How an English lord unwittingly helped a famous local family tough it out to create a jewel of a business for our State.
“They struck up a friendship and every time the lord came in, dad would be the one who would pick him up from the airport,” he said. “They were obviously poles apart, but it was probably what attracted them to each other. Dad was fascinated by the English lord and the money he had and the lord was fascinated by an Aussie bush character, a true-blue Australian farmer.
My family’s road to Broome started long before Willie Creek Pearls.
The story starts with my grandparents, Valda and Don Banfield (Mimi and Tiger Pop) on a Tincurrin wheat and sheep farm with four children and now Willie Creek Pearls is a retail, tourism, hospitality and commercial pearling operation in Broome and Perth. What has remained constant on the journey there, is the strength of my family.