Bettina Gorton
Encyclopedia
Bettina Gorton, Lady Gorton (c. 1915 – 2 October 1983) was the American
-born wife of John Gorton
, Prime Minister of Australia
1968-71.
Bettina Edith Brown was born in Bangor
, Maine
, USA, in about 1915. Her father Arthur A. Brown was the president of an American bank in Cuba
. He died when she was two years old and her mother returned to her home state of Maine. She attended Bangor High School and the University of Maine
.
In 1933 she was studying languages at the Sorbonne
in Paris
, and was taken for a holiday to Spain
by her brother, Arthur Brown, where they shared a cottage with John Gorton
, an Australia
n friend of Arthur's from Oxford University
. She married Gorton on 15 February 1935 at St Giles Church, Oxford, and after his studies were finished they returned to his father's orchard near Kerang
, Victoria
. Her mother Grace Brown came to live with them, and she later revealed that her son Arthur, Bettina's brother and John Gorton's closest friend from Oxford, was a card-carrying member of the Communist Party
.Philip Jones, Art and Life
They had a daughter, Joanna in 1937, and two sons, Michael in 1938 and Robin in 1941.
During John's war service, Bettina ran the farm and raised the children. He entered parliament in 1950, as a Senator for Victoria
, and was often away in Canberra
on parliamentary business. They moved to Canberra in 1958 when he was appointed a minister in the government of Robert Menzies
.
In 1958, in a widely publicised court case, the novelist Jean Campbell (the mistress of John Gorton's father, who had died in 1936) sued Bettina for shares in the family company. Campbell alleged that Gorton senior had given the shares to her. The judge ruled in favour of Bettina Gorton.
In 1960, she accompanied her husband on an official visit to Sarawak
, which sparked a lifelong interest in oriental languages and cultures. This led to her enrolling for a second degree, at the Australian National University
. She graduated with honours in Oriental Studies, and worked as a part-time research assistant on an English-Malay
dictionary.
It was only around this time that Bettina Gorton became an Australian citizen, holding dual American and Australian citizenship. Up till then, she had been prevented from voting for her husband.
In 1968, John Gorton became Prime Minister
and they moved into The Lodge. She oversaw a number of restoration projects, and also arranged for the building of the prominent white brick security wall around the property, and established a garden of Australian native plants in the grounds.
Bettina Gorton was generally a low-profile prime ministerial spouse, but there were some significant exceptions. Her interest in oriental studies was widely reported in South-East Asia, and her speeches during John Gorton's official prime ministerial visits to Malaysia and Singapore
and her ability to converse with locals in their own languages made her very popular there. Gough Whitlam
later praised her for making a lasting and valuable contribution to Australia's relations with Indonesia
.
In 1969 she came to her husband's defence over an incident sparked by his Liberal
colleague Edward St John
, a member of the House of Representatives
. Gorton had attended a dinner at the American Embassy in Canberra, accompanied not by his wife, but by Geraldine Willesee, the daughter of a Labor
senator, Don Willesee
. St John criticised this, claiming Gorton had offended the embassy and embarrassed his party. After Labor Senator Lionel Murphy
sent a message to the House of Representatives suggesting that St John's comments were an inappropriate breach of the Prime Minister's privacy, St John not only received no support from his Liberal colleagues, but was also the focus of a poem that Bettina Gorton sent to the press gallery. She adapted a poem by William Watson
, which she headed "Comment on Current Events":
Edward St John was forced to resign from the Liberal Party, and the incident spelled the beginning of the end of his parliamentary career.
Bettina Gorton's other activities including officially opening Melbourne's Tullamarine Airport
on 9 July 1970.
After John Gorton left the prime ministership in 1971, Bettina resumed her work on the English-Malay dictionary. He was knighted in 1977, and Bettina became Lady Gorton. She died, aged 67 or 68, on 2 October 1983. Sir John Gorton remarried in 1993, dying in 2002.
