CITY OF ADELAIDE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT INTERVIEW WITH PETER GRIFFIN FORMER TRAFFIC & HEALTH INSPECTOR Conducted by KAREN WALTER 27 May 1994 Volume 1 of 2 AIA_KW\FPMS37.cwt ii TABLE OF CONTENTS CITY OF ADELAIDE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT iii BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE iv PHOTOGRAPH v PHOTOGRAPH vi TRANSCRIPT Volume 1 - TAPE 1 (27 May 1994) 1 TAPE 2 (27 May 1994) 16 TAPE 3 (3 June 1994) 36 TAPE 4 (3 June 1994) 53 Volume 2 TAPE 5 (10 June 1994) 71 TAPE 6 (10 June 1994) 88 TAPE 7 (10 June 1994) 104 Additional note 105 INDEX AlA KW\FPMS37.cwt iii THE CITY OF ADELAIDE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT As part of its concern to preserve evidence of Adelaide's past in celebrating the Jubilee 150 in South Australia in 1986, the national Bicentennial in 1988, and its own 150th Anniversary in 1990, the Adelaide City Council established an Oral History Project. The Project continues to provide a record of the past which complements the written records relating to the history of both the Council and the City generally. Recognising the loss of many people who had personal experience of important events in Adelaide's past and the increasing use of oral history as a legitimate source of historical information, the Council sought in 1984 to establish an Oral History Project on a firm basis, and engaged an Oral Historian to carry out interviews with notable former Members and staff, and other citizens. This interview forms part of the Project. Copyright in the tape and transcripts is shared by the Council and the interviewee for the duration of the interviewee's life, and vests wholly in the Council on the interviewee's death. Access to tapes and transcripts for either research or public use is governed by any restrictions imposed by the interviewee during his or her lifetime and subsequently by the Council. AIA_KW\FPMS37.cwt iv BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE PETER TILLOTSON GRIFFIN was born on 18 March 1925 at Strathalbyn. He attended Strathalbyn Primary School and High School before his family moved to Ashford in Adelaide when Peter was aged fourteen. He finished his schooling at Adelaide High School. In 1942 Peter enlisted in the Royal Australian Navy serving as a coder, in New Guinea and in the Pacific area. After his discharge Peter held various labouring positions before taking a job as Traffic Inspector with the Adelaide City Council in September 1950. He was one of the first Inspector~s to use a motorcyle. In 1957 Peter took on the additional role of Inspector of Weights and Measures. During his employment as Traffic Inspector Peter studied part-time at the School of Mines to gain qualifications in Health Inspection. In 1957 he left the Adelaide City Council to take on the position of Health Inspector with the Unley Council. In June 1958 he returned to work with the Adelaide City Council as Health Inspector. He was initially assigned to work in Grey Ward, then Young Ward and finally in the City Wards. In 1974 Peter was appointed Inspector of Restuarants. In 1985 he was promoted to the position of Principal Health Surveyor, retiring in 1990 after 38 years of service with the Council. The interview deals with Peter~s childhood, growing up and war service. It then focuses on his experiences as Traffic and then Health Inspector. In his many years on the streets of Adelaide Peter witnessed great changes. He discusses in detail the many and varied aspects of his work as a Health Inspector. As Principal Health Surveyor Peter was responsible for establishing control programmes for pigeons and European wasps. He also established a fully equipped Health Services Laboratory. AIA_KW\FPMS37.cwt v Peter Griffin as Health Inspector, 1980s. AIA_KW\FPMS37.cwt vi Peter Griffin among the pigeons, 1988. AIA_KW\FPMS37.cwt FIRST INTERVIEW WITH FORMER TRAFFIC & HEALTH INSPECTOR, MR. PETER GRIFFIN RECORDED BY KAREN WALTER AT MR. GRIFFIN'S HOME IN BARROW CRESCENT, LOCKLEYS ON 27 MAY 1994. O.H.: On behalf of the Council, I would first like to thank you for agreeing to be involved in this project and for agreeing to our conditions with regard to copyright and access. P.G.: Oh, thank you. O.H. : So we'll start by having your full name. P.G.: Peter Tillotson Griffin. O.H. : And when were you born? P .G.: I was born on the 18th of March, 1925. O.H. : And where? P .G.: At