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TALKING WITH FRANK

Narratives of Kingston

INFORMATION AND LIBRARY SERVICE CITY OF KINGSTON SEPTEMBER 2001

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Tess BONE 5 Mary CHAPMAN 11 Phillip COFFEY 17 Flo DAY 21 May KEELEY 23 Betty KUC 32 Jean MARTIN and Len LePAGE 34 Joyce PETERSON 42 Bob PICKERING and Joyce PICKERING 51 Alf PRIESTLY 55 Bob ROBERTSON 66 Bob WRIGHT 74

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FOREWORD

Much of the history of our community is locked away in people’s memories so the opportunity to tap this resource was eagerly taken up by the Kingston historical societies. With the assistance of a Commonwealth Government, Federation Community Grant, Piri White and Frank Turley interviewed twenty six people who had some connection to the Kingston district during the period 1901 – 1927, the time when the Federal Parliament met in Melbourne. The task of Piri and Frank was to talk to men and women identified by the historical societies, and to unlock their treasures. This they did. The results of their work are recorded in the two volumes, Talking with Piri and Talking with Frank. From the material unearthed in the interviews, ten articles were written covering schooling, the role of women, entertainment, politics, the church, occupations, tragedy and celebrations. These were placed on the City of Kingston Historical Web Site and can be viewed there at http://localhistory.kingston.vic.gov.au. In reading the transcripts of the interviews it should be remembered that our memory can play tricks. This is certainly the case as we grow older. As stories are passed from one generation to another, elaborations or modifications can occur. Important information unintentionally can be omitted. Nevertheless oral history can compliment information gained from official documents and published histories and thereby add a sense of reality, achievement and colour to what might otherwise be viewed as dry uninteresting and unrelated facts. Talking with Piri and Talking with Frank are packed full of stories and information which reveals life as it was in the Kingston district at the commencement of Australia as a nation. I commend them to you. Graham J Whitehead City Historian

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Without the cooperation of twenty six people this publication would not have occurred. They were generous in telling their stories and many gave access to prized photographs. The assistance of the Chelsea, Dingley Village, Mordialloc and Moorabbin historical societies in helping to identify the people to be interviews was appreciated. The financial grant from the Commonwealth Government’s, Federation Community Projects made it possible for the proposal, originally submitted to and supported by the Electorate of Isaac, to be completed. The guidance of the advisory committee to the project team made easier the achievement of the set goals. The contribution of staff from the Information and Library Service of the City of Kingston in facilitating all stages of the project is gratefully acknowledged.

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INTERVIEW with TESS BONE

October 18, 2000

I am most interested to find that we are now in the room where you were born. That's right. Yes. At 11 Childers Street, Mentone. Yes. Aptly named, because, when we were young, I think every house in the street had children. And we played out in the road or in the school ground - anywhere - and there weren't very many houses in the street. I was only thinking last night how many there were, but there were one, two, three, four to here. Where the shop is on the corner, that was a house that faced Rogers Street, and a widow owned it and she was right opposite the school and she thought, well, I'll have a door put in for one of the front rooms , facing into Childers Street, and she'd have a little tuck shop. Which she did. Before that, it was owned by Freedman, one of the - he was a trainer. I don't know whether he was related to the brothers that are well known now. But, Dad said he always had poor old milky horses - none of his horses ever got anywhere. He was very tidy, evidently, because whenever there was races he would come into Mum and ask if he could have a dip in the Nugget tin to clean his shoes to go to the races. Then, as I say, this lady took over and she eventually died and then Mr Blake took it over and then he bought a small shop and then he built the larger one that's there now. And opposite, where the Church is, there was a house there ... this is, still Childers Street - an old farm house with a well at the side and then the ground from there down to Warrigal Road was all lavender. The Parish Priest bought the land for himself, out of his own money, and then he planted the English lavender and, oh, you can still smell it ... when the flowers were out it was absolutely beautiful and we'd all go over there and help cut it and then that was sold and that was money that came back into the Church. Did your parents move into this house when they were married? Yes. Dad bought the land in 1912 and he built the house himself. He must have started off with two rooms. This one was a bedroom and the other room at the back was the kitchen. And off that was the bathroom. Then he built another bedroom at the side and he built the other bedroom when my brothers were born. My eldest brother was four when they came down here in 1913 ... no, he was three, that was right ... and Ken was thirteen months old, I think. Dad was still building this house when he was crawling. I was born here in 1914. There were only the three children. What was your father's business? Dad was a plasterer. He worked for Picton Hopkins between South Yarra and Richmond.

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How would he have travelled to his various jobs? There was only train. Steam train first and later electric. Where did you go to school from here? I went to St. Patrick's Primary for twelve months and then I went in to Kilbreda. It's changed ... then it was St. Bridget's College, then it was the Brigidine College and then - and now - it's Kilbreda.

Where did the boy's go to school? They both went to the Primary and then Jack was apprenticed to plastering (which he hated, he loathed that) - but he did his apprenticeship, and then, when war broke out he went into the Airforce - Second World War. Ken got a scholarship and went to De La Salle up at Malvern. What are your best memories of school? Well, there were some fun days. Because it was mixed school at St. Pat's. It was a big school. We had one Nun that taught us up there and she could only play the piano with one finger. But she'd have them perfect by the time the Annual Ball came in - whatever they had to do, whether it was the Lancers or the Alberts or whatever they did ... she had them perfect. She was a hard Nun ... very thin ... small ... what you call a wiry sort of a person, but the boys got belted if they didn't measure up ... they got belted with Rosary Beads ... big Rosary Beads that she used to have round and she'd wallop you with that. Not the girls, but I remember the school. I think every person that went through that school threw a pen up on to the ceiling. And they were the old, long, steel nibs and everywhere you looked you could see because it was an old wooden building - there may be a photo down at the Historical Society. Then, when cherries came into season, the boys would go and get cherries and Mother Dunlap had an old wooden chair that she used to sit on and they'd place the cherry bobs underneath and wait for her to come in. And around the wall, there were photos. There was Nelson and there was the Battle of Trafalgar and something or other else everywhere - But, any dead bird, or mouse, or rat that was found was always thrown up behind the photos. When they pulled them down they were surprised at what they found. One of the boys - he played the wag - he didn't want to go to school, he'd sit on the the fence - which was a post and rail - and watch a train go past. Which weren't too many. And then, sometimes, he'd find a sleeper, a spare sleeper, and he'd put the sleeper in front of a train. That was Dinny. How long did you stay at Kilbreda? I was there till about '26, '27. I finished then. Yes. I was home for a while and then I went up to the British Xylonite, that was on the Nepean Highway, I was up there until I was nearly 21. And then I came -- I got myself in a library, a private library, in South Yarra. I was there, on and off, for over twenty years. I liked writing and books. I would like to ask you about the community spirit. Well, see, when we were young, if anything was discussed, the children weren't around. You'd be outside. If your Mother, or even your Father, had visitors, you weren't in the room. You went out. You might have got a piece of cake or a piece of bread and jam , but nothing was discussed. But, on the whole, I think people - well it was a smaller community - and I remember, it must have been just after the First World War, when some of the boys were coming home, specially those that had been injured, my Father took me down. It was a sort of twilight meeting - may have been daylight saving, I don't know - but it was not quite dark, and I could hear the band coming down Mentone Parade and then they came into Brindisi Street and we were standing near the old Council Chambers, and it was something connected with the War - I know that much. See, Friday night was a late shopping night.

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Everybody came out. It was a social time. Everybody spoke. Everybody knew everybody. No matter where they went to or what Church they went to or anything like that, we all knew one another. What about medical services? Cheltenham, we had to go. Most of the time we had to go to Cheltenham because the co-operative store was up there. The Mechanics' Institute had like a library. Mum loved reading and Dad liked reading so I'd probably walk up there. Get books. You'd say the Mechanics' Institute was pretty important then. Yes. It had a dispensary. It was the only one. Were children mainly born at home? There weren't the hospitals. You had the midwife and the doctor come to the house. They're trying to bring it back in again now, aren't they? See, there weren't very many hospitals. I think there was only Merlswood, in Naples Road, (the house is still there), there was Strathaven round in Warrigal Road (well that's been pulled down), then there was one down in Mordialloc on Beach Road. Just a house. Then there was another one round here in Swanson Street. Sister Murphy's. That was just an ordinary house. But she turned it into a good little nursing home. Maternity and small operations there. Did your grandparents live in this vicinity? No. Only my grandmother was alive. She lived up in Carlton. She came down here to live, but she didn't like it. I think she was born in Tasmania. Do you remember your parents having any interest in politics? Dad was a very staunch Labor man. There was the ANA. Dad was a life governor of the existing Mentone Library. He was one of the instigators of that and worked for years there. We all did. On a Friday night, when there was elections coming up perhaps there was a soap box out there with a Labor man giving his little speech. On the opposite corner was Abbott's the grocers, and there'd be the Liberal man. There'd be only the two. And we'd have perhaps a meeting down in the old City Hall, and we used to get carted to all of them. Was there much interest taken in the Federal Parliament? I think they ...it more or less fizzled out sort of thing. You know, the ANA changed over and I don't think Dad worried that much about it. What do you think your parents' attitude may have been to the conscription debate in the First World War? I think Dad went, but when he was young he had rheumatic fever and he had a heart murmur and he was dismissed on account of that. So that was it. If there were memories of the conscription matter it went over my head.

