By Jacqui Lang
These days, Sydney pathologist and father-of-three Ivan Burchett is no celebrity — but he certainly was half a century ago.
Throughout 1958, Ivan starred in
Woman's Day more often than Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Hawkins do today.
Back then, readers lapped up details of Ivan's eating habits, his moods, even the state of his teeth.
"Everyone recognised Ivan — and me," beams his mother Jenny Riegels, 74. "Strangers would stop me in the street and say, 'How is he?'"
"I'll take Mum's word for it — I don't remember anything of this, of course," says Ivan, grinning a trifle sheepishly.
Good timing
So why was he so famous? Ivan was anointed
Woman's Day Baby of the Year, after Jenny won a contest for expectant mums, held by the magazine in conjunction with Sydney's Royal North Shore Hospital.
"The Baby of the Year title was to go to the baby born closest to New Year's Day, and that was Ivan, born that very day," Jenny explains.
As a result, pictures and articles of Jenny, then 24, and her tiny son featured regularly in the magazine for the entire year. Readers were enthralled as
Woman's Day updated them on Ivan's first tooth, his weight and his nappy habits.
"The purpose behind it was to educate young mums in the bush, who couldn't get to a hospital or see a paediatrician, on how to care for their babies," says Jenny, an artist.
"In the end, the attention became almost too much for me. If I caught a train, people would come up to me and say, 'How's little Ivan?' or give me advice about how to care for him. People were so kind, and so curious. Sometimes I'd go out wearing a scarf and dark glasses so as not to be recognised!"
At her cliff-top home in Sydney's northern beaches, she shows Ivan, his wife Jacky, 48, and their bemused teenage children Isobel, 17, Jake, 16, and Alex, 14, her carefully preserved collection of
Woman's Day 1958 issues, with numerous features on wee Ivan.
"These are pretty funny. Gee Dad, you had a rash," giggles Alex, holding up an aged
Woman's Day.
Isobel teases, "Look at this headline ... 'Ivan's upset.' Wow!"
"Every couple of weeks, throughout 1958, the magazine would send its reporter, Helen Gordon, to come to my house with a photographer called Wal who loved Ivan, he was just gorgeous," Jenny recalls.
"They'd arrive in one car, and another chauffeur-driven vehicle would take me and Ivan to the hospital, where we would visit the paediatrician, Dr Clair Isbister. There Ivan would be weighed and measured and all his little problems discussed, which would be written up by Helen Gordon. This was much more than every mother could expect. Ivan and I were very fortunate. "
Sweet deal
With the sudden fame came a few perks.
"I was given more baby food and milk supplements then I knew what to do with," Jenny says. "I was also told that I could have whatever I wanted from sponsor London Baby Carriage in the city. But I was too shy to even go in the store. In it, there were enormous posters of me and Ivan!
"Amazingly, for 20 years after Ivan and I featured in the magazine, people would still stop me in the street and ask me about his welfare. It was really quite incredible. The interest was huge."
"When I was at school, I didn't like to bring the fact that I was Baby of the Year to anyone's attention," Ivan says.
"I found it all pretty embarrassing when a kid would say to me, 'My mum said to ask, are you the Ivan Burchett from
Woman's Day?'"
50 years on
So what kind of a person did our Baby of the Year grow up to be?
"He's always been a wonderful son!" Jenny says.
Jacky, who met him when she was just 16, adds, "He's a really good person — well-balanced in the way he divides his time between work, family and his sports interests."
"I was smitten with Jacky from the day I met her when I was 18 — it was at my sister Ingrid's 16th birthday party," Ivan recalls.
The couple married in October 1983, and Ivan studied medicine at Sydney University, then pathology.
"Now, my focus is cancer diagnosis at Douglass Hanly Moir Pathology [in Sydney]," he says. "My work is very important to me but I'm very much a family man, too. Whenever I can spare the time, I love cycling, running, swimming and sailing."
Mum's story
As for Jenny, who was 24 when she had Ivan and starred in
Woman's Day, "I had three other children after Ivan to my then lawyer-husband Jim — Ingrid, who's now 48, Simon, 46, and Karen, 44.
"Then, many years ago, Jim — who went on to become a judge — and I divorced, though we remain on good terms. In 1972 I married my second husband, Basil, and we moved up to this home. We then had a daughter together, Gem, now 34."
Jenny now travels regularly to Vanuatu's Aneityum Island, teaching the locals art, which is then sold to raise funds for the community.
"As the people are very poor, we try to give them clothes, boots for mill workers — many of whom are badly injuring their bare feet, school and medical supplies," Jenny explains. "I'm desperately looking for encyclopaedias right now!
"Everything now seems a lifetime away from when Ivan and I appeared in
Woman's Day throughout 1958. By the end of 1958, in which time Ivan was walking, I was ready to slip back into anonymity. After that, the magazine had a new family to follow, in its new fictional series The Middletons!
"Still I'm sure some of your older readers will be interested to read this update about little Ivan and his mother," she adds with a smile. "I've certainly enjoyed this trip down memory lane."
If you'd like to donate goods for Jenny to take to Aneityum Island, you can email her at alcie@iinet.net.au
Return to the Woman's Day 1950s page 
