Opening the door on Charles Sturt
Stories of local life by local people
Copyright ©2013 City of Charles Sturt and individual authors. The stories contained in this publication are the works of the individual authors. Views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the City of Charles Sturt.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system or transmitted, in any form of by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without prior permission of the copyright owners. Request for permission should be addressed to: City of Charles Sturt 72 Woodville Road Woodville SA 5011 Australia T: 08 8408 1111 E: [email protected] Foreword
Charles Sturt is a vibrant and story filled City with so many amazing stories to share and celebrate. Each story reveals a little more about the people who call this City home and how our community has lived over time. The challenge to tap into these stories provided an exciting opportunity for our community to learn the skills of story-telling to share ideas and inspire each other toward building an ongoing and sustainable story resource for both now and into the future.
The ‘National Year of Reading’ encouraged Australia to focus on and to facilitate a love of reading and stories throughout the community prompting the local concept of the ‘Writers Workshop’ program.
Here members of the Charles Sturt community fostered their writing skills with the assistance of local author Tom Mann to ‘Open the Door on Charles Sturt’ where stories of their lives and experiences in and around our community were uncovered and collected together forming this collection of short stories.
2 Contents
Goings On In Our Street by Trish Cook 4
Childhood Memories by Maureen Scott (nee Conroy) 11
Family Days At Queenstown by Diana Diprose 27
Hunting: beast to beaut by Aruna Manuelrayan 35
High School Daze by Joanna Burns 44
Memoirs from the Grange by Rose Boucaut 51
Losing Voice, Finding Place: Flinders Park Primary School - 1968 by Melanie Meneaud 65
At the Crossroads (My Journey: A story of early days) Brian E Harfield 69
The House That Bup Built by Lisa Boothey 87
A Beach Memoir: in Poetry & Prose by John Malone 94
Where does your lap go when you stand up? by Rosslyn Werner 100
Finding Charlie by Katrina Macdonald 111
3 Goings On In Our Street Trish Cook
Our home is the centre of our universe, from humble beginnings as a paddock on a dairy farm; Oval Avenue has evolved over the years to become what it is today. A wide open street filled with wonderful people, well kept homes, sporting amenities, playgrounds, kindy, a garage, toyboy factory, dog oval, gum trees, open spaces and no shops! There is no trace of the shop next door, where so many locals and the likes have gathered over the years with their stories and tales. Yes, the area was quite different.
Around 1932 ‘Gopher John’ recalls his very first job. Brrring, brrring, brrring, echoed through the house. “Hello, yes… um… I see, right…hold on” his mother spoke to the operator at the exchange before the call was put through to their home phone. They’d had a telephone in Windsor Ave, dad being a builder; they simply had the phone transferred to their new home. The phone number remained the same, 221! When Mrs Arcus’s sister rang “Please let my sister know I won’t make it for lunch she’s expecting me at noon today”, John would deliver the message. They were the first family in the area to have a telephone. John, a young lad of about 9-years-old, would run past several vacant blocks, to the neighbour. There weren’t very many neighbours and everyone knew each other. Their home (Number 30) was the large home with the balcony. It now overlooks the tennis courts in Oval Avenue and is on the market to be sold. One can only wonder what new sagas await the old house in our street.
Next door to one side (Number 28) Sharps lived: young Doug, his parents and grandfather. The other side neighbours were much further down the road — Nichol’s dairy with the home at the corner of Oval and Fife streets. The surrounding “Glen” Streets existed, more paddocks, almond trees and chicken farms than homes, and they didn’t extend through to Findon Road as they do today. On the corner facing into Cedar Ave, where the big old white house is today, the Kotz family had the first wireless in the area. There weren’t many broadcasts, however, when they could tune in, it was a wonderful opportunity to socialise. John recalls “the children were given milk with sugar to drink. We were delighted; however, Mum would not allow us to have this at home.”
4 The Oval land was acquired by the council as part of a major sub division to diminish the number of dairy farms in the area. The ‘new end’ of Oval Avenue near the bend was opened up following World War II, with blocks being sold for one hundred and eighty pounds. Buyers were encouraged to build stone or brick homes. There were predominately two builders of the homes in Oval Avenue, one specialised in bungalow, the other in Tudor homes. Walking along the street, there are still quite a few of these homes today.
The Oval itself was used for several years by the Messengers as a training track for trotting horses and cycle races around the boundary, before the Oval was turfed in 1923. Cricket, bowling greens, tennis and croquet clubs had already been formed.
Our street had two general stores, the first of which was on the corner of Oval and Cedar avenues, Thieles Shop, along with Goldsworthy’s butcher shop on the other side of the road. Frank recalls “The cold room was made of Baltic pine flooring, walls and ceiling filled with sawdust. That dusty, woody smell hit your nostrils the minute you pushed open the glass door. Glancing at the floor was a thick layer of fresh sawdust with chunks of carcass fat and dark splattering of soaked-up carcass blood scattered in close perimeter to the meat saw. ‘Howdy,’ you’d yell out a greeting over the loud grinding of bones as they glided through the meat saw.” What remains of the butcher shop today is heritage listed.
Just passed the bend, the Hutton family owned the shop on the corner of Glenlossie Street. Everyone knew the Huttons; they lived in the area for many years. Their daughter delivered the groceries by pushbike, and their son worked in the store until he enlisted. Customers would gather, sharing news and stories of the War, then the Depression. They helped each other with coupons from the rationing books and discussed different ways of overcoming shortages. Items like butter, sugar and cotton fabric were rationed; however, curtain material wasn’t, so you’d make do with that for making men and boys shirts.
Huttons moved from behind the counter of the corner shop business and began collecting rent from the shop keepers. Shopkeepers’ hours were long and hard. A variety of shopkeepers of different nationalities and ages came and went over the years.
5 Shirl lived two doors away and recalls “One of the boys was having a birthday party and I went in to buy ice cream, neither the father nor the son would serve me. Apparently I didn’t give them enough business. Fortunately my friend Viola saved the day buying it for me.”
Another neighbour, Mr Harris laughs, “When the shop stock was sold” lock stock and barrel, the shop keeper at the time, decided to re fill the empty soda water bottles himself with tap water, instead of returning them to the manufacturer to be refilled before they were sold. The new owners had quite a few disgruntled customers return with their flat soda bottles.
Helene and Peter first rented the grocery section of the shop in the Sixties, after it had been remodelled. The site consisted of a very small flat at the back of the property, the house and three shops, groceries, deli and Dry Cleaner. In a few years they purchased the property from Hutton’s and continued to work in the main shop selling soft drinks, ice creams and sweets amongst other items. One of their regular customers, Mrs Bugg, lived in 46B. She operated a catering business from the garage on the property selling sandwiches and pastries. Other neighbours certainly remembered the mouth watering aromas from the shed. It was a very popular business. Jenny also had a popular son — he became the first Humphrey B Bear in Adelaide. The next house along on the corner of Gleneira Street also operated a business from the home backyard. Beacon strollers were not only excellent quality, the business served as a local landmark; there was a replica of a lighthouse beacon out the front of the home! “Look out for the beacon and then turn at the next street!”
Football finally arrived, standing freezing cold on the footy mound at the far side of the ground; one could see large cement arches painted navy blue with “Oval Deli” boldly painted in white.
During winter Saturdays afternoons, The Oval Deli did a terrific trade with white knights, violet crumbles, Polly waffles, a huge array of sweets and Balfours pies and pasties if you had that much money to spend.
As teenager we were amongst the crowd screaming and yelling as goals were scored or sitters were missed. “Sheppard! Sheppard!” “Holding the man.”
6 “What…you’ve got to be joking ump.” You’d hear it all, with odd mild swear words, you’d hear great one-liners that cracked up the nearby crowd. And see the occasional brawl when tempers flared a little. No major dramas. The police loved being on duty at the games. What other job paid you to watch the local side, chat with supporters and paid you penalty rates?
The surrounding streets were lined with Holdens, Morris Minors, Vauxhalls and the likes as patrons flocked to the games to support the Peckers, along with the opposition’s supporters. Real locals walked. We’d cram into the old Morris Minor sitting on each other’s lap laughing in hysterics as we’d be sliding all over each other as we rounded the street corners. A leg or thigh or shoulder would be shoved out the way to change gears, four on the floor or column gears in the FJ. This was our very tame Puberty Blues era. Manly Dave & his boyish mate Scotty amongst us school girlfriends. Scotty was the loveable larrikin every one took the mickey out of. That cautious, questioning side way glance, as Scotty sometimes needed more reassurance that those harmless set ups could just be dinky di. He then explodes into fits of laughter. “Gee, how gullible, sucked in again. Boy.” Flatmate stories of the guys and their mates, tales that had us all in fits of laugher. Who was it that put a padlock on the fridge so his food and drinks couldn’t be stolen whilst he wasn’t around?
Alas the 60’s also saw major change with the arrival of Tom the Cheap on nearby Findon Road. Specials at grand openings in those days were real bargains. People came in droves when supermarkets opened all over the suburbs. We queued for hours before one of three or four cash registers, and then loaded the boot of the car with bulk supplies in cardboard boxes. Ironically it was the end for the Oval Deli. Hélène and Peter moved on trying their luck in a fish shop in the Eastern suburbs in 1969. The shop was boarded up, the brightly painted sign faded, fixtures gathered dust and the shops rooms were used for storage. Peering through the arch windows the rooms were stacked with psychedelic, cheaply stuffed dinosaurs and similar side show toys. Periodically an old faded kombi van would pull up out front to collect the toys. The ‘house’ rooms were rented out separately and the tenant’s back yard was home to a car and an extensive veggie patch. There was a time the veggie patch extended inside the house, floor boards in most of the house had been pulled up for the crop. That tenant was turfed out rather quickly.
7 Excitement was brewing over in the pastry chef’s old home. A young vibrant couple now lived in 46B.The stillness of the night was broken. A car pulled into the driveway. Gary hurdled the fence next door into his neighbor’s yard. Knocking softly on the window pane, then shouting “I’m a dad. I’m a dad. It’s a boy. Yippee!” He danced around the front yard before promptly taking himself home. Dave and Shirl lay awake in their beds their hearts filled with delight and happiness. Gary’s second son arrived during the day so celebrations went well into the night; we hope he didn’t attempt to jump the fence that night! A few years ago Gary’s first grandson was born and he jokes that he couldn’t jump the fence and share his news with the same enthusiasm he had some thirty years prior.
While watering the garden, Dave often chatted with Gary when he arrived home from work. Dave was like a kid in a candy store around Easter time, it was then Gary had bags of Hoadleys broken Easter eggs. Dave was a true chocoholic; his dreams came true with these gifts.
Mr Hicks had lived in number 48 right next door to the shop. I believe he was there for quite a few years with his young wife where they raised their daughter, Audrey, until she left home. Mr Hick’s elderly mother lived with them, a situation that often occurred in these times and in Oval Avenue. In later years, after his wife passed away, he remained in his home. Early each morning he dragged open the heavy maroon doors of his tin shed first thing. Shirl would glance out of her kitchen window as she was doing the dishes to see that the shed door was opened, and be satisfied he was all right.
We now live in 48 and each day Sam and I collect the paper for our neighbour placing it on the doorstep. During the day, we check to see it has been collected. We pop in periodically and when the boys were very young they’d love spending time pushing the lawn mower around the back yard! Gopher John has a similar arrangement with his wonderful neighbour. Mary is an incredible woman with three children. Over a few years, he and his wife had been able to help out collecting one of the children from kindy or watching over another. He was feeling unwell recently; he phoned Mary and discussed his plan with her. “I feel I need to go to hospital for a checking over.” Mary organised his doctor to make a house call fairly quickly. The doctor then gently suggested he should go to hospital. He laughed, “Well, I’d be there now, if it wasn’t for Mary!”
8 Next to the deli, after a few years, we’d outgrown our four roomed home. We’ve been fortunate to have two beautiful sons, our family wonderfully complete; we toyed with the idea of moving or extending. Our friends in 28, opposite the kindy, had a spacious home, originally built as a maisonette. The Ruett family lived there with their young school age daughter and Stefan’s mother. It was now converted into one home. The workmanship was a very high standard with spacious rooms, two bathrooms and a swimming pool. Our boys loved visiting Bubka. Playing card with the Polish grandmother after kindy pick up, they were very much at home in the house. With two grown sons now and four cars, the two driveways would have been a godsend.
We love our neighbours whose homes overlook the open space of the footy oval. Expand and extend. Proudly we did. Our oldest son walked with his Adelaide Miethke kindy group for a couple of excursion to see the progress on Adam’s house. Kindy days, they were special times when friendships were formed not only by our sons, but with other kindy mums and dear Kaye our modern day Adelaide Miethke. Anyone, who had children at kindy over the last thirty odd years, knows, loves, respects and greatly admires Kaye her family and work ethics.
Speaking of kindy, Shirl reminds me that her sons also attended Adelaide Miethke. “Rod would walk the length of the Oval by himself — there are no other roads to cross! In the afternoon I’d keep an eye out for him and I’d be there with his baby brother.
When he first began at school he would call into kindy on his way home — he missed his kindy days. The teachers made him so welcome, as he sat quietly at the back listening to story time. In time both boys then walked to school on Woodville Road. Only once was one of the boys asked if he wanted a ride by a man on a push bike, thankfully the boy declined.
Like so many before and after us, we did the kindy walk along Oval Avenue with both our boys, and then there was Auskick footy and cricket clinics when they were youngsters at The Oval. Adam strikes up an impressive pose with his friend in their Eagle Guernsey’s while, a few years later, Dan progressed further in fame. Dan proudly smiles in a photo with his friend Roy when they made the big time and were in the mini league before a finals round at Football park!
9 We have frequented the Oval for league games; however, we also headed to the grand stand for another occasion. We wandered down the road. “Molly ah no,” despite pleading, the budding gymnast continued cart wheeling along the footpath. “Why were we going down the road anyway?” “How we can we see anything of The Sky Show from our street?” “We should be taking deck chairs into the medium strip at the top of Port Road, if we can’t go to the show.” All the children had their whine. It was fun shining our torches as we left the street lights behind. Engulfed in semi darkness we saw a multitude gathered. The footy grandstand was full, people everywhere. Hyped up and ready. Pinks, blues, red, greens, so many colours exploding in clouds of smoke across the skyline. Fresh smell of smokiness from fireworks filled the air. Flames cascaded in abundance across the night sky. A variety of shapes and sizes streaming, popping, flares, so much happening simultaneously across the sky. All this from our street.
The early 90’s saw the cleaning out and knocking down of the shop front, the filling in of the cellar (where shop chocolates and drinks had been kept). With regret the cellar could not be retained; it was located almost on footpath level, and replaced by a small front yard with lawn and garden. Demolition included the six foot high solid brick shop wall, built on the border of our home. A driveway, complete with shed and carport was relocated from the side street to Oval Ave. “Smash, you’re, out” — it served as a wonderful cricket pitch when the grandchildren came to visit. The aromas from shed, unbelievable garlic, herbs as the lamb carcass turned slowly cooking for hours. The home made wine bottle passed freely around, the sounds of chatter intermingled with shouting and laughter. Wonderful major changes we embraced with joy, opened the street view as well as giving us neighbours, we could chat with from the front yard. Low and behold, our neighbours are the four square owners from 1962, now retired from business, coming back home, home to a revamped home without a shop!
In researching to tell this story, I too have been privy to so many stories from the hearts of current day neighbours; I thank them for opening their hearts and home. Their generosity of spirit is both uplifting and humbling. I have so enjoyed hearing their stories.
10 Childhood Memories Maureen Scott (nee Conroy)
Clop, clop, clippity clop, clop … the sound was distinct and familiar. The sound stopped! Moments later came the sound of glass milk bottles jangling as the milkman took the empty glass bottles from our crate, and replaced them with freshly filled bottles of milk. Familiar sounds, but my surrounds and my life had changed.
My husband and I married on 24th April 1965, and this was our first morning in our newly built home in Flinders Park, in May 1965. In the main bedroom we had a mattress on the floor made up with our new sheets and blankets. Our clothes hung in an old cedar wardrobe (a prized and ‘protected’ species in 2012) which my Grandma gave us, and our undies etc were in suitcases on the floor. The floor boards were bare and we spread newspaper in some areas to prevent the mud from outside dirtying the boards. Some weeks later our in- built wardrobes, dressing table and bed arrived.
No longer was I in my usual bedroom, furnished with a dark stained polished bedroom suite (the dressing table decorated with doilies, a crystal setting and candles), plush floral axminister carpet on the floor, and long curtains and drapes at the windows.
But, I was happy and content as childhood memories flash-flooded over me …
I grew up in Ledger Road, Woodville South, and for many years the ‘Milkie’ who lived and ran a dairy at the bottom of Ledger Road (before it was a through road) would deliver the milk. ‘Milkie’ travelled along the streets with his horse and cart, and from a large container filled the ‘billy’ which Mum left in a small double sided cupboard — one side opened into the house and the other side opened to the outside of the house near the back door. There was no need to lock the back door in those days. Mum would boil the milk, let it cool, and then scoop the cream off of the top of the milk.
Also at the end of Ledger Road, almost opposite the dairy, was Bourne’s brick kiln and pug- hole — I remember standing on the rim and looking down into a pool of water at the base,
11 but having been told this was dangerous I never ventured to the floor of the large hole to play!
The Oldfield’s Bakery man called at our home each week day, again with a horse and cart which stopped out the front of the house. The baker came to the front door carrying his array of bread in a large wicker basket. When a full loaf was broken in half the bread was warm, white and soft, and always appetizing — I can smell and see it now being spread with butter and vegemite.
A horse and cart occasionally brought the ‘Rabbit-oh’ along the streets. This man would have dead rabbits hanging from the edge of the horse cart — doesn’t sound too good now, but that’s the way it was then. Mum would buy a skinned rabbit which I think was then soaked in salt water before it was roasted. Sometimes Mum would roll pieces of cooked rabbit in egg and breadcrumbs and then brown it in the frying pan — this was a favourite when we went on picnics — served cold with quartered tomatoes, gherkins, Grandma’s pickled onions, lettuce and fresh bread and butter.
I remember going with Mum, sitting in a wicker chair on the back of her bike to Hutton’s Grocery shop on Oval Avenue across from the southern end of the Woodville Oval. We also went to the butcher shop (where children were given a piece of fritz — can still smell the freshness of the meat and the sawdust on the floor) and then into Lil’s Deli next door — these two shops were situated on the corner of the Port Road and Woodlands Crescent. Sometimes our white cockatoo came along for the ride on the handlebars of Mum’s bike.
Other times we rode to visit Grandma Edgword at Penola Street, Kilkenny. I remember Mum knocking on the door with the metal door knocker, and me peering through the key hole saying “here she comes!” as Grandma walked towards us to open the door. As we left Grandma would say “Oo-roo!” (an old ‘farewell’ expression).
Dad also took me on the back of the bike, and we rode along the Port Road bike track to visit Grandma and Grandpa Conroy at Elizabeth Street, Croydon. Occasionally Dad took me to the Library in the York Rechabite Hall on the downside of the Port Road at Kilkenny. This small hall had an old papery smell and was lined with plain dark coloured book spines.
12 Eventually, we had a car. On Friday nights Dad drove to a shop on a corner of the downside of the Port Road at Croydon where he purchased fresh fruit and vegetables, and sometimes bought me a Cherry Ripe, Luncheon bar or Violet Crumble bar as a special treat. On the way home Dad bought fish and chips. With Mum, Dad and I seated snuggly at the kitchenette table, the fish and chips would be eaten straight from the paper wrappings, along with fresh bread and butter, tomatoes cut into quarters, with lemon quartered and squeezed over the pieces of fish.
My parents built their freestone fronted home in Ledger Road, Woodville South, and moved there in June 1941. This was to be their home which they cared for with pride, and kept well- maintained for the next 64 years, until Mum died in September 2005, and the house was sold in November 2005. A prospective buyer remarked that ‘this was a much loved home’ — it truly was.
Mum and Dad worked hard together to establish their home. Dad mixed and laid all the concrete paths by hand. In the front garden there were two or three arches of pencil pines which went over a path which led to the front door, plus pencils pines at the four corners of the front garden. Across the front fence grew bushes of soft pink roses, and in between them were planted pale pink carnations. On the garage side of the house out the back grew dahlias which were lifted, labelled and stored after each flowering season. In later years this area was to become Dad’s golf putting green lawn with a couple of holes inserted in the lawn. On the open side of the house grew gladioli which were also labelled with their variety/name. In later years this became a lawn driveway to the caravan shed and also Mum’s car shed. Alongside Mum’s car shed Dad and Mum built a fern house using brush which was collected from the vicinity of Goolwa and carted home in our little ‘Tom Thumb’ trailer, this trailer was also used to collect seaweed for the garden from West Beach (neither of these activities would now be permitted!).
Originally there was a fowl run at the very back of the yard. Once, for a few days, a section of the fowl yard housed a small kangaroo which was found roaming the streets — the owners eventually claimed it. Throughout the back yard Mum and Dad grew almond, apricot, nectarine, peach, and lemon trees. When the almonds were harvested, nights were spent in
13 the shed to shell and sort them. They were then sold in Adelaide, and the proceeds used to pay the council rates.
Dad was employed at General Motors Holden’s at Woodville. He worked day and night shifts a fortnight about and also overtime on the weekends — this was his work schedule for all of his working life. In the early years Dad rode his bike to work and carried a kit bag on the handle bars.
When I was quite young Dad taught me to sing ‘April Showers’, ‘How would you like to swing on a Star’, and other old favourites. Dad taught me to swim at Kircaldy Beach — at the end of Grange Road — where Mum and Dad and I spent many hot evenings. Learning to swim I’d sometimes cry when I swallowed a mouthful of sea water, and Dad would say, “what are you crying for? There’s plenty of water left in the ocean!”
Mum was the diligent and house-proud homemaker who cooked and cleaned. I remember many hot days and nights when Mum made jam. One summer Mum and Dad tried to dry apricots which were placed on racks and moved out into the sun during the day and taken back into the shed at night, but this was not very successful. When Dad was on night-shift Mum also had cooking nights and the kitchen table would be covered with various biscuits, buns, and cakes.
Monday was washing day — the copper was boiled, the clothes sorted into piles then washed by hand in one wash trough, wrung out by hand and placed in the adjoining wash trough, and the ‘whites’ were then rinsed again in water into which the ‘blue’ bag was placed — this was to keep the whites white. ‘Blue’ was a one inch solid square block of solid blue powder. Tablecloths, tea towels, pillowcases, doilies etc were ‘starched’. ‘Starch’ was a white powder which was mixed with water into a paste — the finished stiffness of the cloths etc depended on the strength of the paste. The clothes were then wrung by hand, and hung on the lines with precision and order. The long straight wire lines were then lifted and held up higher in the air with a forked wooden ‘prop’. Once the clothes dried they were brought inside. The items that did not need to be ironed were folded and carefully put away. Clothes that were to be ironed — especially the starched items — were ‘dampened down’ (I have kept Mum’s ‘dampening down’ clear class bottle which has a round metal top with holes in it for the water to sprinkle out onto the clothes and which Mum would have used from the
14 1940’s onwards) and then rolled, and placed in a pile. Then it was time for the ironing. As each item was ironed it was placed on the clothes horse to air before being put away.
Mum spent many hours at the sewing machine making clothes and household items. She also spent hours mending by hand and machine, and doing alterations and knitting at night. Mum made nearly all my clothes, including some school uniforms, and when I was at Our Lady of the Manger School at Findon (now Nazareth Junior College) she lined the sleeves of my blazer so that I wouldn’t feel ‘itchy’. In much later years Mum used all her left-over wool to make covered coat-hangers — some had little woollen ‘dilly bags’ attached and into which were placed camphor balls. I now treasure these coat-hangers. One of Mum’s sayings was waste not, want not, which I often hear in my mind, and have tried to be true to throughout my life. Mum was an enthusiastic gardener and enjoyed being outside in the fresh air, and always really loved all birds and appreciated nature and the beauty of each individual flower.
Dad was a special father, very wise and calm in any situation, and had a wonderful dry sense of humour. One of his sayings was piano, piano — softly, softly — meaning take it easy or calm down — this possibly started when he worked with many non-English speaking migrants. Others were a still tongue makes a wise head, and just because Joe-Blow wants to jump off the bridge you don’t have to follow, and two wrongs don’t make a right. These sayings were passed on to our dear sons Paul, Mark and Andrew.
From a young age I helped Dad wash the car — especially the wheels! Perhaps he thought I’d scratch the upper parts! Later I helped build the caravan shed — my job was to hold a piece of wood on the inside while Dad drilled through the metal sheets from the outside. The caravan shed was mainly built with metal sheets purchased from the salvage yard at GMH.
The General Motors Holden’s annual picnics at Belair were always special days. We usually picnicked with Heine and Edna Schenk and their daughter Jill who was a couple of years younger than me. Heine was a first-aid man at GMH Woodville. These picnics were well organised with trains taking families from Woodville to Belair. The smell and smoke from the wood-fired coppers filled the air as they boiled water to fill family billycans with hot water.
15 Soft drinks and ‘dandy’ ice creams provided tasty treats. Adults and children participated in races and fun games, and excellent prizes were awarded. Wonderful days!