In your early years, was the Church very significant, apart from religious questions, in a social way? Well, depending on who you had. Now, we had Father Martin. He was Parish Priest here. He had been in the Navy. He was a real man's man. He finished up out near Camberwell as a Monsignor. But when he was here he was a great one for having the ecumenical - we'd have like, say, a gymnasium in the old Church, there'd be the St Augustine's girls, and there was the Methodist girls, then there was the girls from the Uniting Church, and then we'd have competitions - we'd have marching, things like that, you know. And we mixed. And

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then we had another one that wouldn't have - you know - that wouldn't have acknowledged them. That was the difference. Father Martin was that sort of man, but I think being in the Navy gave him that sort of outlook. Apart from the gym, were there other kinds of social gatherings? Oh, yes. We had Sunday School Picnics and we used to go over to the Mentone Racecourse. We used to think we were going miles! We had one picnic where they hired a train and we went down to the Aspendale Racecourse. That was a social day, that really was. Going in the train! Then, Mum and Dad both sang. They were both in the choir in the Church. We had a Minstrel Show. We had a big concert down in the old City Hall. (When I say the old City Hall - when it rained we used to have buckets everywhere because the roof leaked, you know.) Sunday nights we'd all go over to my Mother's sisters. Both my Aunts played. So, round the piano we would have a sing-song. I notice the piano in this room ... I still play. I was about eleven when I first started to learn the piano. I'd be playing in here and Mum would be out in the kitchen and she'd say 'That's wrong!' She could play a bit, too. When you were a little girl what were your spare time recreations? Tennis. I liked tennis. I used to play against the boys. They made me hit harder. We just played for fun. Later my brother Ken used to beat me hollow. One time we had a Curate who was rather keen on tennis and, of course, he would come in his nice white creams and start to play. And then you'd forget that the Father was down the other end you know and oh b------low. You were going to say something and you'd realise who was down the other end. Were there any bad times that you remember? Well, The Royal Oak went up. I think all of Mentone was there. Then a grandstand at the racecourse went up. There were no houses between here and there, it was mostly all paddocks. When there was sickness in the home - Mother, say, was the victim - and perhaps there weren't children old enough to help. What happened? Well, Mum had a sister - and she'd come over. It was self-help within the family. Was the Mother the central figure in the family? More or less. Mum was like me. She could be like an oyster. If she didn't want anything to worry her - pull the shell over and forget about it. Dad was the world's worst worrier. I think he had the world's worries on his shoulders. Always have to save for a rainy day and Mum would say 'We could do this ... '. 'No, we have to save ... ' There was always going to be a rainy day. Now, when kids of your vintage got a bit older - into their late teens - where did they meet up socially? This old building that was over here in the corner near the old farm house - when they built the school, they pulled the whole inside out of the house, left the kitchen, and then they made that a club room. And we used to meet there on a Sunday night for a dance. We had a pianist who was very, very good. I think he's still playing. He was an excellent pianist. Apart from dance music it was classical as well. And he'd come up every week. I think half of it was only for a mere pittance because we didn't pay very much because we didn't have very much. We used to have fun. Really good fun. When a girl was getting into the marriageable age, what happened?

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We had dances. I can tell you, sometimes the parents made certain remarks about the suitors. Different ones. They might just say, 'Well, I don't like the look of him.' And that would be it, probably. Quite a few marriages were contracted within the district. Some weren't, you know. I found mine over in Hawthorn! Actually it wasn't at Hawthorn that I found him. It was Mordialloc. At a 21st birthday. I knew the lass, and her mother and I were friends. My husband-to-be was invited because he worked with a friend of the family. And that was it. He walked in the door and I said, 'There's the man I'm going to marry.' And I didn't know him from Adam. I didn't even know who he was. That magic moment lives in the mind, doesn't it? It does, it does. Sometimes I look at a photograph of him and I think did I ever know you? Because that's nearly twenty-four years since he died. We were only married twenty-five years. You know - you think - did I dream it? But the memory's there. Was there an industrial development that occurred during your early years? I remember the Gartsides - over at Dingley. The nearest one was up here on the Highway. I could never think of its name. There were two. Pretty small. of course there was the big timber mills here at the back near the school from Station Street. A lot worked there. Because that was a very big business. Think of the boys who were at school with you - where did they work? A lot were market gardens. Parents were. They probably carried on the business. They moved, you know, sort of thing. Couple of priests. We were all just the average family. Most of us were. There weren't that very many. Compared to now. What a marvellous thing it is for you to be able to look back over the years ... Yes. I was just thinking about that the other day. We had a Nun at one of our pupils' reunions. Honestly, she was the funniest thing - what she said. I said to her, 'Well, you amaze me.' She used to scale the fence and go over to Percy Peat's and buy some chocolates, you know. Oh, they loved the chocolate. And all the things that she used to do you know. Of course, she's been gone to God for quite some time now. But, I was thinking of all the different shops, you know. Jacky Jones on the corner of Brindisi Street. They sold everything, sort of thing. There were two butchers., practically side by side. But each one had - you know - you went to Mr Pugh or you went to Mr Jury. And there was the chemist and then there was a shop that belonged to a very well-known runner, but I can't think of his name. I think every girl in Mentone was in love with him. He did very well. And, everyone who lived in Mentone in that era would have known Percy Peat. All the shops were high. You had a step up from a little verandah and there was a window either side and then there was another step up. Sometimes a double door. When he opened it up I think he may have thought that one side would be for afternoon tea - you wouldn't be game to go in it, to be quite truthful. And then there was the shop. Well he even had little tables at the back of the shop. I think he had about a 15 watt globe for you to get in. And he'd appear from about here to the gate and he'd say, 'Yes. What do you want?' And he'd come out through beaded curtains and I always used to think it was the Den of Iniquity! I used to think that if I went in there a trapdoor would open and I'd fall! He used to have the most beautiful cakes of a weekend and chocolates. He was a personality. Talking about a 15 watt globe - in this room, when you were born, what kind of lighting was used. No electricity. Gas. I remember when electricity came. It was strange at first, you know, going from room to room and having to switch off. You'd switch a light on and Dad would come behind and switch it off. You know. I remember it in the streets. But when it was, I'm not sure. In the '20s I suppose.

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You've been marvellously helpful and I'm very grateful to you.

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INTERVIEW with MARY CHAPMAN

October 16, 2000 You were born in Cheltenham? Yes - in Centre Dandenong Road. My father had a market garden in Centre Dandenong Road. But, when I was about - perhaps - ten I went to school at St. Patrick's, Mentone. And then on to Kilbreda. Then, my father sold that property and we went to live - my mother ... had a big property in Ross Street, Heatherton. Quite a lot of property, bounded by Old Dandenong Road and Boundary Road - all round - and they had a big market garden there. My brother was older than me so he and my father, and my uncle, worked the market garden. I was about ten or twelve. Were there just your brother and you in the family? No, I had a younger sister and a younger brother. There were four of us. But, at this time, my mother was very ill. She died of Bright's Disease, when I was about fifteen. When my younger brother was only about eight. And so, because of this, I had to stay home and be the housekeeper, maid-of-all-works. So, you would still have been at Kilbreda then? Yes. but I came home and took over the home-duties. Now, was that pretty much the situation that applied in those days? Yes - if there was sickness or the mother died. Was it a big property? Now, I'm not good on that, but a lot of land. The Heatherton Hall was next door. Ross Street, Old Dandenong Road and Boundary Road. So you became a house-mother and you had the younger kids to look after ... Yes, but I had a dear Dad, you know ... he was a lovely Dad. My mother was ill for a long time. We didn't see much of our mother. Did you have other relatives living nearby?

