Stockman's Hall of Fame among many farewelling Hank Cosgrove

A tree is waiting in a quiet grove on the grounds of the Australian Stockman's Hall of Fame in Longreach for the ashes of Hank Cosgrove, who passed away on May 18.

Mr Cosgrove was the driving force for the Drover's Reunion, conducted under the Hall's auspices, for 28 years, thanks to his desire to keep the history and lifestyle of droving alive in the present day.

He was born on February 20, 1932 and was often taken out of school at Miles by his father to help with a mob, from the time he was eight years old.

Sister Margaret Mary would bring him back up to date with his lessons on Saturday mornings when he returned.

He received a bursary to Downlands College in Toowoomba but had to leave due to ill health, instead taking a job for the Postmaster General delivering black armband telegrams during World War II.

After working for a short while in the Main Roads Department, he decided there was more to life and put his age up from 17 to 21, getting work on Manus Island doing salvage work and supervising Japanese prisoners.

Eventually it was discovered that he was a young civilian and that work stopped, but his adventuring spirit took him to the British Isles and Europe on a bicycle.

Running out of money, he appealed to the Home Office in London and was sent to Kenya to work.

Finding himself in the middle of the Mau Mau Uprising, where men in similar circumstances to himself were being murdered in their beds, he wired his mother for enough money for an airfare to get home.

Mr Cosgrove went back to New Guinea, spending six months in Port Moresby then 18 years in Lae with the Commonwealth Department of Works.

It was here that he met his future wife, Berry, who was nursing there.

The married couple returned to Australia in 1971, together with their two children Stuart and Beverley.

It was in 1990 when they travelled out to Longreach for the fledgling Drover's Reunion to honour his father and three brothers, all drovers, that he was inspired to work with Jim Cuming to make the event something that would celebrate the arts of the profession perfected in the early days of settling the outback.

"Prior to that there was nothing to do except sit around and drink beer and tell tall tales," Berry Cosgrove recalled.

The Outback Games became a highlight of the annual reunion, showcasing billy boiling, damper making, whip cracking, driving the nail, throwing the rolling pin and a unique drover's special, throwing the boot at the dog.

Extended to incorporate station workers, its first roll call tallied 240 people and incorporated the National Outback Performing Arts, acknowledging the poetic skills of many drovers.

In its tribute to Mr Cosgrove posted this week on social media, the Australian Stockman's Hall of Fame quoted his words that people didn't realise the Australian beef industry virtually fed the whole of the American forces in the Pacific during World War II.

"Mr. Cosgrove would say that droving was the hardest job on this earth.

"The drover, he had nothing. He had to carry what they called a cigarette swag; it was a piece of canvas and a bit of blanket. Most of them used their saddle as a pillow."

In 2014, Mr Cosgrove told the Queensland Country Lifethat when he started in 1990, "I was 58 and I was the youngest of the old drovers then".

"As we're losing people, we're losing that part of history, too," he said at the time.

"I keep telling people they need to come and be a part of it before it's lost.

"I worry that those times will just pass into history and there'll be very little mention of it in 20 years."

ASHOF board member Rosemary Champion said last year Hall manager Lloyd Mills organised it so that 80 school students attended the reunion to learn some of those arts from the old-timers.

At the same time, Mr and Mrs Cosgrove celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary.

The reunion was a passion that drove him for 28 years. With his health failing, the pair were not able to travel west from Brisbane to meet up with their "other family" this year, and Mrs Champion said the event was cancelled out of respect.

"Hank's passing is the end of an era," she said. "He was very well loved."

The Stockman's Hall of Fame described him as an inspiration to many and a true and wonderful friend who would be sadly missed.

A tree in the Drover's Grove spread around the turkey's nest at the Hall was marked for Hank's resting place some years ago.

"There's one there he can call his own," Berry said. "He vowed to have his ashes left there so we will be bringing them up."

A farewell service was held in his honour on Monday, May 25.

Article courtesy of Nine and Queensland Country Life