Our family doctor was Dr Drew whose home and practice was in a large house on the corner of South Road and Bond Street at Hindmarsh. The waiting room was large and had a heavy timber round table in the centre of the room. Dr Drew delivered me, and visited me at home when I had measles and chickenpox and other childhood illnesses. Prior to his arrival Mum cleaned the bathroom and set out a starched white hand-embroidered hand towel ready for his use. Dr Drew had a kindly, gentlemanly manner, and a distinctive voice. He was our family doctor up until I was about 14 years of age when he became ill. It was at this time that a young Dr Barbara Angus looked after his practice. When Dr Drew was unable to continue his practice we then went to Dr Barbara Angus who practiced from her home at Fulham. Dr Barbara, in her mid-twenties and an attractive young lady, was an excellent General Practitioner who eventually delivered our children — Paul, Mark and Andrew. Dr Barbara also continued to care for Mum and Dad over the years, and also catch up with Dad on the golf course at Grange. In later years Barbara’s son Mark joined her practice and eventually took over when Barbara retired. Dr Mark then continued to care for us all. I have memories of Dr Mark as a baby playing on the floor of the consulting room when we had gone to see Dr Barbara. We have all been fortunate to have their continued care over all these years.
At Christmas time the Christmas Tree would be set up in the ‘sleep-out’ (the back room) where Mum and Dad slept. The tree was the bare branches of a small tree which was painted silver, and then covered with trails of leaves from the glory vines which grew over a shelter across the back of the house. This was then decorated with various decorations (some still kept with our Christmas decorations) and balloons were hung around the room. Each gift was carefully opened. In amongst them was nearly always a tin which Grandma had painted and filled with coins — her ‘change’ — probably saved throughout the year.
When I was little I received a little table and two chairs. The set was painted blue and on the tabletop were depicted Mother Bear, Father Bear, and Baby Bear. With this table and chairs,
16 my tea set, my pram and dolls, I would ‘set up house’. Around this time — about 5/6 years, I would say that I was going to have lots of children — four boys and four girls, and we would live with Mum and Dad — although ‘upstairs’ because Mum and Dad would be too old to climb the stairs. Ah, childhood dreams!
I remember a Christmas lunch at Grandma and Grandpa’s at Croydon and the sixpences in the pudding … everyone gave their sixpences to little Maureen — I thought I was made. Over the years Grandma Edgword made a huge rich Christmas pudding in a cloth for us — these would be taken on holidays, and Dad called them ‘the sinker’ or ‘the anchor’. If we needed to stop suddenly Dad would say, “Throw out the anchor!”
We always seemed to have a bird as pets — firstly the white cockatoo, later a galah which was kept in a cage near the tank-stand. I remember when Dad and Mum were building the caravan shed, and I helped too — holding on to wood which Dad was sawing — the galah sat on the wood, became frightened and flew off — I was very upset. Fortunately, when I came home from school a couple of days later the galah was back in the cage — a neighbour further down the road had found it in their hedge and brought it back. Later we had a budgerigar named ‘Peter’ who was a wonderful pet. Mum was a very good and patient ‘trainer’. Among other things, Peter learnt to recite the nursery rhyme ‘Peter, Peter pumpkin eater’. He was very tame and loved to have a bath in the palm of our hands with the water dripping from the kitchen sink tap. He would spread out his wings and flap around in our hands — he was very trusting. If Mum was inside so was he, and when she was out in the garden Peter would be out there too in his cage. When the young Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip visited Adelaide in 1954, Peter learnt to say ‘God bless the Queen’, and was taken with us (Mum had been in hospital and was in her dressing gown!) when we drove out along Main North Road towards the Parafield Airport to greet them. Peter also went on all Sunday drives, trips to the country, and holidays. During one of our Christmas holidays at Jubilee Park there was an article in ‘The Warrnambool Times’ about Peter, and also a photo of Mum and Peter.
On very hot days (before air conditioning was imagined) Mum would always close the windows and draw the blinds to keep the house as cool as possible. The coolest area in the house was in the passageway near the bathroom and we would sit on the carpet in that area and enjoy glasses of cold lemonade with an electric fan oscillating close by. In the cool of the
17 evening, the windows would be opened up and we would sit outside under the vines — sometimes with the sprinkler set up on the lawn close by to help to make the surrounding air cool. Once we had a car we would regularly head down to Kircaldy Beach (at the end of Grange Road) for a swim, after which we would sit on the rug and enjoy a ‘choc-ice’ — an oblong shaped chocolate coated ice cream which was wrapped in silver paper — a special treat!
During our Christmas holidays at Warrnambool we usually swam at least once or twice each day in the Hopkins River. Then when we returned home we continued to go to Kircaldy for a swim most evenings. This usually continued for some weeks during the summer months and until the evenings became too cold for a swim.
During the school holidays neighbouring children and I would take a picnic lunch and meander on our bikes through the back streets of Beverley. I remember riding past one house (possibly at the rear of the Halfway Hotel), which seemed to be built at the bottom of a pug hole, and growing everywhere around the property was an ivy-like plant with purple flowers which hung from the fence and surrounds. We eventually set up our picnic lunch on the plantation between both Port Roads and under the shade of some big old trees (this was somewhere near Australian Glass Manufacturers where Paul now works.)
When I was about eight years of age, a new young Lebanese migrant Frank Raslan came to work with Dad at General Motors. Frank lived a few streets away from our home in Wodonga Street, and once he was settled he brought his young ‘proxy’ bride Helen to Australia. I remember Helen as being a beautiful young lady, and that she had a lovely pair of pink slippers with pink feathers across the front of them. Not long after Helen arrived in Australia we were invited to their home for a meal — which was all Lebanese food. Dad was good at trying anything new, Mum and I were not so adventurous but did not want to be unappreciative of Helen’s efforts. Taking my early school readers with me, I regularly visited Helen and tried to teach her English. Other times Helen and Frank would walk to our home to visit us. Eventually Frank and Helen Raslan ran a Milk Bar/Delicatessen in St Vincent Street at Port Adelaide. We occasionally visited them there. By then they had twin baby boys — Robert and Neil whom I would get to nurse. Later when I met Bob he remembered that he
18 used to go to Frank and Helen’s shop for a drink at half-time during dance nights at the Port Adelaide Town Hall. Mid-August 2010 there was an article in ‘The Advertiser’ about Frank and Helen’s youngest son Brian who was the founder and head trainer of the South Australian Coffee Academy and currently trains about 350-400 baristas each year.
Dad and Mum purchased a Vauxhall Wyvern car in 1949. They had this car for a couple of years then bought one of the first Holden’s — an FX48.215 — in 1952, and it was in this car that holidays away began. Dad cut a hole between the back seat and the boot, and made a timber base for the bed which was set up there. Mum made the mattress. Dad made flywire screens which were fitted into the car windows overnight. During the day the food and clothes etc were carried on the bed and at night they were placed under the car. When we were on holidays Dad became the ‘holiday cook’ — probably because of the primus stove which was set up in a wooden box to shelter the flame from the wind. Years later, when Dad retired, he became ‘the cook’ and Mum ‘the gardener’.
The first trip was to the Flinders Rangers where we stayed in the Wilpena Pound camp ground. At that time Bonds Bus Service ran tours there and the guests stayed in the Chalet which at the time was managed by a man that Dad had worked with at General Motors Holden’s. In the evenings we were invited to join the guests in a large lounge room for party games and entertainment. As we walked through the camp ground from our tent site to the Chalet there were eagles flying above us. Mum wasn’t too happy about them so Dad carried a large stick saying that he’d swoosh them away if they came too close.
Following that we went to Victoria — to Lakes Entrance and Bairnsdale, and to Sydney. The next car was an FJ. Mum and Dad purchased the caravan in 1957 and we travelled to Bright and the snowfields in Victoria. As a young boy Dad travelled by train to Kapunda where he was met by his aunt, uncle and cousins and taken by horse and cart to their farm for the school holidays. Dad’s holidays to Kapunda in his youth gave Dad a love of the countryside, and thus eventually a great enjoyment of travelling all over South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland. Over the years, my husband, three sons and I have enjoyed many holidays camping and caravanning throughout Australia — I too love the wide open spaces!
19
I started school at six years of age in 1949 in Grade I at Whitefriars School at Woodville Park. I remember Mum taking me on the back of the bike, and then waving goodbye outside the classroom door. Mum and her brothers Bill and Harry (known as ‘Bub’) also went to Whitefriars School which was staffed by the Sisters of St Joseph. Sr Tressa (later known as Sr Nora Kerin) was my first teacher and she was a kindly sister who I really liked. I have kept in touch with her over the years and recently she celebrated her 95th Birthday. I enjoyed my years at Whitefriars. I only remember getting into trouble once and that was in Grade 2 when I spelt ‘kitchen’ incorrectly — this must have been after a lesson re the correct spelling. In the test I spelt it ‘kichen’ — I was probably trying so hard to get it right that I spelt it wrongly!
Mum took me to Whitefriars on the back of the bike via the pedestrian subway at Woodville Park railway station. Later I walked to and from school with the Illa girls who lived near the end of Ledger Road on the same side as us.
In 1951 Our Lady of the Manger School was opened, and along with Dianne and other children in the area we moved from Whitefriars. This meant that we no longer had to cross both Port Roads, it was a closer walk from home, and eventually I was able to ride my bike to school. The Illa girls all learnt and played the piano which made me enthusiastic and I commenced lessons when I was in Grade 3. The Illa girls had almost taught me my first music book ‘by heart’ when I started lessons.
Our Lady of the Manger Parish Church also started at this time. Originally Mass was held in the side room of the convent (which was also my classroom). Just before one Christmas everyone carried their chairs from the Convent to what was a huge horse stable with hay still on the floor and huge heavy wooden windows which were pulled back to let in the light — hence the name of the Church — Our Lady of the Manger. We were still part of the Woodville Parish which was cared for by Diocesan Priests. Fr Russell (later Monsignor Russell) was the Parish Priest, and his young assistant was Fr Faulkner (later Archbishop Leonard Faulkner). In those days the priests regularly visited people at home. Mum often said that Fr Russell always called when she was making apricot jam. Over the years when we
20 have caught up with Archbishop Faulkner he would always ask how Mum and Dad were and if they were still in Ledger Road. Many, many years later when Bob was very ill in The Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Archbishop Faulkner was visiting to give the last rites to a relative. I spoke with him in the passageway and he came and anointed Bob. Over the years Archbishop Faulkner was always the same — a very kindly and caring person.
The Dominican Sisters from North Adelaide taught at Our Lady of the Manger School and Sr Peter was my teacher for Grades 3, 4 and 5. My classroom was in a large side room in the convent which was a large old house. The large property was originally owned by the carrying firm R.O. Evans. At lunch and recess time we had lots of fun playing in what were once large fowl runs, and also climbing around piles of rocks (just imagine if children did that today — there would be a great fuss because they might hurt themselves — sadly there are now not many opportunities left for everyday adventure!). We also had lots of fun playing marbles in the dirt, and with some coaching from Mum and Dad at home on the carpet in the front passage way, I eventually became good at playing marbles.
In Grade 6, I moved to St Joseph’s School at Hindmarsh which was a Primary and Secondary school at that time. Sr Clement was my teacher in Grade 6 and 7. Sr Clement seemed very strict with high expectations, and a very structured classroom. I was a long way behind with Arithmetic (which I enjoyed) and Geometry (which I didn’t enjoy). I was also behind with English parsing — this was when we had to analyse a sentence in terms of grammar, and divide a sentence into ‘subject’ ‘verb’ ‘adverb’ and ‘predicate’. Once I understood this I enjoyed it, and these lessons have been of great benefit over the years. For the first few weeks I would take home my subject books and Mum and Dad would help me at night to try to prepare for the following day. After a few weeks Dad went to see Sr Clement one evening. The following day she called me over in the yard, and said that if there was something that I did not know or understand that I was to say so. From then on I blossomed and topped the class in Grade 6 in 1954, and again in Grade 7 in 1955. Sr Clement was a very thorough and structured teacher — even though she yelled at times!
We learnt all tables off by heart, and had a mental arithmetic test every morning. Each day all students would stand near the walls of the room and take it turns to read aloud with expression. We kept history and geography notebooks in which were written various facts which we knew by heart. We also learnt various English grammar rules by heart, and to this
21 day I still say in my head : Where there is an ‘is’ ‘am’ ‘are’ ‘was’ or ‘were’ use only one word’ … i.e. ‘was walking — walked’ (Hope I’ve written correctly in this venture!). One of the mental arithmetic rules was: to multiply a number by 25, divide the figure by 4, if a ‘1’ remained that was 25, if ‘2’ it was 50, and if ‘3’ it was 75.
During these first couple of years at Hindmarsh lunch times were spent twirling hoops around our waists, playing chasey and ‘red rover all over’, and various games with a basketball. Skipping was also lots of fun — either with individual ropes or as a group. For group skipping a longer heavier rope was held by one person at each end and turned up and over in unison, then everyone individually, or sometimes more than one person, skipped through the rope. If you stopped the rope it was your turn to hold and turn the rope.
My music lessons continued at St Joseph’s at Hindmarsh, and I was taught by Sr Josephine who was a very thorough teacher. The only problem was that Sr Clement did not like students leaving her class during various lessons so it was difficult to ask to leave the room and she would say, “Oh, go and learn your old crochets and quavers!” Once past that ‘hurdle’ I would run off to my music lesson. Lessons were held in the convent. I would run to the front gate of the convent, push open the heavy wrought iron gate, walk up the steps to the verandah, ring the bell, and then go into the front room of the beautiful old convent building —I was then eleven years old (who would have imagined, that eleven years later, accompanied by my husband I would walk up those same steps wearing my wedding gown). Sr Josephine used a plastic knitting needle to point out a particular note on the sheet music, or to tap the finger which happened to be in the wrong place or on the wrong key. Sr Josephine prided herself that she had never had a failure — and no one wanted to be the first! A man from the Conservatorium usually came to the Hindmarsh convent for our practical examinations. Theory exams were held in either Elder Hall or Bonython Hall. I did practical and theory music exams during Grade 6 and Grade 7, and First Year and Second Year High School, and by then had Music as an Intermediate Subject before I commenced that Third/Intermediate school year.
During my Secondary School Years — First Year, Second Year, and Intermediate my teacher was Sr Maria-Anne Graves rsj. When I think back I am amazed at her workload. She taught the three classes all subjects including Dacombs and Pitmans shorthand. She also taught cooking. I remember on one occasion making cream puffs, and when I came to take mine
22 out of the oven I couldn’t find them — they had burnt black! On the plus side I was an excellent sponge maker and in my teenage years would often make them at home — the recipe used was where one separated the egg whites and yokes, once cooled they were filled with mock cream — yum — light and tasty. Once in Intermediate we would go to school some Saturday mornings for extra tuition. Intermediate exams were held in the halls/pavilions at the Wayville Showgrounds. I remember still ‘swotting’ my English essays on the bus as we all headed to Wayville. I passed my Intermediate with six subjects and two credits — English, Arithmetic (credit), Shorthand, Typing, Book-keeping, Music (credit).
Each year we had an Annual Sports Day, and this included teams. The day usually started with a March Past in which the whole school participated in marching and forming various formations. Then in age groups we performed Rods, Skipping, and Exercises. The finale was the Teams. The Teams Marched Past, and then followed various competitive team games — i.e. ‘Corner Spry’ and ‘Tunnel Ball’ played with a basketball, and running games — there was much cheering and urging — all very exciting! I was chosen to be a Captain when I was in Second Year when my team came first, and again in Intermediate Year when my team came second. In the late 1990’s Bob and I attended a special anniversary celebration at St Joseph’s at Hindmarsh, and were fortunate to watch some old black and white movie films which included Mr Bill Cocks, the official announcer, presenting me with the cup when I was fifteen years of age.
Mr Bill Cocks was the Plant Comptroller at General Motors Holden’s at Birkenhead and I was to eventually be employed by him when I left school. My immediate boss at General Motors at Birkenhead was Mr Len Curnow. On my first morning Len phoned Dad at Woodville to say that I was to work under his direction. When they were young Len and Dad had worked together in the Pay Office in Finance Department at Woodville. It’s amazing how things do go around in circles. Anyway I was very shy and quiet during those first few weeks and whenever given something to do always said, “Thank you very much.” The large open office I worked in was on the first floor, and my desk looked out over the Birkenhead bridge and the Port River. My immediate supervisor was Mr Len Curnow (Accountant), other co-workers were: Graham McDonald (Frigidaire accounts), Ivan Malone, Deane Clee, and Ivan Larsson (accounts receivable), David McInnes, Barry Fowler, Ron Sparbier (accounts payable), and Vashti Day (comptometrist). I was very fortunate to have this wonderful group of people to work with. I was young and naïve — they ‘led me up the garden path’ — and I believed
23 everything they told me. Ivan Malone was the main ‘ring-leader’. Many late afternoons after the paperboy came around selling the day’s newspaper Ivan would make some comment about the headlines. Around the time when television first came to Adelaide, the day’s headlines stated ‘Summit Flops’ — so they told me that the television towers on Mount Lofty had fallen down. That evening on the way home, I told Mr Cocks that the towers had collapsed. The next morning the guys asked how we’d managed with the television that night, to which I said alright, and that I’d told Mr Cocks all about the towers the previous evening. With that Ivan Malone went into Mr Cock’s office to explain things to him — looking back I bet they had a good laugh. On another occasion when the headlines were about the then communist dictator Fidel Castro they told me that that was his ship was moored near the Birkenhead bridge — Mr Cocks learnt this too!
GMH at Birkenhead was the Vehicle Distribution outlet — the dealers came to Birkenhead to pick up their vehicles, and also on the line were the occasional vehicles which were imported — Chevrolets and Pontiacs — when we would all go downstairs to check out these impressive imports coming off the assembly line. Altogether there were about fifty people who worked in the office at Birkenhead including the Sales and Service Departments, and the Plant Manager’s office. There was an annual picnic for everyone and their families. The Office staff also had an Annual Christmas Dinner, usually held at the Largs Pier Hotel, during which we danced, took part in social games, and sang Christmas Carols by candlelight. Later when the Birkenhead plant closed I was transferred to Finance Department at Woodville.
The early years of our marriage were very busy as we completed the painting of the exterior and interior timber work and gradually established our home. After our cement paths were eventually laid Bob moved one hundred ton of dirt into the front and back yards to even out and build up the ground levels.
During these early years in our marriage we also prepared for the births and later cared for our dear baby sons Paul, Mark and Andrew. As our family grew so did our home and garden. Many years later — in 1992 — we received a ‘Merit Award’ in the Council garden competition.
24 Our children attended the Mothers’ & Babies’ Clinic at Flinders Park and later the adjoining Jean Horan Kindergarten. I was part of the Mothers’ & Babies’ fund raising group and we enjoyed many social occasions with other young couples in the area. Our children attended St Joseph’s School at Flinders Park where Bob and I were involved with the Mothers’ and Fathers’ Clubs — I was Secretary of the Mothers’ Club and Bob was President of the Fathers’ Club. St Joseph’s School (later known as Cardinia School, and in recent years amalgamated into Nazareth Junior College) is currently the site for a major building project for St Anne’s Special School. From St Joseph’s School our boys moved onto St Michael’s College Junior School at Beverley and later the Senior School at Henley Beach, where Bob was the Treasurer of the P & F.
During these years Bob was in the Army Reserves at Port Adelaide, volunteered with St John’s Ambulance at Hindmarsh, and St Vincent de Paul Society at Hindmarsh. We were both members of The Woodville Concert Choir for about ten years, and are still actively involved with St Joseph’s Church at Flinders Park.
My husband Bob’s childhood home was on Government Road (now South Road) Croydon, and later his family moved to Garth Street, Woodville Park.
So, the Charles Sturt Council area has been ‘home’ to us throughout our lives.
Toddler Maureen at home 1944, Ledger Road Woodville South
25
Parents home for sale 2005, Ledger Road Woodville South
Maureen and Bob’s home being built at Parukala Street Flinders Park 1965
Maureen and Bob’s home at Parukala Street Flinders Park 2012
26 Family Days At Queenstown Diana Diprose
Hugo and Frances purchased the house at Queenstown in the mid 1930s. Prior to that, they had bought the house in Torrens Avenue at Lockleys from Hugo’s family after his father died. They had the house repainted as a wedding gift from Frances’ parents and both were very busy from early morning until night working the market garden. Frances’ fingers ached picking beans, tomatoes, and oranges and lemons while her husband tended the turning of the soil and replanting of cabbages, cauliflowers and celery, not to mention his prize patch of asparagus.
Hugo’s health though deteriorated, and on a visit to his doctor he was confronted with the words “if you stay working on the land, you won’t last another 12 months”. The insecticides and tomato mould which grew under the leaves on the plants in the glass houses affected his lungs to the degree that he spent his nights coughing violently and getting very little sleep. They sold the property and moved on.
The house they attained a Queenstown was a modest two bedroom brick place but Hugo liked the thought of the deep block which he could partially section off and use as a veggie patch. Frances enjoyed the thought of working with a gas stove – at Lockleys she used a wood stove. “We can use the second bedroom if we are lucky” she told Hugo. In the early years of their married life she had been unfortunate enough to miscarry twice, and they weren’t expecting to be able to have children, which saddened them both.
Hugo was employed as an engineer and when the Second World War was declared, worked at Islington while many of his friends went into the armed forces. Frances worked in a munitions factory along with others who were keen to do all they could to help.
As well as his love of the land, Hugo’s other passion was the sea, and the pair would often go sailing at the weekends. Fishing was an excellent means of adding to their food – they didn’t need coupons. When friends came home on leave from the war, bringing their mates also, Hugo would set sail in the evening, and steer the course by the stars, down to Kangaroo Island. The boatload of war weary patriots would relax and just dangle a line in the water, while Frances
27 busied herself in the galley. All manner of treats were carried up on deck for morning and afternoon tea, as well as fresh fish and chips (from home grown potatoes) for dinner at night. This was like a few days in heaven for the nerves and stomachs of men who were so tired and wary from life at the front, often in trenches.
Then, one day, Frances came home from seeing her doctor. She had to control her patience till Hugo arrived from work. “Guess what! – I’m pregnant” she joyfully told him. Hugo could hardly believe it. He was thrilled. They had almost given up on hope of becoming parents. He went off the next day to work to share the good news with his mates.
Frances was very ill with the pregnancy and had to give up work. She was sick all the time – even water upset her stomach. Because of the previous miscarriages, Dr Cherry insisted she rest most of the day. She busied herself knitting and sewing the things her little one would need, and also added to her store of gloves, socks and balaclavas that war need for the war effort.
Finally the day arrived when she was admitted to the Hindmarsh Maternity Hospital, late in the afternoon, on the 27th July in 1944. Thirty six hours later she held her baby daughter in her arms. An ecstatic Hugo rode off to work to share the good news with his mates.
Frances now stayed home but joined in the support services for the war, as well as caring for her baby. Three months after the baby girl arrived, Frances discovered she was pregnant again. This time she was very well with hardly any illness. Diana, her baby echoed her wellness and steadily gained weight in the correct proportions, sitting, crawling and toddling about enjoying discovering her world. She had developed her own language and happily chattered away to herself and others in her own baby language which gradually became consonants and vowels and eventually turned into real words.
Almost a year to the day later, Frances went into hospital again to give birth to another baby daughter. Unlike Diana, this little one had a thick thatch of fluffy dark brown hair and golden eyes. Frances’ joy was boundless. In her mind they were already good playmates, and company for each other. Her doctor had said “if you want another child, don’t leave it too long before trying again”. Frances was already 36 when her first pregnancy occurred. Now her family dreams were complete. But just six weeks later, her world began to crumble.
28 It happened on the day of her new baby’s six week check up. Old Dr Cherry pronounced the new arrival very satisfactory, then said “But this one doesn’t look too well”. Diana was admitted into the Adelaide Children’s Hospital and diagnosed with nephritis, a kidney disease about which very little was known in 1945. The disease prevented the kidneys from functioning and the little girl’s body began to sell alarmingly. Doctors tried their best to bring her back to health, but her condition only worsened. Each day Frances walked to the tram stop with the pusher and her new baby, but each day she came away with despair in her heart. The nurses and medical staff were wonderful; she knew they were doing their best. The Matron on the ward tried to prepare Frances ahead of time to face the inevitable. “You know she won’t live much longer, don’t you”. It was a statement, not a question. Frances nodded and bit her lip. Family and friends had all said her new baby girl had come to take the place of this sick little one. She gathered her things and took the pusher with her new baby daughter and left the Adelaide Children’s Hospital. Catching the tram into North Terrace, and then out of the city again her mind was working overtime.
Once home again she fed and settled the little one, then prepared the evening meal. That done Frances searched and located a piece of soft white fabric she had left over from making a petticoat. Carefully she cut out the pieces to make a tiny frock to fit her sick one year old daughter. The matron in the ward had said it was unlikely she would still be alive in the morning, and Frances busied herself sewing a burial gown for Diana.
She made the journey again the next day, taking the tiny frock she had sewn during the night. As she re-entered the ward Frances became upset. Her sick child’s body was swollen up like a balloon and when she tried to touch her little one, her body made squeaking noises. No cuddles were allowed. Matron quietly approached. She needed to talk to Frances, but was sensitive towards the mother. Time was short and she had to obtain permission. “Do you mind if we try a different drug called sulphur?” she enquired, “It’s been useful for curing other things, but hasn’t been tried for nephritis”. Frances was afraid to hope. “No certainly you can. Try anything you think might be of help” she replied, “if there’s the slightest chance, we’ll take it”.
The experiment went ahead and gradually there was and improvement in Diana’s health. Another seven weeks and things were almost back to normal. Her kidneys were working again and her fluid swollen little body had returned to the normal size of a one year old child. The day
29 came when she was discharged from hospital and allowed to return home to her family but had to have a salt free diet for twelve months so that her kidneys were not over strained.
And that’s the part Mum told me. The earliest memories I have include my sister. There were always two of us.
Our home was situated at 1136 Old Port Road Queenstown, and the property itself went from the Old Port Road through to the street at the back. Sadly it is no longer used as a dwelling but is part of a business storage location.
