Item 6 - Correspondence - Hilda Bridges to Frances Fuller 1958 - 1964

W. E. Fuller was born in Hobart on 26 December 1885. His father was manager of Walch's book department, which W. E. Fuller joined in 1904. He later worked for a short time for Angus & Robertson in Sydney, where he met Frances Ruby Evans, whom he married in 1910. From 1915 to 1918 he served with the A.I.F. and was wounded.
In 1920 he opened his own bookshop (merging briefly with Oldham, Beddome &Meredith between 1930 and 1932). In 1961 after his death Fullers Bookshop moved from 103 Collins Street to Cat & Fiddle Arcade and in 1962 the business was purchased by three employees, Cedric and Ian Pearce and Lindsay Hay, and moved to Murray Street, 1975.
W. E. Fuller was a keen repertory actor, and helped to found and maintain a repertory theatre in Hobart. He was also one of the pioneer broadcasters with the A.B.C. in the 1930s, giving regular talks on books, and also other broadcasts. He wrote plays, short stories and children's stories and published a novel in 1919, "Love, London and Lynette".

Frances Ruby Evans was born in Smithtown, New South Wales. She married William Edwin Fuller on 27 July 1910 in Hobart Tasmania. She died 27 June 1982 in Melbourne Victoria. Mother of Francis Margaret (Fuller) Morse and Mary Agnes (Fuller) Low

Hilda Maggie Bridges (1881-1971), writer, was born in Hobart on 19 October 1881 and educated at Scotch College there. Roy's lifelong companion, housekeeper and amanuensis, she still found time to produce thirteen novels, three children's tales and hundreds of short stories and sketches. Her first novel, Our Neighbours (London, 1922), was a tale of Melbourne suburban families, while her ensuing works were light narratives of mystery and romance set in Victoria or the east coast of Tasmania, the plots frequently depending upon smuggling, hidden treasure, secret caves and unknown identities. The characters are stereotyped, but her prose smooth, with effective, intimate descriptions of interior ornamentation, fashions and small natural scenes. Her main concern is entertainment but in Men Must Live (London, 1938) she touches upon the denudation of land by firewood carters, a matter of considerable personal concern. She died in Hobart on 11 September 1971 and was buried at Sorell. From http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/bridges-hilda-maggie-5637