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My mother had sisters and that in the City and they'd come out. We'd get very annoyed, because they'd come out in those old-fashioned cars - Ford something, they called them - and they'd have gone for a drive and then they'd call in and fill their cars up with vegetables (for nothing, you know) and have afternoon tea and give my father great instructions ... Dad used to let me go off to the hall, occasionally, we lived just next door, to dances and that. And I played tennis. 'Oh, you let Mary go out too young to dances and all this sort of stuff,' and Dad said, 'Look. Mary works hard and I trust her, so that's all right.' They were very conservative days, weren't they? Yes. Exactly. But I enjoyed the functions at the Hall. Who provided the suppers? The committee. It was mainly womenfolk, I'd say. My father was on the committee. He was - I can't tell you - treasurer. Was the role of women very important in the upbringing of families? Yes ... definitely. You must had a profound influence on your younger brother and sister. Well. I hope so. My sister then went out to do a little bit of sort of housekeeping and then she married - oh well, it was years before she married, of course - she was home for a good while of course, because she was still going to school. And my younger brother was, too. And he got sick of going to - we had to drive the horse and cart half-way up Centre Dandenong Road, leave it at an old property of my Uncle's and then he'd cut across paddocks to get to Mentone. And he got sick of that . He said, 'I'm sick of this. I'm going up to Heatherton School,' which was just up around - it's still there. And so ... that finished Jack. Was your uncle your father's brother? Yes, well, he had the property over the road from our former home, see, so when we shifted, he got lonely and he came down one day and said to Dad, to my father, 'Can I come and live with you?' So he shifted in and lived with us for the rest of his life. So that was while you were running the show, too? Yes. Well. do you look back on those days with pleasure? Yes! Definitely. I think that I had a happy - except because of my mother being ill, that was a terrible thing for my father and all of us. She was ill for so long. She spent most of her time in Shalimar, which was a private hospital in Cheltenham. To what extent would that have affected your interest in school? I liked school. I don't say that I was brilliant, but I liked school. What sort of discipline was applied to the girls at school? You're speaking now of Primary School? Well, the boys could be quite naughty. When I say naughty - they smoked, just quietly. So the nuns would be out whacking them and - but it

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was marvellous, because the school went up to the eighth grade you see, but we girls left in sixth grade and went to Kilbreda. If you hadn't been landed with your heavy domestic duties, what might you have done? Well .. there you are ... you've got me there. I don't know. What did some of the other girls do, who were your contemporaries? Well, I couldn't even tell you that. But see, another disadvantage was that we lived so far from a Station and there were no buses in those days. And so, it was really hard to get anywhere except by pony and jinker. Until, much later on, they bought a truck - a Reo truck - to take the vegetables into the Victoria Market. That's where they had to go. My father had to load up the lorry and he drove two horses - this was before the truck - and he'd have his tea, have a little sleeep till ten o'clock at night. Then he was called up at ten o'clock, had a bit of supper, and went off to the Victoria Market. So he left home at ten o'clock and got into the Victoria Market about five or six o'clock in the morning. Back again the next day about four o'clock. With a load of manure, sometimes. So ... it was a hard life. In the district, do you remember any bad things happening? Well, why do you want a sad thing? Just wondered how the community reacted in those circumstances. Well, I'll never forget one very hot morning - we had this friend - this lady, who used to play ... her name was Brownfield, you've heard of them? They had cows. Quite a few. But she didn't milk. Her husband milked. She looked after the children, of which there was a little boy, going to school, and a little baby, about eighteen months or something. And one morning, my father came into the house - this is in Ross Street - to call us - my sister and I. He looked across and he said, There ... there's a house on fire.' There was terrible smoke about. So, anyway, later in the day, one of our neighbours came rushing in to say, 'Oh, Mary, have you heard this terrible story. Brownfield's house has been burnt to the ground and Gladdie and her two children burnt to death.' It nearly killed us, you know. We used to look after the children when she went off to play tennis. The little boy was sent, with the pram, from their place in Centre Dandenong Road up Ross Street, and gave us the baby and we didn't mind minding the baby for her. So, you and your sister helped ... so far as you could. Yes. And so did everybody else. Yes, my neighbour over the road was called Mrs Mills - he was Bob. We loved Bob. And she was a Steiner. And she was a very efficient woman. Great neighbour, you know. Of course, she rushed off to see what she could do. There's nothing we could do, anyway! But we were all so desperately sad about it, you know. Apart from going to the Hall, with your father's sensible permission, what other things did you do if you ever had any spare time? We played tennis. Next door! Competition tennis. Yes, we used to play with the Stooke boys - they lived over the road from us - they were very good. We played tennis. We played competitive tennis. Were you any good? Well ... they say I was pretty good. I had this MASSIVE serve, which was very good! The Church would have been of very real significance to you in those days?

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Yes. We attended the Church in Mentone. We went in the jinker with my uncle and my father. Apart from the religious aspect of the Church, did it have a social element to it, too? After Mass it was real fun. There'd be a big circle of us all chatting away. And my brother who was a bit of a wit would say 'Long live the Kellys!' - that was our name. It was a great opportunity to meet with people. To what extent had industry developed in the general area? Well, there wasn't much. You know ... there was Gartsides, well they had the factory - they employed a lot of people. They started up in 1916. We knew lots of people who worked there. Where did the water come from? Laid on it was ... Reticulated. So you weren't as dependent as if you had been waiting for the rain ... No - definitely - because they had to have the big sprinklers, you know, huge sprinklers ... bigger than this room, because when you grew lettuce and all that, you know, you had to have the water. Waste disposal? That's a sadness. We don't say much about that. In the early days, you know, when I ... see, I was married at St Pat's, Mentone, and came into this street as a bride. At Number 1. And see, I'm still here all this time later, still in the same street. And I love it, because I don't drive and I'm a good walker. And I can go off and shop at Southland or down the street . And we've got our own Church now and I go with my oldest - I had six children , the oldest was a girl, then three boys then two more girls - three of each - they were all born in Cheltenham, but by that time they were born in hospitals. Which wasn't so when you were a tiny little girl ... No. Because, how shall I put it - the doctor came and the mother had the baby at home with a nurse that stayed for the fortnight - I forget what they called them - midwife, that's it. That was her job and the doctor came along, too. How did he get there? Horse and jinker. In the early days. In your early days, did you take much interest in politics? No, but my Father and Uncle Frank, who came to live with us were dyed in the wool Labor men. My old uncle would go off to all their parties and meetings and he even learnt to recite and all that so as when they had these little parties, he could recite. It was pretty important to them. They were Labor - one-eyed Labor. I don't know whether that was good or bad. So there would have been a good bit of chatter ... Absolutely. And it went down to my older brother, too. What about the younger chap?

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Oh, no. He went off to the Heatherton School because he got sick of going all the way down to St. Pat's and he came top of the school at Heatherton. What did he do later on? Oh, there's a long story to that. There was a near neighbour of ours who had a pig farm. Herman Smith, his name was. Of German descent. So, he died. And, how shall I put it? A man took over, but he was going to do Mrs Smith down, so , because she was on her own and her husband had died he was going to make a bargain that was in his favour. She was a very strong woman. So she came down to our place where my brother was - Jack the youngest one - he was only about seventeen - and asked him if he would come and take over the pigs. Which he did. He eventually married her daughter. And he was in charge of the pigs. Very clever, he was. They've still got the name - you must see trucks all about that says Kelly & Smith - well that was my brother started that. Your father and your older brother would have been actively concerned with things like conscription ... Absolutely. I heard my Uncle Frank say these wars are started by three old men sitting in high chairs in parliament - somewhere in London - making up these wars, so as they can make a fortune. Made up by rich, rich men to get richer. Did they ever talk about conscription? Yes. They thought that that was very wrong;. Apart from the formal meetings with the Labor Party did they have friends around with whom they had discussions? Oh, yes. He was into it up to his neck. Not my Dad so much, because Dad had a family and that and had us to look after and no wife, then, mostly, and so Uncle Frank was a bachelor and he was free to go off to his ... What's your feeling about the spirit of those days? Did people help one another? Yes. Definitely. It's a bit missing these days. Let me ask you what your best memory is, from those days ... I don't know ... a lot of it's sad, you know ... because our Mother was so, so ill ... and I still remember when she died. I went into the screaming horrors at the cemetery. But then you picked up the burden. Yes. Yes. I had to. Somebody had to help Dad. And he was a dear, good Dad. You know. How old were you, about, when you first met the man who was to be your husband? Oh, well, eighteen or nineteen. Met him at a dance. I had several boys before that, of course. Then I met him. And, my father was a bit worried, because he wasn't a Catholic. You know that bit, don't you? And Cheltenham was very bad for that, you know they've got a bout half a dozen or more non-Catholic Churches but, at that time, there was no Catholic Church. But the then Father, at Mentone, told us that the Catholics had land at Cheltenham - very valuable land - just on the corner of Centre Dandenong Road ... acres - and so the Priest there said, look, you people who live in Cheltenham can just go up to Cheltenham, you've got the land, and you can just go up there and build yourselves a Church. I was crooked on that. I thought that was a cheek, all the years that we'd ... we'd lived at Mentone all our life, baptised there, very involved. Anyway, we came up here - and then came in the community spirit, because we all, especially the Catholics - got to work and we had to have house

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parties and things to build ourselves a Church. I had house parties. And we built ourself the first lovely Church and we were very proud, you know ... And so you should have been. But, going back just a minute - your Father was a bit concerned about this chap who wasn't a Catholic ... Oh, yes. That's exactly right. And the relations that used to come out from Town and use us up said, 'If Mary's Mother was alive, she would never have been allowed to marry this chap.' But Dad said, 'I trust Mary.' Anyway, we lived very happily. Brought up six kids. He wasn't a Catholic but he'd often come along with us. He left me with it and we brought the whole damn lot up Catholics, so ... and sent them to Catholic schools and I know that his Mother and Father probably didn't want him to marry a Catholic ... Was there strong animosity between Catholics and non-Catholics in those days? Yes ... very bad then. Now, we've got this wonderful Priest - Father Martin - and he invites the Church of England and that all to come over and have ... and makes us go over there and ... In those days it was bigotry. Shocking bigotry. So there are some of the good things, but there's no doubt that your Mother's death was a terrible tragedy. Yes. It would have probably altered my life. Of course. In the first place, she wouldn't have let me marry a non-Catholic. She was a very strong member of the Church. You know, the Priests used to come and visit her. And they were always going up to visit her when she was dying, of course. And they'd often - well we were at school when she was so ill and they'd often say to us, 'We're going up to visit your Mother, would you like a ride?' In the horse and jinker. She died of Bright's Disease. They can cure it now. How do you compare those days with today's conditions? I look back on those days and figure that I had - there was the sorrow of my Mother - but we had a lovely childhood. And a lovely, when I was getting up to twenty, now what do you call that? maturity you could call it. We had a lovely childhood - we played tennis, followed the football - I look back and say we had a very happy time - except for the terrible thing of our Mother. But then, if she had ... I had a good marriage, you see, he's been dead for twenty years. But he never interfered religiously or otherwise. He was a wise man. He put his family first. Just like you!