When we lived there, Mum had a lawn and flowers out the front and grape vines grew along the driveway side fence. I was very agile at 2 and a half to 3 years of age and so was my sister. I recall going up, up, up to look over the fence to see what that awful noise was, only to find I was having my gaze returned by a sun browned man who had a handkerchief knotted in each corner to keep the sun off his head. He had a very dirty face. I had neve seen any man who was not clean shaven. He was wearing a messy singlet and short pants, and working with a spade. His two workmates were similarly clothed. They said something to each other that I didn’t understand, and then laughed. Mum told me later they came from a different country called ‘Italy’ and they were going to build a new house on the empty block next door.
Our back yard was a magic place to my young eyes: pink climbing geraniums on the side of the fence and brilliant blue grape hyacinths competed with orange red lacinalias – ‘soldier boys’ for space. On the back fence climbed a flourishing, plentiful passionfruit vine. But I had to be careful of the bees. My sister and I played for hours outside. Mum often put little sunhats on us – I had very fair skin. If my little sibling wanted to eat slugs I would obligingly lift up the stones for her! Mum wasn’t really impressed.
At the bottom of the driveway was a tin shed. It housed Dad’s tools and a car. It was quite some time before I understood what a car was. Mum called it “the Oldsmobile”. I thought it a huge black thing, but when it was outside in the sun it was a very dark bottle green. I remember Mum’s instructions one evening when dad had gone to work on his bike. She told us to “hop in” on the front seat and we drove to the end of our block and turned the corner on Tapley’s Hill Road, chasing after the cart with the man calling “rabbi-ooo”. I was sent out with sixpence to
30 buy the rabbit and told to ask him if there were any spare kidneys: some customers asked him to remove them and they were free. Mum could use them in a steak and kidney pie.
We had a piece of play equipment which arrived after Christmas one year. I didn’t realise it at the time, but dad would have made it. ‘It’ was a swing boat in which we could both sit and rock back and forth. I could even stand on the seat holding on to the side bars to up higher momentum. My sister was not as old as I so she was happy just to be riding there.
I realise now having studied nutrition at a TAFE College that we ate very health meals as children with lots of veggies and salads. Dad grew our vegetables in his garden which was partitioned off from the area we could see. Mum’s father had a butcher shop, so our protein needs were also readily provided. I loved Mum’s cooking, and she enjoyed cooking for us. Soups and stews, cakes and biscuits – even with coupons and the scarcity of the times getting ingredients, she always managed.
We didn’t go across the road very often but sometimes we were allowed out of the front yard. Things were so different then – not many cars. People walked or rode bicycles. Also, people had very little money and it had to stretch as far as possible. I recall walking across to the butcher’s shop with Mum and the pusher and going to Gryst’s Chemist on one of the corners of a new Port Road.
On our Port Road there was a canal out the front. It was my very own ‘creek’ to explore. Sometimes there was water in it, and sometimes not, but I didn’t mind. I loved it anyway and the tall green trees.
One day we girls went up stream to the little bridge. There we saw a boy with a two wheeler bike (mine had three wheels). I must have said something like “hello” and was hurt and disappointed to be called a ‘sissy’. This was my first encounter with name calling. We ran home and I indignantly reported “Mum, he said we were sissies”, to which Mum calmly replied, “Well, he’s right you know, you are sisters of course you’re sissies,” and I accepted that.
The house next door actually fronted into the back street, next to our back fence, and their back fence was next to our front yard. The Foster family had stables with horses in them. I used to regularly climb onto the roof, and take my sister along too. We did everything together. A
31 frantic Mrs Foster would call over the side fence to Mum “the girls are on the roof again” and Mum would reply “don’t worry”. “Girls, do you want to come in for a biscuit?” which we always did, and we would just climb down the same way we got up. End of problem till another day.
Sometimes, on my own, I used to go out of the front gate and into the stable. I loved the horses and their size. They were friendly and soooooo big, with lovely brown eyes and long eyelashes, and curious sniffling noses. They had shiny coats and ate straw, which was quite strange to my way of thinking. I was also fascinated by their ‘shoes’ or hooves as Mum called them; very different from my feet and toes. I didn’t have any fear of them until one day I met trouble. I had entered the stables as usual, my friendly little trusting self, and only when I tried to leave did a tall black beauty stamp his feet angrily at me, and he leaned down snapping his teeth, and trying his best to bite me. I started crying and panicked when no-one could hear, so then I began really screaming and yelling. Peter, the Foster’s son came out and rescued me, quieting the horse and taking me by the hand said “he’s just not used to little kids”, and we went back out into the warm sun. I learned not all horses want to be friends. After this little episode Peter made a special effort to help conquer my fear of returning to the stables. He brought round a horse out the front and helped us both to sit up on it together. This was a friendly mare and more accustomed to being around people.
Inside the house, I remember the kitchen / dining area where we often played if we were in doors. This was a multiple use area. We played banging saucepan lids, ate those yummy meals Mum served in our bowls and listened to stories sometimes. Her sewing machine on which she made all our clothes, and her own, was in the corner, and the gas stove happily produced all those wonderful, nourishing meals accompanied by tempting aromas from orange cakes and crunchy biscuits.
Our bedroom was at the back of the house and I recall my dark stained cot. The mattress was black and white striped. Opposite our bedroom was the bathroom with its red painted cement floor where I used to scream as Mum poured water over my head to rinse out the soap. Mum and Dad’s bedroom was at the front of the house, to the left of the hallway. I remember our front door, with the lumpy, marbled glass and its geometric style pattern which is etched indelibly in my mind due to Mum’s wrath. She was so cross with me she threatened to go to town with my sister and leave me home. She even went out and slammed the door shut. Apparently she had washed and dressed us first, then went to get ready herself. I thought I’d
32 give her some help, so I sat my sister in the gully trap for her bath, but I don’t remember turning the tap – just Mum’s fury. I didn’t try to help any more.
During those years I don’t remember seeing much of Dad. He used to work shift work in the evenings and slept some of the day. Then one day, Mum said “your dad’s been busy for the last year, building us a big new house”. We couldn’t really take it all in till one day things were all loaded up and we moved to our new home. My baby days were over but the memories of those innocent times remain.
Left: A proud dad Hugo with Diana, 10 months old.
Below: Healthier days in the sun with my younger baby sister.
Right: Mum’s fingers were never idle. She made all our clothes and her own.
Below: Caught getting up to mischief.
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Above: Making friends with horses again in front of 1136 Old Port Road home when we lived there.
Below: Our old home in 2012.
34 Hunting: beast to beaut
Aruna Manuelrayan
'Dear, come and see this house.' I will never forget the time, nearly eight years ago, when I first set eyes on the Ray Street house in Findon. My husband, the voice behind those words, my daughter, then 20, and I, had been hunting for a house in the Western suburbs for almost a year.
It was the same old story: 'It is such a beautiful house but too expensive' or 'It is affordable but too old' or 'I don't like it, Mum'. The weekend routine was, buy the Saturday Advertiser, pull out the property segment, start circling the properties that appeal, plan the day's schedule according to open inspection times and locations, cook and have lunch, and off to the hunt.
Why the Western suburbs? Well, when we first arrived — meaning migrated to Australia — we lived in Henley Beach, where we met some of the kindest and most loving people. It was also there that we all learnt to drive and got our Australian driver’s licence. Henley Beach was to us the most well planned and least congested suburb; adding to its appeal was its proximity to the beach and the city. What more can one ask for? Oh, my husband just reminded me, don't forget to mention that it was more affordable than the Eastern suburbs. Well, that's true but even if a house in the Western suburbs was expensive, we would not have settled anywhere else because it was and is our first love.
On 9 November 2003, we arrived in Adelaide and were taken to our pre-arranged subsidised housing in Burnley Street, Henley Beach. It was a unit in a three-storey apartment with roughly about 30 two-bedroom units. It was the first time I had heard of a common laundry area. I can vaguely remember going into this dark and nearly derelict little room where the washing machines were housed. I am not at all techno savvy, so I didn't even attempt to learn how to operate the dinosaurs. I was used to drying my clothes out on long bamboo poles and, on rainy days, on lines attached to the kitchen ceiling — the way all Singaporeans dry their laundry. So I was not very comfortable going out with my basket of dirty laundry, let alone drying it out in public. So, it was left to my husband to handle the laundry.
35 I was reasonably happy to take care of the cooking in the so-called kitchen. In comparison, my Singapore kitchen was palatial with state-of-the-art white goods and cooktops. But, given that the tiny kitchen was clean and had a fridge, a cooker, an oven with a grill and a reasonably clean wash basin, I was not averse to cooking there.
'Don't you get sea sick sleeping on this bed?' a question often asked in amazement when people find out that we sleep on a waterbed. Our first night in Adelaide was a far cry from our super comfortable king-sized water bed that we had taken for granted when in Singapore. Not only was our loan bed a ‘super’ single, it was hard and rather uncomfortable. We had many sleepless nights without the 'luxury' of tossing and turning in bed. There was no en suite and not enough wardrobe space. Our daughter's room was even smaller. The accommodation was spartan to say the least, but liveable. 'We did not have a TV, did we?' After our ten years in Adelaide I still vividly remember listening to the news. I also remember looking forward to the Messenger, the free weekly paper. What migrant will not be exhilarated to receive something for free after being told to pay for everything they wanted? The Messenger, user friendly and extremely useful, had enough information for our weekly house hunt; handy, too, in giving details about library programmes.
Now, the library was not only a place to read books, it offered a whole host of invaluable services to a new migrant. It was where we went whenever we had free time, which was most mornings. What a surprise it was when we found out that we could surf the net for free. The library soon became our lifeline to our loved ones in Singapore as phone calls were considerably more expensive. It was here that we looked for jobs, searched for deals on cars and got our daily news of what was happening in and around Adelaide and the world outside. Soon the librarian became our adviser cum confidant. We would go to him with queries about just about anything, for example how to get from point A to point B or where to go for affordable dental treatment or get bargains. He was a treasure trove of wisdom and knowledge. We are very thankful for him, and to the council for its superior and free library facilities. It was the librarian who told us about the beauty and convenience of the Western suburbs. He enumerated the advantages of living in this area when we told him of our desire to buy a house.
Armed with the knowledge of where to buy and what kind of house to buy, we went to our bank, where we held a term deposit for more than two years. We were confident that we would walk out within minutes, with a pre loan approval. But alas, we were disappointed when told that we needed to show proof of work. 'Say that again. We are not eligible for a loan because we do not have a job!
36 But we have enough money for you to give us a loan, don't we?' was all I could respond. 'Sorry, that is bank policy,' the bank manager replied. We left the bank in disbelief and indignation. I asked my husband, 'What assurance does the bank have that we will have a job three months from the day we buy our house? Is it not better for them to use our investment as collateral instead?' My husband just shrugged, as if defeated. That evening when we met our driving instructor, I narrated our bank encounter. He, who had lived in Adelaide for a number of years, and having been a bank manager in Asia, said, ‘That was the way local banks operated in Australia. I will introduce you to a manager of an overseas bank.’ On talking to the loan officer there, we were given an instant in-principle approval letter to purchase a property. Wow! How interesting. However, we soon realised that we were not ready yet to buy one, so we started hunting for a rental property.
Within two months, we vacated the subsidised apartment provided by the state government for skilled migrants such as us and moved into a three-bedroom vintage double brick house. It was an unfurnished, dark, cold structure, which meant we had to buy beds, cupboards, lounge sets, heaters and pretty much everything to make it liveable for however long we needed to live there. As we were waiting for our ten-foot container of our precious cargo from Singapore, we did not want to spend too much on temporary furniture and kitchenware, so we went hunting for these on the weekends.
We drove around looking for bargains at garage sales. Our timing was so perfect because our 'meet and greet' guide, the gentleman who was waiting at the airport to receive us when we first arrived, was downsizing and happy to part with his furniture for a song. The only catch was he lived in Christies Beach and we lived in Henley Beach; yes, his home was a long way from us. To compound the issue, we had never driven with a trailer hooked up to our car. The learning curve was becoming steeper. Did we have a choice? Yes and no. Yes we could decline his offer, but no it was too good to pass. So, what did we do? My husband and I then went to a car accessory fitting shop and had a tow bar attached to the car. After a crash course on how to manoeuvre the trailer, we were off to — yes, you guessed it — Christies Beach. It was worth the cost and time invested as we picked up two new cupboards and a vanity coat hanger dresser, amongst other 'treasures'.
The next challenge was to secure the 'treasures' to the trailer. Having no experience, we did not bring any ropes. All we had was a ball of thin string. Somehow we managed to tie the furniture although a little insecurely. We stopped periodically to check that nothing had fallen off. We brought the furniture home all in one piece. Then we went hunting for the other household necessities. We
37 had more or less furnished the rented house when we received news that our 10-foot container was in Port Adelaide and our 'tangible memories' from Singapore would be sent to our home in two weeks. Oh well, at least we did not have to buy anything else.
By this time, we had made friends with two migrant families who had arrived around the same time as us. The first was a family of four. We met them the day we had arrived in Adelaide, through our meet and greet guide. The other was a family of three who had arrived the week after us and were housed in the same apartment block. So, when the container load arrived at our doorstep, we had reliable people on hand to help unload and set up the kitchen and the other rooms. By the end of the day, the house looked like a home, thanks to the many helping hands. As we knew we would not be living in that house for more than a year, we chose not to open all the boxes, as it would mean repacking. So, we stacked the unopened boxes in one of the bedrooms. Life felt more bearable, as we had our own things, especially our kitchenware and some of the furniture from home.
Seated comfortably in our lounge chairs, my husband reminded me of our car hunt. This happened when we were still in the subsidised housing unit. For a month we had been driving a rented car. 'Don't you think it’s cheaper to own a car?' I casually asked. Being a man of few words, he pointed at an advert in the Messenger he was flipping through. Coming from Singapore where cars cost an arm and a leg, my eyes lit up instantly as I spotted the price of the brand new car he was looking at. Without hesitation we called the number below the picture and were told that a car salesman would come to our home that evening for a test drive. We were astounded by such a service and of course accepted his offer.
That evening, a huge and loud-speaking Caucasian man came with a brand new Toyota something — I cannot remember it as this is one of the episodes I consider a nightmare and best forgotten for good. After a test drive, he came up to the house and gave us a stack of forms to fill in. We duly signed on the dotted line not realising that the cost of the car and the interest on the proposed loan were exorbitant. We found this out the next morning when we returned the rental car and settled the bill. On hearing the price, the rental car salesman told us we had been taken for a ride. Now, we were in a dilemma, we had already paid a $500 non-refundable deposit. On our first month in a foreign country it was a large sum to lose, but what choice did we have. Encouraged by our rental car man, we called the 'pushy' car salesman only to be told that there was no cooling off period for car sales and that we had to honour that deal or forfeit the deposit. Long story short, the rental car man took over the phone and before we knew it, our deposit was on the way back into our account
38 and the deal squashed. What a relief! Our new found friend then introduced us to a car dealer who gave us a good deal on a similar model and brand. With this car we house hunted. As we were still new to the country and the suburb, we soon bought a Tom Tom, a GPS which made the hunt less stressful.
Appropriately armed, we geared up for the hunt with our Saturday property guide, the property section of the Messenger, relevant pages dog-eared and prospective properties highlighted, gassed up, destination set on Tom Tom, water bottles topped up, full of excitement and trepidation. Surprise, surprise, we soon realised that we had to be educated on the pitfalls of buying a second- hand house. So, we went back to our new-found advisor, the rental car mate who gave us a checklist to tick when we were ready for the kill. Armed with this information, we felt prepared and confident that we would find our dream home.
Now, what was our dream house? you ask. We wanted a brand new house in a safe neighbourhood in a convenient location. That is the broad description. Narrowing it down, we should have four bedrooms, en suite, walk-in-robe, a separate kitchen, high ceiling, reversible air con system, and a low maintenance garden — is that too much to ask? Oh, and within our budget. Why did we decide against a second-hand property? Coming from Singapore, we were not that good with our hands, like fixing up the plumbing or wiring or gardening. We had always lived in a brand new apartment until coming to Australia. So, we were not willing to take a risk with a second-hand house, especially when we had heard horror stories about burst pipes, leaking taps, faulty wiring, termites, salt damp, just to name a few. So, we wanted a hassle-free home.
When our landlord found out that we were house hunting, he offered to sell the house we were renting from him. It was an old double brick three-bedroom house with two carports, an average size garden and — wait for it — a granny flat in which he lived. Although the asking price was within our budget, it did not meet our criteria. Was he persistent though! We politely declined his offer and continued with our hunt. Gosh, did we see houses! You name it and we saw it: single, double, old, new, double brick, brick veneer ... and we visited display villages. In one display village we discovered that we could build our dream home; all we needed was to buy a piece of land. A tempting idea! So, we researched and enquired about the pitfalls and benefits of this venture. As you may have already realised, our learning curve became steeper by the months. Now, what did we learn about building our own house? Land was not cheap, especially in the area we were looking to buy. Then we heard from the librarian about the hidden cost of building a house, unscrupulous
39 contractors and traders who short change, cut corners or delay the process, and so on. So, we stuck to plan A: be determined to hunt for a new house and be ready to move in.
After about nine months of hunting, yes, the time it takes to have a baby, my husband called me on my mobile, sounding uncharacteristically excited about a house he had seen. His enthusiasm was so contagious that I immediately agreed to go and see it. As soon as I set eyes, not to mention set foot, on the house I knew she was the one. She ticked all the boxes, except one. Can you guess which one? I know what you are thinking, 'the price'. No, not that. It was an open plan home, which meant that there was one large open space for the kitchen, dining room and family room. Remember, I wanted a separate kitchen? However, I was too tired to keep hunting for my ideal home, and after nine months of relentless searching, it became evident to me that I was chasing an elusive dream and so was prepared to settle for near perfect.
You may be wondering how my husband came to know about this house. He was in Findon Coles supermarket, looking for rat poison. Yes, rat poison, as we had been shocked to find out that we were cohabiting with rats in our rented house. After buying the poison, my husband returned to the car park which was adjacent to a newly constructed corner house. He walked up to the lady who was watering the lawn and asked if the house was for sale and she had said the first open inspection was on the coming weekend. But she was happy for him to take a look since he was already there. Then when he asked if I could have a quick look, she agreed, probably thinking if she could sell it to us she would not have to go through the hassle of an open inspection. As it turned out, she did herself and us a big favour as we loved it.
Before we signed the contract, we wanted a couple of things done. One was the construction of a fence in front of the house, the other, the installation of a roller door at the back of the garage. These were not for aesthetic purposes, they were necessary because we were the only house in that part of the neighbourhood. What was facing the house was a 50-year-old landfill which was being cleaned up. Suddenly it dawned on me that it was the infamous Royal Park dump. The house, therefore, faced this beast — a fence lined with tattered, black tarpaulin that was coated with a grey soot-like substance, possibly toxic dust. The residents in the surrounding area had been lobbying Charles Sturt Council to take action to protect them against pollution and poisoning. Articles in the Messenger claimed that some residents had succumbed to respiratory problems. All these problems became apparent only after we had signed the contract to purchase the house. To be frank, to say
40 the least, it did not bother us. We were elated to become home owners of our dream home. No more paying rent, aka, dead money.
We spotted the house in October and moved in sometime before Christmas. Our first Christmas was a quiet yet joyous one. A couple of visitors paid us a surprise visit at breakfast time. They, being Aussies, were surprised at our decision to buy a house which overlooked a landfill that was being cleared. They were appalled at the gaping hole and the number of earth movers, forklifts and heavy machinery left idle, as it was Christmas. 'How do you cope with the noise and the smell?' they wanted to know. 'An unsightly and toxic surrounding such as this should not have been earmarked, let alone sold for residential development,' said one, in a voice tinged with disgust and concern. 'You must go for a medical check up now, and six months later, to make sure you have not breathed in all these toxic gasses, especially methane, which I am sure will be pumped out,' they tried to advise us. We politely smiled and said, ‘Yes, we will do that,’ and we thanked them for their advice and concern. It was then that the grave reality of living across from this 'beast' dawned on us. But what could we do? We had just bought and moved into the house. We thought we had done our homework. With a steel-framed house we were sure we would not have issues with termites and salt damp. No one had told us to look out for toxic gases. 'Do we need to buy gas masks, Mum?' my daughter queried. I assured her that that would not be necessary, although I was not sure if I was right. I decided to find out more about the claim that there could be toxicity in the air that we breathed.
It was around this time that the developer or the salvage company started sending pamphlets assuring the residents that all precautions had been taken to ensure that the air was not contaminated and pollution was under control. I gave a huge sigh of relief as I shared that reassuring information with my daughter. What did irk me though was the feeble attempt made by the salvage company to 'block' the unsightly view with torn and tattered soot-laced black tarpaulin. 'Why don't they cover it with a new sheet?' I asked my husband. He dismissed my question with 'what difference does it make? Clean new tarp or filthy old one. It is not going to contain the pollution'. So, I made sure that all windows were closed at all times and we did not walk out but drove out from the garage and back in through the garage.
Not surprising, nothing we planted grew. A year after planting roses and lavender, to my dismay, had died. Even the carpet grass did not stand a chance. So, I called my builder and asked what was going on.
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He gave us a quick history lesson. The new development previously had consisted of trust homes which were demolished and the land parcelled out for residential development. Council only approved of 'our' house after he, the builder, had buried six concrete piles or columns to ensure the foundation was strong and that the sewage, which could have leaked from the landfill, did not affect the new structure. In his opinion the place was environmentally safe. Considering he was the builder with a vested interest, it was not surprising that he should say such things but since we had already bought the house, he had no reason to lie or cover up the truth. So, we chose to believe him and take our chances, even though we kept reading about local residents lobbying the council to stop the works until adequate measures were taken by the salvage operators to ensure public safety. As a result, occasional 'hosing' down activities were undertaken. In the meantime, life went on. Slowly but surely, we could see the hole becoming deeper, wider and darker.
It was then that I heard of a plan to store water in preparation for the 100-year-flood. What a good idea to turn the cradle into a reservoir. Then I realised what a dumb notion it was as the water would be toxic.
All too soon, a three-storey apartment block was built at one end of the hole and a park right in front of our house, where the gaping hole was. To make it even better, overnight, ten royal palm trees popped up around the park. What was once a beast had been transformed into a beauty! Like a wise old friend said, 'Aren't you glad it has transformed from a beast to a beaut and not the other way round?' I suppose I should count my blessings.
It got even better and more beautiful. Soon there was a new shopping centre and a small but cosy mall, and the library, our favourite haunt, was given a welcome facelift. Then a playground and two barbecue areas were constructed up in the park. Oh, what a view we now have from the front of our house! It looks and feels as if we are living in a resort with our own park in the front yard. So, we set up the front veranda with a swing and an outdoor picnic set. Then it was time to do up the garden. We went for succulents, low maintenance and less water-consuming plants. Along with our eco- conscious efforts, we installed solar panels, the only house with these power saving panels in the neighbourhood; whether we were smart or silly, we don't know as the upfront cost to install these was high compared to what it costs today. With no rain in sight, but with faith, we installed a slim line rainwater tank in the backyard. I would like to think that we are doing our part to save the earth.
42 Soon we had neighbours. Yippee! They are locals, and migrants like us. We befriended them. I remember taking a tray of home-made chocolate cakes to the first neighbour's house and how soon the children were at our place, jumping on our trampoline or helping me with the cooking or getting help with their schoolwork. However, the land next to ours had been left vacant and overgrown with weeds for many years until recently when a very friendly Aussie family built a lovely house and moved in. We then decided to do up our backyard. After much research and a dozen quotes, we finally settled for an arch and flat opaque pergola. Now we are ready to party — in style, I must add.
If not for the phone call from my husband some eight years ago to see a house in Findon and me saying, 'Let's buy it,' this beast turned beaut would not have become our pride and joy.
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High School Daze Joanna Burns
Two words strike fear into the hearts of most new teenagers embarking on their second stage of their long, arduous road to educational enlightenment. High school…
Yes, I went to high school once. It was back in the eighties where perms, fluoro socks and Spandau Ballet reigned supreme, and the thought of going to high school made me feel nauseous. Nightmares of drugs, smoking and heads getting flushed down toilets didn’t make me feel warm and fuzzy about this whole new experience that I must endure, and the fact that I would hardly know a soul there, despite going to the local primary school, didn’t help me either. And so, on a hot day in early February in 1983, I had my first, dreaded day of high school.
Standing at the gate of Henley High School in my new uniform, a crisp white and green checked dress, I surveyed the crowd as I heard my Mum’s faded blue volksy roar off into the distance. I was confronted with a mass of a hundred or so Year 8’s, and my heart sank at the prospect of finding the one or two kids I knew from Henley Beach Primary. There were more kids here than in my whole primary school put together, and of the dozen or so Year 7’s from the previous year, only a handful were starting at Henley High with me. My primary school was tiny compared to this monstrous place, which I’d only been attending for the last two years because we’d moved from North Plympton to West Beach. My younger sister and I had changed from Netley Primary to Henley Beach Primary as our Dad was the Deputy Principal there at the time, but it hadn’t taken long to get to know most of the kids in the school. I had no chance here, I thought, trying not to panic as I looked around at the unfamiliar faces in a sea of green, grey and white.
That morning, we were duly sorted into our home room groups and led off down the “Spine”, a covered walkway which had prefab classrooms protruding from either side of it much like ribs, to our new classroom. Unfortunately for me, with my disability with directions, all the rooms looked identical and my fear of getting lost came true after recess and I couldn’t find my way back. The thought of being late made me panicky, but I was quickly redirected without too much fuss in the end. I didn’t know anyone in my home room group either, but I ended up sitting next to one girl who also didn’t seem to know anyone and eventually I started to relax.
