Speaker 1: I love the idea of a simple twist of fate,
Speaker 1: and it gave me nobody to be angry with. Yes,
Speaker 1: I was just a simple twist of faith. So no
Speaker 1: matter what God thrown at me, Yes, I had no
Speaker 1: one to sik about Debbie Gray.
Speaker 2: We will never know whether you were one of the
Speaker 2: first solidamide victims in this country, but it remains a
Speaker 2: tantalizing possibility.
Speaker 1: I think that's why God didn't give me arms. What
Speaker 1: God no, because I wouldn't have punch too many people out.
Speaker 2: I'm Andrew Ruhle. This is Life in Crimes Today is
Speaker 2: a bonus episode. It's something different. Mostly on this podcast
Speaker 2: we talk about crimes. Today, we're going to talk more
Speaker 2: about a life. And my guest today is someone I've
Speaker 2: known nearly all my life. Her name is Debbie Gray,
Speaker 2: and Debbie and I were born at the same hospital
Speaker 2: in Bansdale in East Skippsland in nineteen fifty seven. I
Speaker 2: have to say it's rude to mentioned a lady's age,
Speaker 2: but Debbie was born a few months earlier than I was.
Speaker 2: She was born I think in January and I was
Speaker 2: born in April. But our mothers were pregnant roughly the
Speaker 2: same time, and we think that our mothers shared the
Speaker 2: same doctor in Bensdale, a man called doctor Stan Reid,
Speaker 2: who later became a very prominent pediatrician, but in that era,
Speaker 2: in the late fifties, was a young doctor making his
Speaker 2: way in the world with his first appointment as a GP.
Speaker 2: He was a young married fellow, lived in Bensale. He
Speaker 2: had a wife and a growing tribe of kids himself,
Speaker 2: which is interesting in itself for reasons that we shall
Speaker 2: see now. Debbie I first met, I think at school,
Speaker 2: and we didn't go to the same school at Lake Entrance.
Speaker 2: I went to Lake Tires School and Debbie went to
Speaker 2: Lake Entrance. But every now and again we would do
Speaker 2: this thing where our school would take a little bust
Speaker 2: or whatever into like Sentrance, so that we kids from
Speaker 2: a tiny little place could go somewhere bigger, to the
Speaker 2: bustling metropolis of Lake Entrance. And that's where I met
Speaker 2: Debbie in early doors, probably grade three, grade four, grade five,
Speaker 2: And I remember it clearly because you wouldn't forget this
Speaker 2: sparky little person. She was about two or three foot
Speaker 2: highf She's lucky. She was born with no arms and
Speaker 2: very short legs and She would sit on the back
Speaker 2: of the desk and write with her feet and do
Speaker 2: everything really well with her feet. She could pinch the
Speaker 2: other kids, she could use scissors. There was nothing she
Speaker 2: couldn't do. She had dark hair, shock of dark hair.
Speaker 2: She was tough, she was funny, she was bright, and
Speaker 2: obviously very different in some ways and very similar in others.
Speaker 2: I never forgot Debbie Gray, and I had other reasons
Speaker 2: to remember her too, because my mother told me when
Speaker 2: I was a child, she said doctor Reed was a
Speaker 2: great one to hand out tablets and things, and in fact,
Speaker 2: he gave me some tablets when I was pregnant, and
Speaker 2: I think she's told me this story, and also my brother,
Speaker 2: who was born two years later. He gave me tablets
Speaker 2: and I didn't fancy them. I thought I'd rather just
Speaker 2: have morning sickness than take them, and I threw them out.
Speaker 2: And it was her belief, rightly or wrongly, and she
Speaker 2: might have been wrong that doctor Reed also handed those
Speaker 2: sort of tablets out to other pregnant women, including quite
Speaker 2: possibly Debbie's late mother. Debbie Gray, we will never know
Speaker 2: whether you were one of the first thlidamide victims in
Speaker 2: this country, but it remains a tantalizing possibility, the problem
Speaker 2: being of course that thelidamide was not prescribed officially in
Speaker 2: Australia until well after we were born. But what we
Speaker 2: don't know is whether a right using pediatrician, doctor Stan Reid,
Speaker 2: who later became a very famous pediatrician. He was one
Speaker 2: of the great baby doctor guys anywhere. He was one
Speaker 2: of the pioneers of ultrasounds, and he became quite famous
Speaker 2: and well known and a wonderful achiever and all that.
Speaker 2: But clearly he was making his way in those early
Speaker 2: days at a time when pharmaceuticals were not governed the
Speaker 2: way they are now. It seems to me highly likely
Speaker 2: that someone like him would be in constant contact with
Speaker 2: world leaders in pharmaceutical stuff, and quite possibly might have
Speaker 2: gone to conferences overseas in the mid fifties to follow
Speaker 2: his interest in pediatric medicine, and as such he could
Speaker 2: have been the recipient of very early batches of samples
Speaker 2: of this new drug, which we call solidamide, but was
Speaker 2: actually marketed under many different brand names, you know, Distaval, contgen,
Speaker 2: there were many breads names. The first, the Leiderminde baby
Speaker 2: known was born in West Germany in January nineteen fifty six,
Speaker 2: which is one year before U Debbie, And it means
Speaker 2: that that baby's mother took this drug. That baby's mother,
Speaker 2: I think worked at the factory run by the company Gunenthal,
Speaker 2: which made the drug, and the factory workers were given
Speaker 2: samples of the drugs very early. And it follows that
Speaker 2: some of the first victims of Ludamnde were the children
Speaker 2: of people who worked for that company. It means that
Speaker 2: if this drug was being handed out to factory workers
Speaker 2: in fifty five, it seems to me quite conceivable, perhaps
Speaker 2: not likely, but conceivable that samples were being distributed unofficially
Speaker 2: through medical channels in nineteen fifty six in time for
Speaker 2: like doctor Reid to have some and to be hanging
Speaker 2: them out to your mother and to my mother and
Speaker 2: to various other people. Debbie Gray, Welcome to Life and Crimes.
