From Strength to Strength Read online

  Other titles by Sara Henderson

  From Strength to Strength (audio tape)

  The Strength in Us All

  Outback Wisdom

  Some of My Friends Have Tails

  A Year at Bullo

  The Strength of Our Dreams

  PAN MACMILLAN

  First published in hardback in 1992 by Pan Macmillan Publishers Australia

  First published in Sun 1993 by Pan Macmillan Publishers Australia

  This Sun edition published 1994 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited

  1 Market Street, Sydney

  Reprinted 1993 (six times), 1994 (four times), 1995 (five times), 1996 (twice), 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2005

  Copyright © Sara Henderson 1992

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

  National Library of Australia

  cataloguing-in-publication data:

  Henderson, Sara, 1936–

  From strength to strength.

  ISBN 0 7251 0725 1.

  1. Henderson, Sara, 1936– . 2. Women in business—Australia—Biography. 3. Women ranchers—Australia—Biography. I. Title.

  636.0092

  Typeset in Bemer Sabon by Midland Typesetters

  Printed in Australia by McPherson’s Printing Group

  These electronic editions published in 2007 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd

  1 Market Street, Sydney 2000

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  From Strength to Strength

  Sara Henderson

  Adobe eReader format 978-1-74197-181-1

  Microsoft Reader format 978-1-74197-382-2

  Mobipocket format 978-1-74197-583-3

  Online format 978-1-74197-784-4

  Epub format 978-1-74262-390-0

  Macmillan Digital Australia www.macmillandigital.com.au

  Visit www.panmacmillan.com.au to read more about all our books and to buy both print and ebooks online. You will also find features, author interviews and news of any author events.

  This book is dedicated to Charlie—who created the dream Marlee—who is making the dream reality and Uncle Dick—whose loyalty, love and just plain hard work are making it possible.

  Create a dream

  and give it everything you have,

  you could be surprised just how

  much you are capable of achieving.

  If you don’t have a dream . . .

  borrow one!

  Any, which way . . .

  You must have a dream.

  CONTENTS

  Acknowledgements

  Preface

  CHAPTER 1 1936–1954

  CHAPTER 2 1955–1959

  CHAPTER 3 1959–1960

  CHAPTER 4 1960

  CHAPTER 5 1960

  CHAPTER 6 1960–1962

  CHAPTER 7 1962–1965

  CHAPTER 8 1965–1966

  CHAPTER 9 1966

  CHAPTER 10 1966

  CHAPTER 11 1966–1971

  CHAPTER 12 1971–1974

  CHAPTER 13 1974

  CHAPTER 14 1975–1980

  CHAPTER 15 1980–1981

  CHAPTER 16 Uncle Dick

  CHAPTER 17 1981–1986

  CHAPTER 18 1986

  CHAPTER 19 1986

  CHAPTER 20 1986–1987

  CHAPTER 21 1987

  CHAPTER 22 1987–1988

  CHAPTER 23 1988

  CHAPTER 24 1988–1990

  CHAPTER 25 1990

  CHAPTER 26 1990

  CHAPTER 27 1990–1991

  Epilogue

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I started to write this in the usual manner, but after too many pages of names and more names, I realised I was just wasting paper. Each name held a story, each person had had an effect on my life; so much so, that a name was not enough. Each person I thought of had in some way altered the path of my life or helped me along that path—family, friend, stranger, business associate, adversary and just plain straight-out enemy.

  If I were writing about a part of, or even an event in, my life then a few pages of names would be acceptable, but to list names of all the people in my life to date?—forget it.

  Of course, special people stand out and always will. My wonderful Mum and Dad, so sadly missed; my sister Sue and her husband Ralph, who helped me keep sane—or almost—with regular holidays during those trying, first years (about twenty) on Bullo. My wonderful daughters—Danielle, so young, yet in times of great tragedy, so wise and strong; Marlee, words are not adequate for my love and admiration for this five-foot-two dynamo. Special, special friends, always there in time of need. Complete strangers, from all over the world, whose concern, good wishes and words of encouragement came to us in letters and phone calls. I thank you all.

  I even thank my enemy. Having you around makes it blatantly clear that achievement and happiness, like freedom, cannot be taken for granted and must be defended and protected, so you keep me on my toes.

  I thank all the people at Pan Macmillan for their patience in dealing with this first-time author, and for Sarah Overton for presenting my story in such a first-class manner.

  And I thank Charlie who was to me all these things—family, friend, stranger, business associate, enemy, lover—plus a few thousand more, as well as teacher of some of life’s greatest lessons.

  Finally, I thank God for this life.

  PREFACE

  Well here it is, as much of my life to date as I can put down on paper and share with you.

  When I wrote my draft and read it through, I thought to myself critically, well, I feel it is interesting, it is a good story, but that’s what it was, a good story, not my whole life. True, I had written about my life, but I had detoured around the cruel, heartbreaking and embarrassing parts.