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Being early February, the prefab classrooms were hot. The ceiling fans whizzed and wobbled at top speed, faster than helicopter blades, and I could imagine them coming loose and chopping all our heads off. I sunk down lower in my seat and tried to conserve my energy, as the hot air blew around me turning my face a scarlet shade of beetroot.
Eventually lunch time came around and I got to wander the school yard again. A few times I heard the word “vegies” yelled out to the Year 8’s from the older kids. I don’t know why we were called vegies, but I guessed it was better than being called “squares” or “nerds” or “losers”.
“Hey, look at that kid!” a voice came from behind me, and I turned around to see two Year 9 boys smirking at me, one with an outstretched finger pointing in my direction, and my red face went redder. “Looks like one of the kids has jumped the kindergarten fence!” the one pointing laughed to the other.
Okay. I knew I was short, but I didn’t get the part about the kindergarten fence until much later as I had no idea the local kindy backed on to the high school. The whole being short thing though, lasted my whole high school life. You could always find me sitting on the end of the first row in school class photos, and I didn’t reach my grand height of five foot two and a half (don’t forget the half) until after I’d left high school. In fact, I am still waiting for my growth spurt.
That lunch time, however, I did find a girl who was being picked on because her dress was too long. I thought mine was long, but hers was longer. Apparently the popular or tough girls used to hitch theirs up with belts or elastic hidden under their jumpers, I found out later. But this girl and I became friends. And after a few weeks, our little group of two multiplied to four, and so it went on. By the end of Year 8 we had quite a large group of friends and most of us stuck together for the whole five years and even beyond. Our group was inclusive, as long as you had a sense of humour, weren’t up yourself or too tough, you were in. We were from different backgrounds. We were supportive of each other. Some of us were very talented and smart, and others like me, were just plain average. But we got ourselves through the day to day chores of high school, anticipating recess and lunch times so we could laugh madly at our teachers, or sympathise with those who been hauled over the coals, or congratulate those who had done well. Within our group, close friendships were made. But it was an elastic thing. Sometimes you were drawn to certain friends for different reasons, and then you would spring back to others. Anything was possible in our group.
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I had a couple of close friendships, in particular a girl whom I’ll call my twin. She and I were often confused by both the teachers and students our whole time in high school. Apart from looking alike, we had perms at the same time and braces on our teeth at much the same time; we were also good at the same subjects and had similar interests, too. We also rode our bikes to school together and were round at each other’s house almost every weekend.
But it wasn’t just individual friendships that gave me so much happiness; it was our group that gave me even more. Sleepovers were lots of fun. There was one where we all stayed up until sunrise, keeping each other awake by watching movies, dancing and laughing at each other. We were high on sugar and spaced out on lack of sleep. Another one I remember was running around to my friend’s house; she lived in one of ‘The Marines’, the old terraces on the beachfront at Grange. We tore up and down the stairs and in and out of the rooms, and now I’d wish I’d taken more notice of this historic Grange icon, but as a teenager, mucking around with your friends is probably more fun than observing old buildings.
Of course, the other things that made high school bearable were my favourite subjects and my favourite teachers. The subjects I enjoyed the most were art and music, and funnily enough, my favourite teachers were my art and music teachers, although I had a really good maths teacher once who made algebra a breeze, and a really good history teacher who made old stuff seem interesting — and she gave out Mars Bars. Science teachers on the whole seemed either dull or intimidating or smelly, and English teachers were rather intense, and there were others who didn’t seem to have any control over anything or anyone and, as soon as their backs were turned, spit balls flew around the classroom like bullets.
Once, while we were supposed to be watching a video in the Audio Visual room, our science teacher walked out and left us to our own devices. I was sitting near the front with a few of the girls, not at the front, because that was where all the nerdy kids sat, and some of the boys sitting behind us began tapping their shoes on our chairs. It was somewhat annoying, but we ignored it at first, until the tapping became kicking, and telling them to stop or giving them daggers only made it worse. Then we got up and stood at the back of the room behind where all the tough kids sat and watched while our chairs were kicked over. Eventually our teacher came back, oblivious of the fact chairs were upside-down and some of the students had retreated to the safety of the back row. Some other teachers, however, were very intimidating and you wouldn’t dare make a wrong move. If you weren’t paying attention you would have a chalk duster thrown at you or, worse still, you could get
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singled out in front of everyone. That was a big fear of mine. I dreaded the thought of having to stand up in front of everyone, so instead I kept my head down, determined to fly under the radar. Music and art, though, were my exceptions. I loved them both and I felt that I could relax and be me, and they were something I was good at.
I played the violin and I was in the String Ensemble at Henley High – which was like the poor cousin to the glamorous Concert Band that toured around and played exciting things like Billy Joel medleys and movie themes and “The Stripper”. Oh, how I wanted to be in the Concert Band. Several of my friends were in it, and I was envious. So, I became a groupie instead. If I couldn’t be in it, then at least I could hang around with them. Quite a few of them were also in the choir, which I absolutely loved and I looked forward to our lunch time or early morning practice sessions with excitement. It was thrilling to hear our four-part harmonies come together in a Beatles song or a jazz number. But going back to my violin, I could be seen once a week on my deadly-treadly, well, actually it was my Mum’s old bike — it was black with a silver horse in mid gallop mounted on the front mudguard, and there was me, like Kermit the Frog, perched on top with the violin secured to the parcel carrier with an ockie strap whizzing down Ozone Street at a million miles an hour with the wind whipping through my hair. I had to be careful of posts and stobie poles as occasionally I would side swipe them with my battered violin case. I don’t know how I didn’t get severely picked on for that. My violin did save the day once when I was getting dressed in the girls change room after P.E., when one of the tough girls approached me with a cigarette and tried to get me to take it. I remembered clutching my violin to my chest and saying I couldn’t because I would be late for my violin lesson. “Just leave her alone,” I heard one girl say from behind me as I sped out the door. So, how I didn’t get even more picked on for that, I still don’t know.
Art lessons were my other love. It was like retreating into another world. Not only was it fun, but it was therapeutic too. Being caught up in your own creative pursuits it felt as if your cares and worries were a million miles away.
It must have been when I was around Year 10 or 11 when computers were first introduced to the school. One lunch time a week, the computer room was set aside for the girls to learn how to use them, and I remember sharing a computer with a friend, staring at the screen with its flashing cursor and block pictures, playing Granny’s Garden or the Lemonade Stand game.
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Also in Year 10, I took typing as a subject. It wasn’t one of my favourite subjects as my small fingers would sometimes get trapped between the letter keys of the huge old typewriters and it seemed such an effort to press ‘a’ with my little finger. I don’t know who decided to put ‘a’ on the far left hand side of the typewriter, surely it would have been more sensible to swap the ‘a’ with the lesser used ‘f’. But the lessons did prove useful later on when I had to type essays for uni, especially years later when I got my own computer.
Home Economics at about the same time introduced us to the wonderful world of microwave cookery. We did an assignment on the magic of microwaves and learnt that they were able to cook anything and everything in a matter of minutes. Mum had gone out and bought one plus a whole array of special plastic bowls and containers and soon we were having microwaved meals and desserts every day of the week.
We also had swimming lessons one year which I thought would be great as long as you didn’t have to be seen in your bathers in front of your whole class, me who looked like a tadpole next to all the other frogs. We had a pool at home, so I wasn’t too bad a swimmer, but that was until we went to the Henley Swimming Pool by the sea at Henley Beach. There I learnt that I could only swim for about twenty metres at best before clinging onto the edge and gasping. The salt water that came straight in from the sea stung my eyes and made my throat burn. And it was freezing. As much as I hated the whole experience, I was still sad to see the pool go shortly after in 1985.
Fashion in the eighties was wonderful, wasn’t it? Sure, I got a perm like everyone else in Year 9, and once the initial afro frizz settled down it wasn’t too bad. As my perm grew out, Mum would get the curling tongs onto it and swoop the sides out just like Farrah Fawcett. Hairstyles for the boys were pretty standard, as long as mullets were your thing, though one used to wear his hair like a Mohawk, using egg whites to make his hair defy gravity. Squeakies were the fashion for the feet. They were brown leather woven plaited sandals, that most of the girls wore, and they did squeak when you walked. Shell necklaces were also all the rage, which were either white or pink, like hundreds of tiny pieces of shell threaded onto a nylon line. Plastic dangly earrings were also popular but they made my ear lobes red and weepy. Boys wore Romes and carried Puma vinyl bags with their corduroy school pants. My PE uniform was hand made by Mum, and some of my friends also had skirts made by their Mum’s too. As long as you wore the school colours, then that was good enough for your uniform, it didn’t matter where it came from. Make-up for the early teens was worn mostly by the popular or tough girls and applied thickly. Once I saw one of these girls without her make up on and
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I didn’t recognise her at all. You could smell them coming a mile off, too, as the waft of Cool Charm preceded them.
The culmination of my high school years was centred on the Year 12 Graduation Dinner Dance. There were plenty of discussions at lunch times regarding taffeta, ruching and puffed sleeves and whether they were homemade creations or, better still, off the rack. A few of us were lucky or brave enough to have a partner. Even if I did have my eye on someone, I doubt I would have had enough guts to ask them to come with me. At least there were some of us in our group who were partner- free.
So one of my friends and I rolled up to the big event in my Dad’s hand painted (with a brush, by my Mum!) white Holden Monaro, complete with resident huntsman in the back corner window. Nothing like arriving in style! The dinner dance was held at the Reception Centre at Football Park, West Lakes, and the music of 1987 provided the soundtrack to this much anticipated event. Footy Park seemed like a rather exclusive venue and I remember feeling pretty special. There I was, dressed in a black waterwave taffeta full skirt with a peach coloured satin top with pleats down the front and slightly puffed three quarter length sleaves. Mum had spent hours making it out of paper patterns cut out of newspapers — her own design. And, of course, I had a regulation 1980’s perm.
Of the evening, I remember dancing with my friends and accidentally getting my high heel caught in the hem of my skirt. I heard a gut-wrenching ripping sound as I looked down to see part of the hem hanging down at the back of my black waterwave taffeta skirt. However, the best part of the evening was back at my twin’s house where several of us danced, laughed and talked to the wee hours of the morning.
However, that was not quite the end of my high school days. After I received my final results, I waited patiently for a letter to come to tell me what uni course I’d been accepted into. I had selected teaching and art courses as my top four choices, though I really didn’t know what I wanted to do. Eventually the letter came and I was both disappointed and shocked. I did not get into teaching, but I was now going to be a nurse. A nurse! It was my last choice and I’d only put it down because I couldn’t think of anything else! I fainted at the sight of blood. How could I be a nurse?
So, it was decided between my parents and I, that I would defer my nursing course and go back to high school and study three more subjects to increase my final results and try once more to get into
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teaching. It wasn’t too bad going back, as a couple of my friends also returned to try and up their scores.
During that extra year, I studied harder, I got myself a casual job at Target, and I took driving lessons which eventually lead me to meet my future husband at the Henley Town Hall (another story!). But the main thing the extra year gave me was time. Time to work out what it was that I really wanted to do. I went to the universities, I spoke to people, but a lot of it came from home too. With both my parents being primary school teachers, they were the ones talking me out of it, telling me it was hard to get a job in the city. My auntie, on the other hand, was working as a nurse assistant, and she told me lots of wild and wonderful stories about nursing — not forgetting the one where she put one man’s false eye in upside-down so that he looked cross-eyed and she had to fish it out and put it back in the right way round. But it made me think. Maybe I could do nursing. Maybe I could be a nurse
One year later I was walking up to the “Pink Palace”, as everyone affectionately called it. It was the brand new, state-of-the-art, purpose built nursing building at the Underdale Campus of UniSA on Holbrooks Road, and it was there that I began my nursing journey. Yes, I did feel faint at the sight of blood, and when I saw nasty ulcers that penetrated deep into a patient’s leg, or when I witnessed a hip operation and they got out the hammer. But it’s now over twenty years since I began, and I love it — most of the time.
Recently at work, an old woman was wheeled into our ward and I went over to greet her. She looked up at me with a pained and irritated expression on her face. “When someone who feels as rotten as I do right now,” she grumbled at me, “sees a smiling face — it makes all the difference,” and she tried to smile back at me. “Thank you,” she said. And then it’s worth it.
I suppose the whole point of high school is to get a good education so that you can get a worthwhile, stimulating job and, let’s face it, earn some money. But it isn’t just that. It’s also the friendships and the experiences that you have along the way that make it something truly memorable.
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Memoirs from the Grange Rose Boucaut
1981 Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring: Hello? Hello Darling. I am ringing with some exciting news. Your brother has just bought a house. Hi Mum, what did you say? Mouse has just bought a house in the sand hills down at Grange so when he comes back to Australia he’s got a house in Adelaide. What’s he going to do with it in the meantime? He’s going to rent it out.
My brother, or Mouse as we nicknamed him, was off to work in Hong Kong for an unknown but extended time. He had bought a house for a modest price — an old but sturdy bungalow with three bedrooms nestled in the sand hills just north of the Grange jetty. The house was affectionately nicknamed Willy Wong by my mother, because my brother’s first name was William and Wong because he was off to Hong Kong.
My parents oversaw the property, the rental of which was undertaken by a professional property management team. Various stories would filter through to me, the younger sister, as tenants changed and new tenants moved in. My parents took on the responsibility of going in and doing a good but exhausting clean up each time there was a change of tenants.
The tenants from hell were the last straw. Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring: Hello? Hello Darling — the last tenants took their chairs and had a party up on the roof. Are you kidding? No, and the mess was indescribable.
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Then followed a period when the house was unoccupied. As my brother said, it’s too much for Mum and Dad, I’d like them just to use it as a beach house so they can enjoy it in their old age, rather than having to slave away each time the tenants change. And so it was that my parents became regular visitors, not staying overnight but day tripping to check on the house, enjoying the salty smells and the fresh sea air, watching the beach activities, having a picnic lunch and a cup of tea before returning to their home in Adelaide after a lovely day out.
1985 At about this time my parents sold their farm in the mid-north. The sale made us all sad as we had had the place for most of my life and I loved it dearly although it was very marginal mallee country, and unattractive to most who passed by on their way to another destination. The house there, or the two houses, a main one and a cottage, really held lots of very happy memories for me. The houses were modestly furnished including about 15 iron beds that my father bought cheaply from the Queen Victoria Hospital when they had a dispersal sale as they upgraded their hospital beds to more modern ones. The house had a wonderful old fridge that used to rattle away through the night, and a wood stove which kept the whole kitchen area warm and cosy and a huge veranda overlooking the plains to the east — in the direction of the River Murray. My parents always encouraged us to have lots of friends to stay and so it was often full of visitors and good cheer. We would all pitch in to do the work and I especially enjoyed the outdoors tasks with my father: rounding up sheep, mending fences, cleaning troughs, fixing water pipes and collecting wood.
When the place was sold we loaded up some of the much loved items and took them to Adelaide and with these we furnished the Grange house. The furniture was generally mismatched but very functional and what didn’t fit into the house was stored in the garage out the back and the small sunroom attached to it.
My mother made it very homely and of course there was always an ample supply of tea, biscuits and cakes to share with any visitors. Thus it became a habit for my parents to spend a day at the beach to do the gardening, have a picnic, an afternoon ‘forty winks’ as my parents called their nap, and then return home to Prospect with renewed vigour as they both relished the beach.
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Everyone loved sitting on the front veranda. There you could sit and watch events on the foreshore from the comfort of the old bungalow — you could easily see from the Grange jetty to the south up beyond the West Lakes inlet to the north. The veranda had at some stage been enclosed and had big windows which opened out so that they caught any available breeze on a hot day but then could be firmly shut to keep out the full force of the wind to keep it snug. I particularly enjoyed sitting on the veranda to watch the ever changing sea with the clouds catching the last rays of the setting sun as it sank into the sea.
1988-1990 When our children were born we received and unexpected offer from my brother, Would you be interested in caretaking the house over the summer holidays? That would save Mum and Dad having to do it in the heat and the boys would enjoy the beach. What an offer! My brother said it would be good to have the house lived in and maintained and also to keep the burglars and vandals out of it. We subsequently spent Christmas holidays there for about 15 years.
The first year, soon after our arrival the young child of a family friend came rushing out of the bathroom, very embarrassed and on the verge of tears whispered, I think I’ve broken the toilet! I got up and walked into the bathroom. It was flooded. We rang the local plumber, who came to our rescue. The drains were blocked with tree roots. Subsequently, this was an annual problem. The plumber became our friend, we saw him at least once a year and were always grateful for his help. Once the plumbing was functioning we were right for the summer holidays!
Rowing Several of my sporty friends took up rowing in their late 40s. They would ring me and say You’ve got to try rowing it’s such fun and a great way to keep fit. You would love it! At the time I was rather occupied with my studies but decided that once I had some free time I would give it a try. I tried to get into a club on the Torrens which took adults and taught them how to row but, for one reason or another, this didn’t work out — I think the Torrens was closed due to an outbreak of blue-green algae. This particular summer I was walking along the beach at Grange when I bumped into a friend who suggested I try rowing with the Port Adelaide Rowing Club as she had really enjoyed it there, they were a good
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crowd and not confined to the short distance of the Torrens lake. I got a group together and we went over to Snowdons beach to try it out. As it turned out we all enjoyed it (there were 8 of us) but only two of us decided to keep going with the sport after our introductory sessions.
We were rather the wallflowers of the club for a while because most of the others were well beyond beginner level. However, one of the chaps saw an opportunity to coach us and so took us on — lucky us! There followed a period of him giving us regular coaching. From this he invited us to join him for a weekend rowing camp at West Lakes over at the Prince Alfred College boatshed— just north of the rowing course. Well, that was brave of him! There were eight women at this camp, our coach was the cox. He had access to a recently restored beautiful wooden boat called ‘The Bentley’. We were very privileged to get to row in it and were very careful getting it in and out of the boatshed and onto the water. It weighed a ton! Our initial row was from the PAC boatshed up to the West Lakes boatshed — we felt as though we had rowed for miles and then got out and did some stretches before continuing. That of course is an embarrassing admission because it is only about a kilometre or two but for us at that stage it was a long way.
From then on we did a fair bit of rowing out of that boatshed — once we became more proficient our goal was to compete at the Head of the Yarra (an annual boatrace in Melbourne from the CBD to Hawthorne) in a mixed eight. This required regular training as it was an 8+ km race and not for the faint hearted. So most Sunday mornings for about 6 months we fronted at 8.00am to train. Our coach had a great aim that we all shared, ‘To start, finish and have fun’.
It is interesting to go around the island and to see what goes on in the front yards of homes that border the lake — we got to know the landmarks and the bridges and of course we got to master the distance. We had a regular treat after rowing with a drink of hot chilli chocolate that we prepared on a roster system and took to rowing in thermoses over the chilly winter months.
We all trooped off to Melbourne and completed the race — not in a fast time but gosh it was a wonderful experience. At the end of the race we had to take the boat out of the water at the Hawthorne Rowing club and put it on the trailer to come home. That turned out to be
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a marathon in itself as it weighed a ton and some bright spark said we should carry it to the trailer as it was hard to get the trailer in near the boatshed. So there we were trooping across Bridge Road with the precious Bentley which was dreadfully heavy and I distinctly remember pushing the button on the traffic lights to enable us to cross the road — what a circus — a truly memorable event!
We subsequently went on to compete in other events at West Lakes — generally always beaten by our rowing friends and main rivals on the water, from Riverside rowing club. However, we kept working on improving our rowing and our fitness. At the 2011 Australian Masters Games at West Lakes (F Grade) we had a tough row, neck and neck against Riverside. We managed to beat them over the line in the Womens Eight — a complete surprise to both crews which made the victory even sweeter in a hard fought race.
Golf Sometimes we would have visitors without their own transport. When giving them directions we’d say, The best way to reach us is by train, we’ll walk down to meet you at the station, it’s the last stop. The train from Adelaide to Grange passes through the Royal Adelaide Golf Course at Seaton. In the good old days my father said there was a train stop within the golf course, so avid golfers could disembark, but this is long gone. When passing through in the train I always look enviously at the golfers and wish I was with them. Playing that course though is quite different in reality. As any golfer of only average ability (like me) will tell you, golf is a character building sport! There are a number of very big bunkers (sand traps) at Royal Adelaide that take true grit, determination, and skill to emerge from. The greens are beautifully maintained which belies their treachery and the fairways where one should play golf are often seemingly not quite wide enough and the rough on either side seems to draw the ball like a magnet. From the tenth tee the fairway runs parallel with Frederick road and there is a bus stop just along the fence. I must admit that several times I have had to call ‘fore’ to warn any one waiting for a bus to look out for my wayward ball.
Swimming When thinking of the beach my mind automatically conjures up visions of swimming. When I was little I learnt to swim with Mr Renfrey, the swim instructor, down at the Henley baths. The ultimate test was to swim 22 yards to get my beginner’s certificate. Being outside and
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unheated the seawater pool was often icy cold. My mother would coat me in some sort of fat, lard perhaps, to give me some insulation as I was rather skinny and got very cold quickly. She would also have a thermos of warm drinks for after the swim and a sticky bun as a reward. We would track down there from Prospect in the old Holden and then traipse home again. Needless to say eventually I became a qualified beginner but at the time 22 yards seemed like miles! From this start I subsequently enjoyed many aquatic activities.
Forty years on it was paddling in the sand/tidal pools with the boys at Grange, building sandcastles and washing the sand off in those warm pools. Delicious! As the boys grew older it was into the water and the channel before the sandbar. Swimming lessons with ‘Learn to Swim’ or ‘Vac Swim’ and learning about beach safety. All good fun and then back to the house to warm up with warm drinks and freshly baked yeast buns.
In nice weather we’d invite visitors down for a morning at the beach, after a pleasant chat we’d say, Well who’s for a walk along the beach and a swim? One morning we all trooped down to the beach, then on into the water and out beyond the channel to the sandbar and were happily horsing around out there… when looking back towards the shore a fin passed between us and the beach! What a fright! Adrenalin rushed. Not to worry, it was only a dolphin!
We had a few beach birthday parties for the boys — always great excitement and a time for particular vigilance with an army of kind adults on duty as part of the ‘beach patrol’. Not a problem when lifesavers were on duty but when not, parents were a key to keeping an eye on all the swimmers. On one occasion a bright young lad, who was a good swimmer decided to swim out to about level with the end of the jetty which was terrifying for parents on the shore as the less able boys followed the leader. Fortunately all returned to the shore safe and sound and enjoyed a feast of birthday cake after the beach activities. A huge sigh of relief as all boys were collected by parents and taken home. All accounted for and a happy ending.
Of course swimming is not only for the youngsters. Each year at the end of January we would watch the Henley-Grange swim from jetty to jetty. We would stand at the end of the race and marvel at the wonderful swimmers who completed the marathon: young, old, thin,
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rotund — all great athletes. In some years the conditions were favourable, other years it was rough and we wondered how on earth they did it. Sometimes we would take a vantage point with the crowd on the end of the Grange jetty and watch them on their final approach. Bravo to them all.
One year I thought it would be fun to do the swim but on our own terms. Together with my friend Suzanne D we decided to do a leisurely swim if we could from Henley to Grange. We worked out ideal conditions — it needed to be absolutely calm and very hot. The day came and we set off from Henley about 7.00am and breast stroked and talked all the way to Grange — it took ages but was absolutely wonderful. The water was like glass and sparkling clean. Our kind husbands dropped us at Henley with children keen to swim. Hannah D swam freestyle the whole way and completed the swim quickly. Suzanne and I took about an hour; the boys swam about three quarters of the way and then walked the rest. All were happy — the water was at its best — delicious. Exhausted we walked home had morning tea and then flopped about, falling asleep for about three hours. More admiration for those long distance swimmers doing it in record time with their beautiful, rhythmic over-arm action.
At the other end of the age spectrum my mother and Aunt in their later years enjoyed a swim at Grange. However, Spook, my aunt at one stage in the shallows got rolled over by a small wave and then to her consternation was unable to get herself up again — this gave her a great fright. My mother at the age of 90 this year decided she would join me for a beach outing after I had had a period of convalescence — off we set to Willy Wong one hot weekend morning. Well now, bathers perish and do awful things when not worn for a while — so we had a laugh when Mum got into her bathers and I did the loose straps up with a ribbon across the back so they wouldn’t fall off. We both went down through the sand hills to the water’s edge and gently walked into the water. I tried to explain to Mum that she needed to float and that the ideal water depth to do this was about thigh deep. Not listening to me she waded out to the sandbar and then instead of going beyond it into slightly deeper water she decided to sit down in the shallows. It is very hard to get seniors up off the floor if they have had a fall. Although my Mother hadn’t fallen it was very difficult to get her up from a position of lying in the shallows on her tummy! With great effort we did manage to get her upright but what an exercise! On subsequent mornings I got her into thigh deep water to gently tip backwards onto me (standing behind) so she could float on her back — which she was good at. As you can imagine this took a great deal of confidence and trust but
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we both thoroughly enjoyed it and over the period of several weeks each time she got better at doing this. However getting onto her tummy and trying to do breast stroke or over- arm was a spectacular failure — there was much sputtering as she had great difficulty moving one arm out in front of her due to an old injury. She couldn’t believe that she could forget how to swim. Much laughter after the event and a great feeling of accomplishment with improvement made in both walking down to the water’s edge and having a swim. How many ninety year olds are so plucky? Well done Mum!
Bring back a bottle of clean sea water — from out in the deep. As a family we all had great faith in the therapeutic benefits of salt water. My grandmother, Mopsy, had always loved the beach and she and my grandfather Pompa rented a cottage in summertime further north towards Tennyson for family beach holidays. In her later years, my grandmother would often ask us to bring her back some water from our trips to the beach. She would use it to wash her face or soak her feet in.
