Childhood
Ruby Florence Herbert was born in working class Footscray, Melbourne on 15 February 1892, the third of ten children to John George Herbert, (born 1865, Victoria) billiard marker, goldminer and bookmaker, and Florence Louisa Herbert, nee Atherton, (born 1864, Victoria). Ruby’s parents had married in Victoria in 1887. John Herbert was “a Ballarat man who took part of the defence of the Eureka Stockade”. In 1889, Ruby’s parents lost their first child, the “beloved and only” Harold George, aged seven months. John Herbert was initially a bookmaker in Melbourne but expanded his business to include a tobacconist, hairdresser, billiard saloon and shooting gallery. By 1891 he became insolvent with over 100 pounds in debt.
In January 1898, when Ruby was five years old, she sailed to Fremantle, Western Australia with her parents, her brothers Leslie and George, and her sister, Violet on the Buninyong to “take up diggings on the Murchison goldfields” in Western Australia. The family lived first at Cue, Day Dawn and finally at Meekatharra. John and Florence Herbert had ten children: Harold George (born 1888, Victoria); Alfred Leslie (born 1890, Victoria); Ruby Florence (born 1892, Victoria); Arnold George (born 1894, Victoria); Clara Minnie (born 1897, Victoria); Arthur Stanley (born 1899, Victoria); Violet Kathleen (born 1902, WA); Ivy May (born 1904, WA); Albert Gabriel (born 1906, WA); and Evelyn Myrtle (born 1911, WA). It is recorded that Arthur Stanley was born in 1899 in Victoria so Ruby’s mother (and perhaps the whole family) must have returned to Victoria for a short time.
“Ruby Hutchison and her sisters”
From left to right clockwise: Clara Minnie, Violet Kathleen, Ivy May, Ruby Florence and Evelyn Myrtle
Personal Collection: Mavis Pirola
Ruby was educated at the Dominican Convent, Cue where she was a ‘schoolmate’ of May Holman, the first Labor woman MP in WA. Ruby said, “I lived there until I was about 14 and the early rush was over”. From 1916 onwards, John and Florence Herbert lived in Perth. In 1925, John died aged 59 of heart failure in Perth. Florence was mentioned in a local Perth paper as “one of the pioneers of Geraldton and the Murchison goldfields, and is the mother of the state’s leading lady tennis player, Myrtle Herbert”. Mavis Pirola, her grand-daughter remembers Florence as a “very spry elderly lady, affectionally referred to in the family as “little gran”. Florence died in 1958, at the age of 94, after being knocked over by a trolley while shopping in Boans, then Perth’s largest department store.
“Heartless husbands” and summer school
At 17 years old, Ruby married Joseph Daniel Buckley, a miner. Reverend Father Corcoran married the couple with Catholic rites at Ruby’s father’s house in Meekatharra on 11 March 1909. They had three sons and four daughters: Joseph Leslie (born 1909, Meekatharra); Claire Philomena (born 1911, Murchison); Ivy May (born 1913, Murchison); Florence Myrtle (born 1916, Perth); John George (born 1918, Perth); Violet Veronica (born 1921, Northam); and Keith (born and died 1924, Northam).
“Ruby and her children”
Ruby is in the middle of the photograph. From left to right clockwise: Claire Philomena, Joseph Leslie, John George, Ivy May, Violet Veronica and Florence Myrtle
Personal Collection: Mavis Pirola
The family lived at Meekatharra for around six years then they moved to Geraldton, Midland Junction, Northam, Bunbury and Holyoak, Hotham Valley but Buckley did not always live with them. Ruby was “the principal provider for the children until 1923, when she obtained a maintenance order at Northam against Buckley”. Buckley said, “she could put the children on the State as he was sick of them”. Ruby raised her children under “adverse and harsh conditions; supporting them by dressmaking and letting rooms to boarders”. Bobbie Oliver, labour historian, reasoned that with a large family to support, she “learned the hard way what it meant to be poor with a large family”. David Black, historian claims that Ruby’s “determination to succeed and her strong-minded approach to the problems of women dated from this period”. Ruby was divorced on 5 December 1928. In 1931 she was living in Beaufort Street, Maylands but by 1938 she was living again in the country town of Northam. In the 1940s and early 1950s she lived at number 9 and 10 Victoria Avenue in Perth and then 1093 Beaufort Street, ‘Bedford Park’ (now Bedford) by 1955.
“Ruby’s home in Perth” 1093 Beaufort Street, Bedford Park (now Bedford) where Ruby lived circa 1963 until she died in 1973.
Personal Collection: Mavis Pirola
When her children were adults, Ruby attended Stott’s Business College in 1941 and she also studied “social welfare”, public administration, public speaking, psychology and languages at the University of Western Australia's summer schools.
Ruby remarried in 1938 to Alexander Hutchison, a 49-year-old labourer, at the Perth District Registry Office. In 1950, the Daily News reported that Ruby was granted a divorce by Mr Justice Wolff due to “desertion, three years”. On 20 September 1971, the same year she retired from politics, Ruby registered a deed to authorise her continued use of the surname Hutchison.
When she was 74 years old, Ruby married for the last time to Frederick Lavery, a 68-year-old widower and fellow Labor MLC (North East Metropolitan Province), at St Peter's Catholic Church, Bedford on 14 May 1966. They were the first husband and wife to serve simultaneously in an Australian parliament. Fred Lavery died in January 1971, the year of Ruby’s retirement.
“Wedding of Ruby Hutchinson [sic] and Frederick Lavery”, 14 May 1966
Westpix: WAN-0042519