Dimensions
130 x 195 x 40mm
As a barely literate youth of 13, Sidney Kidman ran away from home and worked as an odd-job boy in a grog shanty in outback Australia. He went on to become the greatest pastoral landholder in modern history. During his lifetime he acquired a legendary reputation both at home and abroad. Yet fifty years after his death he has been largely forgotten by all but rural Australians.
'Kidman: The Forgotten King' is a timely reassessment of the life of the extraordinary Australian known as the Cattle King. But as his biographer Jill Bowen shows, he was much more than just a cattle man. In addition to his many successful business ventures and his contributions to the war effort, he was driven by a grand plan for the remote, arid areas of Australia. This kept him locked in a battle with the land -- and against drought.
Wealth, power, fame and honours did not change Sidney Kidman. He remained the homespun, gregarious bushman for whom men worked with an almost savage loyalty. Yet while he was greatly admired by many, others detested him. Controversies and untruths dogged him, especially in later life. The book sorts out the fact from the fiction, and gives a balanced, thoroughly entertaining account of the man and his exceptional achievements.
