Today, the HPPL office will again be celebrating as we do each year, the birthdate (June 10th, 1909) of our company’s founder, Lang Hancock, including films such as “Man of Iron,” “Digger in a Million,” “Dig a Million Make a Million,” featuring the very patriotic Australian, Lang Hancock.
Although he was not always popular, speaking out bravely and strongly in the interests of West Australia and Australia, he was the person who drove the lifting of the iron ore export embargo, an embargo imposed given the government’s view that Australia had little iron ore and would be importing iron ore by 1965.
Dare I add the obvious, governments don’t have any crystal ball! Plus drove lifting the state government ban on pegging for iron ore, i.e. title, necessary for investing, exploration, and development.
These two acts alone, plus his efforts around the world to interest multinationals to invest in the remote and rugged Pilbara, have created immense opportunities and wealth for West Australians and Australians, yes billions and billions of dollars of taxation, have been possible from his discoveries, despite lack of any government assistance.
The multinationals, pre-FBT, even providing the schools and hospitals, police and fire brigades buildings, sporting facilities, even air conditioned shopping centres and post offices! And more.
Yet it is little remembered that despite all this, for a number of reasons, he did not die a wealthy man, indeed left a bankrupt estate.
But his legacy was much greater, including to me.
These days if you tell one of your children off they may say “abuse,” even for ones who did well at private schools and given all sorts of privileges, a friend sent me the below, to remind me of the “good old days,” when yes, children were told off by their parents and grandparents and teachers, but the telling off from our parents was much more serious, and we didn’t have any shootings at school, or in my time as a child, we didn’t use any illicit drugs to waste our family’s money on or harm our minds, or wear show much clothing, as our parents would never let us, in my case, not waste money and health on smoking either.
I am very, very grateful my father left me with such legacy, even though he was strict (much stricter than parents today) and expected me to climb up windmills at 4 and 5 years of age, without any safety harness which today would be called “abuse,” expected me to work whenever he wished, weekends, public holidays, birthdays, even Christmas, I think this “abuse” helped me with life.
Thank you! Huge thanks for such legacy.
The below is what a friend sent me, I remember much of this when growing up with my parents, (although without most when in the bush, but the ‘good times’ and strictness from dad remained, indeed, wasn’t even allowed to choose records I might like, was only Vera Lynn, Louis Armstrong, and the speeches of Winston Churchill, but this didn’t hurt me.)
“REMEMBER WHEN:
All the girls had ugly gym slips.
Nearly everyone’s Mum was home when the kids got home from school.
Nobody owned a purebred dog or cat.
You’d reach into a muddy gutter for a penny.
All male teachers wore ties not ponytails or tattoos.
You got your windscreen cleaned, oil checked and petrol served, without asking, all for free, every time.
It was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.
They threatened to keep children back a year if they failed the school year… and they did!
And couples went steady, and got married before having children.
No one ever asked where the car keys were because they were always in the car, in the ignition, and the doors were never locked.
Spinning around, getting dizzy and falling down was cause for giggles?
Playing cricket with no adults to help the children with the rules of the game.
Bottles came from the corner shop without safety caps and hermetic seals because no one had yet tried to poison a perfect stranger.
And with all our progress, don’t you wish, just once, you could slip back in time and share it with the children of today?
When being sent to the headmasters office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited you at home.
Basically we were in fear for our lives, especially if we lied, even exaggeration was frowned upon as that was a distortion from the truth, but it wasn’t because of drive-by shootings, drugs, etc. Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat! But we survived.
As well as summers filled with bike rides, cricket, Hula Hoops, skating and visits to the pool, lemonade or liquorice sticks.
Send this on to someone who can still remember
How Many Of These Do You Remember?
Coca Cola in bottles.
Home milk delivery in glass bottles with tinfoil tops
45 RPM records.
78 RPM records!
Do You Remember a Time When..
Decisions were made by going ‘Eeny-meeny-miney-moe’?
‘Race issue’ meant arguing about who ran the fastest?
Catching tadpoles could happily occupy an entire day?
It wasn’t odd to have two or three ‘Best Friends’?
The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was ‘chickenpox’?
Having a Weapon in School meant being caught with a slingshot ?
War was a card game?
Taking drugs meant orange – flavoured chewable vitamin C’s?
Water balloons were the ultimate weapon?
If you can remember most or all of these,
Then You Have Lived
DURING A GOOD TIME!
Pass this on to anyone who may need a break”