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INTERVIEW with PHILLIP COFFEY

October 17, 2000 (NOTE: Mr Coffey's recollection of some events in the past has diminished to some extent. In 1987 he wrote and published his Reminiscences and added a further page in 1991. Extracts from these writings supplement the matters discussed at interview. They are printed in italics.) You've lived hereabouts all your life ... Oh yes. I was born in 1919. And I've lived in Mentone all my life. I was actually born in Cheltenham because I believe that, in those days, there weren't too many hospitals in these parts. And, I've lived in only two houses. This being the second. The first I lived in until I was five years of age. Father and mother decided to move house from Naples Road to Como Parade East. 'Received payment in full by cheque 1/3/24 Jim MacLeod.' These words were a prerequisite to our move from Naples Road. They appear at the foot of an account headed 'Statement for a timber residence Como Parade Mentone for A.J.Coffey Esq. R.M.King, Architect, Jim MacLeod Builder.' The contract price was £1175. The weatherboard house lacked amenities common today. The area was unsewered until the late 40's. The toilet was a wooden separate outhouse some 50/60 feet from the rear of the house.. This unlined structure was not connected to water or electricity. Candles were the means of illumination. Newspapers and not toilet rolls were used. Open pans were replaced once weekly by a nightman using a horse drawn vehicle to deliver and replace tar lined cans. My paternal grandfather, James Coffey, was an employee in the Victorian Railways and he was transferred to Mentone as the Railway Stationmaster. That would have been in about 1892, I think. And we have been here ever since. He seemed to be well respected. He retired in 1902, from Mentone, when aged 60 and continued to live here until his death at age 86 in 1928. Did you know your paternal grandfather well? Oh yes. I quite liked Grandfather Coffey. I think he had four sons and three daughters. He was not an educated man but he wrote, in his seventieth year, he wrote his reminiscences. So we got some idea of the style of his life. The railway stationmaster was an important figure in the community, wasn't he? Probably more so than it is now. Keep in mind that he was not an educated man. In fact, he and his three brothers, I'm not ashamed to say, were wards of the State. Simply because their father, who had come out here from Ireland to Melbourne with his wife (both of whom were 21 at the time, I think) and they landed in Melbourne in 1841. He could read and write and his wife, I think, she could do one but not the other. They had four boys. My grandfather was the eldest of those four boys. There was some suggestion that the father wasn't on good terms with his wife. So he decided that he would go up to the goldfields. He

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did so and disappeared. His wife became ill and died. My grandfather would have been about ten. Did you know your maternal grandfather? Yes. Ambrose Chenney was a Parcels Goods Clerk in the Victorian Railways at Spencer Street, Melbourne and lived in Teague Street, Mentone. 'Grandpa' Chenney carried himself with upright carriage, and possessed a distinguished appearance, constantly smoking a pipe with almost loving enthusiasm. He enjoyed all sports and participated as a young man, winning races as a bike rider of penny-farthing machines. In later years he was Club Champion of Mentone Bowling Club. He enjoyed a modest flutter on horse races, which 'Nana' Chenney regarded with disfavour. And your own parents? My father, born in 1882, was a grandson of that man who disappeared on the goldfields. He was, by comparison, educated - going to school at the Mentone State School doing his last couple of years up at Cheltenham State School. So, he got a job in the E.S.& A. Bank at Cheltenham. After some years he left the Scottie Bank and got a job in the Royal Bank of Australia - which was subsequently taken over by the Scottie Bank. He was a man of good character but not of good health. I have referred to him in my Reminiscences as a dictatorial benefactor. He had three children. Didn't have much money. He had a good sense of humour. His whole career was in banking. He finished up as an Inspector. He died in this house in 1947. My Mother was a nice lady and she had a very good singing voice. Father was very proud of her. When she left school she went to work at Hicks Atkinsons in town for some extraordinary amount of money - like 2/6 a week or something like that. Unfortunately, she died at the age of 45. What was your home life like when you were young? The floor coverings were mainly linoleum, although our sitting room and dining room contained carpet squares. Our bedding was mattressed with horsehair. From the hard surfaces we arose to partake of morning cold showers. In winter, our feet were frequently pink with cold. Dark brown holland blinds provided privacy in some but not all rooms. 'Spring Cleaning' was then a hallmark of good housekeeping. That expression has now almost disappeared from our vocabulary. In the days of our grandparents it was a necessary and sensible custom. Lace curtains could be washed, dried, ironed and aired. Carpet squares were lifted and 'beaten' on the external wire clotheslines which hung between posts. It is difficult to appreciate the disabilities under which women folk operated their households prior to the introduction of refrigerators and access to supermarkets. Combined with 'spring cleaning' was the practice of 'putting down' namely the preservation of eggs in kerosene tins. An extensive display of a variety of bottled jams was a visible sign of competence and 'good housekeeping'. Where did you and your brother and sister go to school? My brother and I went to Mentone State School and then each of us went to Mordialloc-Chelsea High School. I left when I was 15 years and 8 months. My sister went to Mentone Grammar School and has lived in Mentone all her life - in fact, she lives here with us. You have told me that your family has been associated with St Augustine's Anglican Church, Mentone, for something of the order of 100 years ... Yes. Over one hundred years.

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How important has that been? In my early days there wasn't the social life then as there is now. Social activities tended to centre round the Church. You'd put candle wax on the wooden floor of the Sunday School hall to have a dance, you know. Then they had card drives. My memory seems to tell me that they had everything that could raise a quid, you know. Well, not a quid. There were great discussions as to whether to charge, say, a shilling or sixpence. At one stage, strangely enough, we had two picture theatres in Mentone. They showed pictures in the skating rinks - that was one of them. They built quite a fine theatre on the corner of Balcombe Road and the Highway - and it's still there. It was a brave move then because it was quite a long way from what they called The Village where most of the activity was. They obviously felt that Mentone would move over in that direction - and they were precisely right. But the social life of the Church was important because they had dances and they had fetes and concerts and Sunday School Picnics - sometimes over at Dandenong. Tell me something about the role of the clergy. In those days they didn't have motor cars. They may have had horses. But Father and Uncle George, as young men, used to go down, in a jinker, and take the Word of God down to Chelsea and Carrum and such parts, because there was only one Minister man - and Father and George (conscientious and decent young men, you know) went and conducted services even in somebody's garden or front parlour or a shed at the back. They were not officially lay-preachers, but with the permission of the local chap. Their role was that they would visit. The clergy had a role in the First World War when they advised the relatives of the death-in-action of a father or a son or a brother. So much so that they sort of became associated with messages of death. Later on, of course, that role was given to others. Do you recall a disastrous situation - in your childhood? You're straining my memory a bit here ... Did your parents talk to any extent about the First World War? Oh, yes. Well, my Father didn't go to the First World War. He was, I think, a conscientious objector. He didn't squib it. I'm not saying that in his defence. But, you see, I was born in 1919, the youngest of three children, so therefore, Father had a young wife - I think, ten or eleven years his junior - and, as I understand it, he felt that it was his duty to look after his wife and children. Did they ever express an opinion about the conscription issue? Not that I can remember. I do remember an emphasis on Anzac Day, Armistice Day, saluting the flag on Monday mornings for King and Country and all that sort of thing ... but these days that sort of stuff has gone out of fashion. I can well remember my Grandmother Chenney coming around with a posy of violets for Mrs Jackson, who lived nearby, and who lost two sons in the First World War. There was a lot in my memory of such events. When the community is small, it brings them together more. In my early days, here, this house was only one of two or three in Como Parade East and the land behind it through to Warrigal Road was full of ti-tree. Was there a spirit of mutual help in time of need? Not really. When my Father was ill there used to be people down here - they ran a laundry - Mrs Prince just walked in - made the bed! That sort of thing occurred. But, no, it wasn't to my way of thinking ... the bigger things get the less likelihood of that sort of thing happening. What was a good thing that happened to you in your first ten years or so?