Speaker 2: Today is your life. The crime is the crime against
Speaker 2: humanity that was the Liddamite. We think you know, we
Speaker 2: know the Liddimbe was a crime. What we don't know
Speaker 2: is whether that's what happened with you and your mum
Speaker 2: or not. What do you think?
Speaker 1: I think it's It has been a really tough life
Speaker 1: and I had wonderful parents and a really supportive brother
Speaker 1: in my little brother.
Speaker 2: Jim, who you speak of very highly at all times.
Speaker 2: I can see you're almost tearing up. It's not many
Speaker 2: things make you tear.
Speaker 1: Up, mate, not at all. But losing that young man
Speaker 1: was probably the tragedy. That's a crime, yeah, crime on
Speaker 1: humanity because I didn't realize I had a disability till
Speaker 1: he died. Really, you know, I just never I don't
Speaker 1: think the word ever ended my lips.
Speaker 2: Tell me this. Your parents, like you know Lenny Roe's
Speaker 2: parents and others, they're not they're not unique, but they
Speaker 2: are in next to you. But they just took you
Speaker 2: on straight on. They ignored all suggestions made by professionals
Speaker 2: or wherever that you should go to your valor or
Speaker 2: somewhere and stay there forever. What were your what did
Speaker 2: your parents do?
Speaker 1: This is our daughter, yep, and we're taking her home
Speaker 1: as simple as that.
Speaker 2: What were your parents' names?
Speaker 1: Cam, Cammi little Cami, who had the best smile. And
Speaker 1: Bimbo they called Ray Gray, Bimbo, Ray Gray.
Speaker 2: So now your dad, he was here from a fishing family,
Speaker 2: fishing Lakes Entrance in those days. Of course, generations, big
Speaker 2: fishing town. And he later on drove trucks which were
Speaker 2: probably delivered.
Speaker 1: Fish maybe no, no, totally out of the fishing industry altogether.
Speaker 1: And he brought truck and Carter timber Carter timber to
Speaker 1: now an hour, Yes, Puts timberyard, and he would cut
Speaker 1: from there to Crawdon Timberyard.
Speaker 2: And did you used to go with him?
Speaker 1: I used to be in that truck all the time.
Speaker 1: I'm very much Tomboyd attitude.
Speaker 2: So you'd be in the truck in the jockey seat
Speaker 2: or on his knee or whatever, and driving down the road.
Speaker 1: I suppose I'd start out in the in the passenger seat,
Speaker 1: but many times I ended up on his knee. Yeah,
Speaker 1: driving with my shoulders the wheel. You know, he didn't care.
Speaker 1: They were the days that and Dad always had a
Speaker 1: lot of faith in me because he had a lot
Speaker 1: of faith in me. You can do it? Yeah, good,
Speaker 1: you know you can do it?
Speaker 2: Well? You could, you were marble.
Speaker 1: He just he built my attitude up too, even if
Speaker 1: I physically thought I couldn't do it to begin with,
Speaker 1: I had the attitude to go, well, we'll sorted out.
Speaker 2: So you were just a little girl. You were a
Speaker 2: little little girl, because you know, I was a little
Speaker 2: little girl. You were. You're not tall now, but you were.
Speaker 1: You were because I just don't have femurs. Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: I have no femurs. So the tibia, the top of
Speaker 1: the tibia is not connected into the knee that would
Speaker 1: be at the bottom of your fema. Okay, that knee
Speaker 1: connection is now up at my hip. Oh, I've got you, yes,
Speaker 1: which is why I've.
Speaker 2: Got the joints different.
Speaker 1: The hip joints are different.
Speaker 2: So here you are. You go often with your dad
Speaker 2: in the truck. Ye, you weren't always at school, clearly.
Speaker 1: Up until five and before four I went to kinder.
Speaker 2: You became well known to all the truckies at the
Speaker 2: truck stops. Absolutely, can you remember that?
Speaker 1: No? I mean I remember missing around down at Crowdon,
Speaker 1: you know, at the yard and running around. Don't get
Speaker 1: run up by that truck, Debbie. You know. Yeah, they
Speaker 1: don't remember me a lot more than I remember them.
Speaker 1: It's you sad, because I do get approached a lot. Oh, Debbie,
Speaker 1: how are you going? And I look up at people,
Speaker 1: and now I'm older, I'm quite happy to go. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but who the hell are you? You know? I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: but it might have been three years old back when
Speaker 1: you remember me, and because of our shape, you remember
Speaker 1: who I am. But you look like every other buggery
Speaker 1: out there.
Speaker 2: You know that's true.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. Can you give me your name?
Speaker 2: You know so you've mentioned your father. He always told you.
Speaker 1: You can do it. You can do it, you can
Speaker 1: do it, you can get it in your head, you
Speaker 1: can do it. You can do it.
Speaker 2: What a bed your mum?
Speaker 1: My mum was very much the same, and she had
Speaker 1: the same attitude whatever. There was no pandering me. So
Speaker 1: one day we were down at nanon Pas having a visit,
Speaker 1: and Mom must have had a friend there beside her
Speaker 1: at the table and nanny's at the stove or whatever,
Speaker 1: and a friend and Mum told me this story. And
Speaker 1: the friend said to Mom, God, keimmy, god, kemmy. Debbie's
Speaker 1: climbing the tree. And Mom looked out and I'm climbing
Speaker 1: the lemon tree. I'm trying to get up on the
Speaker 1: first branch of the lemon tree. I mean it's only
Speaker 1: three ft two foot off the ground. The second branch
Speaker 1: is probably three foot off the ground.
Speaker 2: How did you do it?
Speaker 1: Anyway? I got up there and Mom turned to her friend. No,
Speaker 1: she's all right, She'll only four. Once Mom said the
Speaker 1: friends George.
Speaker 2: Just just dropped.
Speaker 1: That was her attitude, you know, let her stuff up.
