Thirteen branches now care for this vast area. Before World War II it was served by the Australian branch office, which used the Society’s sloop, Lightbearer, and real “pioneers” to penetrate these territories.

DEPRESSION YEARS

By the 1930’s the good news was being proclaimed in Australia by 66 pioneers and some 400 publishers, and the seeds sown from the early 1900’s were sprouting into congregations.

PIONEERS ADD THEIR VOICES

In spite of the many financial difficulties of the depression years, the pioneer work thrived. Joining forces, many pioneers formed group homes, using them as bases from which to preach in the cities. This made living easier, and brothers frequently contributed food parcels. As Ted Sewell relates, a bag of wheat and a grinder were the pioneers’ mainstay as far as food was concerned.

Pioneers assigned to large cities used real ingenuity to help ‘people of all sorts’ to hear the good news. One pioneer group in Sydney made special efforts to contact everyone at the city fruit and vegetable markets, which were open around the clock. Periods of 24-hour witnessing (nonstop) were organized each Friday for several weeks. A car group was assigned for about three or four hours; then these returned home, and another group took over for the next four hours or so. The pioneers equipped themselves with Italian booklets, for the gardeners and growers were mainly Italian speaking. Some of the Italian families in the truth today learned it in the middle of the night as a result of that pioneer work.

Faithful and tenacious though they were, some of the Australian country-pioneer groups looked rough and ready! Some groups had a large old car or trailer with sound equipment mounted on top, and usually a tent. Each member rode a bicycle loaded with books. Some would spend two or three days away from the camp, calling at homes in one direction while other members would do the same in other directions. All would return to the camp at a given time so as to move on to another site.

Literature was left at a low rate or traded for produce. On many occasions the pioneers returned to their central camp at night to find that one would have some potatoes, another a pumpkin, another eggs, meat, and so forth. This was regarded as even better than money, as it could be eaten. With sufficient clothing, food and shelter the pioneers were content and could continue the witness work.

Sister Fry progressed rapidly in the truth, and, in 1932, while still in her late teens, she became a pioneer. She has continued in this service until now and since her marriage to William Moss has enjoyed serving also in Western Samoa.

At the age of 19 Arthur Willis began pioneering around Perth, and in 1932 he made trips to the southwest of Western Australia on a motorcycle. Two partners, Charles Harris and George Rollston, joined him the following year. They began a trip through the northwest of the state to Darwin, capital city of the Northern Territory, and thence across Queensland. At this time there were no congregations in all this area, a distance of more than two thousand miles (3,200 km). This trip took the brothers four months to complete, and it was the first time some of these areas had heard the good news. Brother Willis later settled in Pingelly, Western Australia, where the congregation he helped to form was made up mainly of aboriginal Australians.

WITNESSING IN VAST TERRITORIES

A hardy pioneer, Aubrey Baxter, explains how he preached in territory that covered thousands of square miles in central and northern Queensland in the days when phonographs were used:

“We packed our phonographs in sponge rubber and strapped the pickup arm down so it wouldn’t be broken on the rough, jarring roads. We witnessed in some interesting places. I spent one night with a kangaroo hunter, sleeping on the dirt floor of his little hut surrounded by hundreds of odorous kangaroo hides. Trying to sleep with packs of howling dingoes [native wild dogs] outside was not easy either.”

While visiting the congregations in this area, Brother Baxter, on one trip, found the roads cut off by heavy flooding. A local man to whom he spoke expressed concern for a van that had gone through some days before, as the creeks were flooded and the water was as high as the treetops in some places. Realizing that this was the van belonging to a group of pioneers, Brother Baxter was worried. He followed them and, when stopped by flooded creeks, swam across and walked on. Eventually he found the stranded group, who had nothing left for food but some white flour. He and the other brothers swam back across the creeks, found some food and then ferried this across to the sisters in a tub.