My mother recounted one funny time at Grange when her brother Ron was swimming with my grandmother Mopsy. There was a problem with her bathers and being out in the deeper water, protecting her modesty, she took them off so that she could put them on again the right way. At that stage naughty Ron grabbed the bathers and took off with them leaving my poor Grandmother stranded in chest high water without her bathers!
Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring: Hi Dad, would like an outing to the beach today?
Towards the end of his life, I would take my father down to the beach, wheelchair in the car and take him along the foreshore. He had emphysema from a life of smoking so wasn’t able to walk far but loved a sortie along the jetty or down along the boat ramp where he could watch the boats come and go, the beachgoers and dolphins. He was a keen fisherman and sailor and loved all things nautical. These outings brought him much joy, and gave my mother some respite from caring for him.
The face of Grange — houses and characters Over the years the houses along the front have changed considerably. Fortunately, some houses remain. I am very fond of the beautiful three-story terrace houses next to the Grange
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jetty, the Marines — aren’t they fabulous? I do hope they are heritage listed and won’t be flattened.
There have been some changes near Willy Wong. Miss Gilbert’s gorgeous blue house remains, well, the façade at least. Next to that the besser block beach house has been pulled down. The cream brick house near us with a front yard full of succulents no longer exists. Mr Watts home is now a two story modern building and the old white house on a huge block is now a series of modern two story homes and Mrs Prices house has been flattened and turned into a two story duplex. Such is progress. Over the back fence we have a few houses that have been restored.
A number of characters bring our section of the beach to life. Garry, the plumber, is always helpful and cheerful. Mr Watts, who lived in his old home alone until shortly before he died — what changes he must have seen during his life! Mrs Price — kept young with daily walks and swims — marvellous up until later life; she was fortunate to move from her house to a unit next door. Then the gent over the street who had a beautiful vintage car he lovingly cleaned. All characters, except the plumber, have now gone to the life hereafter, not forgetting Miss Gilbert with her spaniel.
Beachcombing is one of life’s simple pleasures! As a family we have spent quite a bit of time walking along the beach. Generally the best time of day is early mornings when the sand is fresh from the previous night’s tides — if not then — another special time is towards sunset when the sand tells a story of the day’s activity.
So what will it be — a walk from Willy Wong towards the jetty and on to Henley Beach or north towards Tennyson? Both are lovely. Each is different. Sometimes it’s nice to walk north away from the crowd, other times it’s pleasant to walk down towards the surf lifesaving club and on towards the café scene at Henley.
Usually along the beach is best but sometimes the path is more convenient — less sand in the shoes. Or the track north along lawns in front of the houses is interesting to see who is doing what and how the other half lives!
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The beach is a marvellous source of variety often there are things to collect — interesting shells or less desirable bits of rubbish or glass ... we all have a responsibility to leave only our footprints behind — however, on hot days, full of beachgoers there is sadly often a substantial amount of litter.
It can be windy and unpleasant. My husband’s sister and family came down to Adelaide from Brisbane one Christmas holiday — going for a walk along the beach was an unpleasant marathon — the wind whipped the sand up around bare legs. Ouch, that stings! The wind was cold and we all rugged up with jumpers and this was in January! Our Brisbane visitors were perplexed, Are the Adelaide beaches always like this in summer?, they asked There was certainly no thought of swimming that day.
Sandcastle building is a wonderful past-time; who doesn’t love building sandcastles? We did enjoy watching the Grange sandcastle competition each year and marvelling at the masterpieces. This led to our own more ambitious designs — armed with buckets and spades forts were constructed, battles were fought and won, moats full of water that ebbed and flowed with the tide surrounded elaborate castles decorated with shells, starfish, seaweed and with the gulls feather flying from the tallest parapet. Wonderful fun for young and old!
Who’s on for cricket? Beach games were always enjoyable and sometimes needed to warm up before a refreshing swim. Beach cricket, frisbee and soccer — all part of the beach way of life when friends were over. The beauty of some of these activities was that children could be supervised from a distance — the sand hills or the house, so that encouraged a feeling of independence but with a safety net.
One night a family came to stay from the country. They arrived late and our young children were already tucked up in bed but it was still light. The visiting children played on the beach while mothers chatted on the sand hills watching the setting sun. The children walked along the beach towards the jetty. Darkness fell — mothers kept talking but noticed children not in sight. Panic! One mother walked up the beach towards the jetty, the other along the ridge of sand hills. No sign of the children. The husband of the house is minding the sleeping
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children. One mother checks the house but no returned children. That mother goes out the back along the street looking for the children. Crisis. Lost children — and its now 9.30pm or so. Very dark — the beach is now almost deserted. Strangers walking along the beach, in either direction, were asked if they had seen two girls. No-one had. Well it’s time to ring the police or the husband in the country. Hearts have sunken, disbelief has taken over. Suddenly two girls appear. Where were you? Well, Lucy wanted to go to the bathroom so I took her to the public toilets up at the jetty. You what…? Hugs all around. A night to remember. All’s well that ends well but what if…we thanked our lucky stars as we all turned in for the night. A lesson learned.
One day we encountered a most unusual object on the beach. A light plane had made a forced landing on the beach as it ran out of fuel on the way to the Adelaide Airport — it was on the beach at about the level of the West Lakes inlet. Many beachgoers had a wonderful view of the plane as it stayed there for some time before it was eventually removed (how was this done I don’t recall). Anyway we trooped up to the cordoned off area and circumnavigated the aircraft. Most appealing to small boys and fortunately the pilot was safe and sound.
Early in the morning you can often see horses trotting along the beach — training pulling the trotting gig and doing a big u-turn just before the Grange jetty — leaving their footprints on the hard sand.
Unwanted visitors Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring: You wouldn’t believe it but we’ve just been broken into down at the beach… We loved Willy Wong very much. Unfortunately so did others who noted the house was mostly vacant. One year the fridge was stolen — what? Yes, in broad daylight thieves entered the house and with a sack truck took the fridge out through the back door down the steps to the beach track and thence to a waiting vehicle in the car park. On another occasion we had guests staying from overseas. The morning they were due to leave they went out to find their car, parked under the carport, had been ransacked. Our son parked his car out on the road one night to find the next morning the vehicle lock had been tampered with and
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forced open and he had lost some small change, some music discs but more importantly his prescription glasses — now who on earth would want those? The most recent unwanted visitor called in about 2011 — broke in through the back porch area and seemingly found an interesting book to read and left it on one of the beds, plus a pair of Italian ladies shoes around size 8. Apart from the inconvenience the annoying thing about this burglary was that the person — subsequently found to be a middle aged female — had also taken the First Aid kit. Now our first aid kit was not just any old first aid kit — it was actually an ammunition box that my mother had lovingly painted as a small girl and it had two pins that secured it, and webbing attaching the lid to the box. An item of no value to anyone but a family member but obviously it took the intruders fancy. There were no particular medications within it, perhaps a few aspirin, some bandaids and bandages, scissors and safety pins. A sad loss! Since then a burglar alarm has helped keep unwanted visitors out.
Other unwanted visitors were not of the human kind. We had a whole lot of furniture stored out in the back garage from the farm including an old fashioned cupboard and a matching washstand. Unfortunately we went out to brush them off to bring them inside only to find the white ants had been having a lovely time quietly gobbling them up. The garage conditions were apparently just right for the critters. They had also got into the old wood in the house, so the whole house had to be treated which meant several days of chaos as we were staying there at the time and had visitors.
Still other unwanted visitors were of a slithery disposition. I think they were mainly lizards but my mother did say she killed a snake out in the backyard — this was at the age of about 85 prior to our son’s 18th birthday party, I am not sure if this was just a legless lizard or not but often these creatures would come in under the gap in the door by the back toilet and visit. Rather disconcerting.
Out the front there were often rabbits in the sand hills which we could see from the front veranda. Occasionally a dog would get into the sand hills and have a marvellous time chasing the rabbits which of course disappeared into their burrows much to the dog’s bewilderment.
Weather extremes One of the joys of the beach was watching the weather. Most of the Adelaide weather comes from the west or south west and being on the veranda one could watch the clouds
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and wind on the water. The front veranda had dormer windows which opened outwards, I think there were about seven or eight of them. They opened out about 6 inches which meant they caught the breeze. When we had a furious thunderstorm or squall and it poured with rain, someone would yell, Quick get the buckets! We would all rush to grab buckets or ice cream containers to catch the drips as the front veranda was not well sealed and the rain would cascade down from the ceiling and windows to saturate the floor.
At the other end of the spectrum it could be very hot. There was no air conditioning. The house, being stone, would be beautifully ambient in pleasant weather but in a heat wave it would heat up and become like an oven if the overnight temperature didn’t drop enough for it to cool down. Each year we would have a week to 10 days of very hot weather. This was fine if you weren’t working during the day you could just slip down for a swim and then go back to the house to rest. My father’s favourite spot on these blistering days was out under the carport, where there was a slight zephyr of breeze. However, overnight we would generally keep all windows locked to keep out unwanted guests and the house would be like an inferno. Often there would be blackouts, and we would then be in a panic about losing a fridge full of food. We spent several memorable nights entertaining outside as it was just too hot to be comfortable indoors. My father was a wonderful weather monitor. He would go outside, probably for a cigarette and then call out I think the wind has changed, hooray, here comes the change, I think we can open up!
West Lakes Shopping complex A big feature of beach holidays is entertaining and so extra provisions were always kept on hand. The new shopping centre at West Lakes was very handy and a short car-drive away, with convenient parking. Regular trips to Coles and Woollies were made to stock the pantry and fridge. When the children were young we would often swim early and then head to the Mall to do the shopping and visit the library, which was at the time located within the Mall. Thus we could escape the heat of the day and we would borrow a wonderful array of books and videos to keep us all amused. There were also often school holiday programs for children. The shops often had sales and sometimes we would go across to the shops for the post Christmas sales. A particular favourite was the David Jones sale and many a plum
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pudding was bought at half price immediately after Christmas and proved to be a popular dish for New Years Eve parties if cold weather had set in.
Return to Adelaide Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring, Brrring-Brrring: We are coming back! my brother rang my parents from Hong Kong. We were all thrilled to hear this. It was great to have my brother and his family back in Adelaide again with the rest of us. What lucky holiday caretakers we were in his absence, and how privileged to have spent so much time at Grange. Fortunately we can still go and visit, sit on the front veranda and reminisce…
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Losing Voice, Finding Place Flinders Park Primary School - 1968 Melanie Meneaud
“Please stand in a straight line, girls on one side and boys on the other.”
There was a mad scrable with quite a bit of jostling, as friends wanted to stand near their buddies. Unbeknown to me if you stood in line with your friend chances were you got to sit next to your friend, and this was fundamental in the scheme of things. So a disorderly line of skinny kids, the girls with their hair pulled back so severely that their faces too on almost Asian expressions, and with long white socks held up with rubber bands or garters. The boys had unruly hair and wore shorts, and showed scabby knees. And what was that smell? I had four sisters and was unaccustomed to the different smell that boys emanated.
“Stop pushing and shoving everyone, and Mary is that chewing gum in your mouth? Here’s a hanky, spit it out now!”
Two lines of bedraggled children, probably 40 in total reluctantly shuffled up the steps and into the prefab school building. The desks had been organised in neat rows, two per desk which ha a heavy top which you could lift and stow your books and pencils in. These desks were fashioned in solid wood, and you could pass the time of day reading inscriptions engraved on them from previous occupants. For example the initials of previous students and who is in love with who. I shuffled in next to a little girl with quite curly hair and smudgey freckles. She gave me a reticent smile, which didn’t make it to her eyes.
“Owyagoinclass! Didya ava good weekend? Wead abarbe at dadersouse andcorblimey the blowies were a reel nuisance.”
She was an imposing woman made taller by her carefully coiffured hair, which she wore in a bouffant, teased up arrangement. She strutted around the classroom on two tone leather pumps, which clattered
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noisily on the floorboards of the class. Her make-up was generous. Her eye lids were shaded in brilliant aqua eye shadow. She had not matched her powder to her natural skin tones and there was a distinct line visible between her face and her neck, like an incomplete colouring in.
The language she used was vaguely familiar to me, and if I listened carefully, I could sort of understand what she was on about. I followed the cues of the other children, laughing when they did and maintaining a poker face on cue. Mrs Greenham was my first primary school teacher.
“Tda is Monday and we have a new girl joining our class, and her name is Melanie.” She paused, and in the silence I could feel all eyes on me. I slid further down in my seat and pulled my in need of a trim fringe down lower trying to disappear behind it without much success.
“Melanie has come to Astraya with her family from a place called India. Who can tell me something ‘bout India?”
A little boy with ginger hair put up his hand. “Yes Simon”
“Wa wa wa wa,” said the little boy. He was cupping his mouth and moving his body up and down as he chanted, “Injuns, Miss, I seen ‘em at the movies, the Lone Ranger was always fighting ‘em.” “Well that’s not the right Indians,” said Mrs Greenham with a slight smirk on her face. “You are getting mixed up with the North American Indians. Melanie is from India where a beautiful building called the Taj Mahal was built by a prince in memory of his beautiful bride who died quite suddenly.” The class at this stage was looking quite perplexed, and I was hoping that I could become invisible.
My family, consisting of myself, my 4 siblings and my mother and father including my paternal grandmother, emigrated from India in 1968. We were of Anglo-Indian descent, a race that was a result of 300 years of European colonisation of the Indian subcontinent.
My parents chose Adelaide, South Australia, primarily for its non-convict history, pleasant temperate weather, good educational institutions and relatively high standard of living. Adelaide ticked all the boxes, and Flinders Park a compact suburb on the banks of the Torrens seemed an ideal place to bring up a family.
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India was a poor country in those days, so we were only allowed to bring a certain amount of our savings with us. We were sponsored by some American missionaries, who also found us a nice house to rent on Hardys Road, Torrensville.
My mother was a Primary School teacher and was able to get a job at Flinders Park Primary School, which was very convenient as this was where my 3 sisters and I also went to school. My youngest sister, not yet being of school age stayed at home with my grandmother. So my parents bought a neat and tidy 3 bedroom home in Flinders Park. The linear park was across the road, and our school was a 10 minute walk down the road. My father who previously had a managerial position in the Forestry department in India, got a job at Torrens College a training institution for teachers and nurses. This was also only a 20 minute walk. So everything was hunky dory, or so it seemed.
In the first couple of weeks of our commencement at the school the headmaster took my mother aside and quietly asked her how we were settling in. “Oh, the seem to be adjusting in quite nicely,” said my mother, “except for Melanie, she has been having tummy upsets and not wanting to go to school. Yes I am a bit worried about her; however you have to understand she is the darkest of all the girls and also the smallest.” “I am glad you have noticed that she is having some issues,” said Mr Mader the headmaster, “because I was going to ask you if Melanie can read and write and does she understand English?”
My mother was flabbergastered, and there was a pregnant pause while she collected her thoughts. “Yes she does understand English, it is her mother tongue. I taught all the girls to read and write as soon as the showed an interest and Melanie is a prolific reader; she loves the Narnia Chronicles.” Something must be amiss thought my mother. After reassuring the headmaster that she would sort it out she scheduled a meeting with my teacher.
She assumed it was the broad Strine accent that I did not comprehend. She organised for me to be taken out of my class a couple of times a week for short periods, and integrated in small groups consisting of 2 to 3 older girls. In no time at all the problem was solved. I came out of my shell and started establishing my own friendship groups.
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2012 Woodville Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Adelaide SA “Owya goin, Mr/Mrs, my name is Melanie and I will be looking after you tnite. Ifyouneednything just ring that green button with a picture of me onit.”
I started word at QEH where I have worked in a busy Medical Ward for the last 10 years. A 26 year marriage and 3 grown up children, have found me in the same area. Steve and I bought a house, only streets away from where we both grew up. The years have been kind; however, if my mother who passed away this year heard my diction, I think she would smile and understand.
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At the Crossroads (My Journey) A story of early days
Brian E Harfield
“Hey Gran, has the postie been yet?”
My Grandmother, Minna Laura Matilda Baker, (Nee Foster) looked up from where she was preparing the midday lunch in the modest galvanized bungalow where she lived with her husband Samuel Bertram Baker (Grandpa, to me) in Fairford Terrace, Semaphore Park.
Family circumstances, coupled with problems associated with the onset of the Great Depression of 1930, had caused my parents to seek employment interstate. Because of this, my grandparents, at the time when they should have been relaxing in retirement, were saddled within the up-bringing and expense of a three year old grandson.
“Not yet, Brian” she said, “This is the third time you have asked me within the last fifteen minutes, for heaven’s sake stop jumping about like a flea on the dog, go and help Grandfather feed the chooks. The postie will come when he is ready and you will hear if he has any letters for us.”
It was January 12 1945, and the postmen, dressed in regulation uniforms with peaked caps, rode their bicycles every morning and afternoon on their delivery rounds, blowing a whistle to indicate whenever they put mail into your letter box.
The previous year at 16 year’s of age, I had completed 11 years of schooling, culminating in passing the Leaving Certificate (Inaugural Year 11) at the LeFevre Boy’s Technical school, a group of single story red brick buildings on the corner of Mead Street and Semaphore Road at Glanville, adjacent to the Glanville Railway Station.
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My education had commenced at the Ethelton Infant School, Carlisle Street, a two-storey red brick building (now in used as a residential property). Grades One, Two and Three catered for the five, six and seven year old children. Classes for grades Four, Six and Seven were held in a set of four rooms in a large red brick building around the corner in Old Pelham Street (since demolished for housing development). Grade Five was located in a wooden transportable building halfway down the Eastern side of the school yard.
Pleasant memories of seven years of Primary education bring to mind several distinct people who influenced me in my future vocation. Miss Quinn (Grade Three teacher) is one that prevails in my mind. A single lady (no married women were permitted to be employed as the Education Dept. considered that married women should be raising a family and managing the household; men were considered to be the sole bread winners), Miss Quinn was a strict disciplinarian who taught the basics of the three ‘Rs’ in a formal and firm style. She had taught my mother and then twenty-three years later, she taught me.
I recall that when I was a Grade Three student, a procedure was enacted at the beginning of the school day. At 8.45am, a teacher would blow a whistle to indicate that all play equipment was to be stored away and students were to prepare for assembly in the quadrangle. The loud ringing of a bell from the Primary School around the corner in Pelham Street required us to form into our respected classes within the designated area. Grade One at the front, Grade Two behind and the ‘biggins’ Grade Three at the back. Girls in one line, boys in another, graduated from the tallest to the shortest.
The Head Mistress would wish the classes “Good morning children, into school Quick march”. And to the beat of a kettle drum, operated by one of the boys from the big school, we would march, not always in step, into the school building. Miss Quinn’s classroom was at the eastern-end on the second floor with access gained via an internal staircase. We would line up outside the classroom and when all movement had ceased, Miss Quinn would walk up and down the line inspecting hands, fingernails, hair and shoes for cleanliness and tidiness. Offenders would be admonished and sent to the wash room to attend to any necessary requirements.
The instruction, “Class, please enter” allowed us to walk in orderly fashion to stand behind our desks. When all was ready, Miss Quinn would glance around the room “Good morning children.” The class responded in unison, with “Good Morrrrrrrrning Miss Quinn.” It was acknowledged by a nod of her head, we were then advised “Please be seated”. 70
The only variation to this schedule occurred each Friday when all students were assembled in the court yard around the flagpole for the raising of the flag. As the flag was raised to the top of the flagpole by one of the teaching staff, boys saluted and girls curtsied. “Attention children, please be silent”. The strains of the national Anthem, God Save The King, wafted across the yard from an old wind up gramophone fitted with a large horn shaped speaker. Children, stand to attention and repeat the ‘Ode of Allegiance’. With our right hands upon our hearts, we all recited in unison the following words: “I am an Australian I love my country and the British Empire I salute her flag the Union Jack I honour her King, King George the fifth And I promise, cheerfully, to obey her laws.”
Some of the scallywags of the boys often substituted the last line with “I promise ‘Chifley’ to obey his laws” (Ben Chifley at that time being the Prime Minister).
Grade Five was mentored by Mr Little, my first male teacher, a small dapper gentleman with a small moustache and always immaculately dressed. His method of teaching was very informal, introducing activities that tended to make class work pleasant and entertaining. One of his innovative lessons occurred every Friday afternoon when desks were pushed together to form a work table. Different craft activities were undertaken, changing monthly to keep student interest.
He introduced his class to cane basket weaving, raffia work, simple leather work, plaster modeling, spinning, weaving and art work entailing pastels and watercolors. I thank him for his dedication in persevering to instill in me an appreciation and love in these crafts that exists to the present day.
Grade Seven saw all frivolity ceasing as this was the final year of primary education. A solid grounding in the basics of the three ‘Rs’, culminating in the dreaded Qualifying Certificate (QC).The exam was set and marked externally to the school, and all Grade Seven students throughout the state were required to pass the exam in order to proceed to secondary education. A failure to pass required you to repeat the year. Many students did not acquire the Certificate and after repeatedly failing the exam, left school at the grand age of fifteen without the ability to continue into secondary school.
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I was fortunate enough, either by good luck or by an error on behalf of the examiner, to gain the needed qualifications to enter secondary education at the LeFevre Boys Technical School This School supported a three-year curriculum especially tailored to prepare boys for entrance to apprenticeship. Basic core subjects of Maths, English and Science were supplemented with practical units of Woodwork, Metalwork and Art. At the end of third year (year ten), all students sat for the Leaving Certificate. Basic core subjects were set and graded externally to the school but the alterative subjects were internally assessed over the full school year’s results.
Most students left school at this stage to enter the work force, possibly with an apprenticeship. At the beginning of 1944 the Lefevre Tech School decided to introduce a year 11 course, and I, with nine other students accepted entrance to the Inaugural Leaving Certificate class. The curriculum consisted of a much more intensive study of the core subjects, but required specialized study in the practical units. I chose Woodwork and Art as my elective subjects the craft classes were taken in two large workshops just around the corner from the school in Close Street. The Metalwork class was under the instructions of Mr Conrad Carey. The Woodwork was ably taught by Mr Tom Derbyshire. I was the only student to elect for extensive studies in Woodwork and was therefore as a solitary student, pleasantly subjected to his personalised teaching for one afternoon per week. A solid grounding in the practical aspects of cabinet- making, studies of tools and materials and exposure into the history of furniture making was pursued with awe and admiration under his excellent guidance. Little did I realise at that time just how much, in later years, I was to value his excellent tuition.
The year passed and having gained the Leaving Certificate I prepared to leave school and enter the work force. One day as I was finalising all school matters, I was interrupted by an instruction over the school Tannoy system “Brian Harfield please report to the Headmaster’s office.” Collecting all my items, I nervously knocked upon the office door. What had I done, what breach of rules had I broken? Students were never invited into the ‘holy of Holies’ unless it was for chastisement and punishment (the cane was still employed for serious misdemeanors) so it was with some trepidation that I responded to the request to “Come in.”
Mr F Vickory stood up from his desk, extended his hand and pleasantly said “Hello Brian, take a seat. As you about leave school to seek employment, I thought it would be a good time to have a talk to you about your plans for the future. Have you given any thought as to what you would like to do?”
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“Yes Sir, I have talked it over at home and have applied to three different places. One was to Walter & Morris Timber Mills in answer to an advert in the paper seeking an operator to make packing cases. I received a reply offering me a job operating on the box-making machine. Rather a dead end job without much chance of advancement, but the pay offered was good.”
“Is that the factory at the western end of Dale Street, Port Adelaide, down the end where the Port River and Colonel Light’s ill fated canal began? You know the one that he envisaged reaching all the way to the City. The land had already been acquired when it was discovered that there was insufficient water to make it feasible. That is why the Port Road is so wide, even to the present day.”
“Yes, Sir, they only got as far as the Port Road before they realized that up to four locks would be required and the project was abandoned.
I have also made application to Jaffer’s Furniture Emporium, on St Vincent Street, Port Adelaide, just next to the Jervois Bridge, seeking an apprenticeship. They replied that they were not able to offer one at the present time and suggested that I reapply later in the year.
Gran had encouraged me to apply to HMAS Torrens at Birkenhead for admission to the Navy. There had been past connections to the marine services and she was hopeful that I might carry it on. They replied with a standard letter advising that the minimum age for acceptance was seventeen years and to re-apply on reaching that age.”
Mr Vickory reached down and picked up a sheet of paper, “I have just received a circular from the SA Education Dept in which you may be interested. It asks me to approach any student who has obtained the Leaving Certificate and who has shown aptitude in craftwork. It offers training at the Adelaide Teacher’s College in Kintore Avenue, Adelaide with a view of training craft teachers to be stationed in the newly established Area Schools in the country.”
“Up to the present time, many country towns have only small, one teacher schools, possibly with ten or twenty pupils. Schooling is only offered to Grade Seven and very limited in subjects. The Education Dept has decided to close these small schools and to erect one large school in a central town, bussing the students in and out each day. The bigger schools will be able extend the curriculum to the Intermediate (Grade 10) level and to offer a greater variety of subjects. They are seeking potential boy’s craft teachers 73
for appointment to these schools. Have you ever considered becoming a teacher? I think that you should discuss with your parents and see what they think.”
“That is something to which I have never given any consideration, I’m interested, but I would need to give it some thought before I make any decision.”
“Take the forms home with you and let me know tomorrow, I think you will find them interesting, Good- bye, see you in the morning.”