Speaker 1: She's gonna you know, she's going to have it. She
Speaker 1: needs to feel the pain because she won't stop otherwise.
Speaker 1: That was my attitude until I had to prove I
Speaker 1: could and do it anything, even if it ended up
Speaker 1: in a bit of pain.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what you'd.
Speaker 1: Just saying, No, deb you can't do that wasn't good enough.
Speaker 2: I remember seeing that in that Little Girl at Lake
Speaker 2: sent France in the mid sixties, and you're sitting on
Speaker 2: the back of the desk fierce. You're showing off. Undoubtedly.
Speaker 1: Also at that stage, I was supposed to be using
Speaker 1: my artificial arms, so I was actually supposed to be
Speaker 1: sitting in the seat, yes, and writing with my You
Speaker 1: weren't doing that when I know, So I probably jumped
Speaker 1: up on the back so I could get my feet
Speaker 1: over it, exactly. I probably did that. Yes, I can't,
Speaker 1: because through primary school I had the artificial arms. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that I hated profusely.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think you used to take them off.
Speaker 1: Yeah, to read about it.
Speaker 2: You were very bad because you would have them on
Speaker 2: if you wanted to hit someone.
Speaker 1: I think that's why God didn't give me arms. God
Speaker 1: I didn't know because I would have punched too many
Speaker 1: people OUTI now.
Speaker 2: So how was it at school that that school I
Speaker 2: remember visiting occasionally? What was it like?
Speaker 1: Look, I got to say, ben So high school was
Speaker 1: just a great post for me to be.
Speaker 2: So from Lake you went on the Arlie Armstrong's bus
Speaker 2: or your mates on the bus.
Speaker 1: And then they would do the Nanna run. We always
Speaker 1: had to do then run. So we turn off at
Speaker 1: Nanguna there, go around that Nonguna road and come out
Speaker 1: on the Swan Reach road and then come back up.
Speaker 1: So we were the longest ride on the bus.
Speaker 2: And because you had like sentrance kids that you've gone through,
Speaker 2: I was just carried you through school just as Rember
Speaker 2: anything new? Yeah, okay, which was you remember your school
Speaker 2: days as pretty good.
Speaker 1: Times and a lot of my friends. Yeah, it wasn't
Speaker 1: to say that there wasn't the odd smarter.
Speaker 2: If I may say, you can, I don't think we're
Speaker 2: going to get suited.
Speaker 1: There was the odd smarter? Is it like to give me?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 1: I had one girl that didn't like the fact that
Speaker 1: I found her brother quite cute and takes me breath
Speaker 1: away when I think of how nasty she was, really,
Speaker 1: how horribly nasty she was. But I'd put up with
Speaker 1: the odd nasty person before the odd one because I
Speaker 1: really had a good group of people around me in
Speaker 1: the centrance and benstuff. But this chick, I got quite
Speaker 1: sweet on her brother on the bus and we were
Speaker 1: going to sit together until she demanded, you're not sitting
Speaker 1: with a cripple. Yeah, right, And kind of that was
Speaker 1: the end of anything ever developing at high school in
Speaker 1: those years. Through that, she used to always get things.
Speaker 1: You know, you get a joke on the bus and
Speaker 1: you start passing it around or whatever, and she would
Speaker 1: just stand up. So don't show Debbie.
Speaker 2: Is that right?
Speaker 1: So they were afraid of her because she was a
Speaker 1: nasty pasty. They would never show me. And one night
Speaker 1: I had the best joke on a bit of paper
Speaker 1: and I passed it across the aisle. Don't show, oh beautiful.
Speaker 1: So she got up though, because she used to sit
Speaker 1: in the queen Bee seat up the back. She got up,
Speaker 1: shutted down the aisland, snatched it out of one of
Speaker 1: the girl's arms. Held it up in the air because
Speaker 1: I'm only three foot eight and I didn't have a reach.
Speaker 1: So she held it up in the air and said,
Speaker 1: get it, you know, went back to her seat. She's
Speaker 1: sitting in the middle of the of the aisle, and
Speaker 1: I got out of my seat and thought, stuff this,
Speaker 1: I'm getting my joke back. So I went back up
Speaker 1: and right in front of her knees, and I was saying,
Speaker 1: you know, give a sip back, you get it. She's
Speaker 1: got her arms up in the air, She's got everything
Speaker 1: reaching up in the air as she's holding it upath
Speaker 1: like this, give it back. And she didn't give it back.
Speaker 1: So the artificial arm just went back and I came
Speaker 1: in with a whack and it's metal. Oh it's a hook,
Speaker 1: one of those metal hooks, and smashed into a rib.
Speaker 1: I had enough. Bus driver just stopped and watched me
Speaker 1: finish her off. It just stopped and anyway, but I
Speaker 1: obviously caused some pain in the rib. I thought I'd
Speaker 1: broke it. I don't know to this day, but the
Speaker 1: thing is to punch her. I had to take my
Speaker 1: whole body forward and punch. But as she collapsed forward
Speaker 1: on her knees, you know, she's jammed my head between
Speaker 1: her belly or her boobs and her thighs, right, because
Speaker 1: my face is down squashed into her thigh. Well, how
Speaker 1: was I going to get out of that?
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Oh, okay, So I took a great hunk and.
Speaker 2: Well she'll never forget you.
Speaker 1: Well, no she didn't.
Speaker 2: And so that was that. We stood out in your
Speaker 2: school days.
Speaker 1: Oh mate, that was a yeah.
Speaker 2: Now you you were well known around Gibson.
Speaker 1: For sure, and I was treated well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you treated well. I mean, I know you were
Speaker 2: actually mating with a lot of the local rock bands,
Speaker 2: the guys in rock bands, musicians. You like music, and
Speaker 2: musicians liked you. You know, you'rhythm Debbie. You've got around
Speaker 2: to a lot of rock events and concerts and parties
Speaker 2: and all over the journey, and you've become quite familiar
Speaker 2: with a lot of people because, as you say, they
Speaker 2: never forget you well for obvious reasons. Now, one of
Speaker 2: these old mates in the rock scene is Jimmy Barnes,
Speaker 2: and he's entourage and at one point you went to
Speaker 2: the green room after he'd performed here in Melbourne, Is
Speaker 2: that right?
