Lake Biddy is one of Western Australia’s ~700 ghost towns. And, as it turns out, it has close associations for some of our family. The area was surveyed in the early 1920s and the townsite was gazetted in 1925. It was named for Biddy Morrow, the daughter of the surveyor, E. T. Morrow. The Lake Biddy Hall is still standing, but in pretty poor condition.

Mary Jane Savage was born in Busselton in 1878, the daughter of James Savage (b1846 in Swaffham, Norfolk) and Hannah Grace Fordham (b1857 in Fremantle). James Savage was a convict, but that’s another story – yet to be told.

Mary was working in the Goldfields in 1898 when she met James Keighley. James had been born in Bradford, Yorkshire in 1869, the son of Edward Keighley and Jennet Bog Blanchard¹.

James and Mary married in 1900 in Busselton and had seven children (Frederick 1901-2004, Aubrey 1903-1990, Ethel 1905-1993, Neta 1909-2002, Blanchard 1912-1993, Walter 1915-2001, and Roy 1918-1926).

Between 1900 and 1924, the growing family appear to have lived a pretty nomadic life moving from place to place, presumably following the gold. After many ventures and moves around the countryside with an ever increasing family, the family arrived at Lenfield Farm, Chesterpass Rd, where Mrs Keighley declared never to move again. But that wasn’t to be.

When, in 1922, the Lake Biddy area was thrown open for selection, James Keighley and his son Aubrey took up 6000 acres of virgin land, and settled on the land in 1924, with Mrs Keighley moving there in 1926. The Keighley’s were the first in the district to use a “logger” of bush timber, pulled by a ‘Case’ tractor in 1928, for clearing the land. By 1929 James and Aubrey Keighley were bankrupt. Mrs Keighley moved to a neighbour’s farm where she stayed with the family for a year. In 1930 Mary Keighley selected 200 virgin acres and with the physical assistance of sons Walter and Aubrey, and financial help from their son Blanchard, James Keighley built the dwelling and cellar. After establishing the farm, James and Aubrey returned to the Goldfields where James died, east of Coolgardie, in 1933. Mrs Keighley lived on in the house for almost 40 more years until she died at the age of 93 in 1971.

The property is located on the Holland’s Track which was the main communication and transport link between Lake Biddy town and the newer regions in the north east, and onwards to the Goldfields. Mrs Keighley’s son Walter took up an adjacent property, and there are still remnants of the party phone line which linked between the two farms.

James and Mary are buried at the Lake Grace Cemetery with their son, Roy, who died at the age of 8.

---

Sources

1. James Edward Keighley. Retrieved 22 Dec 2023 from https://www.bradyfamilytree.org/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I103319&tree=BRADY2008 ↩︎
2. Lenny Keighley and his home the former Lake Biddy General Store, 10 March 2018. Retrieved 22 Dec 2023 from slwa_b5606048_2 Catalogue No. slwa_b5606048_1 ↩︎

---