Mary Helen Elizabeth Lidden
- Born
- 1923
- Occupation
- Author, Barrister, Journalist, Lawyer and Solicitor
- Alternative Names
- Appleby, Mary Helen Elizabeth (previous married name)
- Coleman, Mary Helen Elizabeth (birth name)
- Jurisdiction
Mary Helen Elizabeth Lidden (previously Appleby, nee Coleman) deserves credit for helping to increase the public's knowledge and understanding of the law through a series of articles she wrote in the 1970s for The ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓÆµ Women's Weekly, published under the name M.E. Lidden. Mary Coleman, as she was then, graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Arts in 1944. Admitted to the New South Wales Bar on 1 December 1950, the following month she was awarded the degree of Bachelor of Laws. By this time she was a widow - her husband, John Ambrose Mitchell Appleby, a student-at-law, had died on 28 April 1946 - and mother of a five-year-old daughter, Victoria. She did not practise at the Bar and on 24 November 1967 she was admitted as a solicitor; she worked at a number of firms in Sydney. In 1976 she was appointed a legal officer in the Department of Labour and Industry where she remained until 25 August 1978. Lidden was author of a book on wills and probate and co-author of another on conveyancing. She also wrote a novel and a number of self-help books.
Sources used to compile this entry: Coleman, M.E., The Vengeful Guest, Hale & Iremonger, London, 1984; Lidden, M.H.E. and Bohnhoff, Ethel, Conveyancing: can you do it yourself?, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1974; Lidden, M.H.E., Wills and Probate: Can you do it yourself?, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1981; New South Wales Law Almanac for 1952, A. H. Pettifer, Government Printer, Sydney, 1952, p. 73; 1965, p. 105; 1968, p. 133; 1971 p. 140; 1973, pp. 175, 190; 1974, p. 144; 1975, pp. 189, 203; 1976, p. 132; 1977, pp. 178, 193; 1978, pp. 190, 221; 'M. E. Coleman', Austlit, http://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/8268316, accessed online 18 February 2016; 'John Ambrose Mitchell Appleby - Date of Death 28/04/1946, Granted on 27/11/1946', State Records, New South Wales Government, http://search.records.nsw.gov.au/items/688950, accessed online 8 March 2016; 'Legal Notices', The Sydney Morning Herald, Monday 15 July 1946, p. 11.
Prepared by Marina Loane
Created: 25 May 2016, Last modified: 16 August 2016