  I worried over this for a fair time. I realised that in the book, Charles, who, let’s face it, was the centre of my universe for twenty-six years, had ended up a ‘goodie goodie two shoes’. In my heart of hearts I knew that this was not so. I had subconsciously recorded all my good memories and left out all the bad. I struggled with this, arguing that it was alright because most of the people who would read the book would not know me or Charles, so what did it matter? On the other hand, what of the people who did know us, together and separately? What about all the affairs he had had which I didn’t know about, but other people knew about? What about the friends and employees who knew of the endless arguments, misery, money problems, family problems and so on? Why had I presented this one-sided view of my life? Only the clean and pressed linen.

  I answered myself that at this time, 1991, people don’t want to read about doom and gloom and misery. Indeed, the recognition I have received, due to the businesswoman of the year award, is the reason my life is being recorded. People like the story of an Aussie battler, struggling against all odds and surviving. So why not stay with this theme and leave out all the miserable, heartbreaking trimmings?

  A trip to Darwin when I was around page 220 changed my mind.

  I was in a taxi driving from Darwin airport to town when the lady driver said, ‘You Mrs Henderson, aren’t you?’

 
; ‘Yes, I am.’

  ‘I see your picture in papers, you have a hard life but you fight hard and you win. You writing a book now, congratulations.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I knew your husband.’

  It was one of my cynical days so I said, ‘Who didn’t?’

  She told me her life story, also a hard life. She had come to Australia from the Middle East as a young girl, to an arranged marriage, and worked very hard all her life. I couldn’t help thinking her life would also make a good book, as so many other people’s lives would. She was now divorced.

  ‘I was Sammy’s wife, you know Sammy?’

  ‘Oh yes, I remember Sammy.’

  When she finished I knew a lot more about Sammy. Then she moved onto Charlie. She spoke very fast, rapid fire. I was listening and not listening, if you know what I mean, when she brought me back to the past with a jolt.

  ‘That husband of yours, don’t forget to write what a bastard he was! I really hate him.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Sure I hate him.’ I think the expression ‘I hate him’ was supposed to be ‘I do not like him’, just a difficulty with the English language. But then again, maybe not.

  Sometimes Charles was rude and sometimes abrupt, but he was always in such a hurry that his manner appeared rude. I tried to convey this to her, but she would not be swayed.

  ‘I take no notice of that, I hate him because what he do to you! When I first meet him, I know nothing of you, he come to town and say “You get me girl.” I say to my husband, “What wrong with this man, why not he get married always wanting girls?” I tell your husband “You go find your own girls” then I meet your children, beautiful children, beautiful, beautiful. I say to my husband, “This man have beautiful children, where his wife, she dead or something?” He say you on station.’

  Her eyes shot to the rear vision mirror, I was only allowed to nod.

  ‘Right, I say to him, “The children are beautiful, so wife must be beautiful, why he always wanting girls when he have beautiful children, beautiful hardworking wife who always stay home and work? What wrong with this man?” So then I say to my husband, you’—her eyes shot to the mirror again to indicate ‘you’ meant me—‘must be very ugly and children look like him, because even though I hate him, he all right to look at, eh?’ Eyes to the mirror for confirmation. I nodded. ‘Yes, so I say to my husband, “That’s it, wife must be very ugly.” Still this not good thing, so I still hate him, and when he say, “You get girls” I say to him “You not talk to me that way because I do not like.” So after long time he stop talking to me that way, he just ask for my husband to meet him at airport, not me. Then long time after, my husband say I pick up Mrs Henderson at airport. I meet you and I am very mad.’ My eyes were on the mirror waiting. ‘Not at you, I mad at your husband.’ I nod and her eyes go back to the road. ‘I say to my husband, “What the matter with that man, he have young beautiful wife, too young for him. She beautiful lady with brains and he chase silly girls with empty heads.” I hate him! Eight dollars fifty please.’

  The brakes brought us to a sudden halt outside the hotel and she was out of the car with bags on the kerb before I could collect myself. She pumped my hand with four or five sharp jerks and said, ‘You still beautiful lady and I was right, you have brains. Good luck.’

  Then she was in the car and gone. The whole story was told non-stop, without even pause for breath.

  What she said was all true and I had heard the same from many other sources, but this time it was put in such a quaint way. She was a delightful person and it was in no way meant to be hurtful. She was stating the facts and I suppose she decided if I had the brains she spoke of, I should know the truth now, even if I hadn’t known it then. And she wanted to make it clear that she had in no way helped him in his nefarious dealings!

  This exchange, coming at a time when I was wrestling with the problem of what to write down and what not to write, made me realise that there were many people out there who knew this side of Charles, and that to ignore it would be to leave out a lot of my life. An encounter on my subsequent flight to Kununurra was the deciding factor.