This pioneer group was made up of Percy and Ilma Iszlaub, who later became missionaries in Japan and are now in the Watch Tower branch there, and Norman Bellotti, who is now a missionary in Papua New Guinea along with his wife, Gladys. Also in the group was Beatrice Bellotti, who later married Aubrey Baxter. As in other areas where hardworking, intrepid pioneers had been, this early pioneer work bore much fruit, and congregations of Jehovah’s people grew up in many of the towns and cities in Queensland.

IN REMOTE AREAS

As early as 1929, Clem Deschamp and his partner, Viv Pusey, preached to the whole of the state of South Australia within a radius of 60 miles (100 km) of Adelaide. This seeding work paved the way for congregations and isolated groups in later years.

In 1932 Len Linke stepped into the pioneer service as a result of a fiery talk on the subject of pioneering by regional service director Bert Horton. With Ronald Payne, William Torrington and Stuart Keltie, he pioneered throughout South Australia during 1933. Later that year Brothers Torrington and Keltie made a trip to Alice Springs in the heart of Australia. On the way they met a hotelkeeper at William Creek, some six hundred miles (1,000 km) north of Adelaide. It was from this initial contact that he learned the truth. This man, Charles Bernhardt, still remembers the sound of Brother Keltie’s wooden leg thumping on the floor of the hotel as he was busy in the cellar below.

At the age of 72, Brother Bernhardt bought a rugged vehicle for use in the outback and then for 15 years pioneered some of the most remote areas of the country on his own. Before selling his store and hotel at William Creek, he set a fine example of putting Kingdom interests first, no matter what the circumstances.

Donald MacLean, serving as circuit overseer, tells of his first visit with Brother Bernhardt:

“Arriving at William Creek, I found that the train stopped for a considerable time while the men rushed to get to Bernhardt’s Bar for a supply of cold beer. On entering the bar I was delighted to find it theocratically decorated. A large sign on one wall invited the men to ‘read The Watchtower, announcing Jehovah’s Kingdom, the hope of the world.’ A second sign invited them to read Awake! and keep awake to world events. Piles of magazines, booklets and bound volumes covered the bar counter itself.

“When everyone had finally been served and satisfied, Brother Bernhardt called for their attention. ‘Gentlemen, may I have your attention, please? I invite you to have copies of the finest magazines on earth today.’ Following his respectful, bold witness, each of the thirsty men contributed for copies of the magazines, threw a sack of beer over his shoulder and returned to the train. It was outstanding that out of respect for Brother Bernhardt’s Christian reputation there was no profanity or foul speech in the bar.”

Now almost ninety years of age, Brother Bernhardt is not able to make his trips into the remote outback areas anymore, but he still preaches the good news from his house in Adelaide.

PIONEERING IN THE OUTBACK

Outback pioneer Joe Bell learned the truth from a pioneer who was working country areas on a cycle. Within days of that first contact, he was witnessing himself. He visited homesteads 300 miles (480 km) northwest of Brisbane, Queensland, and tells of some of the hazards of travel in those days:

“I had to carry my cycle in many places because I ran into continuous banks of sand where there was practically no roadway. Some of these journeys were very perilous. Traveling through open country, the only living creatures to be seen were roving mobs [herds] of bullocks, and they could be dangerous as they are very curious. So it was necessary at times to take refuge in a tree and wait until the bullocks grazed away, allowing me to continue my journey.”

In one particularly isolated area, an owner of a cattle station (ranch) lent Brother Bell a horse to ride the 25 miles (40 km) to the next property, for, as he said, “You’ll never get there on a bicycle!” On Bell’s arrival at this next property, the owner, Jack Carey, was out mustering cattle. His wife said she would pass on to her husband the book and catalog that Brother Bell left with her. Many years later, at a convention in Sydney, this same Jack Carey sought out Joe Bell to say that he had learned the truth from the book left for him. He had written to the branch for more information and was now a dedicated brother!

