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May turned to the hotel trade and was the first to win the lease for Darwin’s Victoria Hotel in 1921 after the
end of the Gilruth initiated state control of Top End hotels. She soon gained a reputation for using pugilistic skills
taught her by her first husband to rid herself of unruly or unwanted hotel patrons.
May’s own lifestyle at the time was lavish, her nature generous. Vanda Marshall said in her book We Helped to
Blaze the Track: ‘She spent her money recklessly and gave it away liberally. As a weekend special she sometimes
tossed a handful of sovereigns in the air, and scattered bank notes on the wind. Let catch as catch can, as men
scuffed and scrambled in the dirt for the gold, and chased bank notes down the windy street.’
When May wasn’t giving money away, she was quite frequently gambling it away, be it at the Melbourne Cup
or Monte Carlo or at the local Darwin and Pine Creek races.
May’s taste in fashion at this time matched her financial extravagance and featured such flamboyant costumes
as ostrich feather boas, handmade lace gowns and diamond studded shoes as well as an elaborate jewellery
collection. Even her Darwin home, purchased and lavishly fitted out in 1920, was appropriately referred to as
‘The Mansion’.
May was also a persistent political lobbyist. Her strongly worded telegrams and letters, often signed
‘Mrs Wolfram Brown’, were reputed to have influenced political and bureaucratic decision-making more than
once.
After her third husband died from malaria while droving cattle on the Birdsville Track in 1926, May bought
the Pine Creek hotel and managed it from 1928 to 1930. From 1930 to 1932 she operated a cafe/boarding house in
Darwin. By then May had also succumbed to regular drinking bouts and would periodically retreat to the privacy
of her home for a ‘binge’.
The year 1932 was one of personal tragedy for May. Her mother, her brother Percy, who had returned to Sydney
after the First World War, and her adopted son, James Scale, all died during the course of the year. Despite these
losses, May continued to show the adventuresome spirit for which she had become renowned and late in 1932 took
a party of five to the latest gold rush on the Tanami. She returned with strong warnings about the false stories being
spread in the press regarding the potential of the field.
By 1934 May’s lifestyle and circumstances began to take their toll and in February she was forced to forfeit
both her Wolfram Hill and Crest of the Wave mines, for ‘non-payment of rent’.
Although she still continued to take a prominent role in the community, and spoke out whenever she felt
injustice had been done, her health began to fail and sometime during the next three years she went to Sydney to
seek medical help. There she died, on 23 July 1939, a virtual pauper. She is buried in Rookwood cemetery with
her first husband, George Scale.
Whatever force motivated and drove her in life, there can be little doubt that May Brown, the Wolfram Queen,
made a significant impact on the financial, social and political life of the Territory.
V Marshall, We Helped to Blaze the Track, nd; Northern Territory Times, 30 July, 19 November 1909, April 1914; NT land titles and mineral
leases (various).
BARBARA JAMES, Vol 1.
BROWN, RONALD AGNEW (RON) (1916–1994), farmer, policeman and Air Force serviceman, was born at
Murwillumbah, New South Wales, on 10 May 1916, the youngest of four children of a north coast dairy farming
family. Educated at Murwillumbah high school and The Armidale School (TAS), his education was put on hold
at the age of 15, as his father wanted him to help on the farm during the Depression. However, he continued his
education to matriculation standard by correspondence and studied animal husbandry through Sydney Technical
College. Fractionally shy of six feet tall (183 centimetres), he was a keen sportsman having taught boxing and
wrestling as well as excelling in running and swimming, and he was an efficient horseman.
Uninterested in farming owing to a lack of prospects at the time because of the Depression, Brown responded
to a newspaper advertisement recruiting for the Queensland, Northern Territory and Commonwealth Police Forces.
Although he was initially successful with the Commonwealth Police Force, he accepted a later offer from the
Northern Territory mainly because the latter involved an aeroplane trip from Brisbane to Darwin and he had never
flown before.
Sworn in as a Constable in the Northern Territory Police Force in Darwin on 13 October 1939, he found the town
to be a rough and ready place although he soon settled into his new role. After a brawl in the Don Hotel—‘the old
bloodhouse’—when one of his colleagues was almost strangled with the necktie the police were forced to wear at
the time, Brown purchased half a dozen ties and converted them to clip-on neckties by means of a press-stud at the
back. These ties were often in demand whenever the police were called to quell a brawl. Being new to the then very
small community in Darwin, he was sent undercover to gather evidence in an illegal gambling house and once won
20 Pounds while on active duty. Advised by his Inspector to keep the proceeds, Brown felt ill at ease with what he
saw as ‘filthy’ money so he promptly donated it to charity.
In Darwin during the first Japanese air raids in 1942, Brown tried to enlist for active service on four occasions
but was precluded from doing so as the police force fell into the category of reserved occupations. However, later
that year following a curtailment in the civil administration of the Northern Territory that enabled the police force
to function with a reduction in numbers, Brown was released and joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF).
Married on Boxing Day 1942 in Melbourne to Mona (following her proposal), a schoolteacher friend of one
of his sisters, he resumed his police duties with the relocated Northern Territory Administration in Alice Springs
in August 1943. By this stage the Administration was again short of police officers and had secured his discharge