the  popular Vic Hotel , frequented by  many scribes  and  the source of many  stories  ,  had  closed   because of  financial   problems ;  it has since  reopened , but is  a  tame  shadow of  its  former  self  in  bygone days .    Another   watering  hole,  part  of  the   grand  old  Hotel  Darwin,  also  closed ,  eventually  reopened , revamped .  Down  in  Alice  the once  centre of social activity, the Memorial Club, was  forced to  close its  doors .     

DEATH OF A BUTTERFLY

Its  eggs being carried  away by ants , this  butterfly, probably a Monarch, ended its life  on a  roadway. Photo by Vallis

NO NEWS IN THE TRUTH -Continuing biography of Northern Territory crusading editor,"Big Jim" Bowditch.

The Darwin-based managing director and shareholder in the Northern Territory News ,  freelance journalist Bob Freeden, drove to Alice Springs  in a black Riley car during May l952  and  spoke to  Jim Bowditch, there being mention of  him and the  vehicle  in a  brief  paragraph in the Centralian Advocate . The two  became close friends and  Freeden would  play a key part in the appointment of  Bowditch as editor of  the NT News.

A tall man , Freeden , pictured above at the entrance of  the Rum Jungle uranium mine ,  had been born in Germany , his family having fled from Nazi persecution of Jews just before the outbreak of the war. The family settled in Western Australia and Bob studied  geology before taking  a job with MacRobertson-Miller Airlines. In his twenties, he  was made Darwin manager of  MMA .

Bush pilots often returned from the outback with offbeat stories . Freeden began to send these stories to newspapers in the south . Within a short time he was stringing for many newspapers outside the Herald and Weekly Times group represented in Darwin by Douglas Lockwood. Eventually  Freeden  resigned from MMA to concentrate on journalism and became involved with Eric White and Don Whitington in  the  News venture.

Freeden quickly realised that southern newspapers had a voracious appetite for exotic stories from Darwin and the Northern Territory, so he gave them what they wanted. This involved beating up some stories , even inventing them. Reports about crocodiles , buffaloes and kangaroos in the main street of Darwin were lapped up by the newspapers. Doug Lockwood became livid when asked by his paper to provide matching stories for Freeden’s creative pieces. One of Freeden’s beat ups had a crocodile marauding through Cashman’s store in Darwin’s main street. Lockwood would indignantly state that a story was false , and his southern head office would be disappointed . However, when Lockwood was absent from Darwin, Freeden sometimes covered for him and sent stories down south. Freeden had an accent and often told Bowditch over a glass of beer , “ There is no noows (news ) in the twoof ( truth) .”

 A WILD CROCODILE HUNT

A true experience with a crocodile filled Freeden with fear. While doing a trip on the patrol vessel Kuru , Freeden went to Maningreda in Arnhem Land . There he asked Native Affairs officer Jack Doolan, later Member for Victoria River in the NT Legislative Assembly , to take him out on a night croc shooting trip . Doolan agreed and thought he would put on a bit of a show for Freeden .

In a canoe with little freeboard and paddled by an old Aborigine , Charlie Mungan , they ventured into the mangroves. Seeing what he thought was a small crocodile because its eyes were close together, Doolan waited until they were alongside before he fired a shot. However, it turned out to be a much larger crocodile with small beady eyes , and it went berserk . Charlie tried to kill the crocodile with wild swings from an axe and in the process nearly scalped the other two passengers . The  canoe tipped and dipped, Freeden hung on grimly . Finally, Charlie was able to kill the croc with a blow between the eyes. Freeden was petrified and insisted on getting out of the canoe and walked back to the camp through the mangroves, arriving there coated in mud and badly scratched.

While the new  NT News was feeling its way, the Sydney directors were already planning another newspaper in the Queensland mining town of Mt Isa.  Don Whitington was not so  keen about starting another paper , but Eric White had spoken to Mt Isa Mines Limited’s chairman, George Fisher , and received encouragement from him for the project. An adventurous New Zealand journalist and author , Ross Annabell , then became involved in the Mount Isa plans , and would subsequently have many dealings with Bowditch . NEXT :  Bowditch in  dramatic court  case.  

LAST OF THE BUSH BALLADISTS

In his  day, poet , short story writer  and composer, Edward Harrington (1896-l966), was regarded  as the  last  of  the  Australian  Bush Balladists. Born in Shepparton, Victoria,  the  fourth son of an Irish farmer and  an Australian mother, Margaret O'Brien,  Harrington  took part in the  famous Australian Light  Horse  charge  on  Beersheba. Requiring  medical attention  for the rest of his life because of  war service , he was  a founding  member of the Australian Poetry Lovers' Society  in  l934  and  the  active , influential  Melbourne  Bread and Cheese  Club - mentioned  several times previously in Little Darwin in connection with NT pioneer  Jessie Litchfield  and  historian, author, publisher  Glenville Pike .

