Cirrus@Austlit

Randolph Bedford was the father of Eric Bedford (q.v.), and grandfather of Liz Collins (q.v.). Born in Sydney, he attended Newtown Public School. At 16, and after a range of jobs, he started travelling the western plains of NSW. In Albury, he discovered The Bulletin for the first time and 'thereby entered a new world'. His first newspaper job was in Bourke, but his fascination with the mining industry saw him move to the Broken Hill Argus in 1888. He briefly worked on the Adelaide Advertiser, then for two years on the Melbourne Age, becoming the latter’s crime reporter.

Bedford worked through the depression as a freelance journalist. In 1892, he was owner of the Gippsland newspaper Toora and Welshpool Pioneer. In 1896, he launched the Clarion which was illustrated and partly edited by his friend Lionel Lindsay. His later journalism included articles on mining and other topics for Lone Hand and The Bulletin. Bedford wrote a small work of literary journalism, “The Retail Brand of Gentleman” (1893) for The Bulletin, and later a series of articles about London (1902/1903).

Bedford travelled overseas as well, leaving a reprint of his Bulletin contributions on the Mediterranean in Explorations in Civilization (1916). He produced a play, White Australia or the Empty North (staged in Melbourne in 1909), as well as short stories, poetry and two novels, True Eyes and the Whirlwind (1903) and The Snare of Strength (1905). Part of his unfinished autobiography was published posthumously as Naught to Thirty-Three (1944).

Bedford gained considerable wealth from goldmining in WA, and was a parliamentarian in Queensland from 1917 to 1941. His papers are held at John Oxley Library (Qld). Randolph Bedford wrote the words of "Australia My Beloved Land", with music by Arthur Chanter. According to the Australian Dictionary of Biography, Bedford 'reputedly published some of his verse under the pseudonym "Martin Luther"'.