That evening, after the dishes had been cleared away, I handed the application paper to Gran. “What do you think I should do? Fill in the form, or get some other job until I am old enough to reapply for the Navy?” Gran looked up from where she had been mending one of Grandpa’s sock, “It’s your decision, but you know that I have always hoped that you would join the Navy like your Uncle Charlie did.”
Gran was small wiry lady, a devout Methodist; she attended the Glanville Methodist Church (now demolished) at the northern end of Carlisle Street, Ethelton. She ran the household with a firm and strict manner. Every thing had its place and every body was expected to abide by her rules. No smoking in the house, no profanity (wash your mouth out with soap and water), and most definitely, no alcoholic beverages. The only exception to this rule was a small flask of Brandy securely locked away in the medicine chest, only to be used in the direst of circumstances. In all the years that I lived with Gran, only once can I remember the flask being opened, and then only for the medical attention of Hilda, Gran’s sister who lived next door and who had suffered an attack of fainting upon hearing of the demise of her husband.
Charlie had been Gran’s youngest son, conceived late in life. Her favourite photo of him in his naval uniform was proudly displayed on the dining room mantelpiece. At the age of 18 he unfortunately suffered an accident and passed away. Gran often told me about his demise as a warning to not to befall the same disaster. It appears that one weekend when he was home on leave, he and several of his mates decided to go for a swim. Their favourite swimming spot was an area at the end of Bower Road adjacent to the train bridge. At low tide a large stretch of white sand and clear water was exposed. This area was also a valued fishing spot and abounded in vast quantities of blue swimmer crabs which bred in the large expanse of mangrove bushes that lined the lower reach of the Port River. My mates and I often made use of this area, and had two methods of catching a tasty feed of fat blueys. At low tide we waded knee-deep 74
into the river towing a bathtub behind us and carrying a long handled dabbing net. As the crabs swam past you a swift hook with net captured a crab and it was then swung into the bathtub. An hour’s effort would result in about ten or twelve fat crabs destined for the dinner table later in the day.
The other method required the use of a homemade crab net, constructed from an old bicycle wheel rim and fitted with a twine net. Within this net large lump of meat (free from the local butcher) was tied firmly in place. A long length of rope was attached and the net was ready for use. Below the train bridge a small maintenance platform had been constructed. With a height of about six feet below the rails, it was provided for service inspection. A small hand rail was the only concession to safety. For safety reasons a six foot wire fence surrounded the entrance and a prominent sign warned of the danger of entrance, advising of legal fines for trespass. This was no deterrent to us as we found that a part of the wire could be removed. A crawl along the platform soon had us over the deepest part of the river and the net would be lowered and the end tied to a nearby stanchion. The net would be left for about half an hour while we retreated to the beach to play cricket or soccer (no football). After the desired time had elapsed we would crawl out and retrieve our nets, assured of a good haul in exchange for the ever present danger. When the train passed overhead the noise was deafening. Sometimes an inspector would appear on a maintenance tour and if we were caught under the bridge a swift clip over the ears or a boot to some other region was quickly applied and legal action would be threatened.
When Charlie and his mates arrived to have their swim, they found a number of other people engaged in fishing and rather than disturb their sport decided to wade along the river bank to reach a secluded swimming hole amongst the mangroves. At low tide a large clear spot appeared with white sand and deep clear water, an excellent spot where they could skinny dip without observation. The only problem was that a constant watch was required on the tidal movements of the river, because whenever the tide turned a large volume of water poured into this area flooding it to a depth of five or six feet.
On that day, the boys were so involved in their activities that they were caught by the rising waters and unable to return the way that they had come. To reach dry land they were required to wade across the black swamp mud and through the large expanse of mangroves. Unfortunately as they struggled towards dry land Charlie stood a mangrove root which broke apart and penetrated his foot. Despite the best available medical attention (no antibiotics in those days) he contracted tetanus and passed away several weeks later at the tender age of 18. I think Gran’s wish for me to join the navy was based more on keeping alive the memory of her youngest son than it was for my future lifestyle. 75
Gran’s eldest son, my Uncle Bert, was also involved in marine service. He worked as an engineer in several of the small ketches that operated out of Port Adelaide by Crouch Co. and Fricker Brothers. Boats named the Nelcebee, Wiamana, Mary Ann and the Falie, all left port laden with general cargo and sailed down the river, out through Outer Harbour into Gulf St Vincent to call at the coastal ports of Ardrossan, Port Vincent, Edithburg and far as Marion Bay. Some even ventured around Cape Spencer into Spencer Gulf to reach ports of Cowell, Arno bay, Port Neil, Tumby Bay and even as far as Port Lincoln. At these ports they would discharge their general cargo which consisted of agricultural machinery and goods needed by the farming communities of the areas. Reloaded with bags of wheat, manhandled from the large wheat stacks that lined the wharves at these coastal ports, they made their passage back to Port Adelaide to unloaded (no fork lifts or front end loaders) by the ‘wharfies’ on the wharves adjacent to Jervois Bridge. Here the bagged wheat would await transport by larger steamers at Ocean Steamer’s wharf for interstate or overseas destinations.
Prior to the commencement of the war in 1944, the Falie, laden with general produce, would make it’s way down Gulf St Vincent, through the savage waters of the Althorps into the Southern Ocean all the way to Melbourne. Refueled, she continued across the torturous waters of Bass Strait (one of the most dangerous water ways of the world because of its shallow waters) finally ending at Launceston. The cargo back consisted of logs of wood stacked in the hold and piled high upon the deck. Upon arrival back at Port Adelaide, the Falie sailed down the river through the Jervois Bridge that was swung open to allow her to moor on the eastern side of the river adjacent to the Walter & Morris Timber Mills. The logs were unloaded over the side into the river and towed by a small motor boat to be stored in a log raft adjacent to the train bridge. Whenever timber was needed by the factory, logs were winched up a long slippery dip into the mills to be sawn into planks for the making of packing cases. At the beginning of the war much of these planks were transported to the munitions factory at Hendon on Tapleys Hill Road. In the first year of the war the Falie , commandeered by the navy and crewed by naval personnel, sailed to Darwin to be used as a supply tender to the warships stationed in Darwin Harbour. After the war she was returned to Port Adelaide to resume, with the other ketches as before, in the transport of bagged wheat. However the transition from bagged wheat to that of bulk handling and the increase of road transport, saw a demise in the need of coastal lighters and unfortunately they were no longer required, spending their final years moored at the Port wharves slowly deteriorating and rotting away because of a lack of financial support. Only the Falie has remained in use as a training ship and by the tourism industry. Sadly this part in marine history is now, also, slowly being lost for the benefit of future generations. 76
Grandma put down her sewing basket, “have a talk with Grandpa. I‘m sure he has an idea about the application, but it’s your decision and your future life, so the only one who can make the choice is you, whatever you decide will be Ok.”
Grandpa put down the newspaper that he had been reading, reached for his pipe, and then remembering Gran’s rules gave a sigh and replaced it into his pocket. “Gran is right you know, you need to think about your future and make your decision based upon what will please you the most. There is nothing worse than being forced to work at something that you do not like. You must be happy in what you do, but whatever it is, make sure that you always do the best you can.”
“I had hoped that you would take up an apprenticeship in the building trade, perhaps as a cabinet-maker or a carpenter. If you have a trade you will never be hungry, there will always be someone who will need your expertise. At the present time, with the war on, and many of the able-bodied men away in the services, there are many jobs available. This will not always be the situation. The war will end soon and all the servicemen will return home, looking for employment, just like it happened after the First World War. Jobs will hard to find and income will be low with a lot of unemployment. It happened after the Great War of 1914-18 and was one of the factors that were an influence in the Great Depression of 1928 that sadly caused problems with your parents.”
“I hope that this time we will not experience the same breakdown of families and that the Government will instigate measures to combat any such hardships. The returning servicemen will want to buy land, to build homes and to establish a family, so it is possible that we will be able to evade such hardship. With new parcels of land being developed and with a growing population, the need for tradesmen will increase and income will be assured.”
“On the other hand teaching is not only a job but a profession, respected by the community and with regular hours, good income and generous holidays; it’s something that you need to consider. It is good clean employment, not a back-breaking a job, unlike the work I had when I was a young man and before I married Gran.”
“Gee grandpa, what kind of work did you do when you started employment?”
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“I was a Night Cart Man, not the most pleasant of jobs, but one that was essential for the health of the community.”
“Night Cart Man, what was that, what did he do?”
“In the early days, about the 1900s, there was no sewer drainage in the areas of Ethelton, Semaphore Park and Grange. Deep drainage could not be installed because of the high water level and seepages meant that the trenches for the laying of pipes would collapse. Because of these problems the local people had only two options for the removal of body wastes.
In the area of Grange, Henley Beach and some parts of Rosewater, many of the houses were constructed with a laneway at the bottom of the block (many of these laneways still exist to the present day, but are not used for their original purpose). If you house was fortunate enough to abut a laneway your ‘little house’ would be built at the bottom of your yard for hygienic purposes but mainly for access by the ‘Nighty’. The ‘dunny’ was a small shed equipped with a bench fitted with a hole under which stood a large metal pan. Once a week, between the hours of dusk and sunrise (hence the name) the Night Cart Man would drive his horse and dray along the laneway. His dray was fitted with two drums, one contained fresh water and the other was his collection unit. He would enter your property and by the light of a ’Deets ’kerosene lamp, would remove your container and empty it into his large tank. After being washed clean with water from the small tank, your receptacle would be returned to its place in your yard. He then proceeded to the next property to continue his actions until about an hour before sunrise. Having completed his round, he would drive out to an area about where the present Dry Creek salt lakes are. Here he would tip his collection of night soil into a large holding pond amongst the mangroves, awaiting evaporation and flushing from a high Port River tide.
If you did not have a laneway at the back of your property, a large 4ftx4ft hole 6ft deep would be dug at a healthy distance from your back door. Over this a small ‘thunder box’ was built, fitted with a bench suspended over the hole. In the middle of the bench a small hole would have been cut of a suitable size for sitting purposes.”
“Gee Grandpa, that’s like the one that we used to have, before the deep drainage was supplied in 1938. I remember it well, because when I was only four or five years old I was afraid to use it because the hole was adult size and the horrible thought of my small body falling through the hole worried me.” 78
Some of the up-market homes had two holes cut into the seat, one adult size while the other catered for children’s bottoms. In some of the real posh homes these holes were even fitted with a lid. One of my chores as a youngster was to cut up newspapers into 10 inch x 10 inch squares and thread them on string for hanging in the ‘little house’. These were used at the appropriate moment. No soft Sorbent or tissue, only hard inky newspaper. I also collected the ashes from the household fires, depositing it in a four gallon bucket by the seat. At the completion of your visit a scoop of the ashes was tipped down the hole, supposedly for hygienic reasons. Once a week Gran would scrub out the room with Phenyl, a strong antiseptic that was supposed to disinfect against germs and repel the Red Back and Daddy Long Leg spiders that lurked under the seat (in later years, a popular song told about the Red Backs under the toilet seat). Once a month Grandpa would make up a Sulphur bomb, a container of flowers of Sulphur soaked in power kerosene. When ignited it was placed into the ‘dunny’ to fumigate and remove the nasties. It was pungent smell that lingered for several weeks and even now, whenever I smell the fumes, I remember the acrid odour that pervaded the little house.
In 1938, with the installation of deep drainage sewage, the ‘little house’ was no longer required and a new WC (water closet) was built adjacent to the back door of the house .Fitted with a concrete floor it supported a shiny porcelain bowl that had been designed by a Mr Crapper in Great Britain. It was flushed with water from a cast iron bowl suspended at head height and operated by a pull chain. No houses had indoor toilets; the only concession was the provision of an enamel or enamel chamber pot under the bed. This proved useful if you had the need for relief during the night and negated the long walk, dressed in night clothes, down the block to the distant room. Not needed any more the toilet shed was dismantled, the hole filled in, and a lemon tree planted on the spot. Oh Boy! Did that tree grow, and continued to produce vast quantities of large juicy lemons for years to come.
“So you see Brian, times are changing and you will need to keep up with them. In the early days this area of Ethelton, Glanville Blocks, Rosewater and Port Adelaide was a river flood plain. When a high tide coincided with a strong north wind, those areas would be flooded up to a depth of four to five feet. In the early days, the land where this house is built would have been four foot under water. In 1915, the Railway Bridge and the Ethelton Station were built, and a large earthen embankment, 10 foot high and 12 foot wide was constructed, running south from the Ethelton railway station for about half mile and then turning westwards towards the sand hills (this area now encompasses Recreation Parade and Bartley Terrace.) With the establishment of the embankment large areas of land were released for building on 79
the western side of the Port River. I built our house in 1916 and was the third house to be constructed in Fairford Terrace, Semaphore Park. I had to cart in soil to infill the block to the height of four feet before I could construct our house in order to raise it above the seepage that still flooded the area. Today, in 1945, this area from Bower Road south to the intersection of Gordon Street is still the only area that has been built up for residential housing. At Gordon Street, Fairford Terrace ceases and a small earthen pathway reaches towards the Southern edge of the Embankment.”
“I know the area well, Grandpa, I often ride my bike along the banks and it is a favourite area where we boys go to fly our kites. We can sit on the bank and let out the string so that the kites fly high over the swamp without of becoming tangled in power lines or houses. We have some good times trying to better our mates in a competition for who can fly his kite the highest. Doug, my friend, made a monster Box kite about eight feet long and two foot square. On Saturday last week, after many attempts he managed to set it sailing high in the sky above the swamp land. As he reached the end of one ball of string he added several more until the kite appeared in the distance, as a small speck about the size of a matchbox. It took some holding and he decided to peg the string to the ground. Just as he was tying the string to a stake a sudden gust of wind either broke the string or a knot parted and the kite, loosened from its restraint, disappeared into the distance high over Ethelton and the Port River, never to be seen again. This was no deterrent as he simply returned home to construct another one for the next week’s enjoyment.”
Unfortunately the new kite never did perform as well as the original. Another game that we played was to launch our homemade kites, fitted with long tails made from old stockings and torn-up sheeting, high into the sky. To the end of the tail we would tie a broken glass bottle. The idea was to manoeuvre your kite as close as possible to your opponent’s kite, trying to swing the bottle as to cut the other person’s kite string. Many a good kite met this fate and disappeared into the distance joining others in the kite graveyard, never to be seen again. No bad feelings, we just returned home and made a new one for the next week’s contest.
At the southern end of Fairford Terrace, where the pathway met the embankment, a small pumping station had been constructed. Its purpose was to help drain the swamp area from seepage and the accumulation of rain run-off from the adjacent roads (a small shopping centre now resides at that area). Adjacent to this, on the eastern corner was a large house surrounded by a six foot wire fence.
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“I know that area well, Grandpa, that is where the ‘witch’ lives and if you trespass into her area she will grab you and you will never be seen again. Grandma has warned me and cautioned me to keep away from that area.”
Grandpa gave a laugh, “I don’t know about the witch part, but an elderly lady recluse lives there and does not welcome visitors. I think the main reason for the story is the large area of quicksand next to her house. It is used by the local people to get rid of dead horses, dogs and cats, and is a very dangerous area. Anything thrown into the large quicksand soon disappears with only a few bubbles to show their passing. I think the Witch story was invented to keep you away from this dangerous area.” (Today, this area is where the Bartley Tavern stands).
Grandpa took his pipe out of his pocket and looked at with anticipation, however a look from Grandma persuaded him, with a sigh, to return it to his pocket. “Times are changing and you must look towards the future, why when I built this house in 1916, it was the fifth house in the area, but now even in 1945, this area is only just being developed for residential housing. The area at Ethelton up to Hart Street is already growing with new homes and once the swamp land is in filled above the water table, it will be considered a valued residential area. I visualise that land as far as Grange Road in the south stretching as far as Military Road in the west will one day in the future become a very well desired area in which to live. The returning service men will be looking for land on which to build and the swamp area, once filled in, will be a valuable source of residential property.” (Little did he know that many years later that swamp area would be developed into the township of West lakes with AAMI Football Stadium, Westfield Shopping Centre and the township of West Lakes would cover the swamp land).
“What other jobs did you do, Grandpa?”
“When I got married to Minna, I looked for a much better job and became a labourer on the Port Adelaide Docks (a ‘wharfie’). It was hard work as it mainly comprised humping bags of wheat from the wheat stacks into the ocean going ships moored at Ocean Steamer’s Wharf. Work was scarce and all able bodied men assembled on the wharf at 6 o’clock every morning. The big boss foreman would walk down the lined up men and select 15 to 20 men for his gang. If you were not selected it meant no work and no pay. You returned home only to reassemble the next morning hoping that this time you would be chosen. Conditions were rough and it was only several years later that the formation of WWU (Waterside Worker’s Union) managed to force an improvement in pay and standards. Now, with many of the able- 81
bodied men away at war, coupled with the increase of shipping trade, only oldies like me are available and employment at the wharves has become plentiful and consistent.”
Grandpa got up from his chair, looked at the clock on the wall, “It’s getting late and I think you should go to bed, think things over and get up in the morning having made up your mind .I think that you should ‘have a go,’ you haven’t anything to lose because if your application is rejected, there is still plenty of time for you to apply for a job as an apprentice at Holden’s on Woodville Road where they are making that new car or get a job at the munitions factory at Hendon at the northern end of Tapleys Hill Road. Good night, see you in the morning, sleep tight.”
I didn’t have much sleep that night. My brain whirled with thoughts about what I wanted to do in life. I was at the crossroads of my life and so many different pathways were open to me that I just hoped that I would choose the correct one. Eventually I fell asleep, waking in the morning having decided to do as grandpa suggested, to ‘give it a go’.
Several hours’ later I knocked upon the Headmaster’s door. “Enter Brian, take a seat,” said Mr. Vickery, “Have you talked things over with your parents and arrived at a decision?”.
“Yes, Sir, Grandpa had a long talk with me and pointed out some of the things that he visualiSes will happen in the future. I found out last night that my mother had been a teacher at Orroroo Primary School in the north of the State and that her father-in-law (my other Grandfather) had also been a teacher, while further back there was another teacher in the family. I guess the teaching bug is in my blood and is awaiting a chance to break out once again. It’s like an itch that has to be scratched. I have decided to fill in the application and hope for the best.”
“I think you have made a wise decision, so sit down at the table and fill the application form with all your personal details. I will then fill details of your academic qualifications and will be most happy to attach my recommendation to it.” A few minutes later the deed was done and sealed away in an envelope for afternoon delivery to the Education Dept’s main office in the city. Mr. Vickery stood up, extended his hand and gave me a strong handshake, “I will get this off straight away and no doubt, in due course, you will receive a reply.”
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Little did realise that the term ‘in due course’ was to be repeated many times in the future. Such a term simply meant that your application would be placed into a pile with many other forms and some time in the future it will be assessed. No hurry, as the wheels of bureaucracy turn very slowly and cannot be hurried. Sometime in the future you will be notified ‘in due course’.
I returned home anxiously awaiting a reply. I waited and waited while Xmas was celebrated, December passed and the New Year started, and here it was January the 12th, and still no reply. My thoughts surged through my head. Had my application been lost in transit or even disregarded? If it had been rejected, I would have thought the Education Dept would have at least notified me of the result. That morning I had awoken with the premonition that today would be the day. The morning postal delivery had proved most unrewarding and it was with great expectations that, as I helped Grandpa to curry comb ‘Bessie’ the mare, I kept an ear open for the Postie’s whistle.
Gran called out from the house, “The postie is almost here, I can hear his whistle just up the street.” I stopped what I was doing and rushed to front fence, to stand next to the letter box. Sure enough, here he came and reached into the leather bag hanging on the bicycle handlebars, he removed a letter. I extended my hand but he ignored it, placing the letter into the box and despite the fact that I was standing only three feet from him and loudly blew his whistle. The regulations stated that he was required to actually place the mail into the letter box and until this was accomplished, he was held liable for its safe delivery. To hand the mail to an individual person did not assure that it was guaranteed to reach the intended person. In similar fashion his regulations demanded that he signalled the arrival of mail by the bowing of his whistle. These were the regulations and were not to be varied under any circumstances.
I reached into the letter box and withdrew one letter embossed with OHMS (On His Majesties’ Service) and addressed to Mr B Harfield (wow, I had gone up in the world , other times any letter that I had received had been addressed as Master). Grasping he letter firmly in my hand, I rushed around into the kitchen. “It’s come Gran, it’s arrived at last. Here you see what it says.” Gran handed the letter back to me, “It’s your letter and addressed to you, so you are the only one to open it. It is very rude to open another person’s mail.”
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I reached for the butter knife on the table and slit the letter, withdrawing a single sheet of official correspondence headed by the Education Dept logo. With trepidation I observed the following information:
Mr B Harfield
Dear Sir, Your application for entry to the Adelaide Teacher’s College has been received and viewed with favour. You are requested to present for an interview at 10.30am on the 18th January 1945 with the Superintendent of Technical Education, Second floor of Education Department building at Flinders Street Adelaide. Please bring with you copies of your last two year’s school report cards, plus any other certificates of qualifications that you have received. Please present three references as outlined below. 1. Minister of Religion 2. Member of the S.A Police Force. 3. Member of Commerce with which you have had contact within the last 12 months. Thanking you, etc.
I handed the letter to Gran who read it with interest. “It’s not quite what you expected is it? But a least you have been received with favour, whatever that means. Take it down to Grandpa and see what he thinks.”
I walked down the yard to where Grandpa was curry combing the old mare in readiness for travel to work that evening and handed him the letter. “So it’s arrived at last” he said, “What does it say?” “Well Grandpa, it doesn’t yes and it doesn’t say no, just a request to attend an interview next week. I have to obtain three references and to take in my school report cards.” Grandpa reached over and took the letter out of my hands, “You will need to get started on getting the references as soon as possible. I don’t think you will have any problem with Constable Browne* at the Police Station because you have been helping every week under the War Time Police Assistance Scheme. Old man Millington*, the grocer, should be able to give you a good recommendation as you have been working as his delivery boy for at least two years after school. You may have a problem with the Reverend Wilson,* he is always long winded and
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takes a bit to get started. Perhaps you should hop on your bike and see him first; you will need to prod him a bit to get his reference in time for next week’s interview.”
I finished helping Grandpa to get ready for his night’s work and then climbing onto my bicycle started the rounds to visit the three people from whom I required a reference. The following day I was able to gain possession of the references from Constable Browne and Mr Millington but it required several promptings at the Manse before the Reverend Wilson produced the required document.
The days passed quickly, and so it was that on the 18th of January I caught the train to Adelaide and proceeded to quickly walk to the Education Dept offices in Flinders Street.With mounting anxiety, I made my way to the Second floor office to be greeted by a young lady sitting at her desk an busily typing. “May I help you,” she inquired. “Yes Miss, I have an appointment at 10:30 with the Superintendent of Technical Education. My name is Brian Harfield, I have brought with me the references and the school report cards as requested.” “Please give them to me and take a seat, the Superintendent is in conference at present, but will be with you in a short time” (I had expected ‘in due course’).
Seating myself on the chairs I tried to pass the time reading some of the magazines provided. It was hopeless, I couldn’t concentrate and so it was with great relief when I was notified “The Superintendent will see you now, please follow me.” I stood up and followed her to where she knocked on a door and in response to the command to enter, opened the door and ushered me in saying, “Mr Harfield to see you Sir.”
A middle-age gentleman dressed in a business suit arose from his desk and extending his hand for a handshake bid me welcome, “Good morning Mr Harfield. Please take a seat.” He returned to his desk, opened a folder and glanced through several of the pages. “I have read your references and a very praiseworthy recommendation from your last school’s headmaster and view them with favour. I have discussed your application to enter the Adelaide Teacher’s College with my associates and with their approval am prepared to accept your application for training as a Boy’s Craft teacher in one of the newly formed, country based Area Schools.” My heart jumped into my throat, I had done it, I was to become a teacher. You missed out Walter & Morris and goodbye to Gran’s wish for a Naval member in the family.
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“However”, said the Superintendent, “there is a small problem, the minimum age for entry to the Teacher’s College and the University of Adelaide is 17 years and you have not quite reached that age. I am prepared to offer you a solution. Would you be prepared to accept an appointment as a Monitor Assistant to a one-teacher School in the country where you will be required to assist the Headmaster in his teaching duties? At the end of the year, providing you receive a good report, you will be accepted into the Teacher’s College and commence training in the subjects necessary for the Area School curriculum.” I hesitated for only a short moment, “yes, Sir, I am prepared to accept that appointment and thank you for your offer. Where will I be stationed and will it mean that I will commence at the beginning of the new school year?” “‘Yes, that is correct, but before we allocate you a school you need to sign a contract .I will get my secretary to bring in the forms for you to sign and she will act as witness.”
A short time later the documentation was completed. “Congratulations, Mr Harfield, welcome to the teaching profession. I am now able inform you of your appointment to the Price Primary School on Yorke Peninsula. The Headmaster is Mr Lionel Kesting*. You are required to commence duties at the beginning of the new school year but I suggest that you arrive in the township several days before that. Accommodation will be arranged locally by the Chairman of the School Council. You are officially on the payroll and will receive a salary as from the 1st. of February. The Secretary will provide you with a copy your appointment slip and the necessary travel documents. You will need to arrange a travel date suitable to your personal arrangements. Goodbye and the best of luck. I hope to see you at the end of the year to make arrangements for your entry to the Teacher’s College.”
I returned home in a daze, unable at that stage to accept the fact that I was now a Teacher. Thoughts tumbled through my head. I would be leaving home and a loving family (I had never been away before), how would I cope? Would I fit into a country township? Where is Port Price, I had never heard of it before, what would I teach? That evening as I lay in bed waiting for sleep to ease my whirling brain, I realised that I certainly reached the cross roads in my life’s journey.