The indigenous garden she created at The Lodge is now named the Bettina Gorton Garden.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
-born wife of John Gorton
John Gorton
Sir John Grey Gorton, GCMG, AC, CH , Australian politician, was the 19th Prime Minister of Australia.-Early life:...
, Prime Minister of Australia
Prime Minister of Australia
The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...
1968-71.
Bettina Edith Brown was born in Bangor
Bangor, Maine
Bangor is a city in and the county seat of Penobscot County, Maine, United States, and the major commercial and cultural center for eastern and northern Maine...
, Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
, USA, in about 1915. Her father Arthur A. Brown was the president of an American bank in Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
. He died when she was two years old and her mother returned to her home state of Maine. She attended Bangor High School and the University of Maine
University of Maine
The University of Maine is a public research university located in Orono, Maine, United States. The university was established in 1865 as a land grant college and is referred to as the flagship university of the University of Maine System...
.
In 1933 she was studying languages at the Sorbonne
Sorbonne
The Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...
in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, and was taken for a holiday to Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
by her brother, Arthur Brown, where they shared a cottage with John Gorton
John Gorton
Sir John Grey Gorton, GCMG, AC, CH , Australian politician, was the 19th Prime Minister of Australia.-Early life:...
, an Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n friend of Arthur's from Oxford University
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
. She married Gorton on 15 February 1935 at St Giles Church, Oxford, and after his studies were finished they returned to his father's orchard near Kerang
Kerang, Victoria
Kerang is a rural town on the Loddon River in northern Victoria in Australia. It is the commercial centre to an irrigation district based on livestock, horticulture, lucerne and grain. It is located north-west of Melbourne on the Murray Valley Highway a few kilometres north of its intersection...
, Victoria
Victoria (Australia)
Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....
. Her mother Grace Brown came to live with them, and she later revealed that her son Arthur, Bettina's brother and John Gorton's closest friend from Oxford, was a card-carrying member of the Communist Party
Communist party
A political party described as a Communist party includes those that advocate the application of the social principles of communism through a communist form of government...
.Philip Jones, Art and Life
They had a daughter, Joanna in 1937, and two sons, Michael in 1938 and Robin in 1941.
During John's war service, Bettina ran the farm and raised the children. He entered parliament in 1950, as a Senator for Victoria
Australian Senate
The Senate is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives. Senators are popularly elected under a system of proportional representation. Senators are elected for a term that is usually six years; after a double dissolution, however,...
, and was often away in Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
on parliamentary business. They moved to Canberra in 1958 when he was appointed a minister in the government of Robert Menzies
Robert Menzies
Sir Robert Gordon Menzies, , Australian politician, was the 12th and longest-serving Prime Minister of Australia....
.
In 1958, in a widely publicised court case, the novelist Jean Campbell (the mistress of John Gorton's father, who had died in 1936) sued Bettina for shares in the family company. Campbell alleged that Gorton senior had given the shares to her. The judge ruled in favour of Bettina Gorton.
In 1960, she accompanied her husband on an official visit to Sarawak
Sarawak
Sarawak is one of two Malaysian states on the island of Borneo. Known as Bumi Kenyalang , Sarawak is situated on the north-west of the island. It is the largest state in Malaysia followed by Sabah, the second largest state located to the North- East.The administrative capital is Kuching, which...
, which sparked a lifelong interest in oriental languages and cultures. This led to her enrolling for a second degree, at the Australian National University
Australian National University
The Australian National University is a teaching and research university located in the Australian capital, Canberra.As of 2009, the ANU employs 3,945 administrative staff who teach approximately 10,000 undergraduates, and 7,500 postgraduate students...
. She graduated with honours in Oriental Studies, and worked as a part-time research assistant on an English-Malay
Malay language
Malay is a major language of the Austronesian family. It is the official language of Malaysia , Indonesia , Brunei and Singapore...
dictionary.
