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Independent MLA Dawn Lawrie , called a witch and a few other fairytale characters by the CLP , wrote a regular column , Dawn Weekly . A good political operator , quick on her feet because her Boxer roamed Nightcliff byways at times, resulting in a trip to the pound, she went on to have her own paper and become the Queen of a tropical island which would have been invaded by hordes of dehydrated journalists on rafts seeking a calypso lifestyle if it had been closer to Darwin.
As the name implied, a column called Beating the Bulldust , by Pandanus , did not pull any punches and Roger Ryan , MLA, attacked the rubbish served up each week by the anonymous writer . Pandanus also got up the nose of Majority Leader , Goff Letts. Pandanus , he wrote, should change his sobriquet. Pandanus was a prickly denizen of swamps and bogs . Ricinus ,the castor oil plant, seemed more apt. Little Darwin is aware of the identity of the irksome Pandanus , but nothing will induce us to reveal it- unless a large sum is deposited in our Swiss bank account .
Social news was supplied by Darwin's answer to Hollywood’s Hedda Hopper, Joy Collins, who had worked at the NT News back in the 1950s. In those not politically correct days , Joy spent weekends at Batchelor, where her eventual partner, Ron, worked at Rum Jungle. One Monday she rang editor Jim Bowditch from there and said she would not be coming to work as she was in bed with a wog . Bowditch asked what nationality. It became an anecdote Joy freely repeated, even in genteel company, such as Quota Club meetings . As a result of her extensive connections, Joy often picked up many news tips which provided both the News and The Star with scoop stories.
Founding photographer, Barry Ledwidge ,who had worked for the Australian News and Information Bureau , operated out of a tiny darkroom in which the airconditioner almost sat on his shoulder. Ledwidge recalls one of his unusual assignments for The Star included stumbling around a pastoral property at night looking for graves in a major story. Bazza also had to shed his gear to cover the official opening of Darwin's nudist beach, of which more will be revealed later on .
Rugby League notes were provided by Frank McPherson, author of the history of rugby in the NT, who was kicked out of play by the Grim Reaper last year.
The August 5 1976 edition of the paper announced that Ken MacAulay had resigned as editor and would be replaced by Peter Blake. It was stated that MacAulay intended to establish himself in fulltime creative writing . He would continue writing features for the paper while researching material for a novel set in Darwin. His first novel, Black Anna, written with the assistance of a Commonwealth Fellowship, was to be published in November. At the time of the announcement , Ken told how a leading businessman had said the smart money in town maintained The Star would not last more than four issues; now six editions had been printed.
MacAulay wrote profiles, all skilfully penned, one about mining magnate Lang Hancock, interviewed as he was preparing to climb into a hot bath . HOW A PEA PUT LIZ INTO POLITICS , another brilliant profile, was about CLP MLA Liz Andrew , tragically taken by cancer . If only there were political writers of MacAulay’s calibre in Darwin today. Without knocking was another bright column he wrote , admitting in one that he had been suspended from the Journalists' Club in Sydney. Sadly , Ken drowned during a Sydney flashflood while trying to ford a crossing to get to a pub , from which he had departed a few hours earlier .
Discharged from hospital, Sandra Byrnes , started working back at the newspaper office after two weeks , going home early in the afternoon. Her father, Ted Hurst , and mother, Iris, moved , up from Melbourne to help. Ted Hurst was businesslike , analytical , with a time and motion approach to the running of the often chaotic , very boisterious printery and newspaper .
Under- capitalised, the weekly Star , full of local news , cost 10 cents and outsold the NT News on its day of publication ,Thursday , and created great interest in Darwin with its lively new style and strong local stories . The initial ambitious print run was in the order of 16,000 ; it levelled out at something near 12,000, at times running to 40 pages. From inside informants at the NT News came reports that the management was deeply concerned and shocked by the standard of the opposition. There were anguished cries at the News of why the hell didn’t we have this front page story ?
A southern printing trade journal on several occasions mentioned this lively new paper In Darwin with a healthy circulation. As a result, it attracted the attention of assorted major media players and some very strange organisations . A strong approach was made by the well- connected Jewish journalist ,PR, politician, organiser of Royal tours and a Papal visit , Sir Asher Joel , of Sydney, through one of his companies, Carpentaria Newspapers Pty Ltd, Mount Isa ,Queensland . Joel , with backing from Mount Isa Mines , had forced News Limited to close the Mt Isa Mail as a result of the great mine strike .
Another organisation which “sniffed about” seeking information may have been connected with the Sydney Morning Herald group. It is sheer hearsay that Sir Frank Packer’s Consolidated Press had an agreement with Murdoch not to get involved with any competitive Darwin paper because ConPress had or was interested in the TV station.
Startled was perhaps the best word to describe the reaction of Sandra Byrnes when she received telephone calls indicating a desire to buy the paper from Frank Nugan, a founding principal in the Nugan Hand Bank, later centre of a sensational scandal which revealed that it was a CIA front which dealt in drugs, guns and money laundering.
Nugan, an Australian lawyer, reputed to be associated with the Mafia in Griffith , was found shot dead in his Mercedes on January 27 ,1980, near Lithgow, NSW . A bizarre report said a bible with the name of William Colby, former director of the CIA, had been found in the vehicle. Midst ever astonishing revelations about the shonky bank it was suggested Nugan had faked his death and was in hiding, so the body was exhumed. It was found to be his.
At the inquest, his partner in the bank, Michael Jon Hand, a former US Green Beret , who had served in Vietnam,said the bank was insolvent , owed at least $50million .Then he flew out of Australia on false identity papers to Fiji in June 1980, after destroying Nugan Hand’s records , and has not been seen since . As a CIA operative, it was said he probably re-entered the US and was given a new identity.
There were astonishing revelations at a subsequent royal commission and a joint task force report on drug trafficking regarding the activities of the Nugan Hand Bank . It was reported Nugan Hand had acted as a CIA front to finance the war in Laos by laundering drug money. Nugan Hand's Chaing Mai branch was even said to have participated in the covert sale of an electronic spy ship to Iran and weapons shipments to Angola.
On the Australian front, Frank Nugan was linked with the mystery disappearance and murder of Griffith politician , Donald Mackay , the name of Sir Peter Abeles (Hand had once worked for one of his companies in Australia ) was mentioned and there has long been speculation that Nugan Hand played some part in the dismissal of Prime Minister Gough Whitlam, an allegation made that the bank transferred $2.4million to the Liberal Party of Australia for the 1974 and 1975 elections .
During the shock inquiries and reports, Sandra Byrnes’s ears pricked up when she heard the name of an American , a member of an odd Darwin organisation, the Institute of Commercial Affairs ,who came to The Star from time to time . The very initials , ICA, could and were taken to really be CIA- the US Central Intelligence Agency .
ICA had something like a compound in Parap Road occupied by three American families. There was no sign outside , just a small brass plate with the letters ICA above the street number. The folksy Americans approached Kerry and invited him to join their fellowship group which held picnics at places like Berry Springs, where they sang songs, the Internationale not one of them . It was not a religious organisation, but extolled the American way of life, said Pine Gap was good for Australia and that the US was sorry so many people had been killed in Vietnam but Communism had to be held at bay.
The ICA presented poorly written press releases which were usually binned at The Star. However, the ICA newsletter was printed on the premises .What was plainly a public notice was presented as a news item, and Kerry told them they would have to pay for it as an advertisement. In the minds of many people in Darwin at the time , it was a CIA front . NEXT EDITION-Abuse, a bashing and a millionaire buyer.
