Book Published by 97 Year Old Beth

Mrs Beth Robertson (nee Wordie) RN RM Ba Dip Soc of Resthaven Malvern (97) – who gained her third tertiary qualification when she was 90 – has published a 50,000 word memoir, Into the Light, which will be available in bookshops in April 2023.

This latest milestone is no surprise to those who know her, with Beth’s tenacity and intelligence well known throughout the home.

Born in October 1926, Beth grew up in Adelaide, although moved around a lot during her early childhood.

Her grandfather, Vaules Wordie, was the son of freed slaves in Jamaica, and spoke against the White Australia Policy in parliament. Beth says, "He was well-known, and greatly loved and respected."

"Being a coloured person in a white world, you know – it was very discriminatory."

The family was very religious, and Beth had great faith as a child, cemented at a camp aged 16. Here, she describes how she realised that her "whole life had been coming to know Jesus as my personal saviour."

Beth started her nursing training at age 18, completing three years at what is now the Royal Adelaide Hospital, before moving to Melbourne to study midwifery.

On her return to Adelaide, she attended Bible College in Payneham, where she gained her Diploma in Theology.

"In 1954, aged 28, I went to Africa, where I worked as a missionary nurse," she says.

"I sometimes worked in clinics way out on the backroads. I remember at one stage walking 30 miles through lion infested terrain to reach someone to help them."

After eight years working as a missionary nurse overseas, Beth was forced to return home following a bout of Hepatitis A.

"By then, my mother was in her 80s and I felt like I should stay in Australia," she says.

"I wondered what to do. A friend was doing social work, and I thought, 'I could do that.'"

Beth studied for three years, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts and a Diploma of Social Studies.

She would go on to become Head Social Worker at The Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

She met her husband, Albert, aged 46: "He was by way of being an agnostic, and I was by way of being a Bible basher, so of course we didn’t know where to get married," she says, "So we had a beautiful garden wedding!"

"We had 45 years together before he died in 2019."

On her retirement aged 56, Beth played bowls, tennis and golf, however, she felt "at a bit of a loose end."

It was one day at church that Beth, who’d seen a pamphlet for Tabor College, mentioned that she would like to enrol, however, thought she was "too old for that."

Her church community weren’t having it, however, and encouraged her to enrol.

So it was that, aged 88, she enrolled in a Diploma of Arts at Tabor College. 

It was here that Beth had the idea to publish her life story: "We had writing exercises to do, and I had a lot to write about my life, and it just kind of grew from that," she says.

With the book now published – available in regular and large-print versions for the vision impaired – Beth says that she "has been helped by God and many people."

"I feel that when I gave my life to Jesus Christ, He enabled me," she explains.

Beth’s book, Into the Light, will be available in bookstores in April 2023, or can be purchased from Resthaven Malvern reception prior to this.

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