Mrs Bowen has achieved a lot of things in her life, but one thing she really loves to do is use the power of the pen to promote local sport and local people. 

When you read polocrosse results, pony club results or show results – often they are written by this long term local resident who has been very involved in all the organisations mentioned. 

Mrs Bowen is an Aberdeen lady who is well known for her contribution to the local communities of Aberdeen, Scone and Muswellbrook. 

While her involvement has been largely centered around horses, the busy mother and grandmother has also spread her goodwill through other avenues in her local community. 

Although she has now fully retired from the workforce, the fit and focused woman is still very involved in horse sports, tennis and babysits her grandchildren every week, which keeps her healthy and  proactive.

Mrs Bowen loves the Upper Hunter and she loves being able to help, something that she has always felt since growing up in the small rural community near Denman. 

She was born at Muswellbrook District Hospital and the newborn was taken home to Baerami Creek, where her father worked on a property and they lived in the Old Baerami Homestead until she was five-years-old. 

Her father then changed jobs to a dairy farm at Dalswinton, near Denman, so they moved and Mrs Bowen started school at Denman Public School. 

Being the eldest of four – she had two sisters and a brother – it was a young Carol that helped her dad on the farm a lot, which clearly instilled a work ethic that was to guide her in later years. 

Secondary school was at Muswellbrook High School until year 10 when she was preparing to sit for the school certificate examinations and the opportunity arose for Mrs Bowen to sit for the public service examination.

After topping the exam in the local area, she was offered a job at the Denman telephone exchange, which she accepted and worked as a telephonist.

Carol had just turned 16, which meant she had to acquire a special licence to drive to and from work, due to her shift work schedule of day, afternoon and split shifts. 

Shift work kept Mrs Bowen busy from 1966 to 1972, but not too busy as during that time she met her future husband, Peter Bowen – a young local man from Muswellbrook, which Mrs Bowen said made it very interesting when the football season came around as she was a Denman Devils fan and Peter a Muswellbrook Rams player. 

The couple married in April 1972 and moved together onto Mr Bowen’s grandparents’ farm at Dartbrook. 

Mrs Bowen transferred to the Muswellbrook Post Office and Mr Bowen was working as a linotype compositor at the Muswellbrook Chronicle. 

The farm was leased by Kia Ora at the time, so the couple were able to continue their busy working careers and simply take general care of the place. 

After about 18 months they moved into Aberdeen, first to Moray Street and then to their home in Campbell Street, which was later to become the site of training racehorses. 

Apart from time taken off to have their three children – two sons and a daughter – Mrs Bowen worked at the post office until 1984 when the system changed to automatic, and being a casual employee she decided to finish up. 

Some time later Mrs Bowen was approached with a new challenge when she was asked to become an integrated aid for students with learning difficulties.

Never one to shy away from a task, Mrs Bowen accepted and worked in the role at St James Primary School at Muswellbrook from 1986 to 1990.

She said she really enjoyed the role and finding ways to help the children learn. 

During this time Mrs Bowen was also the canteen treasurer at the school, which filled in her weeks at a place she loved being involved with.

Mr Bowen was a thoroughbred race starter for the local race clubs and the couple had started pre-training for Max Lees and a few others prior to Carol applying for her own licence in 1986.

She was successful and became only the second woman trainer in the local area, with the first being Scone’s Betty Shepherd. 

The Bowens worked together training for many years, preparing the horses with slow work at home before taking them to Muswellbrook and Scone for their full on training. 

Danny Burns, who was sadly killed in Tamworth in 1991, rode for the Bowens and they trained many sprinters for people like their good friend Hilton Cope, and other local clients and Sydney owners. 

Although Mrs Bowen says Peter was the brains and she was the worker, the duo had a special bond and work ethic that brought them great success throughout the years. 

From 1986 to about 2007 they trained quite a few horses including a couple of Sydney winners such as ‘Rare Excellence’ and ‘Ricketty Nick’ who both won at Canterbury.

Mrs Bowen said the business just kept growing so they were pretty busy with up to six horses at a time and with Peter still working as well, the kids often had to help out. 

“It was good though as we mostly always got a winner out of each one we trained,” she said. 

Surprisingly only one of their children has the passion for horses, their youngest - daughter Linda who has played polocrosse since she was six-years-old and was very involved in pony club as a youngster. 

As many parents do, Mrs Bowen became very involved in the sports being the Muswellbrook Pony Club canteen volunteer, publicity officer, announcer and general helper from when Linda was six through to when she was about 21.

Her involvement with the Muswellbrook Polocrosse Club started a long time ago and she has held the roles of canteen coordinator, secretary/treas urer for numerous years including when she played   herself in 1971 and 1972, and she is still involved only recently handing over the club publicity officer duties.

Each year Mrs Bowen coordinates the NSW and Queensland competition at the Upper Hunter Show, as well as being involved in organising other facets of the show, such as pencilling in ring one for the past 20 years.   

On the weekend, Mrs Bowen was again witnessed out there doing her bit at the Aberdeen Bushman’s Campdraft where she organises and runs the ring two at the event. 

She first started organising the second ring in 1992 and is still doing it, which earned her recognition as a life member of the association in recent years. 

Mrs Bowen was also the treasurer of the committee from 2001 to 2010 and writes the publicity for ring two, which she said she has a great love for.

Mrs Bowen’s sons, Michael and Darryl, played soccer and rugby league and Darryl (aka Carrot Bowen) is still very involved in the local Aberdeen Rugby League Club as a life member. 

When she’s not busy on the road, Mrs Bowen still finds time to dedicate to her church, St Thomas’ Catholic Church in Aberdeen where she has been playing the organ for services since 1987 and is generally involved as a parishioner of the church.

Since retiring she has enjoyed volunteering at St Joseph’s High School Aberdeen with learning programs, and she still enjoys sport herself playing tennis all year round, and breeding numerous chooks. 

After living in Aberdeen for the past 43 and a half years Mrs Bowen said she absolutely loves it and wouldn’t change a thing. 

“I love living in Aberdeen, it’s good here and although we’ve been very busy we have been able to achieve a bit,” Mrs Bowen said. 

She said she has enjoyed all of her work in the community, as she gets great satisfaction out of being a part of things and             helping out.