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including Francis James, who was then editor of a controversial church newspaper based in Sydney. The creation
of the new Diocese of the Northern Territory was clinched when the Australian Board of Missions agreed to its
funding provided that the parishes contributed as they could. On the 24 February 1968, at St John’s Cathedral
Brisbane, Ken Mason was consecrated Bishop by the Most Reverend Phillip Strong, Archbishop of Brisbane and
Primate of Australia. Ken was enthroned at the old Christ Church Cathedral in Darwin on 1 March 1968.
Parishioners of the Cathedral recalled Ken’s encouragement of social and cultural activities although he himself
denied having been much involved; he felt himself able to ‘empathise with Franciscan larrikinism, mobility and
openness’, wanting to ‘provide a role for Christians to be themselves and to accept people who are sacramentally
Christians from many backgrounds’.
Ken’s tenure as Bishop was interrupted by Cyclone Tracy, which all but destroyed the old Christ Church
building, only the porch being salvaged. The collapse of the roof and walls destroyed most of the furnishings,
and many of the damaged robes and items of furniture were consigned to some of the old wells that dotted the
church property. At the first Eucharist after Cyclone Tracy glassware from Tuminellos wine bar was used as altar
vessels; the wine bar also provided a ‘throne’ for the Archbishop of Canterbury during the consecration of the new
Cathedral in 1977.
Highlights of Bishop Ken’s incumbency were the ordination of the first Aboriginal Priest in the Diocese,
Michael Gumbuli Wurramara, and his involvement as Chairman of the Council of the Darwin Community College,
Nungalinya College Council and the Young Men’s Christian Association.
On the 7 July 1983, Bishop Ken resigned the See of the Northern Territory to take up the position of Chairman
of the Australian Board of Missions (ABM) to which he had been elected in May of that year. In this capacity and
as a member of the Anglican Communion Ken was involved in many committees, conferences and commissions
such as Treasurer of ABM, Convenor of the 1986 Anglican Missionary Conference in Brisbane and member of the
Standing Committee, Missionary and Ecumenical Commission, and International Affairs Commission—all of the
General Synod of the Anglican Church of Australia.
On leaving the Brotherhood of the Good Shepherd in 1964 Ken joined the Oratory of the Good Shepherd, which
was a small, worldwide religious congregation, living by common rule but not in a community—from 1981–1987
he was the Superior of the Oratory. He was also a member of the Society of St Francis; from 1981–1993, he was
the Protector of the Society’s Australia and New Zealand Province and from 1991–1993 Protector General of the
Society worldwide.
Bishop Ken received the Queen’s Silver Jubilee Medal in 1977 (‘it just arrived in the post one day’), was made
a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 1984, and was a Chaplain of the Order of St John of Jerusalem. Bishop
Ken’s last official act was the consecration of the Bishop of Dogura, Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea in
1992 after which he retired to live in Sydney.
Anglican Church of Australia, Diocese of the Northern Territory, records; Parishioners of the Diocese; personal information; P Spillett,
interview, 1994.
MICHAEL EVANS, Vol 3.
MASSON (MALINOWSKI), ELSIE ROSALINE (1891–1935), was born in Melbourne, Victoria, to a
distinguished academic family in 1891. She was the daughter of Sir David Orme Masson, Professor of Chemistry
at the University of Melbourne, and his wife Mary, daughter of Professor Sir John Struthers. The newly married
David and Mary Masson arrived in Australia from Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1886. The family was cultured and
urbane. Professor Sir Baldwin Spencer was a close family friend, who probably influenced Elsie’s decision to
travel to the Northern Territory.
She came to the Northern Territory to take up work as governess to the children of the first Commonwealth
Administrator, Dr J A Gilruth, in 1913. She was also companion to Mrs Gilruth in a period where there were
relatively few European women in the Northern Territory. Masson is probably best known in the Territory for
her book An Untamed Territory: the Northern Territory of Australia, which was written from articles she had
published in various Australasian newspapers. The book is a lively account of Masson’s experiences, although
didactic rather than autobiographical. The book covers material from Darwin to Pine Creek, the Daly River, the
Alligator Rivers region and the Roper and includes information on the economy, industries and geography of the
region and peoples. Historian Barbara James noted that the book, ‘though presented from an elitist vantage point,
provide[s] excellent first-hand account of early Territory lifestyle’.
Masson described the Aboriginal people she encountered at various locations and communities in the Territory.
She was critical of the mission system and although patronising, recognised the role Aboriginal people played
in opening up the Northern Territory. ‘When in the future the picture is painted of the pioneers—the stalwart,
strenuous man and woman pressing on through primeval bush—let there also be depicted marching briskly in their
shadow the aboriginal black-boy and his lubra’.
Spencer’s biographers, D J Mulvaney and J H Calaby, have noted that both Spencer and Masson, writing across
a variety of subjects but particularly Aboriginal welfare, took a ‘kindred approach’. Masson complemented the
picture of the Northern Territory that had been constructed by Harriet Daly and Jeannie Gunn in presenting the
region from a female perspective. She noted that although a man travels north to, ‘The prospect of better work,
or the fascination of life in a more primitive community... The wife, on the other hand, goes because he goes,
and not because the life appeals’. Masson also pointed out the role that European women played in socialising
Aborigines into European society through the training of domestic servants. Europeans who forged good working
relationships with Aborigines impressed her: Paddy Cahill and Joe Cooper are both mentioned favourably.