Donald Mountfort was born in the town of Buckley in Flintshire, North Wales on 30 September 1907. Don’s father was the Colliery Clerk of the Buckley Colliery Company which operated the local colliery. Don had left school at seventeen years of age, and was not interested in the mining industry. He was impressed by films and exhibitions at the British Empire Exhibition 1924, and so with hopes of becoming an Australian farmer, he joined the Dreadnought Scheme. Donald Mountfort sailed from London in early December 1924 on the SS Diogenes, arriving in Sydney 19 January 1925. He was sent first to Scheyville for his farm training, he was then placed on rural properties in country NSW, where he was involved in dairy farm work and also on sheep stations.
Don was a cheerful and confident individual who loved life in Australia. In 1928, on being pressed to return home, he wrote that he would like to stay until the shearing: I do not know how I shall leave Australia even for a holiday. What will I do for my rides in the bush, my shooting and last of all the open life?
During the 12 years that Don spent doing rural work, the most significant of these placements was Mossgiel Station, 30 miles south east of Ivanhoe in western NSW. Mossgiel Station covered an area of 350 square miles or 225,000 acres (91,000 hectares). Paddock sizes varied from 10 to 10,000 acres. These huge portions, in comparison to those in Wales, needed a completely different mindset. As a young farmhand, Don was involved in work with the sheep such as mustering, droving, crutching and butchering. All the equipment and facilities of this large station needed to be kept in serviceable condition, and that meant fencing repair and renewal, mending telephone lines, repairing wells, windmills and bores. Don became known for resurrecting failed shearing machines. Sunday was a chance for rest and recreation and tennis, shooting, swimming or picnicking, were available activities, as well as just relaxing.
The big distances between properties and people made socialising quite difficult. But dances were held in the local Hall, to raise money for the small hospitals and charities in this region, and people came from as far as 80 km away.
As a schoolboy, Don's hobby was making wireless sets. While at Mossgiel he took up the hobby again and, in 1935, entered a £100 Circuit Competition. He received only a Mention, but HMV sent him a set for trial in the outback, which Don modified for daytime reception of the 2UE race broadcasts. This led to further contact and, in early 1938, a job selling and repairing radios in the Boggabilla district (on the Queensland border, 800 km north east of Mossgiel). In late 1938 he became manager of the radio/electrical department of a large country store in the central west town of Parkes, where he remained until World War 2 was underway.
Don, having no permanent home, no relatives and his sole assets contained in two suitcases, was hesitant to take on married life. Nevertheless, in 1940 whilst in Parkes, he married Christina Annison. Then in 1942, he applied to both air force and army to enlist and both turned him down on medical grounds, he was colour blind and had a heart murmur. Sent by the Government’s ‘Manpower Directorate’ to Amalgamated Wireless Australasia (AWA) in Sydney, he was involved with the development and manufacture of radio communications equipment during the war years.
As soon as the war ended, he opened a small radio/electrical business in the suburb of Maroubra, Don Mountfort Radio Service, but found getting anything to sell almost impossible and frequent blackouts interfered with repair work. Acquiring a generator, he was able to carry on, hiring out amplification equipment. He ran several outdoor concerts for the Police Boys Club. Police closed Anzac Parade, and hundreds of people came. With lights and amplification through a 100-watt amplifier built by Don, up on the tray of a tabletop truck, the shows had great sound, and good money was raised.
Don also supported the club in 1946, in organising the Australian Motor Cyclists Union Quarter Mile Acceleration Test Australian Championship. Twelve thousand people came to watch 250 competitors at Bankstown Aerodrome in the morning and an air pageant in the afternoon.
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| Don Mountfort |
In 1958, both his wife and his father (who had also migrated to Australia) passed away. Don subsequently opened a new store in Anzac Parade Kingsford, 4km nearer the city. He was also keen on lapidary and gemmology, and was able to include these in his business interests. In 1967 he completed the two-year diploma course to become a Fellow of the Gemmological Association of Australia. He also taught lapidary and gem identification at the Bondi-Waverley Evening College for ten years.
In 1974, following Roy Moore’s advertisement in the Sydney Morning Herald, he was reunited with two of his old shipmates from the Diogenes, Canon Harold Rawson and Ernie Chambers. To see them again after fifty years, made it a great day in his life.
Don suffered a severe stroke in 1981 and was confined to a wheelchair. In 1982, he married Pamela McDonald, and during the 1990s he wrote his autobiography, From Farm Boy to Leading Radio Man. Don passed away on 10 October 1996.
Don had been a member of the Radio & Electrical Retailers Association Council for ten years, and was described as ‘a fighter and a man who is prepared to do something and have something to say, not be just a ‘yes’ man.’ One of the journals later called him ‘The stormy petrel of the radio industry.’ The Mitchell Library in Sydney holds his records and papers; these include what the library called ‘a long sequence of correspondence with politicians.’ Don Mountfort was clearly an activist and achiever.