A Little Darwin scavenger found the above  1940 collection of Harrington's outback songs in an op shop box . Titles include  Old Timer , The Swagman's Song, Port Noarlunga (Adelaide) By the Sea and The Fossicker. The music was published by Allan and Co. Pty. Ltd., of Melbourne, Adelaide and Bendigo. Alas, this fine Australian music company was forced to close its doors in recent times. The back of this volume advertised SONGS FROM THE BUSH , collected and edited by John Meredith and others, arranged by Alfred Hill , which included Click go the Shears, bushrangers Bold Jack Donahue and Frank Gardiner , and Widgeegowera Joe. Other works by Harrington included Songs of War and Peace (1920) ; Boundary Bend and Other Ballads (1936); The Kerrigan Boys (1944) and The Swagless Swaggie and Other  Ballads (1957).

STRONG BONDS BETWEEN AUSTRALIA & KIWIS...May Day Special

It  is timely to recognise the incredibly strong ties that existed between Australian workers  and those in Aotearoa before the bloodbath of World War  further  cemented that  relationship.  Battles for social justice, better pay and working conditions took place across the Tasman with a strong input by workers from Australia . These actions involved strikes, lock outs, black bans , imprisonment . Some of those who went looking for work in the Land of the Long White Cloud had been involved in early union struggles in various parts of Australia. A considerable number of them became deeply involved in unions , politics ; some even became ministers of state.

The Maoriland Worker , the masthead of which appears above , was started by the Shearers Union’ in Christchurch in 1911 after it had been savaged by newspapers over a bitter wage dispute the year before . The Shearers’Union soon amalgamated with the Miners’ Union and the Maoriland Worker eventually became the official journal of the Federation of Labour , disparagingly called the “ Red Feds”.

The first editor was the remarkable Tasmanian born Kiwi, Ettie Annie Rout , assisted by Alexander Wildey, a Christchurch publisher , one of his printed works being sheet music for  piano which  included the French national anthem , La Marseillaise . Rout, an early Supreme Court shorthand typist and journalist , was both reviled and praised for her campaign as  a sex educator and her direct action against  the spread   of  veneral  diseases, especially among  troops.  During he r time she was described as the “ Guardian Angel of the Ansacs ” (lost  last letter of  the alphabet ) and a British bishop  branded her “the most wicked woman in  Britain . ” The French decorated her, while in New Sealand (letter loss), a ban was imposed on even mentioning her name , newspapers  liable to  a 100 pound fine if they did so ,  her books banned . In  recent times the aids centre in Christchurch was  named after  her .

Due to financial problems, the Maoriland Worker collapsed after only three issues and control passed to the miners , with Bob Ross, a former editor of the Barrier Truth , Broken Hill , NSW, a strong centre of  industrial action , stepping into the editorship, production moving to the capital, Wellington

Under the editorship of Henry Edmund ”Harry” Holland from 1913-18, the paper’s weekly circulation rose above 10,000. The Maoriland Worker’s editorial policy firmly supported socialism , industrial unionism, international co-operation among unionists and pacifism. Holland, an avid socialist, who had  worked in the newspaper industry in Australia before crossing the Tasman , was jailed for sedition during the war. The  paper  ran two poems by the  British war poet  Siegfried  Sassoon.

 Holland  went on to become Parliamentary Leader of the Labour Party from 1919-33 . [Little Darwin has mentioned Holland in several posts ,one related to Kiwi author and ardent activist , Jean Devanny , who sent several letters to the paper and  was influenced by the editor, but later became disenchanted with what was regarded as the contradictory stance of the Labour Party in respect of socialism and other issues .] NEXT :  More information about Ettie Rout and  the  identity revealed of  another  activist  mentioned  in  an interesting  inscription  in   an  anti- war  book  owned  by  Holland.

FRONTIERSMAN STILL REMEMBERED

Good to see that the late historian , journalist , author , publisher -Glenville Pike- is still remembered in North Queensland , while he appears to have been completely forgotten in the Northern Territory where he, his mother and aunt (actually his mother’s cousin) lived for years. They ran the Emerald Springs Roadhouse , near Pine Creek, also lived at the 23- mile south of Darwin , and Glenville started the North Australian Monthly magazine , painted Territory scenes, produced Christmas cards and published a variety of books about the NT. An early book on NT history was printed at the NT News in Darwin in the l950s.

Some of his books are on sale at the must see Museum of Tropical North Queensland in Townsville and the North Queensland Register reruns his popular Round the Campfire by Sundowner column which he wrote for decades.  The  insert of  Pike  above shows him in his book filled Mareeba , NQ , office with a trunk containing all the items he had written or edited and had  published for others.  The Northern Sun , one of  a number of publications  he started , is  still going , run by a close friend , Reg Starkey.

Glenville amassed a large collection of North Australian photographs, now in the Cairns Historical  Society. Over the years he had many dealings with journalists, editors  and  publishers and produced and wrote  books  about Australian history and pioneers when local publishers were not interested in the subjects.   A popular book of his is Queensland Frontier ;  he also wrote about various parts of the last frontier in the North. A German woman who moved to North Queensland said  Pike’s books were wonderful  and made her realise what an astonishing country she had come to after reading his accounts of the early days in the North . (Graphic and text - Peter Simon . )

PATTERN IN A TROPICAL TIDAL POOL

Photo by  Vallis