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Well ... I remember the opening of Parliament House in Canberra in '27. Now another good thing that happened to me was that I had good parents. That sounds a bit sloppy, perhaps. But it is so. That would be one of the best things that happened to me. How significant was politics in your family? Now that's a strange thing. I am a Protestant and in my life there's been - I've been a Church-goer all my life. I've known a lot of people who have had a strong antagonism towards Roman Catholics. I've never had that. The antipathy used to be quite pronounced. But, strangely enough, I never felt that. Don't ask me why - I'm not ashamed to say so - I have been a Liberal voter all my life. It may have been because my Father suggested that perhaps that was a a better line of thought. But it was a decision I arrived at myself. But there wasn't a great deal of discussion about such matters in my family when I was young. My Father spent considerable time in telling us what we shouldn't do - in lots of ways I think his views were too forthright. Things were either black or white. I don't see things that way. Did you enjoy the beach at Mentone? Neck to knee swimming costumes were mandatory for women, and were also worn by men. Beach inspectors patrolled Mentone Beach to enforce standards of attire then considered desirable. Rules of attire were not always observed. Shoulder straps were lowered. I have seen professional fishermen haul in nets at dusk. It was exciting to await the size of the catch. With trousers rolled up to their knees, the fisherman waded from the shore whilst straining with the lines. It could have been a re-enactment of Peter's life at Galilee. At the time, Mentone cliffs could be likened to 'The White Cliffs of Dover' and were as portrayed by the Heidelberg school of painters. In the late twenties, however, the progressive construction of the sea wall gradually replaced the natural cliffs. Whilst an erosion preventative, this concrete walkway, with sloped embankment, destroys the natural beauty of the foreshore.

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INTERVIEW with FLO DAY

November 23, 2000 Mrs Day - when you were born, in 1901, the Boer War had not yet ended ... Oh, yes. And I can just remember - he lived next door to us - and he came back with a white helmet on. But he must have stayed back there for a while, because I can remember him coming back. I'd only be - what would I have been - I was four when my Mother died, so I suppose I would have been about five. I can just remember that. His name was Satchell. I can remember when the First War started. I was thirteen and I was seventeen when it finished. I had brothers go to the First World War. Now, the man who was to be your husband volunteered for the First World War ... Yes, he went in as soon as he could, because he had a brother over there. I had a photo of him of his Mother saying goodbye to him on the wharf. He got as far as New Zealand and that was it. I didn't meet him until years after. Do you remember, in 1927, the opening of the new Parliament Houses in Canberra? No, I don't remember that. I do remember going to Canberra and getting lost! When you came to Cheltenham, in 1925, soon after you were married, did you have good neighbours? Oh, yes. But we had a great paddock next to us and we only had neighbours on one side really, and they were marvellous. Our oldest daughter, (she's 74 now) if anything happened she used to run in there . Everybody knew everybody. You walked down the street you knew everybody. Even until quite late - when I had to give up my home - the neighbours would come in any time to help. Aunty Mary was very good to me. They were all 'Aunties', you know. The kids all called them Aunty. Let me ask you about when you first went to school ... I went to school in Camperdown. It was just a primary school. There was no High School in those days. you always had the fifth and sixth and the third and fourth grades in separate rooms. The teachers were very good in my day. They were lovely old teachers. We used to love them. Schooldays were good days.

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In Cheltenham, were you actively involved in your church? No, not really. When we lived in Kingston Road I used to up to the little church in Heatherton. I was brought up Methodist. But I had more Catholic friends as neighbours than I had the others. They didn't have a Catholic Church in Cheltenham at first, either. They had to go to Mentone. Until Our Lady's was built and then they went there. How did you get from place to place when you first came to Cheltenham - for shopping, say ? Oh, I just walked. It was about a couple of kilometres to Cheltenham from our place. We used to go further in the train. We didn't go much to the City. I worked in the City first, would you believe? Right in Swanston Street. That was the first job I had. When I came to Cheltenham I worked in cake shops, right up till I was sixty, I think. My husband was very bad with asthma. Did you and your husband take any interest in politics? No, Joe didn't. Well there wasn't much reason to know much about it. I remember Menzies and old Joe Lyons. I remember poor old Billie Hughes in the First World War, yes. I don't think my Dad was very interested, either. I really couldn't tell you who he voted for. When you went to Cheltenham you were recently married. You were setting up a home. Were there concerts? Were there socials? There were concerts. We used to go dancing - old time dancing. I liked the Gypsy Tap and we used to go from one end of the hall to the other. We used to have great times. Was your husband interested in sport? Was he a football fan/ No, it was me that was a football fan. Before I was married I used to follow Richmond and then I followed St Kilda. Joe was a great bowler. He was a member of Cheltenham. Do you remember the Le Page family? Oh, yes, yes. They are a lovely family. The Mother was a lovely woman. She was absolutely lovely. They had large land holdings and it was a pity when they were sold. You husband's father suffered an injury and your husband moved to Cheltenham to take over the running of the market garden. Is that right? Yes, Joe's Mum and Dad bought this place and they ran the pig farm. and Joe's brother managed it for a good while because Joe's Father damaged his heart while lifting a whole side of pork - or something like that. It wasn't a market garden until after the pigs got swine fever or something like that. Then it was vegies. He used to go into market. It was hard work. Where we used to drive down to pick the vegies up that's Golfview Road now and there's houses both sides. There were big families in those times, weren't there? Everybody seemed to be related to lots of others. There are quite a few of us too. A few Days about. Three families of us lived in Cheltenham. In your own family, who was the boss? The boss? Oh, no, we got on alright. In fact, if I ever yelled at the kids, Joe would be out the back door and down. He used to love his plants. He was really the boss of the house, but he was good, as well. I was contented. Only for Joe's sickness, we had a happy time. It wasn't too good then.

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INTERVIEW with MAY KEELEY

September 14, 2000 Miss Keeley, we're talking about the period 1901 to 1927 and, in particular, in this area. I wonder if you can help me with the kind of schooling that kids had - in that era and, perhaps, the sort of discipline that was common to that time. Yes, well I went to South Clayton State School, which is in the municipality and, every morning, we had observation. When we got to school we were asked what did we see on the way to school - it might have been a wild flower that had come into bloom, or a mushroom that had come up or had we seen a snake or something like that. And - the teachers were strict, that's for sure. In what way? Well, if you talked in school you got fifty lines! Corporal punishment? Yes, the boys got the strap, the girls didn't. Yes, and we didn't have any heating as much in the classrooms - not like they have today. There was a fireplace built across the corner of the room and the teacher used to stand in front of it so the kids didn't get any heat. And, of course, we had homework and sport ... we used to go out on 'nature walks' because Clayton was all bush down that way then. We'd go down Clayton Road and then down Fraser Road, or maybe go down as far as Ryan's Road and come back up - is it Dunlop Road that runs through there to Fraser Road and observe what wildflowers were in bloom 0r what birds were around and that sort of thing and when all the wildflowers were out (those days you were allowed to pick them, not like today, and you're not supposed to touch them) and there were lots of Spider Orchids and Greenhood Orchids and those little orchids that grow close to the ground - I'm not well into the orchid business - but there were lots of different varieties of orchids around ... Were they discussed in schools? Yes, we took them back and we would talk about them and have to draw them and so forth and colour them in sometimes. And then I can remember geography lessons - there was none of this trace from a map you buy in Coles or somewhere or other ... you had to do it by hand. What you did - you drew inch squares (I don't know what that is in metric measurements, I haven't a clue. And you put it into those sections like the Headmaster had done on the board or the teacher or whoever - I mean there usually only two teachers in a school, the Headmaster and the lady teacher for the younger classes.

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In two rooms? Yes, two rooms. So you had first, second , third and fourth in one and fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth in the other? That's right. Did you feel that was a good thing? Did it help you? Did it help kids? Well, I I think so ... well, I suppose it was the way it went and we were used to it. I mean, when I went to South Clayton, I suppose there would have been seventy to eighty children who's come as far away as Heatherton - who used to walk all the way to school and ... I walked across the paddocks to school; kids came from up Clayton down there and the Headmaster and the teachers used to get off the half-past-eight train at Clayton and walk all the way down and sometimes there was water all the way across the road down there at what they used to call Dead Man's Gully near the shops that are down there in Clayton Road ... What about sport? Oh yes - oh yes - we played rounders and we played basketball and the boys played cricket. They had a concrete pitch those days and, you know, it was very sandy in South Clayton and the sand wore down and the pitch would be up about three inches above the ground . A bit dangerous, really ... Competition with other schools? Yes, there was Heatherton, Clarinda, South Clayton, North Clayton and Notting Hill schools in the competition and, once a year, we used to have the sports up at the Clayton Cricket Ground So, there would be running ... Yes, running and tunnel ball and ... what do you call it ... criss-cross ball - that's not the right name for it, but it's something like that. We used to play inter-school basketball and rounders and the boys used to play cricket against the other schools. When the kids got through that level of schooling, what were their expectations? Well, I only went as far as sixth grade. At that time they were sort of phasing out the seventh and eighth and I went to East Oakleigh Secondary School for two years and then two years at MacRobertson High, where I did the commercial course. Was that the sort of future that the kids were able to look forward to from those schools? Oh well, you always get a certain amount who go into salesgirls or salesmen or something like that. There wasn't the variety of jobs around those days as there is today. I wanted to be a dressmaker and I wasn't allowed to go to work in a factory so I had to go to an office, so ... I did all right, I had quite a good career ... So you'd say then that the grounding that the kids got at the schools you attended - in common with the other schools in the district - was pretty sound?