Speaker 1: What happened? I did? Well, you know, I'd been slightly
Speaker 1: intoxicated boogin drinking dance and drinking dancing, and it all
Speaker 1: ended and I wasn't ready to end. So I went
Speaker 1: over to the backstage doorway and I said, hey, come on,
Speaker 1: let me out. I can't. I'm not going to do
Speaker 1: any harm, you know, let me in. Let me in.
Speaker 1: And Jimmy must have been just back a bit over
Speaker 1: and he turns around. He goes, hey, I've got this
Speaker 1: chick at the at the door out their bounds is saying, well,
Speaker 1: we let her in, and Jimmy just looked down and
Speaker 1: he looked at me, and he looked over and he goes,
Speaker 1: let her in. She looks armless, and he let me in.
Speaker 2: Let you in. Shocking joke, but.
Speaker 1: Jo great joke. Didn't mind, didn't care.
Speaker 2: And they were all off their rains.
Speaker 1: Oh absolutely, Mom and dad.
Speaker 2: Mum and dad were there.
Speaker 1: Mom and dad were there, and they just accepted anything
Speaker 1: that boy did. She loved him like and I talked
Speaker 1: to them for a little while. But the horrible thing,
Speaker 1: because I'm on young twenties and I'm standing in front
Speaker 1: of them, swaying all over the place. I'm not always
Speaker 1: like this. I didn't want me because they could see
Speaker 1: what boys and all that were doing. Yes, and I'm
Speaker 1: thinking I'm not going to do that in front of them.
Speaker 2: No, you were respectable.
Speaker 1: And I was trying to be fisherman's daughter. That's right.
Speaker 1: So you know, anyway, I tried to bluff them into
Speaker 1: the fact that I'm not always like this. I want
Speaker 1: Jimmy Barnes to write a song about me.
Speaker 2: Well he might, now, so you get to be grown up.
Speaker 2: Your three foot eight which is a meter and a
Speaker 2: bit in the three foot eight and a half three
Speaker 2: eight and a half.
Speaker 1: I used to.
Speaker 2: Sprout like Peter Bakos, like he used to say that
Speaker 2: extra half inch means a lot when you've got to
Speaker 2: stand on a chair about your So you get to
Speaker 2: your twenties, you do the best you can. You said, Margaret,
Speaker 2: I'm going overseas. Yeah, is that right?
Speaker 1: As quick as that? Because I went into a rehabilitation
Speaker 1: center from school. Yeah, we're at the one in Spring
Speaker 1: Road here, the motor accident one that is Oh, that's
Speaker 1: the first Commonwealth rehab center. It was a Conwealth rehab
Speaker 1: center that they brought up from Mount Martha used to
Speaker 1: be a rehab center down there. Well, they brought it
Speaker 1: up and brand new built purpose this building in Springvale Road, Okay,
Speaker 1: And it was a living so for country people. So
Speaker 1: I had accommodation at the back.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So at fifteen I got moved up there, I see,
Speaker 1: and lived there for seven months.
Speaker 2: And did you at that stage, I still trying to
Speaker 2: equip you with artificial limbs and.
Speaker 1: All boy friends escape one night over water.
Speaker 2: You have a bit of help, Yeah, I had a
Speaker 2: bit of help. Goodness.
Speaker 1: Yeah, one boy behind his hand up me, mum pushing out,
Speaker 1: the other one sitting up on the top of the
Speaker 1: fence and he's got hold of me neck. We got
Speaker 1: me out. I think I was going for a pregnancy
Speaker 1: test and I didn't want to tell him at the rehab.
Speaker 2: Is that a fact? Well, I'm glad your mum's not
Speaker 2: either here.
Speaker 1: That's so am. I I always said I was never
Speaker 1: printing the book until I didn't have mum and dad anymore.
Speaker 1: Fair enough, And I used to say it as a joke.
Speaker 1: But here we are.
Speaker 2: Well. One of the reasons we're here, Debbie, is that
Speaker 2: you have written the book of your life, which.
Speaker 1: She's called simple twist of fate.
Speaker 2: A simple twist of fate and that is a line from.
Speaker 1: A rock song, isn't it a line from Bob Dylan?
Speaker 1: Bob Dylan, that's title of his song. And I think
Speaker 1: if you listen to the song, the lyrics don't really
Speaker 1: fit in with my life. But I love the idea
Speaker 1: of a simple twist of fate and it gave me
Speaker 1: nobody to be angry with. Yes, I was just a
Speaker 1: simple twist of faith. So no matter what God thrown
Speaker 1: at me, yes, I had no one to sook about.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's your take on your situation.
Speaker 1: Well, that the attitude I grew up with.
Speaker 2: You did, and you know, the courtesy of your parents really.
Speaker 1: And your brother Jim. Yeah, they're both great.
Speaker 2: That book has a cover, and the cover is an
Speaker 2: old black and white photograph. I've seen a lot of
Speaker 2: black and white photographs of my time, Debbie working in newspapers.
Speaker 2: It is one of the more striking pictures. Tell us
Speaker 2: how you came buy that picture and where it was taken.
Speaker 1: When I was traveling the world on my own, what
Speaker 1: I had actually put a backpack on my back nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty five, gym was always around me. I wanted to
Speaker 1: give him a life because I felt people felt that
Speaker 1: I was a burden to him. So I needed to
Speaker 1: kind of prove the world that I didn't have Jim
Speaker 1: around me all the time because I was asking him
Speaker 1: to be. He just wanted to be. So I bought
Speaker 1: a one way ticket around the world and ended up
Speaker 1: flying off to America, traveled around there for a while,
Speaker 1: got up to Canada, went back down to Mexico, went
Speaker 1: back to bottom California, San Francisco, jumped a Greyhound bus
Speaker 1: to New York diagonally straight across. And I don't know
Speaker 1: if I should extend on that trip, but that was
Speaker 1: a really good trip.