I had made my choice I had decided which path to travel (one that would continue for the next 45 years.) My Journey had started.
* Indicates not true names
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The House That Bup Built Lisa Boothey
Great ... just what I need, the tiles are falling off the walls in the bathroom and over the kitchen sink the hot water service is packing in too. The cement floor in the unused ‘telly room’ (which I’m determined to fix and turn it into a home office) is damp with salt rings spreading like they’ve been painted on.
Today it’s raining so heavy that the old rotted windows in the porch simply can’t contain the water any longer causing a constant trickle down the wall. What else could go wrong? Well the wiring is pretty dodgy too so I’ve been told by an electrician recently.
I don’t know where we are going to find the money to fix these problems. Some people have suggested bulldozing it. It is just a house after all and it requires so much work that it mightn’t be worth fixing. But to me it’s not just any house … it’s the house that Bup built.
Bup, my grandfather, passed away in February 1987. I was 11 years old. I still remember when we got the phone call at home at Mum and Dad’s. We were just about to have tea, Mum had made roast chicken. The phone rang and it was ‘Mar Mar’, mum’s sister, her real name was Inge Marie and somehow we got ‘Mar Mar’ from that. Mum dropped the phone and suddenly Mum and Dad were rushing off leaving me and my little sister who was only 18 months old with a close family friend who was thankfully staying with us at the time.
It was too late, by the time Mum and Dad got to the hospital Bup had passed away from a massive heart attack. He was only 64, leaving Oma, my grandmother alone after a 40 year journey of love, children and settlement across the other side of the world, hardship, hard work, commitment, and grandchildren. That’s where I fit in.
“Lishka, come and try the arpreecotts.” Lishka is what Bup called me with his thick Ukrainian accent. I always got to try the first ripe apricot from Bup’s trees.
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“You picka one out and I wash it”. “That one there, no that one”. I would always protest and jump up and down under the tree because he’d reach up and pick the apricot that he knew would be the best. And it always was the sweetest, plumpest and juiciest apricot. He’d wash the fruit with the garden hose, making the fruit warm and slightly squishy as the water from the hose was so hot, virtually stewing the apricots.
Oh that reminds me, stewed apricots, apricot jam, you name it there was always an abundance of them. With two trees laden with fruit, Bup made big pots of jam and usually Oma would stew the apricots ensuring that there’d be enough to give a few Tupperware bowls away and ample stewed fruit to have with ice-cream every day for 6 months.
My childhood memory is full of fun times here at Seaton, the door was always open for family to stay whenever they liked. And I like to stay here a lot. “It’s your house Lihska” Bup always told me that. It never felt like I was just having a sleep over, it was home here. I must say I was rather spoilt, my every need or rather want was met. Oma sewing handmade delights in whatever fabric I desired. I’d pick something out of her Burda books that she ordered from the local newsagency. The pattern book came from Germany so you were ensured that it was the latest European fashion.
The trouble was 1980’s Australia was a few years behind in fashion. I didn’t have the latest catalogue item from K-Mart like Jodie (she was my best friend) but I did have finely crafted European trends which were to be fashionable in two summer’s time. My poor darling sister, 9 years my junior inherited a lot of those fine threads, as they were too good to give away of course. So when she got to wear them, they were just a few years behind the latest K-Mart fashion, needless to say neither of us was really on trend.
For a few years I went to the local Catholic Parish School, Our Lady Queen of Peace, Albert Park. Bup would drop me off in his 1969 Holden Torana and pick me up again unless I went to a friend’s house for a play. Usually Jodie or Julie-Anne’s. Our favourite game to play was “Famous Five”. We’d role play the TV series and I’d always be Julian because I thought that he was the boss. Sometimes he’d make my lunch too. I’ll never forget the taste of cold lard and silverside sandwiches, every day for a week. Oma was staying with Mar Mar in Victoria and had left dripping in a margarine container in the fridge, probably to use for a roast or something. Bup mistook it for margarine and ‘voila’ cold lard and silverside sandwiches. I left them in my lunch box every day until Sister Jerome (my grade 3 teacher) noticed and marched me up the corridor. She said, “Do you know how many children are starving to death in Africa?” 88
She proceeded to call Mum and lecture me about famine and I should be grateful for the sandwiches I’d been given. I’m sure that even a nun’s humble diet consisted of something tastier than that.
Life was peachy neato. When I was eight I didn’t think that there could be a better place than Oma and Bup’s house, I had my Chihuahua Minka to chase around the magical garden, a great swing, that Bup built when Mum was a baby, a netball ring that he salvaged from the skip up the road and my favourite, the bike that he modified from a 1970’s number and probably handed down from my cousin Jeffrey. We put spokey dokeys on it and tassels on the handle bars. All of the important features were there and I rode that bike which such pride round and round the garden.
Bup was a pioneer greenie recycler. He recycled everything. The council used to leave a skip bin at the end of the street every couple of months and he’d collect chairs, tables, and bits of wood to turn into something useful much to Oma’s dismay. I think she would have liked a set of kitchen chairs that matched but Bup would see nothing go to waste and he’d fix those chairs up with some nails and lick of fresh paint all in same colour and call it a set. Sitting proudly at them with all of his family around the table, Oma would have cooked up something out of scraps in her big black pot — we called it ‘Black Pot Surprise’. “Better than in a restarong”, Bup said.
Bup took great pride in his appearance, and he did look sharp when he went out. He always washed his combed back silky hair in rain water and kept his good clothes with Oma’s in the bedroom and his work and gardening clothes were kept in a cupboard in the shed. This he called his ‘Fletcher Jones’ wardrobe. The telly room was a place to relax in the evening with a cup of tea. I didn’t know anyone else that had a telly room. Bup would love to watch the news, every report that he’d watch he’d somehow miss where it had happened — probably attributed to industrial deafness. “Oh very bad” with roll of the R, then he’d ask “where Sydney?”
The lounge was the good room, saved for the very best guests, brandy and coke and a never ending supply of potato chips. I’d always be indulged with showing off my baby album and putting on a dance show with Oma’s scarfes as my impromptu costume. All other visitors sat at the kitchen table with a cup of tea. Like Aunty Ett who lived at the end of the street. Ethel was a 4 foot 5 lady from Laura in rural South Australia. Now you’d think I’d be used to the accents by now, but when Aunty Ett would ring up and ask me if Oma was home because she’d be there dreckly, I was never entirely sure what she meant.
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It probably took me 20 years to discover that she was telling me she would be coming directly, meaning straight away. How could I miss that?
The house was completed and ready for Oma and Bup to move into in 1954 just before the birth of my mum. They had been in Australia for approximately 5 years at that point after arriving on an immigration program targeting refugees from Polish and Baltic origins. As a result of World War 2, Bup had become displaced and met Oma in Aschaffenburg, Germany. As a German woman marrying a displaced person, she became eligible for refugee status as well. This began their journey to Australia.
They left Germany in 1949, Mar Mar was about 18 months old. It took 3 months to arrive here where they were placed in temporary accommodation in Bonegilla situated on the Murray River. It was an unused army camp and it was pretty simple. The accommodation was unlined and most of the furniture and facilities were basic army issue. Initially Oma and Bup were separated as men and women and children were separated into 20 person huts. But they were still optimistic as Bup was offered employment in Adelaide; he moved to the Pennington Hostel to work in a factory as a boiler maker. The stress of separation had become too much so Bup sent money to the officials at Bonegilla for Oma to move to Adelaide but they were told on Oma’s arrival she could not live with her husband as the Pennington Hostel was for men only.
Oma and baby Mar Mar were sent to live on a property which was a market garden and winery in the Lockleys area where they was accommodated in one small room with no flyscreens — she hates bugs. Oma cooked and cleaned for the owners to pay for her room. Bup visited her on the weekends and brought money.
Bup longed to be reunited with his wife and daughter but was told he would be on his own with no assistance from the Australian Government if he went against the rules. Regardless, Bup collected Oma and they set off on another journey with just the clothes they were wearing and a couple of suitcases. They could barely string together an English sentence between them and had no idea what they were to do next.
Oma walked into the Anglican Church on Port Road Alberton and met a wonderful family called ‘the Martins’. They took them in and offered them a room in their family home at Alberton. Oma helped around the house, cooking, cleaning and sewing and Bup set off to work. After a while, they managed to 90
save a little bit of money and Mr Martin was so kind to lend them the deposit required to purchase their block of land at Minns Street, Seaton.
Bup built a shack at the back of the block, just enough room for the three of them. Oma had a separate kitchen area and somewhere to do the laundry. Bup grew veggies and fruit trees. He raised chickens and they had plenty of eggs. There was enough produce to adequately feed them. The milkman came past, the baker as well, and Oma learned enough English to buy meat from the butcher on Trimmer Parade.
Bup was proud of what he’d achieved but Oma started to grow homesick. It was difficult for her to manage, she had a small child, she was learning English, the climate was hard to get used to, and everything was so different. Oma still laughs at the first time she tried a pasty. She bit into it expecting it to be like a German apple turnover. The shock was so overwhelming, she spat it out.
Oma had part-time work at a trouser factory by that stage and Bup had permanent work at a factory in Finsbury. Before long they made acquaintance with Mr and Mrs Jensen who lived in the house across the road on Minns Street and Mr Jensen got Bup work at Holden’s, Woodville which was really handy as he didn’t drive. Mrs Jenson became Nanny to Mar Mar and then later to my mum.
The suburb was starting fill up with other Europeans so Oma and Bup had the opportunity to make friends with other refugees. The feeling of isolation was starting to fade and things were looking up.
This financial security allowed them to start building the house. It was to have 2 bedrooms, a lounge with a fireplace, a kitchen with a wood stove and a tiny bathroom and an inside toilet and laundry and a garage (except they didn’t have a car). They laid the foundations and saved for enough bricks to reach the window ledges. Refugees could not get a loan until that benchmark was met and when it was, they were able to borrow the money from the bank to build the rest of the house. They built that house brick by brick, room by room whenever they could afford the materials, which were in still in short supply post war.
The house was finished in 1954 and just in time for another new arrival, baby Roselie, my mum. Eventually, a porch was built on the back with a telly room on one side and a sewing room for Oma on
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the other. This increased the living space by a mere 4 x 12 metres. Bup finally learned to drive when he turned 40 so a carport was built to house his new car.
The late 1960’s saw the birth of their first grandchild my cousin Jeffrey. A second was to follow 8 years later (that’s me). The family was growing so Bup took on another building project, the flat. He turned the garage into a flat adding on to it, complete with 2 bedrooms open plan living dining/kitchen and a bathroom and laundry and a front and back door. Solar hot water was installed too.
He kept his garden immaculate and the house was always well tendered. They squeezed in a trip to Europe and Oma went to Germany every 5 years after that to curb the homesickness.
The 1980’s saw the birth of my little sister Erica. Mar Mar and Jeffrey headed back to Adelaide and the flat became their home. Oma and Bup were so proud that they could offer refuge and safety to their daughter once again. Bup retired from Holden’s and Oma from the Queen Elizabeth Hospital a few years later.
It’s funny how life goes in full circle.
A couple of years ago, I found myself in desperate circumstances, my husband Scott had changed careers, and he was studying and working only part-time. Our landlord had put our rent up and told us that she wasn’t going to renew the lease as she was selling the property. We had just had our second baby, struggling to pay bills let alone feed us all. We were facing homelessness. Oma was becoming frail and ill. She was also suffering from the unexpected and premature death of Mar Mar to cancer.
I did the only thing that made sense to me; I packed up my family and moved to Minns Street, Seaton. Just like my grandparents did 60 years before but thankfully our journey was only four suburbs away.
To me, Minns Street, Seaton will always be home because it’s rich with the memory of my grandfather’s pride, love and labour. These daggy old cracked walls hold images and sounds of family’s history. My mum’s childhood and my childhood are ingrained in the foundations as are my children’s now. My boys share the bedroom that Mum and Mar Mar shared 45 years ago.
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Oma still lives here with us – in the flat - and we are creating new memories. The renewal of this house of small proportions (4 rooms plus a porch and an unused telly room) is somewhat a labour of love, just as it was for Bup. I don’t think that I will ever renew the house to it’s former glory but I will give it something back. It’s amazing what a lick of paint can do. Bup’s sense of pride keeps me here and his sense of hope. Things are looking up for us. Scott’s career has taken off and he now has a fulltime job and a company car. I am finally going fix up the telly room as I’m now studying and I need the quiet space. Our eldest son Julian is at school and our youngest son Bernard is about to start Kindergarten. I’ve just gone back to work too.
So you now understand why to me it’s not just any old house … it’s the house that Bup built.
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A Beach Memoir: in Poetry & Prose John Malone
They say what you write about is what you care about so I must care a lot about the beach. Most of the poems I write are set there, on that narrow strip of beach between Henley and Grange. A few, when I have been feeling adventurous, are set a kilometer either side.
Many are descriptive poems, some are narrative, and a small number, like ‘How The Pelican Got His Bill’ are amusing:
How The Pelican Got His Bill Who Me? Me? The black beady eyes seem to say. Me take the fish from the bucket? No Way! [though we know he did]; his bill long like Pinocchio’s nose from telling all those fibs.
You will always find pelicans at the mouth of the estuary, and they always stand alongside fishermen in the expectation of plenty. Sometimes, if you watch long enough, you will see one or two doing exactly as described in my poem, playing Mr. Innocent. Pelicans are real characters.
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Jetties are too. Although inanimate, jetties have character. The Henley jetty certainly does. I wrote an ode to it once. Odes are poems of reverence. The great ones praise skylarks [Shelley], Grecian urns and nightingales [Keats], daffodils [Wordsworth] and so on. I thought the jetty worthy of an ode so I wrote one, moments before a huge storm broke over the area:
Jetties Jetties are long and sturdy. You can stand upon jetties and think
you are at sea, look safely into the black throbbing heart of a storm,
watch the waves roll in like liquid mountains. People lean
from jetties, dream from jetties fishing for tranquility. They are
walkways into and out of the mind. Umbilical cords attaching us to the sea.
I know this poem could have been written about almost any jetty but it wasn’t.
Near where the Henley Jetty is there once stood a swimming pool, a saltwater one. Many famous swimmers, including Dawn Fraser, once swam in it. It has long been demolished but is remembered by three blue starting blocks and a plaque near the old surf life saving club. I notice the latter itself is now being demolished and a new one put in its place. That saltwater pool is where I learnt to swim. Here is the poem in its honour: 95
My Inner Fish See those starting blocks over there? Those three blue concrete stumps? That’s where I learned to swim. There was a pool there once ---- a saltwater one and a coach who one chilly morning threw me in. “Nothing else seems to work,” he said. “You choose. Sink or swim.” That’s where I found my inner fish. Waterlogged, I struggled to the side. But I was fine. Unlike my lost uncle “Adelaide’s finest swimmer,” dad said. “Dead at twenty five. The river took him.” Dad always spoke of Uncle Laurie. That’s why I learned to swim.
While we’re in this neck of the woods I would like to pay respects to another establishment that has been replaced by either Cibo or The Bacchus Bar: ‘The Rock ‘N’ Roll Café’. How many remember it?
Rock ‘N’ Roll Café Four forlorn stools against a pink wall muralled in album covers ---
the King , Bobby Darin , the Beatles and a black vinyl trail of golden oldies
their spin frozen forever; a pink wooden staircase ascending to ---- a rock ‘n’ roll
heaven? floor to ceiling guitar & a space in the corner where a jukebox stood; 96
a shopfront graffitied with black jiving notes --- & the exhortation: Relive
the 50’s & 60’s … but the recession’s played a harder tune; now the empty
café listens to the rhythms & percussions of the grey squally sea .
A lot of buildings have come and gone since then. The Henley seafront is continually undergoing renovation. Only the sea remains the same. Though whether it continues to do so under the influence of rising sea levels and global warming remains to be seen. The crowds themselves though are fairly constant depending, of course, on the seasons. Two exceptions come to mind.
The first was the summer of ’75 shortly after the blockbuster ‘Jaws’ appeared on our cinema screens. The beach that summer recorded its lowest crowds in decades.
The second occasion, much more recent, involved an incident that my grandson and I were unaware of. It was a particularly hot morning when we went down for a swim at Grange, our favourite spot being at the end of Grange Road, a little south of the Grange jetty. Here is what happened:
Why You Should Watch The News Grandad and I didn’t watch the news last night. That is why we are down here wading in the water, at eight in the morning while others are watching to see how deep we will go. But why are they holding back? And where is the trio of elderly women who usually chatter away shoulder deep? 97
We are on our own. Out past the jetty a black dorsal fin causes consternation till its languid loop through the water identifies it as dolphin . Grandad is about to dive in when a voice calls out , haven’t you heard? and, of course , we hadn’t and that is why we are coming out .
Only when I climbed on the bus a few hours later on my way to a late start at work did I realise why the beach was so deserted that morning. A young man had been killed by two white pointers the day before in the waters off West Beach while water skiing.
It hasn’t stopped me swimming. There are many ways to die at a beach, as anywhere: heart attack, drowning, being struck by a stingray as Steve Irwin was, to being hit by a beach buggy like the American poet Frank O’Hara on the eve of his fortieth birthday. I have not written a beach buggy poem but this one comes close:
Beach Butterflies The sky is full of butterflies beach butterflies rising and falling in the strong sea breeze, wings curved and colorful as real butterflies: brumby butterflies tethered to earth-men on surfboards below skimming across the waves holding on fiercely as these butterflies buck and lunge for freedom. 98
The last beach poem I wrote took me back to my school days where my love for the sea was first revealed:
Inkwells
When I was a kid we had inkwells at school. One to a desk topped up with ink the colour of the deep sea. When I had free time I’d dip a pen in the well and write about the sea: how ships seems to sail along the curve of its edge how it breathes in and out like all living things and how seabirds fly over it like we do in planes gazing down through the portholes of their eyes. When I finished what I wrote I’d look at all the runny blue letters curved and flowing like waves on the sea and I wouldn’t be in the classroom anymore --- I’d be down at the beach. One day it all came to an end. Inkwells went out. Ball points came in.
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Where does your lap go when you stand up? Rosslyn Werner
This was one of my father’s favourite conundrums, designed to make me think; like the poster of proverbs plastered on my bedroom wall, wedged between posters of the Beatles, when I was growing up…
As I sat listening to the click, click of the indicator, waiting for a break in the Findon Road traffic, I remembered this saying and a smile crept across my face; then I turned right into the street where I’d spent the first 15 years of my life. Every now and then when I am in the area I’d do a drive-by the old house, just to check on it and to jog my memories.
But that particular day, as I got close I took in such a big gulp of air I almost choked, as my eyes tried to focus on the scene before me. There were building materials piled up, and foundations about to be poured, and the house my father built in the early 1950’s was gone — obliterated from the face of the earth. No, no, no, this just could not be happening. Surely I must be in the wrong street?
This was the house that Dad had built himself; by that I mean, he mixed the cement, made the bricks and painstakingly put the jigsaw together. He was pretty clever at making things, my dad, at improvising and improving things; the kind of person you’d be happy to have with you if you were shipwrecked on a deserted island.
I was overwhelmed and speechless with disbelief and anger, and grief. It felt like someone had just graffittied over my past. I started to shake and my very own conundrum began to form, and I asked no- one in particular “so where does your past go when your home is no longer there?”
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It’s not like a computer where you can just press control-alt-delete to reboot life into a lost program, but standing there I realised I must, I must do exactly that, because without the house I fear my memories too are in the process of demolition.
So many questions raced through my mind, colliding with echoes of the past, laughter, sibling rivalry and grief, and one question in particular floated to the surface “When they demolished the house — did they find the money?”
And suddenly, one of the old proverbs kicked in, “it’s no use crying over spilt milk”; however, I am not so sure about that now.
In a disoriented fog of discontent I turned for home, my photo albums and my computer and start to write…
Growing up in the 1950’s life was fairly uncomplicated. My mother was a full time housewife, and I had a brother seven years older than me.
We were a working class family living in Woodville West in a house my father had built. He, like a many of his era, was a member of the First Home Builders Club; however, building was not his full-time occupation. He was a welder by trade who used to ride his bike to work each day.
We did not have a car until the early 1960’s, so we all rode our bicycles to schools, shops, sport and so on.
Both of my parents were extremely good at making things. My mother created amazing ballet costumes for me for many years, with yards and yards — yes, “yards” in those days not “metres” — of prickly braids and sequins, and an astonishing amount of patience and persistence and love, combining hand-sewing with the brrrr-brrr-brrr-brrr of the Singer treadle sewing machine, as her feet peddled at a frantic pace.
If she wasn’t sewing she was certainly cooking; she could make even those horrid pig’s trotters, lamb’s tongues, tripe or kidneys, taste good, though I never really got into the crumbed brains.
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My father loved his shed. In there the atmosphere was like Guy Fawkes' night. Dad with a big black shield over his head, reminded me of Ned Kelly, but it was necessary to protect him from the sparks that bounced and danced out in all directions, as he welded and shaped wrought iron into gates, garden seats and fancy house names, some of which can still be seen in the district today.
I can also clearly picture him bending over his workbench, with his vulcanising kit, repairing bike tyre punctures and my nose twitching at the smell of burning rubber. Alternatively, he’d be carving up a solid piece of leather to make new soles for our shoes and clamping them into a vice to ensure the glue stuck, or painstakingly painting my new bike, black and white to reflect my favourite footy team. Men and their sheds! It must have provided great therapy.
One day I remember he’d built a go-kart and we would all take turns to race it up and down the driveway, until one time it veered off course and into the garden bed. Would you believe it but when we were rescuing it from the soft soil, we came across an incredible sight — a bundle of moving spikes. What was a spiny ant eater, or was it a hedgehog, doing in our garden? How this prickly animal ended up there was a huge mystery to all and a source of much speculation.
As I said life was pretty simple. In the early days we didn’t even have a refrigerator, so food was stored in an ice-chest — a cabinet with a compartment at the top in which a huge block of ice would be placed once it was delivered to our front door by the ‘iceman’. This would keep the temperature of the compartment below cool enough to preserve the food for a couple of days.
The iceman wasn’t the only supplier of home delivered products. The milky would call by in the early hours of the morning filling up our billy-can at the front door with milk, until eventually the milk was delivered in glass bottles.
We also had fresh bread delivered to our door. We loved it when our folks ordered half a loaf, because it was easy to pinch out some yummy soft bread from the middle, and sometimes if we got too carried away, all that was left by the time it got to the table was the hollowed out shell.
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Both the milky and the baker used a horse drawn cart to transport their goods, so it was not unusual to see horse pats on the roadway in the morning. Dad being a keen gardener would be quickly out with his shovel to clean up the road and add it to his compost heap.
Dad was a good gardener; no, a very good gardener. Our garden was like an artist’s pallet with splashes of colour of sweet peas in abundance, ornamental gourds and tangy passion fruit creeping their way up the fences. Fruit trees were bent over with the weight of a bountiful harvest and rows and rows of green veggies sprung up in between them with cobs of sweet corn reaching for the sky. At times our garden was open for public viewing, when it was awarded prizes in the Sunday Mail Home Garden competitions.
We also had home deliveries from the rabbito whenever he had fresh rabbits; the haberdashery van with its range of cottons and sewing materials; and the grocer who brought boxes of groceries and always had some broken Bush biscuits as a treat for us kids. Visits to the butcher usually ended up with a free slice of fritz.
For entertainment we’d play cards, snap and switch mainly, or draughts while listening to the radio, sitting around the chrome-edged, red laminex, marble-patterned table, drinking tea from orange Pyrex mugs that every home seemed to have.
The radio was a big valve driven affair, in a walnut wooden cabinet about three feet high (1metre). Later we advanced to a chunky portable radio with a bakelite covering and, later still, one made of plastic with a round dial to find the stations. Back then, radios always had knobs and dials, never push buttons or sensors.
Another radio form was the crystal-set. I think a crystal-set was the latest do-it-yourself gadget at the time for growing boys and frustrated fathers who fancied themselves as engineers. How it ever worked was beyond my understanding. It was such a fragile affair with a tangle of little wires delicately woven between little bubbles of glass, and an antenna and my brother would spend hours under the bedclothes listening to it. I guess its parallel today would be the home computer enthusiast who is always tinkering and adding more RAM, wireless routers and other bits of hardware to their systems.
Often when we sat listening to the radio, there would be other things happening at the table, such as potatoes being peeled, or beans being sliced in a bean-slicer that had to be screwed to the table for 103
stability. We might also be playing with pick-up-sticks, or throwing knuckle bones in the air and trying to catch them on the back of our hands, or shooting brightly coloured marbles around on the floor and getting into trouble for leaving them there where they were a potential hazard.
The radio ran long serial programs. Blue Hills, Yes! What? and Portia Faces Life are a few that spring to my mind. On wintery nights we would sit huddled around a tiny kerosene heater, taking turns to pump more kerosene into the heater to keep up the heat. When the sky flashed with lightning, and the thunder rolled and rumbled for what seemed an eternity, I was scampering into my parents’ bed in the middle of the night. Thunder frightened me — it still does. Some things one just never seems to get over. For me, thunder and lightning rate right up there with spiders and moths.
Sunday was our big day out. It was our day of going to Woodville Methodist Church, Sunday School and to Grandma’s house. All the family gathered on Sunday afternoons at Grandma’s house on Findon Road. Grandma and Grandpa moved there after they sold their previous home on the Port Road to General Motors Holdens, the site where Bunning’s is now.
The house on Findon Road was a lovely old double-fronted cottage sitting on quite a few acres of land where Grandpa used to cultivate lush crops of lucerne, which he would reap the old fashioned way with a scythe, a rather threatening tool with an enormous curved blade about three feet long. He always had one cow there as well which I used to do my best to dodge around, as it was never certain of me or me of it either.