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Yes, it was. Some of them went to Dandenong High School There was only eight High Schools in Melbourne those days. And, of course, there was Clarinda School to. That, of course has been going for over a hundred years now. They put a book out on the School. You'd have it down there because I went to the opening - or the official launching of the book and that sort of thing. The Mayor of Kingston was there. She was a woman at that stage. I can't just remember her name. In this period, are you aware of any disasters that impacted on the community? Except the Great World War, of course. Well, they had the pneumonic influenza, didn't they, that killed people, that was straight after the First World War, wasn't it? And, of course, there was always droughts with us and there were some local bushfires. from time to time. Were you a bit far from the sea to be troubled about incidents at sea - fishing and the like ? Oh, we were about five miles inland ... Now, from a social point of view, what role do you believe the Church had? I mean, all churches. Yes, well those days, they used to have their fetes and their dances and their concerts and - gosh, I remember, my sister being in a concert (I was only about five ) we walked all the way from down Main Road, near Whiteside Road up to Clayton Methodist Church . A repeat of All Saints concert was done up there and we had to walk home again in the dark - no street lights! And then there was the fetes ... and people used to run garden parties. I was brought up on fetes and garden parties - I can't stand them now! You're saying that they were pretty important social events. Yes ... and the dances. And picnics of course. They all had their picnics once a year the churches - down to Aspendale or Mordialloc or Edithvale. And, what's more, they went on the trucks, and the kids used to sit on the side and the kids would sit and dangle their legs over the edge ... How do you see the role of the clergy in those days? In being helpful or counselling? Better than what it is today. Are you thinking about the counsellors and the guidance people who are available today attempting the role that the clergy then had? They wouldn't have a clue. (I shouldn't say this, should I?) You're saying, I think, that the role of the church was both social and socially effective? I think that the role of the church today has deteriorated compared to what it used to be. Can you think of a reason? Oh, they've got more money-minded, for one reason - and I don't think the clergy are as well educated as they used to be. So, they were revered - the reverend gentlemen? Yes, you looked up to them.

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The general social atmosphere owed something to the schools - school committees, perhaps? Yes - the parents sort of always helped there. And we used to have concerts down at South Clayton by kerosene light - there was no electricity down there those days. Unmade roads ... and everything else, and people walked across paddocks and that in the dark they carried hurricane lights. Torches weren't even in then I don't think. Did you feel in anyway disadvantaged? No. That was the life ... the good life. People walked and that, they didn't have cars and all this stuff we're supposed to have today. We've got the lot today, haven't we? Oh, so they say. The role that women had ... when I say that, what does that bring to mind? Well, they had the Red Cross - a lot of women belonged to the Red Cross - they had a branch in Clayton and, during the 1914-18 War they had the Clayton-Clarinda- comforts fund for the servicemen - some big long name like that. They worked for them. Did knitting and that sort of thing. And, of course, they always had the Ladies' Guilds at the churches. Every church had its Ladies' Guild they were the one responsible for running the fetes and sometimes the dances, concerts. They were vital elements in the social structure? In the home? What did Mother have to do in the home? Was she in charge, or was she ... Oh, I don't know. Well it depended on the type of woman, wouldn't it? I know some of them the blokes wouldn't have been game to look sideways. Did they have budgets? Well, I don't really know about that ... See, I grew up on a market garden. Life was always a bit different there, because you always had your own vegetables. My father used to bring the groceries home from Ratcliffe's in Prahran. And they bought meat up the street at Smiths the butcher. There weren’t all the ready-made things around in those days that there is today. In whose name would the house be? The property was in my father's name. I think it was mostly in the men's name those days. So - what about voting? Who was able to vote? Oh, well the women – 1927, no - 29 ... voting came in for women ... Prior to that? Oh, it was the men. They had to own so much land, didn't they before they could vote. Both for the Council and for State and Federal. When it came to problems, some terrible problem that affected a growing boy or girl, who could a child turn to? Well, I think Father dealt with the boys and Mother with the girls. I think that's the way it went those days.

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Was there family discussion round the kitchen table, as it were? When the girls were getting to a marriageable age, how were the decisions made? Oh well, from what I can see and what I've read, they grabbed one of the local boys or girls or whatever - they didn't go very far to find a husband or a wife. Do you think there might have been a family influence? I think so, yes. To what extent do you think the ladies of the house took an interest in Government - in politics? I don't think they took any interest those days. Why would you say that was? Oh, well I think that was because they had other things to think about. I mean, they were cooking with one- fired stoves and washing with coppers and troughs and that sort of thing. There was too much to do at home to start worrying about politics. Do think this might have arisen from a sort of a sense of isolation - small community? I think so, because things came slowly those days, didn't they? I mean it might have happened three or four days before we got to know about it . I wonder to what extent the First World War had an impact on this community. There certainly were young men who went - and young men who were killed. Yes. Well it would make a shortage of workers - for those who worked at home it would make a shortage of labour, wouldn't it? I mean there would be more to be done by the ones who were left there. I was thinking about this the other night. I don't know of many young fellows who went to the First World War - Dave Morgan was one - from down South Clayton, but, as for the others, I don't think there was - I was sort of wondering where I could look for a list. The RSL down Oakleigh don't have it - they have them all sort of on a notice board - I'll just have to ... well, there's not too many of those papers of that era around. They were put on to bad paper and the way they were stored made them deteriorate and they're not available at the State Library. Leisure time, if any? You mentioned the socials and concerts and the like . What did leisure time mean? Ah, well, I think there wasn't too much of it. My Father and brothers - they used to play tennis and cricket. My Mother's spare time, well, by the time she'd mended clothes, done the ironing with flat irons, there wasn't too much left. You just felt like flopping and sitting, because there was no radio those days, either. People amused themselves having - singing old-fashioned songs around the piano, didn't they? So, would you say that it was, to some extent, family focussed? I think so, yes. Water? Oh, well there was no water except for tanks around the place. It was tanks. And, of course, although you had strainers in them on the top and every thing, some how or other birds got in - and sometimes an odd frog. Who knows how they got in, because the strainer fitted in the top and there was just the little holes for the water to go through. You had to be very

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careful during the Summertime with water because - well, if there was a drought. You could buy water up at the corner of Clayton and Centre Roads at the stand pipe ... How much? It was ten shillings to fill a great big tank - would it be 500 gallons? I think it was. Waste disposal? Oh well ... the people used to bury it in their back yards - they were all big properties and that's what they did. Medical services? Oh, the nearest doctor was down at Oakleigh - you know, you got better sometimes the best way you could. What if he had to come to the house, how did he come. He came by car. Look, I've known, when I lived in Main Road, the road was so bad it was full of potholes big enough to take a car so the doctor used to drive as far as he could and walk the rest. What did he do before there were cars? Rode a horse. 1901, 2, 3, 4 ... Rode a horse. No phones? No, no. Nearest phone was half a mile away. If you wanted to ring up you walked round to the Reynolds's probably. In this district, when do you think the industrial element developed - apart from the agricultural and market gardening? Well, the first factory in Clayton was last century - about 1860 - when Mr Zorn had his sauce factory down there and then the one the other side of the railway line Mr Frost had his wireworks down there for some years. He started round about 1914, something like that and had wire works. So he was one off, was he? Yes, he was. So it was after this time that there was any significant... Yes ... Mr Zorn was there of course. But it was not until after the Second World War that Clayton went ahead and and got factories around, down everywhere. Pubs? None. Only the Notting Hill. Half-way-house, they called it. Boarding houses? None.