Strathalbyn, South Australia. O.H. : And your parents had been living there for a while? P.G.: Yes, my father had been living in Strathalbyn all of his life, my mother came from Castlemaine in Victoria, and for a short period of time my father went to Broken Hill and worked on the mines and he met my mother at Broken Hill. She was a barmaid in the Southern Cross Hotel at Broken Hill and they married soon after they met and they had their first child in Broken Hill and following that my father came back to South Australia and took up farming from his father at Strathalbyn. O.H. : What were your parents' names? P .G. : Charles Thomas Griffin and Ethel Esther Tillotson. O.H. : And where were you placed in amongst the boys? P.G.: I was number four. O.H. : There were five boys, weren't there? P.G.: Five boys yes. There was, Ken was the eldest, Charles, Colin, myself and then Donald. O.H. : So what kind of farm did your father have then? P.G.: We had a poverty stricken farm (laughs). We had lots of food but very little cash flow. It was about two hundred and seventy acres at Strathalbyn and about half of that was only good for sheep and the rest our father used to grow wheat there but sometimes peas, oats and with late rains he'd often have failures with the wheat crop. O.H. : WaS he affected much during the Depression? MS37.CWT 2 P.G.: Yes, I remember my father holding up a cheque for forty dollars, five shillings - forty pound, five shillings, I'll correct that ­ and that was from the local flour mill and he waited six months for that and that was the only cash flow we had for that year. O.H.: How did you manage? P.G.: Well, we had lots of food, mother had turkeys and fowls and father used to kill a sheep occasionally and there was vegetables grown on the farm. We never went without food, mother was an excellent cook and the five of us are still alive and we're all pretty healthy. D.H.: Did your mother work during that time when you were a boy? P.G.: No, no such thing as work, no, housework, farmwork, washing in an old copper with troughs and hand wringers, I think the hand wringer was a luxury, and when the road came through from Macclesfield, they tarred it, my father recovered some of the tar drums and beat them out and built a bathroom and that bathroom is still in existence on the farm at Strathalbyn, because of course the metal was heavily coated with tar and it's still there to this day. D.H.: So that was down the back was it? P.G.: Yes, that was in the back verandah. D.H.: What are your memories of growing up on a farm as a boy? P.G.: Well, I remember getting attacked by the rooster and I remember Jerry the bull getting loose in the farmyard and Darkie the horse charging across the paddocks and killing himself by falling into this twenty foot high creek. I remember walking to the Strathalbyn Primary School. I remember my brothers in particular catching possums, that would have been during the Depression, selling the skins. I remember my mother in what we called the dairy, a dug out dairy, with newspapers tied around her legs to stop these biting flies that were very prevalent, and I remember when my brother Charlie cut one of his fingers off climbing a tree. (laughs) D.H.: How did he do that? P.G.: Dh, Charlie was climbing a tree and for some reason he was swinging a tomahawk at the same time, probably trying to cut a branch off and I remember Charlie with his pony, and to this day although he's eighty years old, he loves horses and he's actually bought a racehorse recently (laughs) so he expects to live a lot longer. D.H.: Did you have chores that you had to do as a boy? P.G.: Yes, one of my chores was picking up the eggs and the fowls roamed free and they laid most of their eggs in the geranium hedges about the place, and I would collect the eggs and so many fowls so many eggs, I'd get half way around the geraniums and I'd have enough and when the fowls weren't laying so well, I'd go the extra distance and bring back mostly rotten eggs (laughs). Mother would roll them around on the table and sort out the good ones. I remember being bathed in front of the wood stove with, in the big tubs that we used in the laundry. Dh laundry says I, on MS37.CWT 3 the back verandah, and that happened about once a week. I remember cooking mushrooms on the wood stove under a little pat of butter and I remember the sparrows which used to get into the thatched farm outbuildings.