Mike Munro developing The Last Bushrangers for History channel

TEN’s Mike Munro is developing a documentary series for the History Channel, based upon Australian bushrangers and their descendants.

Driven by his interest in Patrick and James Kenniff, the working title is The Last Bushrangers.

“They were two guys who killed policeman and a station manager up around Roma, Mitchells, Springsure, Toowoomba, at the turn of the 20th Century. The older brother of the was hanged in Boggo Road in 1903 and he was the first man hanged on the word of a black man, a black tracker. So there are all these racial overtones,” he says.

Munro’s interest in the story stems back a long way after learning he has family connections to the Kenniffs.

“They were my second cousins, and I never knew this until I was in my 30s. Mum would always say ‘You’re only from a family of murderers and bushrangers anyway!’ And I never knew what she was talking about. I was 8, 12, 15! I never knew until my father sat me down in my late 20s or 30s working on 60 Minutes and regularly going to Europe and I could find where the family came from.”

Munro is developing the series with Eyeworks after attracting the interest of the History Channel.

“The History Channel said ‘We love it, and whatsmore do a series on it!’

“So we’re now looking at a series on the descendants of bushrangers.”