Digger Harman, an Antipodean McGonagall
Has William McGonagall met his match?
Has William McGonagall met his match?
A year or two ago I was privileged to receive a remarkable book from the library of a friend who had passed away. It is a hefty bound volume, containing a logbook of the travels of a 19th century English seafarer named Robert Huddle. The book contains an introductory essay, day-by-day accounts of many of his voyages and experiences, and a concluding essay. The book is handwritten in ink, and its pages are interspersed with delightful watercolour paintings depicting some of the ships on which Mr Huddle worked and scenes he observed during his travels. I…
THE only unsolved aviation mystery in Australia since World War 2, the crash of Cessna 210 Mike Delta X-ray on August 9, 1981, has attracted hordes of searchers and spawned a myriad strange conspiracy stories. In 2005 I joined one of the annual searches for the missing plane, stumbling around the steep gullies and ridges of the Barrington Tops with a group of volunteers and returning wearied but none the wiser. I joined the search because I wanted to write about the crash for The Newcastle Herald, and thought visiting the area where the plane was…