Speaker 2: Well you could censor it a bit, but not too much.
Speaker 1: Well, I smoked a lot of pot, did it on
Speaker 1: that trip because you.
Speaker 2: Were a bit of a rock check Like check now,
Speaker 2: I've got to steer your back book cover And that
Speaker 2: photograph tell us about that that was.
Speaker 1: Insane in San Francisco. And I have a girlfriend who
Speaker 1: disputes when that was taken, so we'll leave it in
Speaker 1: what she recalls, which was nineteen eighty eight. I came
Speaker 1: back to Australia and I wanted to take off again,
Speaker 1: so I took a girlfriend with me and we went.
Speaker 1: We bought a car. Eventually we just bought a car
Speaker 1: and lived in the car to travel around America. And
Speaker 1: then she had her grandmother die. She had to fly
Speaker 1: back home, and she suggests that's what happened because she
Speaker 1: wasn't at that concert. I decided I wanted to go
Speaker 1: to this big blues concert that was underneath the San
Speaker 1: Francisco Bridge. Well, I believe I've got good rhythm with music,
Speaker 1: and when I'm dancing, I mean I'm with it. I'm
Speaker 1: in the moment, and he seemed to enjoy that.
Speaker 2: Are we talking about Albert Collins?
Speaker 1: We are talking about Albert Collins, one.
Speaker 2: Of the great blues guitarists of all.
Speaker 1: The time, absolutely and a beautiful person. Not that I
Speaker 1: really got to know him as a beautiful person, but
Speaker 1: he I bored me off the stage because I'm at
Speaker 1: the front, just under the rope, and I'm kind of
Speaker 1: just under that, and nobody's wanted to push me back
Speaker 1: because they knew I had to get up front just
Speaker 1: to even see something fair enough. So I was allowed
Speaker 1: to boogie there and on boog in, and next minute
Speaker 1: he just did this almighty leap off off the stage,
Speaker 1: and I thought he's going to land on me.
Speaker 2: This guy, Just to put it in context, he was
Speaker 2: a black guitarist. He was a striking looking figure, a
Speaker 2: bit like Samuel L. Jackson, the Factor, and he was
Speaker 2: he was not as famous as Jimmy Hendrix, but his
Speaker 2: own in his own sphere.
Speaker 1: He was in the blues world.
Speaker 2: He was Jimmy Hendrix of Blood. He was a big deal.
Speaker 2: So he's jumped off the stage with.
Speaker 1: His Yeah, got his guitar and he's in the.
Speaker 2: Middle of a song and he's hitting the notes.
Speaker 1: The next minute he does his fly through the air
Speaker 1: and I kind of stepped back because I thought he
Speaker 1: was going to land on me. Did he know I
Speaker 1: was there? I'm thinking, you know, like.
Speaker 2: Even how did that go?
Speaker 1: And of course, I mean the photo is him forehead
Speaker 1: to forehead, and that's what he did. He just came down.
Speaker 2: So he starts, he gets right down next to you
Speaker 2: and starts.
Speaker 1: Playing in front of me, and he's looking me straight
Speaker 1: in the face.
Speaker 2: And while this is happening, someone in the crowd thinks
Speaker 2: this is a great photograph and takes it.
Speaker 1: Takes a fabulous photo. She must have leaned over that
Speaker 1: white rope and taken it along sideways along to the left.
Speaker 2: So somebody's taken a camera. This is an era when
Speaker 2: you know there's no camera phones. Cameras are big and heavy.
Speaker 1: It's not digital. And I didn't have a camera.
Speaker 2: Like either a professional or am a photographer. Was an
Speaker 2: amateur who had a camera.
Speaker 1: There a camera she took a couple of quite a
Speaker 1: few didn't know she takes. And I had no idea,
Speaker 1: and I just thought, this is a moment that I'll
Speaker 1: remember for the rest of my life. And nobody's going
Speaker 1: to believe this. Nobody's going to believe I've had Albert Collins.
Speaker 1: And at one stage where forehead to forehead, he's sweat
Speaker 1: stripping on my face. Yes, okay, and we are booging.
Speaker 1: We are anyway, And I had a fabulous time.
Speaker 2: And what happened next, well, we.
Speaker 1: Went I finished the concert of and leaving the concert,
Speaker 1: it's only a gate, you've got to walk out, and
Speaker 1: I'm amongst the masses of people and I'm walking out
Speaker 1: of the farm gate and somebody tapped me on the
Speaker 1: shoulder and I looked up and it was a German.
Speaker 1: I think she was German. She said, I've just got
Speaker 1: some great photos of you. And I said, where and
Speaker 1: she said when Albert Collins jumped down at you, I said,
Speaker 1: oh god. She said, where can I send them? I said, mate,
Speaker 1: I've left Australia for a year. I've just started.
Speaker 2: I haven't got an address.
Speaker 1: I haven't got an address. She said, well, where's your
Speaker 1: address at home? Said, well, in twelve months or so,
Speaker 1: I'm going to be back in Lake Entrance, and here
Speaker 1: is the address. And so I gave her that address
Speaker 1: where my dog was still living, so she could have
Speaker 1: got the mail. But anyway, when I finally got home.
Speaker 2: A year later, what happened?
Speaker 1: And then a year after that, so two years after
Speaker 1: the after the event, what happens. I go to my
Speaker 1: letter box and I pull out the letter and this
Speaker 1: letter from Germany, and there's these photos, black and white
Speaker 1: photos that she'd taken me.
Speaker 2: I just stood there.
Speaker 1: I think I sat down on my nature strip and
Speaker 1: just went no, crying magnificently. I remember that I remember
Speaker 1: getting those.
