Jan Heaslip

Jan Heaslip died in early November 2026, aged 87. Tributes to her were broadcast on ABC's NT Country Hour on Tuesday 3 November 2026, and ABC Rural published a report of her death shortly afterwards. The exact date, place and cause of death were not made public.

Liz Bird, a Centralian pastoralist and life member of the NT ICPA, remembered her as a wonderful mentor who was always available for advice. In a statement her family said that while she would be remembered for her work across the region, most of all she was "our mum, grandmother, and great-grandmother", adding: "We are bereft but thankful for the shining light she was." She is survived by her four children and their families. Funeral arrangements had not been published at the time of writing.

Jan Heaslip grew up in Orroroo, a farming town in the Mid North of South Australia, in what she later described as a conservative family. At 18 she left home for Alice Springs to work for the stock and station agents Elder Smith Goldsbrough Mort, and then took a job as a governess on remote Hamilton Downs station, falling in love with the Red Centre from the day she arrived.

She returned to South Australia to marry her childhood sweetheart, Grant Heaslip, in 1961, on the understanding that they would one day go back to Central Australia. The newlyweds honeymooned on a road trip from Adelaide in a Volkswagen Beetle, sleeping in swags and inspecting stations along the way. They worked on Grant's family property until 1964.

In 1964 the Heaslips bought Bond Springs, about 20 kilometres north of Alice Springs, a pioneering station first settled in the 1870s and owned from 1910 by the cattle king Sir Sidney Kidman. They arrived at the start of 1965 with three young children on a mattress in the back of a station wagon, in the middle of what became a ten year drought. Working side by side, they built up a Poll Hereford herd and helped develop the Centralian Beef Breeders Association. At times Jan catered for up to 30 staff, and from 1988 she welcomed paying guests, opening the historic homestead and Kidman era outbuildings to visitors. The family's work preserving the old buildings earned a National Trust award, and she created a small museum in one of them.

Her advocacy for remote education was sparked in 1975, when a homesick telegram from her daughter Tanya at boarding school in Adelaide was read out over the Royal Flying Doctor Service radio network. She became a founding member and the inaugural president of the Northern Territory branch of the Isolated Children's Parents' Association, which united its separate Territory branches in 1981 ahead of hosting the federal conference in 1982. She was later a life member and patron.

She had been involved with St Philip's College in Alice Springs since 1974, when it was a residential hostel for students from the bush. As the first chair of its college council she hired Chris Tudor, headmaster from 1986 to 2016, and together they turned it into a full day and boarding school in 1989, so that Centralian children did not have to travel so far for secondary education. She remained a life governor. She also chaired the School of the Air Parents' Association for many years, sat on many education boards and was an honorary fellow of the Association of Independent Schools.

Jan and Grant Heaslip had four children: Tanya, a lawyer and the author of memoirs about growing up on Bond Springs, M'Lis, a teacher in Alice Springs, Brett, who runs the family property Witchitie north of Orroroo, and Ben, who lives on Bond Springs. Grant, the inaugural president of the NT Cattlemen's Association, predeceased her; the NT Legislative Assembly paid tribute to him in March 2019. In later life she divided her time between Alice Springs and the Bond Springs homestead and described her proudest achievement as watching the accomplishments of her children, eight grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Jan Heaslip was one of the generation of station parents who turned the problem of schooling for children in the outback into lasting institutions. The NT branch of the Isolated Children's Parents' Association continues to lobby for equity in education for rural and remote families, and St Philip's College, which she helped build from a hostel into a day and boarding school, remains a leading school in Central Australia. Her recognition included the Medal of the Order of Australia in 1992, the Zonta Club of Alice Springs Woman of Achievement award and a Rotary Paul Harris Fellowship. Bond Springs, which she and Grant preserved, continues to operate as a family cattle station and visitor destination.