A lane lined with lemon gum trees, sharply aromatic in the heat of early afternoon, leads to a large neo-classical house with carved pillars and shady verandahs. This is Cruden Farm, home to Dame Elisabeth Murdoch for the last 81 years, and where her four children, including Rupert, the media magnate, enjoyed an idyllic childhood. There were horse and cart picnics, cricket on the grass and fishing outings for Rupert and his father. “Our idea of heaven,” Rupert’s sister, Janet, recalled, “was to get on the bed with our parents in the morning while they had breakfast.”
The house, with its 153 acres on the outskirts of Melbourne, was a wedding gift to the 19-year-old Elisabeth from her 42-year-old husband, the Australian newspaper proprietor Sir Keith Murdoch. He had a large family in mind and it has carried on growing since his death, steered and overseen by Elisabeth, the family matriarch.
In her native Australia, Dame Elisabeth is not seen simply as Rupert Murdoch’s mother. She is regarded as a national treasure who has put in decades of philanthropic work.
I visit on the eve of her 100th birthday. I had assumed the matriarch of this dynasty would be a towering, imperious figure. Instead, I am met by a tiny smiling woman. Despite being frail, she opens the front door herself, leaning with one hand on a walking frame. She doesn’t believe in having staff “to do the things I am still capable of doing myself”, as the artist Judy Cassab discovered when – working on Dame Elisabeth’s portrait – she stayed overnight and was informed that “the rule is breakfast in bed”. She had not expected Dame Elisabeth to cook and deliver it herself.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2009/feb/20/interview-elizabeth-murdoch