He considered the civil service monotonous, and in 1880 left to work for his older brother George Brookman, a land agent and general merchant.

[2] After the collapse of his company, Brookman and a schoolmate, Charles De Rose, went to the Glen Taggart goldfields (near Mount Burr).

Brookman convinced his brother to form a syndicate to finance a prospecting party, and in June 1893 he and Pearce set off for Western Australia.

Their camp's population swelled in size as they began to hire other prospectors to assist them, and over the next few years grew into a town, which was named Boulder.

[2] Later in the year, Brookman was also elected Mayor of Perth, defeating two other candidates (Timothy Quinlan and Thomas Molloy) by a large margin.

[8] Brookman's status as a political outsider helped secure his victory in the mayoral race, but once in office it proved to be a disadvantage.

He suffered heavy losses in a stock-market collapse and also lost several directorships due to unexplained absences, finally losing much of his remaining wealth in a failed venture to build a smelting plant at South Fremantle.