Cirrus@Austlit

When Don Munday's family arrived in Western Australia, they settled in the Kirk's Rock district, near Wickepin, two hundred miles from Perth. Munday was eight years old when his father died, and his mother was left to raise seven children in harsh conditions. The Munday brothers cleared, ploughed and fenced their property, with little time for formal education.

During the Great Depression, Munday worked at wheat lumping, road clearing and shearing. He became famous as a shearer: in England he broke the world shearing record in 1937. He was asked to demonstrate blade shearing to Queen Elizabeth at the Bicentennial Exhibition in Australia in 1988.