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No need? No. Some people took in boarders - railway porters were an instance. Simonsons were some people in Centre Road who took in boarders, and they used to have the porters. Railway porters. Yes, when they ran the gates and closed ... checked the tickets and all that sort of thing ... Today, you can have communities where people don't really know their next door neighbours ... That's right. How would you assess the community spirit in the times we're talking about? Oh, very good. Yes ... For example ... Well, for example ... say my Mother got sick, the neighbour would come along and do some work, clean the house ... another one would come along and do some cooking I mean, us children - well I was anyway - (I was only about two-year-old in 1927) and, you'd go and see the people and help them as much as you could. Well, what was happening then would have been a flow on from earlier times ... but was it confined to relatives? No ... no. We had a woman round our way - you know, she knew all the gossip and everything - and all like that. She'd make mountains out of molehills and so forth but she would be the first there to help you if you were sick ... Would you say she was characteristic of people generally? Well, as for helping she was characteristic, but she'd only be one-off the way she used to talk! Were there any notable figures of those days whose names were often mentioned? I suppose there was, but I can't think of anybody at the moment. I suppose the Councillors always stood out. Were the Councillors necessarily wealthy men? No ... They were actually representative ... Representative, yes. You had to own so much land those days, though to be a Councillor, didn't you? Yes, but land holding at that time was fairly general, I understand. Somebody told me that, if a young fellow were contemplating marriage, he'd be likely to put down a deposit on a block ... Yes ... sometimes there was a few small blocks around. Sharp and Taylors had the place next door - it was all sub-divided - in 1919 after the First World War - but they couldn't sell the blocks of land. They might have sold one or two. And they all had trees planted along the streets and so forth but they turned it back into cow paddocks, because it wouldn't sell. It wasn't until after the Second World War that that part was sold - and they used the original

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plans. If there was a small block around yes some of them would buy it - some of them rented houses. There weren't too many rented ones around. I'm thinking of the one down the end of Main Road, by the railway line. It was a real Colonial house. They're going back to building that style today. Returned verandahs, you know ... It had been knocked around over the years but it was a nice plan of a house. Banks? Oh ... old Mr McKenzie had a couple of agencies for Banks - but you wouldn't bank your money there! Solicitors? No .. the nearest of those were in Oakleigh. How did people regard a visit to the City? Ooh ... the highlight of the year! And they'd go by what means? Train ... one and sevenpence ha'penny, second return. When you went to the Station those days, they would have the wood chopped and put in the Waiting Room. The Porter had to chop the wood and they'd have a nice fire going for you in the Winter time and you'd spend the hour between trains - if you missed the train - one hour to wait - and you'd sit by the fire. Now, your parents, as you mentioned before, were resident here in the market gardening field. What about your Grandparents? Well, my Father's father, he was a railway man. He had his right arm chopped off above the elbow because, when he picked the thing that goes between section where there's only one line. A lot of them got their arms cut off those days through doing that. I never knew him, of course, because he died in 1881. And my Grandmother died in 1908 so I was well out of the picture, wasn't I? My Mother's mother died when she was born and her Father died when she was fourteen. She was the only child. He was a butcher. The sizes of families? Much bigger. Where were the children born? Most were born at home ... had a mid-wife. The mid-wife was a neighbour? I think it was somebody generally known as a mid-wife. So she hadn't necessarily been to four courses at University ... ? No, she relied on practical experience. And the survival rate? Oh, I think it was fairly high. I don't know of anybody - I know there's a lot of babies buried in Oakleigh Cemetery, but, no, I'd say it was pretty good. Because of the absence of smog, do you think?

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We used to have lots of thick fog in those days because it was open. I remember walking to the Station through the fog in those days, you could hardly see your hand in front of you. Not any longer, though, because the place is built up now. The only drainage, of course was well - if you ran a market garden it went out into the market garden or somewhere, but any houses that were on small blocks it was drained into the street and you had stagnant water in the drains along the side of the road and sometimes cars went into them - the few cars that were around. Look, you've been most helpful and I appreciate the free and easy way we've had this discussion . Thank you kindly.

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INTERVIEW with BETTY KUC

November 21, 2000 Where did your parents go to school? My parents, my two brothers and I went to school at Cheltenham. The lovely old school at Cheltenham. My parents would have been at school at about the beginning of the century. Your father was a well known photographer, wasn't he? Oh, yes. He had one of those very big cameras that sort of folded in. Last year, my daughter did a thing on Grandpa for Graham Whitehead. She did media studies and Grandpa was a sort of fascination for her. When my Father came back from the War my Father took over the shop from his father. I wasn't born until the '30s and I didn't ever have much discussion of the past with my parents. I was looked after by a Nanny because my Mother had to care for my brother Bill, who contracted polio. And I've got to the stage where I don't remember dates very well. What's your impression of the role that women folk had in those earlier days? I think they were very suppressed. and they didn't have the opportunities. And even when I wanted very much to be a nurse my father wouldn't allow me because he had worked at night as an orderly at the Caulfield hospital in the early days when he was developing the business. He saw what the nurses had to do and I don't think he wanted his only daughter to do that, so, of course, his word prevailed. Mother was in the business and she was very popular. People would come in and there were constant cups of tea made and everything. She was also a great gardener. She was one of a family of ten in a guest house and they'd do tables and that sort of work. So that's where her growing up period was spent - helping her parents in the guest house. What do you think was the importance of churches in those earlier days? Very important. It was part of your life. I'm sure it was in my grandparents' days. Grandma was a very social person. She was in the choir at the Church of Christ and she was in the tennis club up in Park Road. I think what she did was more or less characteristic of the times. I think it didn't matter how poor or how rich you were it was just a part of your life. What do you think the role of the clergy was? I think he had a significant part to play and I think he was involved in most of the social things that occurred. They were just a part of the community in those times.

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Did your parents have any other leisure interests than the church? The business took most of their time. My grandparents had a bit more time, particularly Grandma. For my parents, Friday night was almost like carnival night, with the shops open till nine. The rest of the time Dad was working in the garden. He was a mad gardener. We had a holiday house at McCrae which he worked on, too. We had a wonderful home life. My grandparents lived next door. In the early days there was no fence it was just two big gardens merging. Grandpa had been a real estate agent in the earlier days. The business Dad and Mum ran was a big hardware shop and gift shop and that sort of thing. Dad had his photography shop next door. Do you get the feeling that there was a spirit of mutual help in those early days? Oh, yes. You knew everybody in the street. My ninety-nine year old friend remembers lots of people there from the early days. One lady, called Mary, just gave up her shop a little while ago. My Mother died eleven years ago in her ninety-third year. She was very sharp. She was born before the turn of the century. She'd sit there and keep me on the track.

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INTERVIEW with JEAN MARTIN and her brother: LEN LePAGE

November 21,2000

Where did your Dad go to school? (L) Dad went to Moorabbin school, from up here at the corner of Bernard Street and Wilson Street. (J) Worthing Road. (L) At the time Worthing Road was a better school than Cheltenham. How did he get there? (J)(L) Walked. (L) He took the milk to the Butter Factory in Centre Dandenong Road then he came home and went to school. How long did he stay at school? (L) I don't know. He went to Mentone College after he finished at State School.. He never really said, did he? (J) No. Mentone College is where St Bede's College is now, just on the Beach Road. What would you say the expectations of the kids were when he was at college? (L) The ones that Dad was at College with - and they wanted him to go there - came from Junee up in New South Wales. They were farmers' sons. And they wanted Dad to go up there and buy land and be a farmer up there where they were. Also, the other ones were the Fitzgerald brothers, Dave and Jack Fitzgerald, they had the blood and bone mills over on Warrigal Road, and they were going into their father's blood and bone mills. In general, people were going into the family enterprise. What about the girls? (J)(L) I don't really know. He never talked about the girls at school.

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Speaking of girls, what would you say his views were about the role of women in his early days? (L) Well, mostly just housewives. (J) The woman's place was in the home. And bringing up the children. (L) You ask about what women did in that period. Mum was a tailoress and she went from Cheltenham to Melbourne every day before she was married. After she was married she never worked. But before she was married she travelled by steam train from Cheltenham to Melbourne. (J) Mother was born at Lyndhurst. They had a dairy farm down there. Then they shifted to Charman Road. To Yalupna. Which is about halfway between the Station and the Beach Road. Our parents were married in 1917. When women married in that era they simply didn't work. (L) Only the spinsters. The spinsters worked on for many, many years. Women of Mum's age - say the McKnight girls - they never married and they worked all their lives in the newsagents. In the shops in Cheltenham. Other than that, if the family had a shop - say a butcher's shop or a grocery - the wife worked in the shop. That was about the extent of it. (J) After they were married, Mum had five of us fairly quickly then the only break is between Len and I - there's five years between us. But she had five of us so she had a big job just looking after the five of us. And ... feeding the men in the paddocks - you know she used to make morning and afternoon tea and lunches for them. The men would come in for lunch at mid-day. And then cooking dinner at night ... it was a full-time job, just being a house-wife. Generally speaking, there were larger families at that time, too. (L) Oh yes. Well there were six of us in our family. Saltbush Bill - you've heard of him - had eleven children ... (L) Well, we can beat that one ... Joe Kelly - down Centre Dandenong Road, Mary Kelly had a baby every year for fourteen years - and they're still going, so ... (J) My husband was one of twelve. Eleven boys and one girl. A lot of them didn't know anything about birth control. And they just had one child after the other. My husband's family lived just out of Coleraine until they came to Melbourne. Apart from those involved in family business, what other occupations were there then? (L) Labourers, shops, road making. I don't have it with me but I have a list of the occupations of the children who were with me when I started school. I got the list at the 'Back-to-School' about five years ago. It also gave the occupation of the parent. Let me ask you about the Churches, generally. Their significance. In your Dad's day. (L) Well, most people attended Church. Their own Church, whatever it was. In Cheltenham we had the Church of Christ, the Methodist, the Presbyterian Church. (J) Church of England. (L) Yes - four Churches in Cheltenham, and each family went to their own Church of a Sunday. And there was Sunday School in the afternoon. (J) Before they were married, Mum played the organ or the piano in the Sunday School in the afternoon when Dad was at Sunday School. Then, when we all started to go to Sunday School we'd go to Kindergarten of course and we got through that. We'd go to Christian Endeavour at 10 o'clock, then on to Church at 11. Home for lunch. We'd go to Sunday School at 3 o'clock till 4 and the we'd go to Young Worshippers' League at 6.30 and Church at 7 o'clock. That was our Sunday routine. So you can just imagine Mum getting five of us - because Lenny was too small - five of us off to Church on a Sunday. Then we'd get home about 8.30 at night. (L) Well everything was centred around the community at the Churches, you know. (J) Everybody went to Church.

