By Rachel Haynie

Errol on the deck of the Strocco at Halvorsen's boatyard in Neutral Bay, N.S.W. He is cradling a hair brush in mock heroics. 1930 Photos taken from The Young Errol Flynn before Hollywood by John Hammond Moore

The dynamic star of rousing '30s and '40s adventures, on screen and off, was born in Hobart, Tasmania, south of the Australian mainland.

Flynn spent his youth in Australia, England, and New Guinea before appearing in his first movie, In The Wake of the Bounty, in 1933.

The years leading up to that break were the ones that most interested Moore as an author. Considering the number of marine-themed movies Flynn ultimately starred in, his father, the distinguished marine biologist/zoologist Prof. Theodore Thomson Flynn, may have been the wind beneath his wings.

Flynn's pranks and curiosity frequently got him in trouble in school, and as Moore found out, he was often expelled.

Flynn was emancipated and, at the tender age of 17, was working as a shipping clerk in Sydney. That was not his thing, and he didn't find himself in New Guinea government service either, so he took off to prospect for gold.

In a last gasp effort to help her son cast off from his troubles, Flynn's mother bought him a yacht. The dashing adventurer, with three friends as crew, sailed the Sirocco to New Guinea. There he tried his hand at overseeing a tobacco plantation and contributed articles to the Sydney Bulletin.

Perhaps just in time, Elsa Chauvel or her film producer husband happened to spot the handsome, athletic Flynn on a Sydney beach. Charles Chauvel offered Flynn the Fletcher Christian part in his film In the Wake of The Bounty , and the Aussie's screen career was launched.