15a[Idriess, Ion L., 1937, Forty Fathoms Deep, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, Chapter 2]

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Chapter 2

Con the Bosun

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Mark Rubin was actually the man who put the Australian pearl definitely on the market; he made the market. In youthful days, essentially a battler, he pushed a barrow as a hawker. He made a crust in various ways. A small man and apparently not physically strong, he did not hesitate to lump coal at Newcastle. Uncultured, forcing bluster when necessary to cover his lack of knowledge, his assets were courage and a determined will.

Fortune guided Rubin to the White Cliffs opal-fields, in the north-western corner of New South Wales.. It was really destiny; he was to be a famous buyer of gems. He swung his pick as an opal-gouger, but was soon buying small parcels of stones in the rough; facing them; then selling them at a profit. In a month he learnt more about opals than the majority of men would learn in a year. In a very short time he rose to be a recognized buyer.

Later, Rubin noticed that one of the big buyers made trips of long duration from the field. Rubin, with the genius of a Sherlock Holmes, tabulated this man's time. He traced him to Sydney and Melbourne, to Paris, Vienna, Berlin, London, and New York. The man would be selling his opals there of course. But again and again occurred lapses of time which Rubin could not localize. He asked the man point-blank where he regularly spent so, much valuable time. A shrug was the answer. Rubin tracked him by coach, train, and sea for nearly four thousand miles. The man visited practically unknown tiny places on the north-western Australian coast and finally stayed at a wild and woolly meeting-place of motley craft called Broome.

There Rubin started buying pearls; he knew no more about pearls than he had known about opals. A man would bring him a pearl and ask five hundred pounds. Rubin would examine the gem with the air of a connoisseur, then gruffly offer two hundred and fifty. Probably he would buy for three hundred or three hundred and fifty pounds. He got together a big parcel of selected pearls, took them to London and sold them at a handsome profit. This so impressed his bankers that they concluded he knew all about pearls.

I knew nothing about pearls when I went to London," be chuckled to Long Jimmy James. "But when I returned to Broome I knew more than the pearlers did. When I went to London the second time I knew more than the pearl-buyers did."

On his third trip to London he made a big deal. He returned in delight. Long Jimmy James called on business and congratulated him.

"I've got a valet now, Jimmy," Rubin chuckled. "I'll show him to you. Charles! Charles!" he called. James made himself comfortable on an easy chair as the man appeared.

"Whisky and soda!" promptly ordered James. That rather took Rubin's breath away.

Bankers gained great confidence in Rubin's shrewdness and judgment. Although much of it was bluffing, their confidence was not misplaced for he began to rise toward the millionaire class.

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15b[http://adbonline.anu.edu.au/biogs/A110483b.htm]

RUBIN, MARK (1867?-1919), pearl dealer and pastoralist, and BERNARD (1896-1936), sportsman, were father and son. Mark was born probably in 1867 at Salantai in the province of Kovno, Russia (Lithuania), son of Louis Rubinstein, medical practitioner, and his wife Hannah, née Smitkin. He left Russia as a young man and lived for a time at Cardiff, Wales, before reaching Sydney in December 1886. He moved to Melbourne in February 1887. With little English, he worked at odd jobs, including a spell as a wharf labourer, before investing his savings in haberdashery which he hawked round the city in a wheelbarrow. After acquiring a horse and buggy he extended his business into country areas. For several years he was an opal miner and dealer at White Cliffs, New South Wales. On returning to Melbourne, he was naturalized in January 1893. He became a jeweller and married Rebecca, daughter of Woolf Davis, a well-known figure in the Melbourne Jewish community, on 23 October 1895 at Carlton.

Soon after 1900 Mark moved to Broome, Western Australia, centre of the pearling industry, where he quickly became a leading pearl dealer, travelling yearly to London. He also owned a large pearling fleet. About 1901 the family moved to London, although Mark continued to spend most of his time in Australia. Believing that war in Europe was inevitable and that wool would be more in demand than pearls, he bought several large sheep stations in 1912-13, including de Grey and Warrawagine near Port Hedland, Western Australia, and Northampton Downs in Queensland. He also transferred his pearl-dealing business to London and Paris. Mark died at Fontainebleau, France, on 6 November 1919, leaving a fortune. His will requested that he be buried in the Jewish cemetery, Melbourne, and a special request was entered that his family return to live in Australia and his sons marry without delay and take an active interest in Jewish communal affairs. The running of the family business was left to his younger son Harold de Vahl (1899-1964), who achieved fame as an art collector and philanthropist.

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Select Bibliography

J. S. Battye (ed), The History of the North West of Australia (Perth, 1915); H. Birkin, Full Throttle (Lond, 1932); O. Cathcart-Jones, Aviation Memoirs (Lond, 1934); I. L. Idriess, Forty Fathoms Deep (Syd, 1937); J. D. Benjafield, The Bentleys of Le Mans (Abingdon, Eng, 1948); A. F. C. Hillstead, Those Bentley Days (Lond, 1953); N. Bartlett, The Pearl Seekers (Lond, 1954); D. Berthon, A Racing History of the Bentley (1921-31) (Lond, 1956); W. O. Bentley, An Illustrated History of the Bentley Car 1919-1931 (Lond, 1964); E. Nagle, The Other Bentley Boys (Lond, 1964); W. O. Bentley, My Life and My Cars (Lond, 1967); A. Swinson, The Great Air Race (Lond, 1968); M. A. Bain, Full Fathom Five (Perth, 1982); H. Edwards, Port of Pearls (Adel, 1983); E. P. Wixted, The North-West Aerial Frontier 1919-1934 (Brisb, 1985); Autocar, 26 Oct 1928, 3 July 1936, 10 June 1978; Australian Jewish Herald, 14 Oct 1921; Argus, 6 Apr, 3 May 1934; Sydney Morning Herald, 11 Apr 1934, 7 Mar 1964, 4 Oct 1972, 16 Apr 1983; Times (London), 2 May 1934, 1, 4 July 1936; Sunday Telegraph (Sydney), 20 Oct 1957; West Australian, 30 July 1963; Daily Telegraph (Sydney), 7 Mar 1964; Courier Mail (Brisbane), 4 Feb 1966; Daily Mirror (Sydney), 21 Apr 1977. More on the resources

Author: John Playford

Print Publication Details: John Playford, 'Rubin, Mark (1867? - 1919)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 11, Melbourne University Press, 1988, pp 474-475.