Speaker 2: Letters such good pictures, and they're really.
Speaker 1: Good pictures on one stage, in close to him, and
Speaker 1: then we're back of having a boogie. And then but
Speaker 1: the fact that that's the cover of your book and
Speaker 1: the cover of my book is where we I think
Speaker 1: we've connected forward to forehead and I had a single
Speaker 1: it top on which immediately shows there's no arm on
Speaker 1: the right side. Fair enough, and I thought it really
Speaker 1: shows the people with disabilities could be found anywhere.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Good, it's very good.
Speaker 1: So when I looked at that, I thought, I'm so
Speaker 1: pleased that was there, because I was always about showing
Speaker 1: wherever I tried, I wanted to show that people with
Speaker 1: disabilities didn't always need to be pampered.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, And you.
Speaker 1: Were and we got out and loved life like the
Speaker 1: rest of them.
Speaker 2: You were more the bull terrier, pup, the poodle I have.
Speaker 1: Exactly. You were well known and I grew up with
Speaker 1: two brothers.
Speaker 2: Well, that's right. So it's been a hard life. It's
Speaker 2: not easy tough.
Speaker 1: I've arettend it's easy. Yeah you do, but if you
Speaker 1: don't do that, it becomes hard.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you've you know, it's had ups and downs. But
Speaker 2: along the way, you've you had a daughter, Yes.
Speaker 1: I have. I've got a beautiful da beautiful daughter. And
Speaker 1: we just got married, did she.
Speaker 2: We've got hope for the future. There. How old is
Speaker 2: your daughter? Now?
Speaker 1: Thirty two? She married another lady called Stacy. Yeah, who is.
Speaker 1: We're just coming to terms with each other. And I
Speaker 1: love her very much and she's more than welcome in
Speaker 1: my family.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: I've got two daughters, and you know, life goes on.
Speaker 1: It was a lot like me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we have a.
Speaker 1: Few longer heads here and there. She's half like a mother.
Speaker 2: Like a mother. Yes, And what got you to the
Speaker 2: idea of right now? I know you and I have
Speaker 2: discussed you writing a book a long time ago, and
Speaker 2: you've You've done it, and.
Speaker 1: You did taken me over thirty years.
Speaker 2: To get around it. Well, truly put pen to paper.
Speaker 1: I was still working for the Navy when I started
Speaker 1: that book. Tell us about I started, well, I started
Speaker 1: doing public speaking because the guy he rang me up
Speaker 1: one day when I was working for the Navy, He said,
Speaker 1: can you come down and talk to our students. So
Speaker 1: he had me down there to talk about disability and abilities.
Speaker 1: You know what we can do. It's in our head,
Speaker 1: you know, it's really in your head. And so he
Speaker 1: got me to come down and that started my circuit
Speaker 1: of schools talking to schools about ability.
Speaker 2: When was that, roughly in the eighties. Tell us about
Speaker 2: working for the Navy.
Speaker 1: I loved that it's my best. At the time, I
Speaker 1: didn't realize it was the job of a lifetime.
Speaker 2: And how did it come about public service?
Speaker 1: Because I couldn't get a job in the private sector.
Speaker 1: All the interviews I went to. Once I got to
Speaker 1: an interview, that was everything stopped after that, even locally, well,
Speaker 1: I was in Melbourne, I left local fift.
Speaker 2: Yeah, right, so you stayed out at your stayed I
Speaker 2: was gone.
Speaker 1: I was gone from Lakes. I was never going to
Speaker 1: get a job down there.
Speaker 2: And you got a job in the public service, and then.
Speaker 1: From the public service. First one was with the aircraft
Speaker 1: factory dead to Port, Melbourne. Yeah, but my I was
Speaker 1: on just a typist in a typing pool.
Speaker 2: You could so you could type very ably with your
Speaker 2: feet thirty odd yeah, thirty yeah good, better than faster
Speaker 2: and more accurate than.
Speaker 1: My average typist. Yeah yeah, I could do thirty three
Speaker 1: thirty four words a minute or so.
Speaker 2: That's enough for a government job.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2: And you've held that job for a farewell.
Speaker 1: I held it for a while. At some stage there.
Speaker 1: When I was eighteen, I moved back to sales, so
Speaker 1: I beat in Melbourne three years.
Speaker 2: That's when the band goes new you.
Speaker 1: It's it's when I got around Sale with I remember
Speaker 1: that pubs on Saturday night.
Speaker 2: Yeah, mid seventies, mid seventies, so ye know, I.
Speaker 1: Got to know people in Sale, A couple of them.
Speaker 1: I'm still good friends with, you know to this day. Yeah,
Speaker 1: even though work was really hard down there.
Speaker 2: I think there was a band called Unchained. It was
Speaker 2: and I think how called unchained because one of them,
Speaker 2: I'm going to say, the lead guitarist or the singer
Speaker 2: had sadly been locked up in prison for a little
Speaker 2: while when they led him out, he's been unchained. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I suspect that they might have had a song about you.
Speaker 1: Well I had I went back to Melbourne. They might
Speaker 1: have did it without.
Speaker 2: Me, don't we They might have the dirty dogs.
Speaker 1: Because I ended up getting myself a volunteers job at
Speaker 1: the Sale Hospital in the records department at medical records,
Speaker 1: and we were redoing all the medical records hither and
Speaker 1: I and then the government decided they'd give me a
Speaker 1: job and I got a job at cres Nit Factory.
Speaker 1: It's clothing factory. So I had to leave this really
Speaker 1: stimulating job with the Base hospital, even though I won
Speaker 1: being paid it was a job to me. I was
Speaker 1: there nine o'clock every morning. I didn't leave till Heather left.
Speaker 1: And anyway, they pulled me out and said, no, you
Speaker 1: can't do there. We're sending you to work. And I
Speaker 1: had to go to work at Chris Knit Factory and
Speaker 1: in sale pulling threads, oh dear, just pulling threads off.
