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On return to Darwin, those women and children who were in a position to do so resumed residence with husbands
and families and Shankelton was left with about 30 of her original contingent. The mission house in Darwin had
been demolished during the war years to make room for landing aeroplanes and the group was located initially
in ex Army hospital buildings at Berrimah. Then, with the handing back by the Army of the Bagot Compound in
1946, the group was relocated by the Native Affairs Branch to a partitioned portion of the compound. The ex Army
Sidney Williams huts and houses were used as dormitories and the home was officially registered as the Retta Dixon
Home for Children on 17 December 1947, with Shankelton as its first Superintendent. Bagot Compound was re-
established as an Aboriginal settlement after the war and the Retta Dixon Home shared occupancy of the site until
December 1961, when construction of the new home, begun in December 1959, was completed. Paul Hasluck,
then Minister for Territories, officially opened the home on 30 July 1961. It was then accommodating more than
80 residents comprising male and female infants, adolescents and a few mothers. The new Retta Dixon Home for
Children operated in eight cottages on the cottage system and Shankelton remained its Superintendent until her
retirement from that position on 1 June 1962 at the age of 60. Mervyn Pattmore replaced her as Superintendent
and she remained on staff as Book Keeper and Liaison Officer until June 1967. In June 1964, she was created
Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE), an honour bestowed upon her for her services to the Northern
Territory.
Shankelton remained at the Retta Dixon Home in her retirement years with Marjorie Spohn, a retired missionary
colleague and friend. They resided in what had been called the ‘clinic’ until 1974 when damage caused to the
building by Cyclone Tracy forced the evacuation of its residents. Shankelton was evacuated from Darwin on
Boxing Day and spent the following six months with her sister Marjorie (Marje) in Sydney. She returned to Darwin
in mid 1975 and she and Marjorie Spohn set up residence in two caravans in the suburb of Rapid Creek and, after
repairs, in Number One Cottage on the Retta Dixon site. The children remaining at the Retta Dixon Home before
the cyclone and relocated in southern states after, then returned to Batchelor, a town some 100 kilometres from
Darwin. Spohn died in 1982 and Shankelton stayed on another two years. She finally said goodbye to Darwin
and to the Territory in 1984 to live in Sydney with her sister, Anne. Succumbing to illness, she spent the final six
years of her life at the Saint George Hospital in Sydney and then the Calvary Nursing Home in Kogarah, a Sydney
suburb, where she died on 15 June 1990 at the age of 88.
The Retta Dixon Home, for which Shankelton was largely responsible for founding and to which she contributed
22 years of her life, was officially closed in June 1980. Its closure was dictated by changing government policies
that favoured the fostering of children within private homes.
Shankelton saw many changes in government and social policy during her period as Superintendent of the Retta
Dixon Home: the change from the dormitory to the cottage system of care; from institutionalised care to private
care and the change in policy from the protection to the assimilation of Aboriginal people. As Superintendent of
the Home, Shankelton was responsible for fostering many sporting activities and the RDH Team, as it was known,
participated actively and successfully in basketball and boys from the home were enthusiastic members of local
football teams. Games and ‘picture’ evenings were routine and the participation of children from outside the Home
was encouraged. Shankelton was also responsible for commencing Sunday school activities and other church
activities at the Police Paddock, the Racecourse and Winnellie, then inhabited predominantly by Aboriginal people
awaiting resettlement following their return to Darwin after the war. In 1958, in association with Mrs J Johnson and
Rita Birkett, she commenced the Girls Life Brigade in which she held office until Cyclone Tracy. She established
school holiday camps for ‘home’ children at Coomalie Creek, 87 kilometres from Darwin, and at Casuarina Beach
and Lee Point, then both on the periphery of Darwin’s suburbs. Shankelton was called and is remembered as
‘Lailie’, a name that remained when a small child failed to articulate ‘Lady’, causing great amusement to those who
overheard the mispronunciation. Former inmates of the Retta Dixon Home remember her mostly with affection.
Variously described as a disciplinarian, as benevolent, strict, authoritarian and fair, with an acute sense of duty,
she was responsible for caring for a great number of Northern Territory Aboriginal, part Aboriginal and European
children and many of their mothers.
Sunday Territorian, 24 June 1990; The AIM, vol 14, no 6, 1980, vol 24, no 7, 1990; B Bartels, ‘Retta Dixon Children’s Home’, original
manuscript, nd; B Hansen, ‘Retta Dixon Home for Children’, Bachelor of Education Dissertation, Darwin Community College, 1982.
MARY DORLING, Vol 2.SHAW, MARTHA SARAH ELIZABETH, nee PATERSON, formerly FOGARTY (1895–1964), pioneer, was
born at Boothela Station, Warrego, Queensland, where her father was the manager, on 26 March 1895. Her parents,
both born on the Darling Downs, Queensland, were Catholics, as were their five children. Sarah was the second
born. Her education was limited, as her father was a brumby runner and the family was often on the move.
On 11 May 1914 at Normanton, Queensland, Sarah Paterson married coach driver Clifford Hunter Fogarty
(known to all as Ted). Fogarty was born at Jondaryan, Darling Downs, Queensland, in 1888 and married Sarah
according to the rites of the Catholic Church. They had a daughter and then a son whilst living at Cloncurry.
In May 1921, the family set out for the Northern Territory by horse and buggy, following all the government bores
along the way. Their journey ended at Katherine.
Fogarty obtained work and left to break in horses at Wave Hill Station to the south. Sarah and her two children
then departed by train from Emungalan to Darwin, to await the arrival of her third child. In July 1922, she returned
to Katherine with her two children and her new baby daughter.
On Fogarty’s return, the family then departed in the buggy for Delamere Station to the west, where Fogarty had
accepted the position of manager. It was there in August 1923 that Sarah gave birth to her youngest son with no
medical help and with aid only from the station Aborigines; her husband had departed for Victoria River Downs