A PIONEER AMONG PIONEERS

Noted for his determination and persistence to “get the message through” in the outback was Ben Brickell. For decades he plied the remote areas of the country as an isolated pioneer. Brother Brickell had come from New Zealand in 1932 and became another of the faithful band of rugged pioneers of those early days. He continued on in the full-time ministry right up until his death in 1974.

The following is typical of the colorful life and experiences that Brother Brickell enjoyed to the full:

“In early August 1932, I left Townsville, Queensland, on an 800-mile (1,300-km) journey to Normanton on the Gulf of Carpentaria. Loading my bicycle with 60 bound books, some booklets and magazines, a change of clothing, a roll of two blankets, some foodstuffs and a small water bag, I set out on the first stage of my journey over Mount Fox on the Great Dividing Range. The one-mile (1.6-km) climb over Mount Fox, on a track of one-in-three gradient, took me nine hours of arduous toil as I propelled my heavily loaded bicycle with my right hand and my left shoulder behind the load. Then down the steep track on the other side the next day, after witnessing to the small settlement on the mountaintop and receiving a night’s hospitality at one of the homes there.”

Many aboriginal Australians were contacted by Brother Brickell over the years. “After my giving a talk to one gathering,” he related, “the entire audience came forward to thank me warmly for the truths I had told them from the Bible. On another occasion, 50 aborigines came to hear a talk within a few minutes of my arrival, although the camp was in complete darkness.”

LONG DAYS IN SERVICE

Even for those who could afford a motor vehicle in those days, pioneering in the rugged Australian countryside was not an easy task. Alan Holtorf, a member of the Bethel family for a number of years, commented on using his car in Kingdom service:

“The fuel tank was under the front seat, so the seat had to be removed to refuel. Tires were of poor quality and punctures were frequent. Often it was necessary to patch tubes on the roadside, then wait for the patch to dry before putting the tube back in the tire. On steep hills it was sometimes necessary to turn the car around and back up, otherwise the gravity-fed fuel would not flow from the gas tank to the engine. To spend a day preaching, it often involved leaving home at about four o’clock in the morning, arriving at the town about eight o’clock, spending a full day witnessing in the town and then traveling home after dark.”

Life in the rugged outback country is not generally considered suitable for women. But Netta Pusey, for more than fifty years a pioneer servant of Jehovah, endured such demanding conditions, playing the phonograph to farmers and sheepshearers in woolsheds. She often found it necessary to wade a river, carrying her heavy phonograph and book bag, too. Netta’s sister Gladys, devoted wife and mother in the Mouritz family, reared her seven children while keeping active with her one-armed husband, among the hills of Bowral, New South Wales. It was fine to see the entire family out in service, packed into an ancient-vintage open automobile. Today, son Viv Mouritz serves as coordinator in the Australian branch. The other sons are all active in congregations in Australia’s largest city, Sydney, and one of them, Douglas, serves as city overseer.

AMID DROUGHTS​—AND RAINS

A group of pioneers set out from Sydney, loaded with 31 cartons of literature. They headed for a sparsely settled area where landholdings were each about a quarter of a million acres. That summer was very hot and dry, and the group reported they went for six weeks without finding enough water to have a bath! Then, when the rains finally came, the roads were impassable. The group were stranded in one spot for a week. When eventually they got moving, it took eight days to travel 38 miles (61 km)!

Pioneer Robert Bell tells of cycling fifty to sixty miles (80 to 96 km) in a day and making just five or six calls. He says that dogs and snakes were the worst hazards on the bicycle. At seven o’clock one bitterly cold morning he rode to his first call. The mud was still frozen hard, and it took two hours to ride from the mailbox to the homestead. In these regions it is not uncommon for the homestead to be up to twenty miles (32 km) from the mailbox. After a favorable response at the homestead, Brother Bell then ventured back to the road, to find that by this time the sun had softened the mud, making it impossible to ride the bicycle. This made it necessary to carry it and its load of literature on his shoulders and stop every few steps to scrape the mud from his boots, because they became too heavy to lift. He reached the road five hours after he had left it and had made only one call.