Speaker 1: When they knit the man's on, there's an extra thread
Speaker 1: and I had to pull the threads off. And I
Speaker 1: sat there with an ittle, actually disabled woman. It'll be
Speaker 1: very sweet and that's that's fine, but that was my
Speaker 1: you know a lot. I had to sit with her
Speaker 1: and no conversation. I wasn't allowed to near a sewing
Speaker 1: machine and I've been sewing at home for years a
Speaker 1: knitting machine. Sorry, And I had to stay just pulling
Speaker 1: threads bits of cotton off. So anyway, I spacked the
Speaker 1: dummy from that and said to Mom and Dad, I'm
Speaker 1: going back to Melbourne.
Speaker 2: Ah, did you so?
Speaker 1: I did tell us about Jim, my little brother, come
Speaker 1: with me.
Speaker 2: So Jim is a bit younger than you. Yes, tell
Speaker 2: us a bit about Jim and your how your brother,
Speaker 2: you know, he helped you and was your best matin Anyways.
Speaker 1: The thing with Jim and I, we were like twins.
Speaker 1: We were like twins. I cared for him as he
Speaker 1: cared for me, And no matter how I tried to
Speaker 1: break away from him coming in to do dishes or
Speaker 1: whatever he do around my house to eating up because
Speaker 1: not all we didn't live together all the time, I'd
Speaker 1: live with other people. And it's the one stage I
Speaker 1: was living on my own and Jim was just there
Speaker 1: to make sure things were right. He'd wash the dishes.
Speaker 1: If I'd lift the dishes out and come and the
Speaker 1: dishes aren't done, he washed the dishes. He'd sweep the
Speaker 1: floor anything. He never made my bed, which I have
Speaker 1: never had to deal with him, Jee when you could
Speaker 1: have made the bed too, You know, No, it wasn't
Speaker 1: like that, but he just really So the trip around
Speaker 1: the world was catalyst was Jim. He was having a
Speaker 1: lot of trouble with things, and it was I was
Speaker 1: finding it very hard. So I abandoned him. Basically, I
Speaker 1: just support a ticket around the world, thinking if I'm
Speaker 1: not here and he can't get to me, he's got
Speaker 1: to find a life.
Speaker 2: Right. Oh, that was a very noble thing. You left
Speaker 2: so that he wasn't welded to your side and felt
Speaker 2: that he had to stay there.
Speaker 1: That was my idea. I didn't want to fly off
Speaker 1: around the world on my own. I was very scared. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was, how are we You're only eighty five? What
Speaker 1: do we say, early twenties?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you were just early twenties.
Speaker 1: And Jeff was also having the same trouble, similar troubles,
Speaker 1: and there were things were happening that shouldn't have been
Speaker 1: And I thought, well, if I'm the catalyst of all this,
Speaker 1: time to go yep. So I told it one way.
Speaker 2: When you came back and you worked the places you've
Speaker 2: just told us about, when did did your life with
Speaker 2: Jim sort of resume? Brother Jim?
Speaker 1: Well, as it turns out, when I got back home
Speaker 1: from my one year gone, Gym wasn't far behind me,
Speaker 1: wasn't he. He'd actually flown out within a month of
Speaker 1: me leaving, really to do the same thing and catch
Speaker 1: up with me. And there are records to state then
Speaker 1: in actual factor during that year, at one stage we
Speaker 1: were three minutes apart a he Throw airport. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: flew out to Greece as he flew in from New York.
Speaker 2: In that year, people found out had to believe never
Speaker 2: we know mobile phones. No, you didn't know.
Speaker 1: You only had a postcard. They could have taken how
Speaker 1: long to get through stards never come back to me
Speaker 1: because I was always on the move. I just, you know,
Speaker 1: could disposed guard to the frosts to say I'm not
Speaker 1: dead yet, you know exactly, unless to say I've made
Speaker 1: it here and there.
Speaker 2: And somewhere else.
Speaker 1: And they just trusted me, and you.
Speaker 2: Got home and then he got home. And wait, when
Speaker 2: when did you lose Jim?
Speaker 1: God, No, it's terrible to think I'm thinking about this,
Speaker 1: but it was nineteen ninety.
Speaker 2: Five, so he died pretty young.
Speaker 1: He's been dead thirty two. Emma's now thirty two and
Speaker 1: he died when she was two and.
Speaker 2: A half, so he died pretty young.
Speaker 1: So everybody's going to have to do their own.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but obviously he was only thirty, she.
Speaker 1: Was two and a half. He was like surrogate dad.
Speaker 1: I've got some good photos of them. She was a
Speaker 1: lot younger. Sadly she doesn't really remember him today, but
Speaker 1: he was like surroy good dad.
Speaker 2: So looking back at your parents, him as that killing
Speaker 2: and yeah, and Jim.
Speaker 1: And my bigger brother Jeff, Jeff, Jeff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I didn't know he was.
Speaker 1: Four years older than me.
Speaker 2: They all did a good job.
Speaker 1: And so my teenager and my brother Jeff taking me
Speaker 1: to serve club dancers and things like that, and I
Speaker 1: had a ball for the day diying. I idolized him.
Speaker 1: But the will the family doesn't see it that way.
Speaker 2: With the book, the.
Speaker 1: Family, the family, the family is all dead. Now, yeah,
Speaker 1: you are the fan, the last man standing. I asked
Speaker 1: somebody about it. Why do you think that, he says,
Speaker 1: because nobody's got an internal fortitude like you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, And also you might have stayed. You smoked
Speaker 2: a bit of but probably not a lot of tobacco.
Speaker 1: Oh no, full the backer smoker, Oh you were. Oh god,
Speaker 1: My mum and dad were smokers. We all smoked.
Speaker 2: Oh fair enough, we all smoked.
Speaker 1: You remember his children sitting in the car going down
Speaker 1: in Melbourne to fit for artificial arms, and we threw
Speaker 1: her in the back going can we wind the windows?
