On Sunday, 9 January 1972 the Queen Elizabeth, one of the greatest ocean liners of her age, caught fire in Hong Kong harbour and there was only one foreign journalist covering the story – my […]
Who knows the truth about Francis James, one of Australia’s last great characters? My father Jack Spackman, who knew him better than most, said he never got to the heart of the man, best known […]
When the current Mr Baxter was nominated for a Walkley there was only one thing on Your Girl Reporter’s mind: A pesky kilo which would need to be banished if I was ever going to […]
It was an ambitious undertaking to cram more than 100 years of experience of war correspondence into the ceremonial Banco Court at Brisbane’s Supreme Court building for an hour-long discussion of armed conflict and the […]
On 16 January 1973 Australian Francis James emerged from three years’ imprisonment in Canton (now Guangzhou) with just a brief announcement from China to herald his expulsion to the border and into the waiting arms […]
Part Three of a Special Report on China Watching, based on a three-part feature written by my father Jack Spackman on the mysterious disappearance of Francis James, who was imprisoned in China on suspicion of […]
Part Two of a Special Report on the arcane art of China Watching, through a three-part feature written by my father Jack Spackman on the mysterious disappearance of Francis James, who was imprisoned in China […]
Australia’s rush to embrace sweeping powers to access the digital footprints of its citizenry has raised the existential age-old question: What is a journalist? The development of the government’s data retention bill and its implications […]
The first thing the China Mail’s journalists did after deciding to stage their sit-in over the closure of the newspaper was to get the news out. The job fell to Linda Siddall and Debra Jopson […]
I was 17 years old and filling time on my father Jack Spackman’s monthly computer magazine while I decided what to do with my life. I wasn’t expecting it to be hard work. I certainly […]
Copyright: Maria Spackman
