Aussie author Ion Idriess drew yarns from everywhere

For the prolific, best-selling author Ion 'Jack' Idriess (1889-1979) indeed once seemed to have been everywhere before going on to pen an incredible 56 true-life books.

Idriess, a gold and tin prospector, drover, opal gouger, shearer, cane-cutter, outback explorer, buffalo shooter, boundary rider, crocodile hunter and even a hard-helmet pearl shell diver, had a fascinating, eventful life.

But to modern book readers, he's probably the most famous author they're never heard of, despite some of his books being reprinted an extraordinary 40, possibly 50, times.

For city readers, his books brought the nation's then largely unknown north and its islands into sharp focus, especially in the 1930s, promoting a number of Australian icons: from the Light Horse in World War 1, to a pioneering outback medico, to legendary prospector Lasseter and his 'lost' gold reef, to Sid Kidman, the outback's early cattle king.

Hands up those who can recall, or even have vaguely heard of, country singer Lucky Starr's annoyingly infectious 1962 novelty hit song I've Been Everywhere.

Well, maybe you should. Starr, like Idriess, popularised Australiana long before others.

Singer Starr's tune lists more than 90 Aussie towns from Boggabilla to Indooroopilly with a rapid-fire delivery and tongue-twisting lyrics.

Little wonder then that more than 130 versions eventually popped up around the globe with the tune performed by everyone from Johnny Cash to Willie Nelson. Local lyrics were substituted for markets in the US, New Zealand, the UK, Finland and Germany.

But the original tune is uniquely Australian, like Idriess.

It starts with a hitchhiker humpin' his bluey on the dusty Oodnadatta track, declaring he's crossed the desert sands, breathed the mountain air and "of travel I've had my share, man".

He's the bloke who says he's been everywhere, listing all the places along his journey, but strangely (at least in the tune's original version) not Newcastle and Lake Macquarie, while Kurri Kurri, Ettalong and Terrigal get a guernsey.

So, if singer Lucky Starr's wanderer didn't get around these woods, maybe real-life inveterate traveller Ion Idriess didn't either. Is that possible?

Well, while the Sydney-born Idriess strangely never seems to have written about the Hunter Valley and preferred wilder places, his wanderlust oddly seems to have been sparked from a trip into the Hunter Valley.

On again hearing Starr's novelty tune recently, I was reminded of a very old PIX magazine article I'd once seen (maybe at a street market) of similar 'everywhere man' Idriess and decided to investigate further.

Then I discovered ABC broadcaster, radio and TV documentary maker Tim 'Backchat' Bowden had written a unique book about 'forgotten' writer Idriess only three years ago. Its origin though dated back 45 years.

In 1975, Bowden tracked down author Idriess aged 86, living in Mona Vale, Sydney.

The aim was to create a radio documentary on the soft-spoken man's remarkable career. Idriess reminisced to the microphone for four hours but in a little, wheezing voice barely audible even to his interviewer Bowden.

Unfortunately, the ABC never broadcast the planned documentary and Idriess then died a few years later. But Bowden did archive the audio and the transcript.

This forgotten audio record then became Bowden's 2020 book The Last Interview. It gives a valuable insight into writer Ion Llewellyn Idriess OBE (for literature), who over 42 years became one of the country's best-loved authors.

He also contributed to the resurgence of Australian publishing with his fast-paced, colourful and unusual Aussie yarns.

The book also reveals the young, impressionable Idriess was originally sent by his grandmother from Sydney to find work on a paddle steamer on the run to Newcastle.

It was March 1908 when 'Jack' ran off to sea on the SS Newcastle plying between Sydney and Newcastle and up the Hunter River to Morpeth. Later that year he spent four months horse-breaking at Moree.

Idriess then worked in western NSW before heading into North Queensland seeking gold.

He soon travelled throughout Cape York Peninsula and spent months living with Aborigines observing their customs. He then mined around early Cairns and Cooktown.

In 1914, with the outbreak of World War 1, he joined the 5th Australian Light Horse Regiment, was wounded in Gallipoli and was the 'spotter' for legendary sniper Billy Sing. Trooper Idriess soon saw action in Palestine and the Sinai, was wounded again at Gaza, witnessed the cavalry charge at Beersheba and kept a war diary which later became his famous 1932 classic, The Desert Column.

Well after WW1 ended, Idriess decided (in 1928) to be a freelance writer and became obsessed with producing a book about every 10 months based on his extraordinary experiences and the people he'd met or heard about.

Among his most popular books were Flynn of the Inland (in 1932) and The Cattle King (in 1936). Other major ripping yarns included Forty Fathoms Deep about the early pearling fleets of Broome, The Drums of Mer and Headhunters of the Coral Sea and Lasseter's Last Ride about a doomed outback prospector and his fabled gold reef.

One of the more unusual tales this 'Boswell of the Bush' told broadcaster Bowden was how he came to write about gold-seeker Lasseter. Idriess bought a recovered Lasseter diary from his widow and also made enquiries.

Idriess said Lasseter, aware he was constantly being watched by the Central Australian natives, would write up his prospecting diaries, then cunningly dig a deep hole to hide them beneath what became the ashes of his campfires.

Idriess said he believed Lasseter's still undiscovered gold reef was real, but was much further north from where people later searched after his body was found. Lasseter had become sick, lost his sight, then was befriended by natives, wandering all over the countryside with them looking for game before he was left alone to die.

Idriess often admired the people he wrote about, like outback cattle king Sidney Kidman who had a one-eyed horse and "five bob [50 cents] in his pocket" and ended up rich, owning 100 cattle stations in his lifetime.

Then there was the time up on the Daintree River that Idriess saw a young Aboriginal mother and her baby suddenly taken by a large, lurking crocodile. It flopped straight back into the water.

He couldn't fire his rifle because the woman and baby were in its jaws and the huge body was swishing all around.

"But she got away, she got away and the baby survived, too (although) some teeth had gone through its little ribs," Idriess recalled.

"(The mother) had jabbed her thumbs into the crocodile's eyes and kept gouging and screwing.

"Terrible pain. It was the only chance she had. He let go and she managed to struggle ashore and scream and the warriors came running down with their spears."

In 1975, in retirement and old age with a broken leg and hobbling around with a stick, writer Idriess reflected on his 'wonderful' life.

This was despite the hardships, the dangers, recurring malaria, the inconvenience of having broken one of his arms five times and his old war wounds still playing up.

He'd been peppered with tiny pieces of shrapnel at Gallipoli's Lone Pine six decades before which kept swelling up.

One larger fragment in his hips near an artery couldn't also be removed for fear of him immediately bleeding to death.

"Apart from that, life's been good," Idriess quipped.