It was only around this time that Bettina Gorton became an Australian citizen, holding dual American and Australian citizenship. Up till then, she had been prevented from voting for her husband.
In 1968, John Gorton became Prime Minister
Prime Minister of Australia
The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...
and they moved into The Lodge. She oversaw a number of restoration projects, and also arranged for the building of the prominent white brick security wall around the property, and established a garden of Australian native plants in the grounds.
Bettina Gorton was generally a low-profile prime ministerial spouse, but there were some significant exceptions. Her interest in oriental studies was widely reported in South-East Asia, and her speeches during John Gorton's official prime ministerial visits to Malaysia and Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
and her ability to converse with locals in their own languages made her very popular there. Gough Whitlam
Gough Whitlam
Edward Gough Whitlam, AC, QC , known as Gough Whitlam , served as the 21st Prime Minister of Australia. Whitlam led the Australian Labor Party to power at the 1972 election and retained government at the 1974 election, before being dismissed by Governor-General Sir John Kerr at the climax of the...
later praised her for making a lasting and valuable contribution to Australia's relations with Indonesia
Indonesia
Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...
.
In 1969 she came to her husband's defence over an incident sparked by his Liberal
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
colleague Edward St John
Edward St John
Edward Henry St John QC was a prominent Australian barrister, anti-nuclear activist and Liberal politician in the 1960s. His political career came to a controversial end after he criticised the Prime Minister John Gorton. His book A Time to Speak was an account of his eventful three years in...
, a member of the House of Representatives
Australian House of Representatives
The House of Representatives is one of the two houses of the Parliament of Australia; it is the lower house; the upper house is the Senate. Members of Parliament serve for terms of approximately three years....
. Gorton had attended a dinner at the American Embassy in Canberra, accompanied not by his wife, but by Geraldine Willesee, the daughter of a Labor
Australian Labor Party
The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...
senator, Don Willesee
Don Willesee
Donald Robert "Don" Willesee was an Australian politician, a member of the Australian Senate for 25 years representing Western Australia, and a Cabinet minister in the Whitlam government....
. St John criticised this, claiming Gorton had offended the embassy and embarrassed his party. After Labor Senator Lionel Murphy
Lionel Murphy
Lionel Keith Murphy, QC was an Australian politician and jurist who served as Attorney-General in the government of Gough Whitlam and as a Justice of the High Court of Australia from 1975 until his death.- Personal life :...
sent a message to the House of Representatives suggesting that St John's comments were an inappropriate breach of the Prime Minister's privacy, St John not only received no support from his Liberal colleagues, but was also the focus of a poem that Bettina Gorton sent to the press gallery. She adapted a poem by William Watson
William Watson (poet)
Sir William Watson , was an English poet, popular in his time for the political content of his verse. He was born in Burley, in West Yorkshire....
, which she headed "Comment on Current Events":
- He is not old, he is not young,
- The Member with the Serpent's tongue,
- The haggard cheek, the hungering eye,
- The poisoned words that wildly fly,
- The famished face, the fevered hand –
- Who slights the worthiest in the land,
- Sneers at the just, condemns the brave
- And blackens goodness in its grave.
Edward St John was forced to resign from the Liberal Party, and the incident spelled the beginning of the end of his parliamentary career.
Bettina Gorton's other activities including officially opening Melbourne's Tullamarine Airport
Melbourne Airport
Melbourne Airport , also known as Tullamarine Airport, is the primary airport serving the city of Melbourne and the second busiest in Australia. It was opened in 1970 to replace the nearby Essendon Airport. Melbourne Airport is the sole international airport of the four airports serving the...
on 9 July 1970.
After John Gorton left the prime ministership in 1971, Bettina resumed her work on the English-Malay dictionary. He was knighted in 1977, and Bettina became Lady Gorton. She died, aged 67 or 68, on 2 October 1983. Sir John Gorton remarried in 1993, dying in 2002.
The indigenous garden she created at The Lodge is now named the Bettina Gorton Garden.