Ion Llewellyn Idriess
Ion Llewellyn Idriess, known as “Jack” while on the road, was a prolific Australian author who published some 50 books in a span of 43 years. Idriess was born in Waverley, Sydney, in 1889 and visited Lightning Ridge in 1909-1910, staying for about two years.
While at The Ridge, Idriess obtained a miner’s right and worked as a miner and a pony driver. Idriess mined at the Dead Man’s Claim on Lunatic Hill on the Three Mile field. He mined with Tom Peel.
After his time in Lightning Ridge, Ion Idriess saw action in World War I in Palestine, Sinai and Turkey, and was wounded at Gallipoli.
“One evening several travelling shearers arrived. They’d been putting in time at a new opal-field called Lightning Ridge, away west. At the men’s hut they yarned of ‘nobbies,’ and ‘fire,’ and “harlequin,’ and rich parcels and dazzling money awaiting the lucky ‘bottomers’ of ‘holes.’”
His book, Lightning Ridge: The Land of Black Opals was first published in 1940. The book is a dramatic account of Idriess’s time at Lightning Ridge, following the dramatic story of a young man introduced to the opal fields who finds himself involved with local characters, old miners, ratters, and the adventure of opal discovery. Lightning Ridge covers a multitude of opal mining and local history subjects, refer here for a list of topics mentioned.
Lightning Ridge has been reprinted a number of times, with the Lightning Ridge Historical Society underwriting the 16th reprinting in 2019, celebrating a century since Idriess first visited the town.
Opals and Sapphires (1967) is a referential volume, offering the science and history of both gemstones and the fields and processes involved in mining them.
Ion Idriess passed away in Mona Vale, Sydney on 6 June 1979 at the age of 89 years.
Photographic plate opposing pp. 134 of Lightning Ridge: The Land of Black Opals, captioned:
OLD MATT WATSON’S CAMP. (The author is fifth from the left.)
Article: Research by Leisa Carney, edited by Russell Gawthorpe. LRHS research compiled by Len Cram and Barbara Moritz. Sources: Lightning Ridge: The Land of Black Opals, Ion L. Idriess, 1940; Lightning Flash Newspaper, 21 June 1979, 23 March 1988; Walgett Spectator, 25 March 1910, 10 February 1911; Ion Idriess, Beverly Eley, 1995, p. 41.