Bruce Small

Sir Andrew Bruce Small (born December 11, 1895 in Ryde , † May 1, 1980 in Benowa ) was an Australian businessman and politician.

In Melbourne , Small made Malvern Star's bikes a well-known brand in Australia, then moved to the Gold Coast , Queensland . There he worked as a building contractor and as mayor made the Gold Coast in Australia and beyond as a holiday resort known. Among other things, he propagated the bikini-clad “Meter Maids” who don't distribute parking tickets in Surfers Paradise, but feed the parking meters for tourists.

Childhood and youth

Bruce Small was the second of six children. His parents, William Andrew and Annie Small, were members of the Salvation Army , and their son was playing the tenor horn in a Salvation Army band at the age of six . For 22 years he was the solo euphonium player with the Territorial Staff Band of Victoria . The family was constantly moving from place to place, and Small later recalled that by the age of 13 he had attended 14 different schools. After school he worked one after the other at a printer, delivered milk and became a sales representative. In 1919 he married his first wife, with whom he had a son. The marriage ended in divorce, and in 1939 he married a second time.

Owner of "Malvern Star"

In 1920 Bruce Small bought the Malvern Star bicycle shop in Melbourne for $ 200 he had saved and initially built twelve bikes a week. In 1926 he founded Bruce Small Pty Ltd , which was renamed Allied Bruce Small Ltd in 1936 . Two of his brothers, Frank and Ralph, also worked in the shop.

Malvern Star's breakthrough came from working with his advertising medium, Hubert Opperman , a former newspaper messenger who raced successfully in Europe in the 1920s and became an Australian cycling idol. During the Second World War , Malvern Star began producing the necessary components for bicycles itself, as supplies from Europe failed to materialize. The demand for bicycles increased because gasoline was rationed. In addition, the company worked for the military and created z. B. radio masts or metal frames for military tents. After all, Malvern Star had six factories, its own department store, its own chain of stores with 45 branches and around 1,000 dealers who sold Malvern bikes.

In 1958, Small withdrew from the company.

Small was considered a “non-cursing, non-drinking, God-fearing Christian”, and as such he was lifelong committed to socially disadvantaged people. For 25 years he was director of the Victoria Blind Association . He campaigned for the building of retirement homes in Brighton , Bendigo and Ballarat . For many years he served on the board of the YMCA Melbourne.

Career as a politician

Meter Maids at a show in a retro look

After 1945 Bruce bought Small Land in Gowanbrae and Strathmore Heights in Melbourne and worked as a contractor. In 1956 he bought 40 hectares of mangrove swamps on the Nerang River near Gold Coast and had the land drained with the help of canals so that they could be cultivated.

In 1967 Small ran for the office of Mayor of Gold Coast with the slogan "Think Big, Vote Small" and was elected. That summer, the region was hit by numerous cyclones and he managed the aftermath with the help of 5,000 civilian volunteers and around 180 soldiers who sandbagged the eroding coastline. He then campaigned for a permanent fortification of the coast by a wall of rocks, which is why he was nicknamed Boulder Bruce ( rock Bruce ).

Meter Maid 1970

In the following years, Small promoted the Gold Coast as a tourist destination. He was one of the supporters of the idea of having girls dressed in bikinis made of gold lamé as meter maids feed the parking meters for tourists in the district of Surfers Paradise . The Meter Maids were originally created as a protest against parking space management, but they became the region's image carrier. Accompanied by the Meter Maids and that of his poodle Mimi, he made promotional tours through various countries. On site, he took part in dance marathons and accompanied a parade through Surfers Paradise on a high wheel . All these actions made the Gold Coast an internationally known tourist stronghold.

Bruce Small held the office of Mayor of Gold Coast until 1973 and again from 1976 to 1978. From 1972 to 1977 he served as MP for Surfers Paradise Member of the Parliament of Queensland . In 1974 he was beaten to Knight Bachelor ("Sir"). In his second term in office, he ran into problems because he was becoming increasingly arrogant and not always keeping the line between office and private life, so that the city council was finally dissolved by the government because of the resulting disputes and Small was deposed as mayor.

Shortly afterwards, Small developed cancer. He last appeared in public in 1980 at a dinner in his honor and asked for honorary citizenship of Surfers Paradise, which he was denied. Three days before his death, he was made an honorary citizen of Hervey Bay , a place around 400 kilometers from Surfers Paradise. He was buried according to Salvation Army rituals.

In Benowa, Sir Bruce Small Park and Sir Bruce Small Boulevard are named after him. Since 1986 there has also been a statue of him in Surfers Paradise.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j} Robert I. Longhurst: Small, Sir Andrew Bruce (1895-1980). Australian Dictionary of Biography, accessed May 9, 2014 . 
2. ↑ engl. Parking meter maid and a synonym for policewoman
3. ↑ Meter Maids. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on June 25, 2007 ; accessed on May 9, 2014 (English). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ↑ Malvern Star Timeline. Archived from the original on July 27, 2008 ; accessed on May 9, 2014 . 
5. ↑ Chipperfield, Mark (September 22, 2002). "Time is running out for Queensland's meter maids". The Telegraph (UK) .