John Flavelle
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ÒNurungiÓRemembered Official Newsletter of the City of Canada Bay Heritage Society email: [email protected] www.canadabayheritage.asn.au EDITOR LOIS MICHEL No.201 MAY, 2013 9744-8528 Growing up in Concord West Memories of Graeme Senior by his mate John Watson * * * * Graeme and I met by accident some time the scrum passing out to me and moments CITY OF CANADA in 1950. I would like to think it was an later he would be in the back line taking the accident: he hit me across the back of the ball from the inside centre and heading off for BAY MUSEUM head with a baseball, or softball, bat in the a run calling for back-up. As I write I can see 1 Bent Street, Concord school grounds. From that moment on we him as clearly now as he was on the field. The became firm friends, inseparable for goal posts are behind him; he moves quickly Open Wed & Sat many, many years. to the back of the scrum as I wave my right 10am to 4pm That meeting was at Concord West arm telling the backs to line out to the right. I Guest Speaker primary School in Sydney. We were can see him pounce on the ball and whip it to on 1st Saturday of each both born in 1945. We would have both me. He still looks like a footballer. month at 2:00 pm been five years old. Graeme liked to re- When we were nine or 10 we decided one Phone: 9743-3034 mind me that he was older than me. He school holiday to ride our scooters from Con- during museum hours was born in March, I think the 17th, while cord West, where we both lived (Graeme in or email I was born much later on May 27. Sen- Harrison Avenue, 17, I think, and me at 22 [email protected] iority is important, especially to a Senior! Killoola Street) to Parramatta, about 10 miles We played cricket and football together away (that’s 16km in today’s measure.) Look- in the school’s teams that played other ing back it was a hell of a feat. I had a pump- schools. Graeme was a natural sports- up tyred Speedwell scooter and Graeme rode man despite wearing those horrible round a red Cyclops solid-tyre scooter. We had to glasses that were common in the 1950s. scooter along Concord Road to Ryde Bridge STEERING I should say he “didn’t wear” those through a suburb called Rhodes then up Ryde COMMITTEE glasses. I think his Mum and Dad (Alf and Hill (that was tough for cars in those days) then Jean, always called Mr and Mrs Senior by turn left along Victoria Road to the main street Lois Michel me as was done in those days) thought of Parramatta. We did not have a haversack 9744-8528 he was wearing them but they only came with any supplies. We did not carry water and out on rare occasions. His natural ability I can’t remember either of us ever wearing Betty Fletcher was all the better when you think he must hats. 9713-1384 have seen oncoming cricket balls as blurs Aunty Ned greeted us at the front door and Mark Durance until the last moment when he made the gave us soft drinks and moist, dark chocolate decision as to which way to hit it ... and cake, her specialty. Then we rode home, only 9743-0583 he certainly could hit the ball. this time via Carlingford, although I don’t Margaret Barbalet My best memories of school days are of remember seeing Mrs Senior at her shop. 9717-1306 Graeme playing rugby league at St Luke’s We did pass The King’s School grounds. oval, or the playing field nearby. Our 4th We rode home and no one made even the Lorraine Holmes class teacher Mr O’Brien was the coach, slightest fuss about it. That was how life was 9743-2682 a teacher who rode on the bus with us to in the 1950s. Kids were naturally fit. We rode scooters, walked, graduated to bicycles, Alan Wright these games. We used to get changed in the open using bench seats meant for walked some more and ran everywhere. 9743-4869 spectators. We pulled on Green footy Terry Robinson jerseys with a deep, gold vee, the same 9743-1154 as the Australian players wore. We had green and gold socks and black, polished Diary Dates Jeanette O’Hara boots with long white laces. There is noth- MAY 4th: Mark St Leon, “Circus: The ing like the feeling of walking to the play- Australian Story 9743-3409 ing field in an outfit like this with the metal Trish Skehan sprigs on your boots crunching on the MAY 11th: Power Point Presentation of pho- concrete. tographs through the ages at Concord 4369-4172 Library at 2:00 pm. Graeme was fullback and probably cap- tain. He had a football brain, as they are JUNE 1st: Mark Dunn, “Henri L’Estrange, the called today. I was five-eighth and Australian Blondin who walked across Graeme would appear suddenly behind Middle Harbour” When we were 11, going on 12, we after game after game and we usually crossflow head, the same as the MGA decided to earn a quid mowing lawns. ended the session level pegging in of the day. No one knew what a Graeme pushed his father’s electric wins and losses. They were hard- crossflow head was but it sounded blue cylinder mower with front grass fought games often making it to eight- good. I drove us off the road at catcher and I pushed a red and green all and then going on to a score of 10. Daretown near the NSW- Victoria- Lawn King rotary mower (no, not a One day one of us clipped the other’s South Australian border and Victa, they hadn’t yet been invented by ear starting a constant blood flow we Graeme, asleep across the back seat, fellow Concord resident Victor didn’t think was worthwhile stopping reached up and pulled the door shut as Richardson but he would have been for. The owner of the courts was less we clipped a guide post. He was not close to becoming a household impressed with spatters of blood up the amused at the damage but we drove name.) We charged 10 bob a lawn. white walls and over the polished tim- on. I remember we came to a sign post Graeme mowed the backyard and I ber floors. We got rags and helped that said Adelaide was, I think, 75 miles mowed the front and out into the clean up! By the way, both of us had at right angles to where we were head- street. The first lawn we did was for an sticky-outy ears as was, or seemed to ing. We all decided we should see older couple about three houses from be, normal in the ’50s and that’s why I Adelaide and I drove there, arriving our school on Concord Road. can’t remember who got clipped. about 7pm on a Sunday. Nothing was We picked up the ten bob (a dollar to- When we left the courts each Satur- alive, awake, stirring. If a few newspa- day), pushed our mowers to the Shell day in summer we went our different per pages had been blowing in the garage nearly opposite the school, ways. Graeme went first to VJ gutter it would have been a film set for filled our mower tins with two stroke (Vaucluse Junior) sailing, then Skates some end-of-world movie. We back- fuel then called in at Mrs Janus’ deli- and I went to cricket. Graeme, as tracked to the turn-off without even catessen (with the word Delicattessen usual, was good at sailing, as with getting a cup of tea or a Coke. We misspelled on the front window in blue) every sport. He would have been reached Ceduna, filled up and re- where we had chocolate milk shakes among the first to sail Skates at marked to the garage bloke that the ... and we still had money in our pock- Concord-Rhodes Sailing Club, as it NRMA said we faced 75 miles of dirt ets. was then called, from the clubhouse road on the Nullarbor but we heard it We spent that Christmas holidays next to Ryde Bridge, across the could be less because it was being mowing and getting our prices up to Parramatta River from Halvorsen’s sealed. He laughed and told us there 15 bob in some of the bigger yards. boat shed. He sailed in the NSW was 1700 miles of dirt road ahead. In those days it wasn’t summer holi- Championships and later the Australia There was! I remember driving looking days or vacation; it was the Christmas Championships. into the sun as it sunk in the west and holidays, right through until near the seeing the sun come up in the rear One Saturday night we met after our vision mirror the next morning! end of January when we went back to respective sports outings with news of school. I don’t recall any Australia something fantastic. I was an opening In Perth, after two days and three Day, either. bowler and just as I was running in to nights on the road driving non-stop, Probably the same holiday we went to bowl at St Luke’s I felt a huge gust of Graeme was billeted with the Court Massey Park Golf Club for our first wind carry me along and as I let go of family.