Speaker 1: That will be finished soon, you know? And so we
Speaker 1: all ended up smokers. In my teenagehood, I got led
Speaker 1: a little bit further.
Speaker 2: Oh right, I can, Debbie. You've spent a lot of
Speaker 2: years writing the book, I made another, and then at
Speaker 2: some point I think you've reached out and got some
Speaker 2: professional help.
Speaker 1: From thirty year for thirty odd year, well thirty years now,
Speaker 1: but tell us about it, well, twenty years. I just
Speaker 1: plodded along with it with the book. Yeah, just twenty
Speaker 1: odd years, typing away each night and thinking about, you know,
Speaker 1: where my life had been and how I'd done it.
Speaker 1: And people kept asking me, oh god, how did you
Speaker 1: do that? And how did you do this? And then
Speaker 1: someone else said you should write a book. And I
Speaker 1: was about twenty four to twenty.
Speaker 2: Five when you start, yeah, okayah.
Speaker 1: I was about twenty four to twenty five. They said
Speaker 1: he should write a book. I thought, oh, that'd be
Speaker 1: a good idea. Stop me answering these stupid questions, right,
Speaker 1: you know? So I started writing about what I did
Speaker 1: where I did. I had to feel a bit guilty
Speaker 1: because by then I had a bit of pipe. So
Speaker 1: really I wanted to write an honest book though, and
Speaker 1: why was I doing this? And I was trying to
Speaker 1: fit in everywhere I went. I wanted to show that
Speaker 1: I was cool, I was all right, I wasn't a
Speaker 1: cripple that needed nurse mating so I joined a lot
Speaker 1: of different crowds to show that I had that tenacity.
Speaker 2: You've sat on the back of the odd motorbike.
Speaker 1: I've done that on the numerous occasions, numerous Gonna be
Speaker 1: a good seat, though, I don't like the new seats
Speaker 1: where you sit in.
Speaker 2: The big Harley system.
Speaker 1: No. I liked that. I really used to like the
Speaker 1: hond of gold Wings. I see love the Honda gold Wings.
Speaker 1: I really know.
Speaker 2: And is that Is there a bit of that in
Speaker 2: the book?
Speaker 1: I don't know where there is. I think I spoke
Speaker 1: of the men that I really kind of desperately wanted
Speaker 1: to have a partnership with for some reason. They all
Speaker 1: rode bikes. But I think I wrote about a couple.
Speaker 2: Your book came as it covers a lot of ground.
Speaker 2: So you're going to have published several hundred copies and
Speaker 2: then as the demand grows, you'll publish more.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm hoping, Britman, I need a little bit of
Speaker 1: money at the moment. Certainly didn't help me, you know, no,
Speaker 1: it didn't.
Speaker 2: That's the thing, isn't it. We have a situation here
Speaker 2: where where a lot of people that you know, some
Speaker 2: of them because they've born a couple of years after
Speaker 2: you two, three, four years after you, so well looked
Speaker 2: after they got a big payout that was negotiated in
Speaker 2: part by Peter Gordon, now of Gordon Legal, who have persuaded,
Speaker 2: really persuaded is the term the English firm Distillers Limited
Speaker 2: or Diagio, which is the parent company to hand over
Speaker 2: tens of millions of dollars YEP to victims in Australia
Speaker 2: who before that it only had very small payouts. But
Speaker 2: sadly you and a handful of other people never made
Speaker 2: the cuts. It's quite a striking fact and it does
Speaker 2: make you wonder whether, to return to our previous point,
Speaker 2: whether the ldamite was got to Australia through back channels
Speaker 2: in nineteen fifty six, and if no, no in nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty six, because you were born in nineteen fifty.
Speaker 1: Seven, it had to be in the first.
Speaker 2: So it would seem to be a possibility, but one
Speaker 2: that's probably unprovable at this distance, unless someone somewhere can
Speaker 2: uncover some documents or a diary or some that that's
Speaker 2: where somebody's recorded handing them to so and so and
Speaker 2: so and so and so. These are questions that could
Speaker 2: be put to several people, but one of them might
Speaker 2: be the surviving sons and daughters of doctor Stan Reid,
Speaker 2: if they possibly have their father's diaries. It's a very
Speaker 2: faint chance, but one, and I'll look into Thank you,
Speaker 2: Debbie Gray. You've told us about your life story. You've
Speaker 2: done your book a simple twist of fate. You won't
Speaker 2: see thousands of them, you'll see dozens of them out
Speaker 2: in the marketplace. And it has a striking cover photograph
Speaker 2: of you and Albert Collins, the late great blues guitarist.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Debbie Gray.
Speaker 1: It's been my pleasure, and I really want people to
Speaker 1: know that I didn't do this book as a grandiose
Speaker 1: look at me. It was a book to make people
Speaker 1: think about disability, yep, and the way they perceive what
Speaker 1: you can do. Oh, she's got no arms. She won't
Speaker 1: be able to do this or that and that. And
Speaker 1: I really want to show the world that don't be
Speaker 1: locked into what you think you do with your arms.
Speaker 1: If they're gone, you're not going to be able to
Speaker 1: do it, you know. Like, so that's what I was
Speaker 1: out in the world trying to do.
Speaker 2: You've always done it since you were three years old.
Speaker 1: Maybe I've been successful in something.
Speaker 2: Now you have, Yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 1: My daughter is definitely my greatest success.
Speaker 2: Good it's good on you.
Speaker 1: Thanks WI great, Thank you, Andrew.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening. Life and Crimes is a Sunday Herald
Speaker 2: Sun production for true crime Australia. Our producer is Johnty Burton.
Speaker 2: For my columns, features and more, go to Heroldsun dot
Speaker 2: com dot au forward slash Andrew rule one word. For
Speaker 2: advertising inquiries, go to news podcasts sold at news dot
Speaker 2: com dot au. That is all one word news podcast's sold.
Speaker 2: And if you want further information about this episode, links
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