A touching and unusual tale about an angel delivering a feather to announce the death of a Darwin woman, once known as the Duchess of Duke Street, emerged at the funeral service for Jill Graham , of Nightcliff, pictured above .
The celebrant told the small gathering that a woman living in Queensland had found the feather in her house and believed it had been delivered by an angel to announce that Graham had died .
Little Darwin attended the service and followed up the story . Jill had a friend with whom she had worked in the NT Government’s Protocol section . They had discussed life after death . Graham, an atheist, said it was finito once you died and were buried or cremated . Her friend, now residing on the Gold Coast , having had a long illness , firmly told Jill there was life after death.
They regularly rang each other to see if they were alive or “upstairs" . A kind of a pact was made to let the other know if they were no longer around. After hearing that Jill was in hospital , a feather suddenly appeared in her house which was taken as having been brought by “an angel” announcing Jill had departed her mortal coil. And so she had .
A highly efficient , low level clerk in the public service , Jill Graham used to be one of the most powerful people in Darwin. She compiled ,updated and had published for several years what amounted to the A-List, called WHO’S WHAT WHERE . You were a nobody, even if your were on the Readers’ Digest ubiquitous mailing list, if your name did not appear in its pages. People clamoured to be included in the publication, which she irreverently called WHO’S UP WHO .
At her funeral service , it was revealed that she deliberately left out some people from the directory because she did not like them, probably with great justifaction . A shorthand typist from London, Jill worked in the Information and Public Relations office, later in Protocol, playing a prominent part in both .
The celebrant told the small gathering that a woman living in Queensland had found the feather in her house and believed it had been delivered by an angel to announce that Graham had died .
Little Darwin attended the service and followed up the story . Jill had a friend with whom she had worked in the NT Government’s Protocol section . They had discussed life after death . Graham, an atheist, said it was finito once you died and were buried or cremated . Her friend, now residing on the Gold Coast , having had a long illness , firmly told Jill there was life after death.
They regularly rang each other to see if they were alive or “upstairs" . A kind of a pact was made to let the other know if they were no longer around. After hearing that Jill was in hospital , a feather suddenly appeared in her house which was taken as having been brought by “an angel” announcing Jill had departed her mortal coil. And so she had .
A highly efficient , low level clerk in the public service , Jill Graham used to be one of the most powerful people in Darwin. She compiled ,updated and had published for several years what amounted to the A-List, called WHO’S WHAT WHERE . You were a nobody, even if your were on the Readers’ Digest ubiquitous mailing list, if your name did not appear in its pages. People clamoured to be included in the publication, which she irreverently called WHO’S UP WHO .
At her funeral service , it was revealed that she deliberately left out some people from the directory because she did not like them, probably with great justifaction . A shorthand typist from London, Jill worked in the Information and Public Relations office, later in Protocol, playing a prominent part in both .
In the chaos after Cyclone Tracy , she helped produce a daily information sheet which was run off and distributed at centres where people went for meals in the wrecked city . Soon after , she went to Sydney to help conduct the Northern Territory stand at the Royal Easter Show with the head of Information and PR , Dick Timperley , and the “White Hunter “, Allan Alexander Stewart , of Nourlangie safari camp fame.
Stewart , an old PR hand who handled the Humpty Doo rice account, once stood for parliament in NSW and later in the NT, took up a position in the members’ bars at the show where he hobnobbed with old military mates and captains of commerce.
He arranged for the Royal Australian Naval Band to frequently march up to the NT stand and play deafening music for Jill Graham and Dick Timperley . While Timperley was furious, Jill thought it hilarious. Timperley said he would not have been surprised if the White Hunter arranged for a Scottish pipe band playing Amazing Grace to be parachuted onto the stand, which would reveal what was hidden beneath the kilts. Through her work she met many local, interstate and overseas journalists .
At the funeral, a longtime friend , Shirley McManus,recalled that when Jill lived in Duke Street, Stuart Park , being a good cook , she entertained friends with fancy meals at which the wine flowed. Because of these grand evenings, she became known as The Duchess of Duke Street, after the British TV series, centred about the renowned female hotel owner, highly regarded for the wonderful table she kept.
Jill liked a punt, and each Melbourne Cup she held a party in her small unit ,which was decorated for the occasion , her catering lavish . She was also a dab hand at billiards and snooker.
Cockroaches terrified her from the moment she first encountered them in her Sydney bedroom and screamed blue murder , soon after she arrived in Australia. On being told that cockroaches would be numerous in Darwin, she went to the library and got out every book she could which had information about them. When a librarian asked if she was making a study of cockies, she said no, she just wanted to know how to kill them. Her unit was sprayed every three months to achieve a cockroach free zone .
Two of her great nieces , Louise and Clare , raised in Darwin, came up from Sydney for the funeral , and told how Jill had a magical influence on the household each time she visited when they were children . They loved her visits so much they made a sign WELCOME QUEEN JILL , placed on display near her coffin, along with family photos and a teddy bear or two .
Jill, 75, died suddenly in the Darwin private hospital on January 4 and was cremated .
Stewart , an old PR hand who handled the Humpty Doo rice account, once stood for parliament in NSW and later in the NT, took up a position in the members’ bars at the show where he hobnobbed with old military mates and captains of commerce.
He arranged for the Royal Australian Naval Band to frequently march up to the NT stand and play deafening music for Jill Graham and Dick Timperley . While Timperley was furious, Jill thought it hilarious. Timperley said he would not have been surprised if the White Hunter arranged for a Scottish pipe band playing Amazing Grace to be parachuted onto the stand, which would reveal what was hidden beneath the kilts. Through her work she met many local, interstate and overseas journalists .
At the funeral, a longtime friend , Shirley McManus,recalled that when Jill lived in Duke Street, Stuart Park , being a good cook , she entertained friends with fancy meals at which the wine flowed. Because of these grand evenings, she became known as The Duchess of Duke Street, after the British TV series, centred about the renowned female hotel owner, highly regarded for the wonderful table she kept.
Jill liked a punt, and each Melbourne Cup she held a party in her small unit ,which was decorated for the occasion , her catering lavish . She was also a dab hand at billiards and snooker.
Cockroaches terrified her from the moment she first encountered them in her Sydney bedroom and screamed blue murder , soon after she arrived in Australia. On being told that cockroaches would be numerous in Darwin, she went to the library and got out every book she could which had information about them. When a librarian asked if she was making a study of cockies, she said no, she just wanted to know how to kill them. Her unit was sprayed every three months to achieve a cockroach free zone .
Two of her great nieces , Louise and Clare , raised in Darwin, came up from Sydney for the funeral , and told how Jill had a magical influence on the household each time she visited when they were children . They loved her visits so much they made a sign WELCOME QUEEN JILL , placed on display near her coffin, along with family photos and a teddy bear or two .
Jill, 75, died suddenly in the Darwin private hospital on January 4 and was cremated .
