Mary Ward (actress)

Mary Ward Breheny credited professionally as Mary Ward, is an Australian actress, with a career spanning the latter half of the 20th century in radio, stage, television and film. Trained in Australia and England, Ward became one of the first female radio announcers at the ABC in Australia. She is perhaps best known for two notable roles in Australian television garden loving inmate Mum Brooks in the cult series Prisoner, and Dee Morrell in soap opera Sons and Daughters. In both roles, Ward played an elderly matriarch character.

Ward was born as to a pearler in Fremantle, Western Australia in 1915. Ward began acting professionally shortly after leaving high school and later studied at the Perth drama school. She also studied in England performing as a stage actress for several years, she worked in Britain in film and repertory stage theatre before returning to Australia prior to World War II, when she became one of the first female radio announcers for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation during the war as The Forces Sweetheart. She returned to the English stage and, in 1948 acted in parts for the British Broadcasting Corporation including a cameo role in the Chips Rafferty film Eureka Stockade.

Source: Wikipedia