Couple head south for quieter life

Hedland might seem a sleepy town to many, but popular couple Phillip and Maureen Clark say it has become like the big smoke.

This led the couple to pull up stumps this month after almost 45 years of married life in town.

They have headed south to retire in sleepier quarters in Gin Gin, about an hour north of Perth, but leave behind a long connection to the town.

They not only raised three daughters here, but Phillip's parents, John and Francis Clark, also ran the well-known JG Clark Baker store on Wedge Street from the 1950s to the 1970s.

For Phillip, the move away from the coast will be an especially big change after a childhood fishing in Hedland harbour before the iron ore carriers sailed into town.

He said in those days, the only rush hour that mattered was the battle for a choice fishing spot.

"In the early days, you could go down to the wharf and get any kind of fish you liked," he said.

"But to get a decent spot on the wharf, I would get the bakers (in my parent's store) to wake me about half past four in the morning.

"You could get mackerel anywhere up to 30kg, but you also got some big sharks that would take the mackerel while you were pulling them in."

Phillip moved to Hedland with his parents in 1948 as a three-year-old and said it was a great place, full of friends and natural environments to explore.

In those days, pristine sand dunes ran all the way to Pretty Pool, where he and a friend used to go fishing.

However, he said he kept mum about one childhood trip to Pretty Pool after he and a friend accidentally burnt down the community shelter erected on the beach.

Phillip remembers on a later occasion having drinks with a friend who worked on a pearl lugger.

When the friend decided to sail the company of friends around Finucane Island and back on the lugger, he landed in hot water with his employer.

There was also plenty of hard work to be done once Phillip's father, who first moved to Hedland as the police sergeant, gave up his role to buy the bakery and general store.

Occasionally, when flour ran short, Phillip said they would drive to Roebourne to meet the Hedland supply ship early in a bid to ensure the morning's loaves made it on to the shelves.

He was also early on the scene when Maureen came to town as a 17-year-old in 1968.

After the couple's first double date at the drive-in, they were married less than a year later.

Not long after that, Phillip landed a job with Leslie Salt, which is now Rio Tinto's Dampier Salt, where he worked for 38 years - the couple spending most of that time living in a company house on Sutherland Road.

Prominent in the darts club and other local groups, Maureen said Hedland was a social town where "you just knew everybody".

She said she and Phillip had a wonderful life together in the town and it would be hard to leave it and her daughters behind.

But, after years of hard work, it is time for the couple to live in a quieter place.

"We were here before South Hedland and all those houses were built," Maureen said

"It has gotten too big; to me it is not Hedland any more."