[1] He presided over an era of controversy that included the setting up of the Racing Development Fund, ministerial re-zonings and the licensing of Jupiters Casino.

Russell James Hinze was born on 19 June 1919 in Oxenford on the Gold Coast of Queensland to a German father and an Australian mother.

In 1966, Hinze entered the State political arena as the member for South Coast, representing the then Country Party.

However, before the case could go to trial, he died from bowel cancer on 29 June 1991, at the Allamanda Private Hospital in Southport, aged 72.

[6] After his death, Queensland Deputy Premier Tom Burns remembered him in parliament with the following anecdote: "The best cartoon of him was the one that showed him as a bulldog.