  The man seated next to me was dozing when I sat down. The air hostess roused him for a snack. He smiled at me and started talking. He looked American and when he spoke, it was confirmed.

  ‘Live in Kununurra?’

  ‘Not really, I live on a cattle station outside Kununurra.’

  He had the usual fascination with cattle stations that many people have and asked more questions.

  ‘What station?’

  ‘Bullo River.’

  ‘Bullo River, eh?’ I knew by the way he said it that he knew Charlie. ‘I used to know the guy who owned Bullo, Charlie Henderson.’

  He went on to tell me the story. Charles was his commanding officer on the U.S.S. Enterprise during the Second World War. ‘Boy, did that guy hate me.’ He didn’t have the problem with ‘hate’ and ‘not like’ that my lady taxi driver may have had.

  He never explained why Charles ‘hated’ him, he just said it caused him endless trouble. Knowing Charlie, I would say that the man would have been too goodlooking and a hit with the girls, and Charlie always had to be top dog. But that’s only my guess, it could have been something completely different. He spent the first half of the flight telling me what a rotter Charles was and then he asked:

  ‘Did you know him?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ I said with a smile.

  ‘Have you been on Bullo a while?’

  ‘I suppose you could say that.’

  ‘How did you come to be connected with him?’

  ‘I married him.’ The poor man nearly knocked over his dinner tray.

  ‘Oh, I am sorry. I mean . . . what I mean . . .’

  ‘It’s alright, I know what you mean.’

  ‘Please accept . . .’ He went on and on for the rest of the flight apologising.

  I told him that he was not exaggerating and that Charles really was as he had said. ‘I was married to him for twenty-six years and you are trying to tell me what he was like?’

  He stopped when I said this and realised that he really didn’t have to convince me. He introduced himself and I said I knew who he was. There weren’t many Americans who had lived in Darwin for twenty years, only himself and Gus.

  ‘And you are definitely not Gus,’ I said.

  ‘I can’t believe I’ve been in Darwin all these years and never met you; it really is amazing. I saw Charlie plenty of times at parties . . .’

  He was going to say more but lapsed into silence. The plane landed at Kununurra and he said goodbye and that he hoped we would meet again.

  These two encounters in just a few days convinced me I had to put more of Charles down on paper. So I came home and put in fifty pages of inserts. I thought that was not too bad, only about twenty-five per cent gloom and doom.

  Of course I couldn’t possibly put down all my life with Charles as it would fill many books and would also be, to a large extent, very ‘everyday’. So, I have stayed with the fast-moving parts.

  Then there are parts of my life that are impossible to put down on paper. The hurt is too deep and I cannot dig it out—it has taken too much time and heartbreak to bury it. In some cases only the other party and I know the story and that is the way it must stay. Other parts are so dark and dreadful that innocent family members would have to suffer the disgrace of other family members’ actions.

  Other situations in my life, I would willingly write down, just to show the undesirable qualities of some humans, but the ink would not be dry before I was sued, so those secrets too will have to stay locked away. I am a great believer in my friend upstairs who said, ‘Revenge is mine’, so I will leave it up to Him although it is very hard to get that cheek turned, waiting for Him to get His act together. But, there is also the very true saying, ‘Give them enough rope and they will hang themselves.’ So I am busy plaiting rope!

  CHAPTER 1

  1936-
1954

  And the winner is . . . The lights in the Regent Ballroom dimmed and a giant screen flashed scenes of my present life. As the vast expanses of the Outback invaded the room and wove their usual magic, enthralling everyone present, my mind raced back through the years.

  And the winner is . . . I remember how nervous I was through the tournament. As I won each round the nerves increased. By the quarter-finals my mother was giving me a vile-tasting nerve calmer and more advice than a twelve-year-old could absorb.

  I moved into the semifinals. We played three very long very close sets. There were many times when I was within a point of defeat but I fought hard and finally it was over, the final stroke mine. Even though my backhand failed me miserably, I had won. The one day between the semifinals and finals I spent on the tennis court coaxing my backhand to perform in a reasonable manner.

  The big day arrived, my first singles final in a major tournament. More vile-tasting nerve calmer and prayers my backhand would behave.

  The thrill of being a winner defies any description. The surge of adrenalin on that final stroke is very hard to put into words, even now. The cup was about twelve inches tall, all shiny with two enormous garish curved handles, but to a twelve-year-old it looked the best in the world.

  I was born in the Cooinda Private Hospital in Mosman on the 15th of September, 1936. Years later, I asked Mum if she remembered the time.

  ‘Well I was playing bridge and I remember I had to excuse myself before the hand was finished.’

  So it could have been at the end of the 15th before midnight or the beginning of the 15th just after midnight.

  I arrived before the doctor. Mum just made it to the hospital in time. Fortunately she was only streets away, as it was only thirty-five minutes from the first pain to my birth.

  At that time, Dad had the Union Hotel on the Pacific Highway, North Sydney.