Running the Northern Territory News with its clapped out plant , subject to frequent breakdowns, and tight cash flow, was a difficult task . A press arrived from Perth on the back of a truck and the driver
demanded 800 pound($1600) before he would unload. Bowditch told the man, to be perfectly
frank, he needed 90 days to pay. With that, the driver said he
would take the press back to Perth .
A quick approach to banks
failed to secure the money , so Bowditch called on Mick Paspalis who had the accountant, Norman Young , later knighted and closely involved with the
Adelaide News and other major companies, including the Elders conglomerate ,in his office.
Paspalis asked Young what he thought about the request for
the money. According to Bowditch,
Young said not after the way
the newspaper had treated Mick in the betting shops episode. Enjoying the situation, Paspalis laughed
and baited Bowditch for about a
quarter of an hour. Then he signed a cheque for the amount, saying he wanted
eight per cent interest , to be paid back
in a year. There was no contract , just a shake of hands. “ I
don’t know what I would have done
if he hadn’t given me the money. It was such a hassle keeping the place going. ”
The very existence
of the paper was
placed in jeopardy due to an unusual event . North Australian Workers' Union vigilance
officer “ Wild Bill” Donnelly, another person of interest to
ASIO, called
at the office and asked Bowditch to come outside. He said he did not want the paper to run a court case
involving a watersider, a family man
, who had been charged with pilfering . Donnelly claimed the man had been set up .
Bowditch said he could
not keep the story out of the paper , that everybody received the
same treatment in the News under his editorship and there
could not be any exception to that
rule. Donnelly accused Bowditch
of being anti- working class. Becoming
angry , Bowditch said Donnelly would not
complain at all if a bank manager , a
clerk or some other person was written up in the paper. Donnelly
responded by saying that if the story
appeared in the paper not one bale of newsprint would cross the wharf for
the NT News .
The story was run and Bowditch wrote an editorial upholding freedom of the Press in which he
revealed the News had been threatened with a
ban . True to his word, Donnelly put a stop to unloading newsprint for the paper . At the time
Bowditch said the paper was “ insolvent
” and the
ban cost the News a lot of extra
money. The paper had
a bank overdraft of l7,000 pound
($34,000) and revenue was about the same amount.
The cost of having
newsprint brought in by sea was about half that of overland
freight. The freight on newsprint
by road in those days was 68 pounds
($l36) a ton . Roads were
poor so a lot of newsprint had to
be held in store. The News was placed in
a tight spot with supplies of paper in store running
out . However, Bowditch bought up all
the butchers’ paper in town to keep the
paper going until more supplies could be brought
in by air and road from
south. That ban remained for l8
months before it was lifted. Bowditch
said he thought it was lifted because the watersiders realised the paper fought for the working class.
Donnelly was a hard working
crusader himself . Born l917,
the year of the Russian Revolution
, Donnelly had a bust of Lenin on
his bookcase. Before
Bowditch came to Darwin , Donnelly campaigned for better
wages and conditions for men employed
in the pearling industry ; he
also spoke out against the indentured labour system
which was soon to attract the
attention of Bowditch. Donnelly was the subject of a humorous episode
when he intervened in a dispute on a
ship in Darwin . Below deck, he
was trying to hammer out a solution to the trouble
when the ship set sail without him noticing . When somebody told him
to look out “the window” , Donnelly glanced
out the porthole and realised the
vessel was underway. He and some crewmen
went to the captain and asked him to turn the ship around and make a kissing approach to the wharf so that Donnelly could jump off.
The captain refused
. Donnelly, the captain said, had
caused the company a lot of trouble in the past
and , as far as the skipper was concerned , the first landfall would
be Broome in Western Australia. Furthermore , he told Donnelly to get below and
come on deck next morning with a
brush and a pot of paint to cover up rust . A heated
exchange ensued and finally the captain reluctantly returned to Stokes Hill Wharf
where Donnelly slipped ashore -
right in front of reporter Jim
Kelly who had been tipped off about Donnelly having been
shanghaied. A story appeared in
the newspaper under the heading THE
RETURN OF THE NOT SO VIGILANT VIGILANCE OFFICER .
Donnelly worked long hours looking after the welfare of watersiders , often neglecting his own social life, and was apt to quote Thomas Jefferson, Abe Lincoln and the Declaration of Human Rights . Like Bowditch , he had met and been impressed by the oratory of Jack Hughes of the NSW Federated Clerks’ Union. NEXT: Bowditch and the bombs.
