The Chiltern Chemist Book Launch

Local author, Mervyn Rea, is launching his book, The Chiltern Chemist, in Chiltern.

The author will be present to talk to visitors and sell signed copies of this book, telling the story of Chiltern's chemist, David James McEwen, his journey across the world, the tragedies that befell him and his family, and the making of an Australian Prime Minister. Join them in meeting the author and learning more about his book.

In the late 1800s, a young David James McEwen from Ireland arrived in a country half a world away, not in search of fame or fortune but to be useful.

What he found was Chiltern, a small Victorian town at the fading edge of a gold-rush era. Behind the counter of a modest pharmacy, McEwen's life was defined by service, faith, and quiet responsibility. Married three times, widowed twice, and taken too early himself, he left no monument and little expectation of remembrance.

Against all odds, McEwen's son John, orphaned in childhood, raised far from his birthplace, rose to become one of the most influential figures in Australian public life: architect of national trade policy, wartime strategist, statesman of rare authority, and briefly Prime Minister of Australia. It is a story of places that remember, of buildings that bear witness, and of how leadership is not manufactured but compounded—through loss, duty, circumstance, and love.