Away from the house was a very deep well, from which he used to pump water out into series of u- shaped troughs which ran alongside the fence line around the paddocks, so he could water the crops. These troughs he had fashioned out of old 44 gallon drums that had been cut lengthwise into two, once the tops and bottoms were removed, and then joined them together end to end.
When the water was pumping and flowing along, it was not unusual to see the kids popping in little handmade boats to race and running alongside them to see whose boat reached the end of the trough- line first. This provided many hours of entertainment.
Inside Grandpa’s many sheds there was much to delight curious children. A massive set of old bellows hung on the wall and a heavy old horse collar. In a shed closer to the house was a huge mangle with a 104
large set of wooden rollers through which Grandma would feed freshly laundered items, like sheets, to flatten them out before folding them away.
Grandma always gave us pocket money. In those days it could have been threepence, a sixpence or a shilling and later on two bob (two shillings). We each had our own pocket money tins in which we kept our stash.
One day when my brother had upset me, I can’t recall why now, I decided to get even with him. So I found his tin of pocket money and promptly slid out all of its contents down between the window frames of the sash window in my bedroom. “That will fix him” I thought. Well the sight of my father armed with fire tongs trying to retrieve the loot from the bowels of the window space still is a strong in my mind, as is the one of my sulking on the bed sobbing my heart out from his angry reprimand.
The other thing about Sundays was roast chicken! We always had roast chicken on Sunday, but it was quite a circus, because we hand-raised our own chickens and had grown attached to them and given them names, and on Sundays Dad would single one out for slaughter. I can still hear the squawking as he tried to catch one, with a dozen birds flapping and scurrying off in all directions. Some things are terrifying for a child to witness, like the headless beast flapping upside down on the clothesline after Dad had hung it there.
Somehow I managed to get over that by the time it was cooked and on the table, but then there was always a fight over who would have the parson’s nose. Other food we regularly were served included Corned Beef (Silverside) served hot with cauliflower and white sauce and then cold in sandwiches during the week. Favourite desserts included upside down jam pudding and pancakes with fresh cream, and home-made ice-cream.
When television hit the scene in the late 1950’s we were the first family in the street to have one, and dozens of neighbours crammed into our lounge room, each one keen to get a glimpse of the newest toy on the block. We would stare in awe for hours it seemed at the black and white test-pattern. We didn’t have a car — but we did have a TV and that was really something.
And yes, we had a phone too. It was solid lump of black bakelite material shaped like a pyramid with a silver dial on the front with numbers and letters on it and a heavy handset that rested on its peak. Our 105
phone number was something like JL4556 I think, and when we rang our cousins in the bush (Mt Barker) the calls went through a manual exchange where we were asked for the number we wanted to be connected to (e.g. Mt Barker 203) and after three minutes were asked “are you extending”. Up in Mt Barker, they didn’t have a dial phone, just a phone with crank handle which they turned and turned until the exchange answered, and then they would ask for the number they wanted.
Occasionally we would visit our bush cousins — usually during school holidays, when an uncle, who did have a car, would drive us and his family up the winding old Mount Barker Road, through Germantown Hill, a notorious stop for car sickness, to the country town.
Life in this different place, for a city kid, was fraught with all sorts of demons. The most memorable being the long drop, an outside toilet which was just a wooden bench with a hole in middle suspended over a deep hole in the ground, and which might even have a red-back spider or two lurking in the corners. At the very least there were always some gigantic wood-moths — about the size of your hands — peering down at you from the rafters.
But there were some excellent things for a city kid in the country, so you just had to get over the others. Things like country shows where you’d get to see horses and cows and cradle fluffy baby ducks in the palm of your hand.
And then of course there was the yearly event — Guy Fawkes’s night sometimes celebrated in the hills with cousins, but more often than not at home in Woodville. On Guy Fawkes’s night everyone gathered at our vacant block next to our home, and while the massive fire burned in the centre of the block adults and kids would light squibs and ferris wheels and sparklers and carry on like irresponsible idiots, until someone invariable managed to get themselves burned or an eye injury — all considered to be part of the “fun”. We’d light little bangers and throw them into letterboxes and wait for the bang. Next day we’d go looking to see if any had made a dent.
Of course these days, Guy Fawkes’s night is no longer celebrated, due perhaps to some bureaucrat’s stroke of pen on political correctness. For us it was all a part of growing up and learning to live with and avoid danger, just like crossing the road, not that there was much traffic about in the side streets.
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We played hopscotch on the road outside our home, and cricket in the middle of the road too, and I’d spend hours practicing my goal throwing in the ring my father had attached to the front of the shed.
It seems to me that life was much more physically active than it is today. Walking was a part of everyday life for most people I knew, as was riding a bike. We played lots of sport too - basketball, tennis and some softball.
It was not unusual to walk a mile or two to catch a train or a bus. A trolley bus or double-decker bus ran along the Port Road and we would love to sit upstairs and take in the world from the lofty height, as we travelled to the city to shop or to Semaphore for a swim.
We also walked in sweltering heat to Tapleys Hill Road to catch a train at Seaton to Grange beach. It used to stop at Kirkaldy station on the way, but it seems the suburb of Kirkaldy has long since disappeared along with quite a few other names in the Council area like Carnarvon, Gelland and Finsbury.
Now as I drive from place to place, shopping, dropping books off to the local library and visiting friends, I’m struck by how few people are walking or riding bikes or catching buses. Of course during the week it is different, the buses are thrumming with school children — making it a war zone for the adult commuter.
Down on Tapleys Hill Road near Grange Road intersection was a favourite spot known as Rivets. It was a resort where we could learn to swim in a full size pool and bounce around on trampolines. I understand the Police Lifesaving Squad used to train in the pool at Rivets and that numerous “bronze medallions” were awarded there.
Other popular places we went to were the Findon Skid Kids and Rowley Park Speedway where the noise of revving engines and dust were revered.
At Woodville Primary School, students were given a small bottle of milk each day and expected to drink it. Often by the time we got to it, the milk had been sitting in the sun for so long that and it was warm with a glug of fatty congealed cream formed across the top. It’s a taste that I’ve never forgotten, not a pleasant one, and just recently having bought a different brand of milk from my usual, I encountered ‘that taste’ again, and it took me back, back, back to the school yard days, and I shuddered.
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During summer we would have the opportunity through school, to go swimming at the City Baths. We travelled by bus to the swimming centre which was in King William Street, where the Festival Theatre is located now. What I recall most about these visits is the strong stench of chlorine that pervaded that place, and etched its way into my nostrils. Of course, in the summer heat, we were sweltering again by the time we got back to school. I’d rather run through the sprinklers on the oval than head back into the classroom, but that wasn’t a choice.
I remember the four seasons were quiet well defined. Summer could be extremely hot with temperatures of over 100oF and winters were boisterous, wild and very wet. There were precious few verandahs between home and school to shelter under, but there was one corner deli about half-way, where we’d stop and shelter; a good excuse to check out the lollies.
We had an interesting variety of sweets: freckles, clinkers, bullets, milk bottles, conversation lollies, and tiny little pink musk lollies that were a favourite treat from one of my uncles. At the movies it was always Fantails and Jaffas — funny how the Jaffas always found their way rolling down the aisle and the stairs “they have a life of their own, Mum”. In school when the teachers weren’t looking we’d pass around conversation lollies to our friends and often break out in fits of giggles for no real reason at all.
One day I was sitting at my desk with a biro in my mouth pointing it to the ceiling having first loosened the biro tube insert. The teacher had her back to us and she was writing on the board. As I puffed into one end of it, the biro inside would rise and fall according to how much I puffed. Fascinated by this I kept huffing and puffing a little bit harder, until I finally gave it an almighty blow and the insert went shooting right out of the end and over the top of the girl sitting in front of me and straight down the front of her dress.
Poor thing almost had a heart attack as she shrieked and squealed trying to work out what on earth had happened. Pandemonium broke out in the class, as no-one else knew either and kids thought that perhaps there was a mouse running loose in the classroom. “It’s moments like these you need Minties.”
Life was indeed less complicated when you didn’t have think about the possibility of being sued for using the wrong terminology. We read our favourite books with characters like Noddy and Big Ears, and Mr Plod the Policeman, and had dolls and gollywogs and fat goldfish with names like Fatty Arbuckle, and
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we’d chant “sticks and stones can break my bones but names can never hurt me”. Political correctness was yet to arrive.
Both at primary and high school there was a strict dress code. Uniforms of a certain length were worn, and yard duty was imposed for minor offences such as being hitched up too short, or simply not wearing your hat.
At Findon High School I was enrolled in the commercial stream, which provided opportunities to learn typing, shorthand, book-keeping, history, geography, arithmetic, English and home economics; but not art, science, or mathematics beyond the first year level.
During these years I loved extra-curricular activities more than school, playing basketball 7-a-side, and tennis. I was always getting into trouble for talking in too much in class, but it wasn’t till many years later I understood why I did.
My interest wasn’t being held. And this was partly because I was losing my hearing, so I would do a lot of talking so I wouldn’t have to listen — a concept that some people might find a little hard to understand.
Sometimes after school, I’d call in to see my Dad at his work at Geosurveys Australia in Todville Street, Woodville West. This was such an interesting place where I could admire semi-precious gemstones, like rose quartz, agate and amethyst in their raw state and also after they had been tumbled and smoothed and polished.
My father was the workshop foreman and his boss, Reg Sprigg, was one of Australia’s most famous pioneers in oil and gas exploration, geology and also in ground-breaking oceanographic research. He was the first to cross the Simpson Desert in a vehicle – and did this three times. And in 1946 he also discovered the world’s oldest fossils dating back to 560 million years – a period defined as Ediacaran Period.
At the time when many Australians were glued to their new black and white TVs probably watching the deep sea diving adventures of Mike Nelson (played by Lloyd Bridges) in the series known as SeaHunt, very few would have been aware that Australia’s very own sea hunt was getting underway in our own backyard in Woodville West. 109
At Geosurveys, one of the major projects Dad worked on was the construction of what I understand to be, Australia’s first diving chamber, carrying out the precision welding that was required to make it fit for deep sea exploration work. This chamber was the brainchild of Reg Sprigg, who wanted to explore one of the last remaining unexplored frontiers — the secrets of the sea.
Inspired by a rusty old boiler he’d seen, the idea segued into the basis of the diving bell, which he then adapted with portholes and fitted out with just enough room to carry one man down to a depth of 300 feet to take gravity readings of the ocean floor.
Before the chamber was put to use on the research vessel MV SAORI; numerous staff at Geo’s had to be trained in scuba diving techniques, which itself was still in its early days. The police diving squad and Dave Burchell, a well-known and respected diver with one leg, were involved in the training.
As I reflect back on it being built, the diving chamber reminds me more now of a Dr Who, Tardis. It was used successfully to do thousands of hours of underwater research and mapping across South Australian gulf waters. The photo below is courtesy of the Advertiser at the time and shows Dad, Mal England working on the chamber.
Today, in 2012, approximately 50 years on, the diving chamber is sitting up in Arkaroola, in an outdoor mining museum gathering dust. “What is a diving bell doing in the outback?” Well, Arkaroola was yet another of Reg Sprigg’s projects. Despite being a geologist and oil and gas pioneer (he was involved with Beach Petroleum and Santos from the beginning) he was also an environmentalist concerned with conservation, which is why he set up the Arkaroola Wildlife Sanctury.
There is a post script to the above
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In writing this memoir, I discovered some exciting news on Facebook — that moves are now afoot to “save the bell,” to bring it back to Adelaide, to restore it and preserve it as a precious piece of our history, and who knows perhaps it might even make one last dive? Details can be found at www.facebook.com/SaveTheBell
While my father played a small part in birth of this history making project, our local community can be very proud of the achievements and contributions made to Australia and indeed the world by the work of such visionaries as Reg Sprigg and his dedicated team at Geosurveys in Woodville West.
I wait now in anticipation to see the “phoenix rise from the ashes”.
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Finding Charlie Katrina Macdonald
Charles Sturt Civic Centre, Monday morning. It’s lovely and peaceful walking into the internal street, populated only by a couple of keen sorts who have clearly been busting all weekend to fix up their dog rego. I exchange good mornings with our facilities go-to guy who is wheeling a stack of chairs on a trolley and start waffling out my thanks of a loan of some extension cords, which I know are in pretty short supply following a series of no-returns. He tells me no problem in his quiet, laconic way. I’ve never seen him flapped, although I’ve invoked his long-suffering expression a few times as a stupid newbie when I’ve asked him on short notice for things that hadn’t occurred to me. I swipe past the security panel and enter the Civic Library, taking care not to let anyone else in before opening time. The little-kid part of me likes this; having permission to be out-of-bounds. I poke my head through the workroom door to deal with the stack of boxes I’ve been sent last Friday, which will be presenting all sorts of OH&S hazards. It doesn’t turn out to be the Aztec wonder I’ve feared and think better of it. That room is a freaky time portal where a five minute squiz is an hour in external time, so I head on upstairs before it sucks me in. The office area on the mezzanine deck above the Library, with its steel railings and smooth wooden banister, makes me think of an ocean liner. I swipe myself into the glass stairwell and ascend to the promenade deck. Provided I stick to my plan and not get seduced by a burning desire to tidy some unimportant corner or become engrossed in water-cooler talk, this morning could be one of the most productive times in the week. My success in getting myself set will impact directly on tomorrow. Tuesday, aka Right-Off Day, has all the qualities of one of those dreams of somehow trying to get ready for a birthday party for which I’m hosting and also the hired clown, while spring cleaning the kitchen cupboards, entertaining visiting relatives and doing my tax assessment. In between prepping myself for the children’s story-time session, delegating to-dos to the volunteer ladies who come in for a couple of hours each week, having lunch and doing service desk duties for the rest of the day, I know there’ll be a couple of box stacks of stuff that’s found its way back to craft resource HQ. It’s been a year-long operation to get this particular too-hard basket I inherited into a workable state. Sometimes colleagues comment that it’s a pity I didn’t take ‘before’ photos, but there’s no need. Each time I open a cupboard and picture the former carnage, I declare: ‘As God as my witness, I’ll never be messy again!’
The months of the second half of the year will be insane, what with Engineering and Science Weeks, followed immediately by Children’s Book Week, then Term 3 School Holiday Program, the Mayoral Make-
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A-Book competition, Diwali, Summer Reading Challenge, another School Holiday Program, producing my quarterly zine and all the other things that keeps the Good Ship Kids Team afloat. My compiled to-do list is of course primarily doing stuff now to make the future happen. But sometimes, momentarily, ghostings of the Library’s past watermark my pages of scrawled notes. I am the custodian of traditions, like Mayoral Make-A-Book, which has clocked up shy of two years that I have been on this earth. It has survived two separate council amalgamations, which is no mean feat put beside all the initiatives and funding and staff that would have come and gone. Last year’s awards night was for the first time officiated by a fem-mayor, who was accompanied by her young children. Everything old was new again that year. Maybe it’s just being relatively new to the environment, and the mental stretching that goes with making sense of other people’s normalised history and culture. But sufficient time has passed to have slipped into taking things for granted and losing the surreal feeling of newness. There’s something about travelling out of my CBD home base and into the City of Charles Sturt, where multiversity seems entirely plausible. I mean, the Council’s boundary is even the shape of the Bermuda Triangle.
Somewhere in time, I had a conversation with Julia after Thursday Babytime at Hindmarsh; something to do with strategies for sending SMS reminders for the next School Holiday Program. Was it sending a general message of ‘You are booked in for an activity next week’ or were we going to try to schedule a message send-out for specific sessions, and if so, which ones were they? I try to recall what constituted a ‘significant’ event as opposed to ones we could wear plenty of no-shows. It seems a year ago. I realise I’m wired and over-hungry; too tired to be effective but with cogs still grinding on auto. Perfectionist, they called me in school. I always hated that in my gut, but at home it was a compliment. ‘You can never achieve perfection; only God is perfect,’ my dad would always say, ‘but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t strive for perfection.’ Am I a perfectionist? I thought I had reformed myself from all that crap. But here I am, stupidly berating myself for the things on my to-do list that were never dismissed with a strike- through and tick. Must have been procrastinating again, Katrina; you need to prioritise. Come off it, I tell myself. Yesterday, I figured out the structure for dealing with the security, archival practices for a key internal information collection, killing at least four birds with one stone. It felt awesome; like one of those visionaries sketching out a radical solution on the back of an envelope. Where is that feeling to be found in this moment now? It’s always like this when preparing programs. What if no one turns up to my party? I’m trying to have a phone conversation with Julia while she’s on her service desk shift, but it’s so repeatedly punctuated with, ‘I’ll call you back in a minute’ that I give it up. The customer always comes first, and each minute I take her up is another colleague put under pressure, having to cover for my greediness. 113
A thirty-something couple talks about moving to Adelaide; a conversation that has gone on for at least a decade. It’s always been when, not if. Even our earlier move from Melbourne to Ballarat was a stepping stone up the Western Highway. B-town has not disappointed as an ideal place to start a career, family and mortgage on a pre-Federation weatherboard that soaks in the icy currents that seem to constantly sweep over the undulating goldfields plains.
‘This is the sort of pleasant day I can see myself being nostalgic over in years to come when I’m looking back through rose-coloured glasses, and have forgotten the reality of how much the cold weather sucks balls,’ I comment while out walking on an unseasonably pleasant August day in our eighth year here. ‘I’m ready whenever you are,’ he responds immediately and unemotionally. We walk westward along Gregory Street towards Lake Wendouree. Towards West Terrace and the Market. ‘Where you go, I go; your people will be my people. When we get home, we start packing up.’ True to our word, we do.
I’m told mine is what a fine looking résumé should be: like a stylish bathing suit, revealing enough to suggest and intrigue. I say I’m hopeful that before too long I’ll be working. Maybe not in a library job, but at least in something that comes under the umbrella of Information Management and will strengthen my skills and attributes. Maybe it’s a bit much to expect I’ll just walk into a plum job, but it seems reasonable that someone will know a good thing when I walk into their world.
My bubble of time in the holding zone expands. Weeks bloat into months. Each morning at eight, I get myself out of my in-laws’ tiny unit and sit in McDonald’s using their WiFi, as slow as my progress cracking the job market. I sometimes go to the public library at Glenelg or to the State Library in the city. Valuable community resources at face value, but teasing under the mask; needling me with the knowledge that I belong there but authentication denied. I haven’t wanted to believe what the self-hating crow eaters have said about their beautiful city, because it’s mine now, too. But they are right: Adelaide has shut down over summer. My interview uniform I’ve lashed out on hangs in the cupboard, trotted out for the occasional humiliation. Anxiety is overtaking me, screwing with my head. I’ve blown my good thing. I can’t expect to hope for anything good again. The net won’t appear. My working life is probably over.
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Each day I fail to grasp a tenable future widens the hole our savings are pouring out of, and we will have to foreclose on our charming life-sized dollhouse that no one wants. My in-laws hate me and my presence. The feeling of cold dread is so familiar, it regulates my core during the intensity of my first sub- desert summer.
After all my hope and longing, Adelaide turns out to be a cold bitch. I have come offering her so much, but she has taken me for her fool. I amuse her by dancing the Recruitment Agency Sign-up. She tells me she’ll call me but she never does. This, my friend, is what you get for pissing security up the wall and for cock-eyed bragging. Jump for me. Now go and sit in the corner until I’m ready to look at you again.
I can’t be mad at her, though. She’s holding out, for sure, but she’s a disciplinarian; teaching me the virtue of living in the moment while waiting ceaselessly. Somehow, I eventually turn her head and cause her to look favourably upon me. Pieces start falling into place, a kind of tit-for-tat negotiation between cities. A vacancy opens up, admitting our son to school the week before term starts. I get interviewed by a temp agent who is genuinely enthusiastic about adding me to her toolkit. The house sells. An apartment near the school and my husband’s work becomes available and leased to us. I’m allowed to get up off the floor and enter the dungeon, filing doc wallets in a local council records office for a couple of weeks. Airless, windowless, monotonous: it’s glorious and I want to do it forever. And then I’m sent back to my corner to wait. But it has kicked off a fortnight-on, fortnight-off series of assignments. Each day of knowing and not-knowing lasts an eternity. I am now a professional dream-walker, not really sure what the play is or where to stand or what to say, but fudging my way through and acting the guts out of my bit parts. The concept that I might still be of use becomes more possible with each day I add to my payroll sheet.
Are your ears burning, Adelaide? They should be, the way I’m courting you. Every night I look out my window towards the northwest of the city grid and wish you goodnight; every morning when I open the blinds, I wish you a good morning. Just to remind you not to forget me. You’d better not.
I’m an admin monkey for a local council engineering department, and my lady at the temp agency calls me in a burst of excitement. A public library desperately needs someone to step in and coordinate their children’s program: someone with experience as an information manager; someone with familiarity of children’s literature; someone who can confidently stand up in front of a group of people and talk about what contemporary libraries have to offer. She confesses she’s brashly broken her policy of forwarding a 115
résumé without first letting me know, but that it’s such perfect timing for both parties; she hopes I didn’t mind. Mind? After four months of unemployment and another four of semi-employment since crossing the border, this was providence. The Children’s Services Officer I’m replacing has already been gone for several weeks, and her assistant who has been doing both jobs in the interim, is leaving in a week and a half. Children’s Book Week is backing its rear up to the present like a hoon. And things are piling up and falling off the backburner. They’re offering me a baptism of fire: can opportunities to get back in the game come any more golden?
I’d seen the ‘Hello, I’m Charles Sturt’ banners previously on the Council website and all the careers resources. All those smiling faces, representing the diverse facets of the community, like the adorable elderly Chinese man in the grey suit and jade ring giving the thumbs up, and the chick with the retro do- rag (possibly a customer of Miss PJ’s from Powderpuff Boutique in Croydon, who had been a Facebook friend of mine for several years now). I’d been impressed by the branding. Charles Sturt is obviously, determinedly, image conscious. The United Colours of Pennington. Yeah, I know I’m being pitched to, Charlie Boy, so pitch it to me good. Just give me a goddamned chance.
Somewhere in time, I am a child who realises Playschool presenters are real people working jobs. I don’t want them to step out of the box and be my friends; I want to be their colleague. I rock a pair of overalls, which they seem to wear constantly. I like Warren’s tinkling piano riffs. My grandparents are friends with the Hazelhursts (although Mum says Noni always irritated her with her showing-off when they were kids). It seems a logical progression: go to uni, earn acting chops out the other side, then join Playschool. I love my town library and decide, while watching the librarians running searching fingers over the tabs of paper members cards in the sunken box in the service desk, that librarian is my other dream job. Workplace personality profiling workshops will eventually make sense of my primary school experience of being in a seemingly perpetual state of daydreaming, absent-mindedly losing personal belongings, and not really gathering there is a formal timetable for the week. In high school, I have learnt to be attentive and organised; the textbook if-you-want-something-done-ask-a-busy-person person. Always doing and carrying and pretending to be something; you never know what Katrina will be up to next. I’m dutiful and striving but an oddly shaped peg. No matter what I try, there’s always a part of me that seems to be jutting out of the mould, particularly in respect to jobs. At any given point in my life, it seems there’s
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someone there to remind me of how difficult I am to categorise, and the puzzlement is obviously slightly irritating to them, otherwise they wouldn’t phrase their compliments as such. Like how I was always told as a child that ‘it’ll be a special man who marries you’. It casts the world in a certain light, which never quite seems to be on me at the right angle. If only I could go back and tell myself how it’s all preparation, leading to a moment in time where my oddball mix of precision organisation and goofiness is perfect and the planets align.
I’m chatting with the Library Manager about the importance of self-reflection on the passion and enthusiasm we need for our jobs.
‘Can you recall how you responded to the interview question about what you like about working with kids?’ she asks me.
‘I can’t for the life of me remember. I’d only ever worked with adults before, so I was self-conscious and probably gave some textbook answer about believing the children are the future. Why, what did I say? You’ve got me worried now,’ I say with a laugh.
‘You know, I can’t remember either.’ She pauses for a moment, trying to reel back into mind the words that obviously had stuck with her, and gives up with a laugh, before turning serious again. ‘I can’t remember, but I’ll tell you this: it proved to be a very key question. Sometimes, you just know that something is the right fit. Not everyone feels the way you do about working with kids.’ ‘Are you happy working here?’ she adds.
I’ve heard this question many times in the past year, and it’s touching each time. It’s a very busy job; I’ve heard this one a lot, too. It has resonated in the halls and corridors and in my mind’s ear for twelve months, since my first speed date with Charlie Sturt. ‘It’s a very busy job’ I was told. Warned, more like. A very—busy—job. Children’s Services Officer. The Lucy Ricado conveyor belt worker of the Charles Sturt Library Service. Lucky for me I walked like a duck, talked like a duck and was goose enough to quack like one in front of a room of strangers. I’ve been here a year and still feel like I’m unpacking my suitcase, but that doesn’t matter. I have come home. I had assumed it was Adelaide I was reaching out for. But I never
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realised it was Charlie Sturt who was waiting for me, too. For a long time, I had doubts about my ability to cope with the role, and to be honest, in my crazy-busy stressed-out moments I still do. This is no ordinary Library job; it’s a creative project in which I’m dancing a constant merengue with time and logistics and incidents and things. I need to remind myself of that so I don’t drown under the siren song of ‘Heavy Workload’. I direct and perform and write and promote and critique and dream and lead a dynamic ensemble. And I am becoming an expert plate-spinner.
‘Yes. I am happy,’ I tell her, and I see the same relief wash over her face that I’ve seen each time I have assured my colleagues of my satisfaction. But it’s true. ‘You have no idea how happy I am.’
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