June Marie Dally-Watkins was an Australian businesswoman and fashion model, recognised as an entrepreneur. In 1950 she started a personal development school in Sydney to train young women in etiquette and deportment. A year later, she started Australia's first model agency and modelling school and later established a Business Finishing College. She was later a public proponent of etiquette and elocution, and frequently commented on those topics in the media. In 1993, Dally-Watkins received an Order of Australia for her contribution to business. She was featured on the popular Australian television show Bogan Hunters on 7mate in 2014, where she provided information relating to etiquette to the winners of the series. In 2019, she was teaching etiquette to women in China.
Early life
Dally-Watkins was born in Sydney in June 1927 with the birth name June Skewes. Her mother, Caroline May Skewes, came from a family of farmers in the village of Watsons Creek, close to Tamworth, New South Wales. Her father, whom she did not meet until later in life, was a businessman named Bob Monkton, who had met Skewes while on a rabbit-hunting expedition in Watsons Creek. Former army captain and wine salesman David Dally-Watkins married her mother and adopted her in 1940, after which she assumed his name, becoming June Dally-Watkins. The family moved to Sydney in 1940, where Dally-Watkins attended the Willoughby Girls High School, but Caroline's marriage to David was short-lived, and she and Dally-Watkins returned to live in Tamworth in 1942 amidst threat of a Japanese invasion of Australia.
Career
In 1944 Tamworth-based photographer Jan Solomons performed a photoshoot with Dally-Watkins, after which he suggested to her mother that her appearance could lead her to a career in modelling. Acting on this advice, the pair moved back to Sydney, where Dally-Watkins was appointed to a modelling job at Farmers & Co Department Store,. Dally-Watkins later described her appearance in the 1940s as resembling that of a milkmaid, but her success grew through the decade and in 1949 she won the Australian Model of the Year award. In 1950, after a visit to New York City to research the latest developments in fashion, Dally-Watkins founded a school of deportment and etiquette. She then went on to start her own modelling agency, as well as a business college. In later life, Dally-Watkins expanded her etiquette coaching to China, establishing a programme called Look of Success in collaboration with a Chinese partner. The programme ran a series of courses, using venues such as luxury hotels.