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(L) They went to Church and that's where they met all the other people and is was the social outing sort of thing. 'Cos there was nothing else! (J) The was nothing else down here, really. Did the clergy have a counselling role in those early days? (L) I would guess so. I don't know. (J) We never seemed to have any trouble ... (L) Things were so slow, you know, nothing was a rush. If you didn't get it done today there was all day tomorrow not touched. So they never hurried to get anything done so there wasn't the same sort of stress. What happened if there was trouble in your own family? (L) It was worked out in the family. (J) Well, our Dad was strict with us. We never had any problems as a family. We never fought ... (L) We'd get a hiding with the buggy whip ... (J) I got it once! I'll never forget it. The buggy whip. Yes. But Dad was very strict with us. Even today - I mean there's only five of us left but we don't have any fights. We get on very well together. And that was the way we were brought up. Sunday School picnics? (J)(L) Oh yes ... Sunday School picnics and Sunday Tea Meetings ... (J) The Tea Meetings were in late October ... round about Guy Fawkes night. (L) There was a Sunday School Tea Meeting. Grandma died on the 23rd of October 1931. We were at a Tea Meeting the night before she died because I can remember Mum and Dad coming and getting me from the Tea Meeting and taking me up to see her before she died. (J) Now, that was another thing - as well as raising six of us at home, Mum looked after our Grandmother, her mother-in-law, who was bedridden from 1927 until she died. So Mum had an invalid mother-in-law as well as the six of us. You see, they lived up on the corner there (LePage Park) corner of Wilson Street and Bernard Street and, after Grandfather died, Grandmother couldn't stay there on her own - she wasn't well - so they brought her home to us. (L) Families looked after one another, and also looked after a lot of other people. See, in the Depression years - I know that's after the 1927, but those years were a lead up - well, I remember Dad, because we were market gardeners, Dad kept numerous families in vegetables and, we always had a cow, so .. (J) He kept them in milk, too. We used to walk over there to beyond where Southland is now, with a billy of milk in McIvor Street, on the way to school. We used to give milk away to people. Well, we were kids, so we had to take the milk and things ... They didn't come and get it - we took it to them. (L) But every one helped one another in those days. They didn't just look after themselves. What leisure activities were there? (J) Dad used to go rifle shooting down at the Mentone Rifle Range ... (L) Dad was a very good rifle shot and he was in the ANA Lodge - they asked him (he used to belong to the OST) but they asked him to join the ANA because they had rifle competitions. And, over five weeks, I think it was, he had to travel from Cheltenham to Northcote, and shoot. Out of twenty five shots he got twenty four bulls-eyes. For that he won a brand new .22 calibre pea rifle with a brass plate on it which he left to my youngest son. I've got it at home. It's never been fired. And that was in 1903 or 5. And the targets that went with it! But they also had the Victorian Rangers, and they drilled in the Cheltenham Drill Hall, just after the Boer War. He was about 18 or 19. And they drilled up there every week and went on camps and so forth and they had a rifle range in what is now the Cheltenham Park. At the Cheltenham and Victoria Golf Club - there was a rifle range in there that Dad and Grandfather were members of and they used to shoot there quite often.

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(J) And then there was roller skating. Dad used to go roller skating. And bike riding. Dad was in a lot of things - but there wasn't that much when we were growing up. There was more when he was growing up. (L) Dad would go to Market with a horse and lorry. On his way home he'd throw on a load of manure, bring it home, then walk to Bentleigh for rifle shooting that night (this is a Saturday night), walk home from Bentleigh, put a hurricane lamp on the corner of the lorry and throw the load of manure off. Then that was the day! But ... they had a bike club and their races used to be from Cheltenham down the Nepean Highway to Mordialloc, round Beach Road and back up Charman Road to Cheltenham. I think it was five miles. And that was where they had their races every week. And then there was the bowls ... Grandfather was one of the foundation members of Cheltenham Bowling Club. He was already a member of Mentone. And when they decided to build one in Cheltenham he was a foundation member there. Now that would be about 1901 or something like that. (J) That was up in the park, wasn't it? Just by the Railway Station. That was the first Cheltenham Bowling Club. What do you think was the basis for these leadership qualities in your grandfather and your father? (L) Well, Dad always had a saying 'You pass this way but once. Any good that you can do, or any kindness you can show, do it now. You shall not pass this way again.' (J) Dad was an only child and so he had a lot of friends and he used to be in everything and I think that's why he ... He had a younger brother who died before Dad was born - and he was only a few months old, wasn't he? And I think that was why Dad was in everything. I was reading a letter - I was telling Len the other day - how my Grandmother wrote to him when he was up Hepburn Springs ... (L) 1910 that was ... (J) 'My darling boy ' ... you could tell he was an only child. "My darling boy. How I miss you. I have not got you to talk to.' Oh, it was a very sad letter, you know. He was an only child, but Grandma never seemed to hold him back, did she? (L) Some people from Cheltenham were going up to Daylesford or Hepburn Springs for a holiday - I think it was the Chipperfields - and they asked Dad to go with them. He could have been, at the time, recuperating from sun-stroke. (J) Well he'd been in hospital when she wrote to him ... (L) But, anyway, while he was up there, he cut himself a walking stick - which I've got at home. And he carved his initials. It was blackwood-wattle. And that was the 10th of the 1st, 1910. I looked it up before I came here today. But there is a bike that Dad used to use as a racing bike, which he bought in 1903. (J) See, we've never sold anything. We've kept all the mementos. We've got a nephew - the T model or the A - which came first? (L) The T model - Denis has got the T model. I've got the A model truck down in my shed. The T model our Grandfather bought in 1924. (J) We've kept everything. (L) I've got Grandfather's buggy - built by Pengelly and Hooker, I think - It was built for Lord Brassey - no it wasn't, it was the ADC to Lord Brassey, the Governor of Victoria. This was pre-1924, when Grandfather needed a buggy. And we've got that in the shed. You were talking about the Boer War. After that war there was a few - not a lot, but a few - young men from here, from Moorabbin, went to South Africa to make their fortune. Herb Daff, who lived over the road here, was one of them and the others were Brewers from Bentleigh, who were market gardeners, and Dad or Grandfather bought his horse-lorry at the time. And I've got that in the shed, too. He bought that at Zeb Brewer's sale, before he went to South Africa. Whether he made his fortune or not, no-one knows. Mr Daff came back. He was a body-builder. He built horse lorry and truck bodies and that sort of thing. What was the attitude of your father and your grandfather in regard to the First World War?

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(L) Well, I don't know - I wouldn't know what Grandfather thought about it - I wouldn't know what Dad thought about it. His best friend was killed in the First World War. Was there any mention of the Conscription issue? (J) We never heard it discussed. (L) I think the main thing for the vegetable growers - the market gardeners - was to produce food in those days. One thing I do remember about the First World War was that, the day Armistice was declared, Dad was carting his last load of onions, brown onions. We used to grow a very early brown onion. Much earlier than they grow them today. And he took his last load in on Armistice morning and while he was in Melbourne unloading them the Armistice was declared and everyone went silly, you know. And he always remarked about this that they were, I think, twenty pounds a ton on that last load he took and the next day, when they opened, the prices dropped to ten pounds a ton. And that would be horse and lorry into Flinders Street. Was there a strong political background in your family - strong Labor or strong Liberal? (L) Well there was the UAP, the UCP and the Labor Party in those days. Dad and Grandfather, I guess, always voted UAP - but Dad knew all the politicians personally. Probably the best politician we had here in this area was Charlie Gartside. He was in the Legislative Council. (J) Sir Thomas Bent was an old friend of Grandfather. He often talked about him. (L) They used to visit one another for Sunday night tea. Dad always told us a story about Sir Thomas Bent - or Tommy Bent as we always called him when we were kids - he went broke here and he went to Colac and grew onions and paid back a pound for every pound he owed and came back here again after he became the Premier of Victoria he got up in Parliament and he said, 'I grow cabbages and I grow them well.' And that was his claim to fame. Just one of the ordinary people, you know. Grandfather was working at - I think, I remember - at Brighton Grammar School as a gardener or something and Sir Thomas Bent was - they were about the same age - there wasn't much difference in their ages - and they became very firm friends. Of course, they served on the Council together in later years. Around 1901, that was about the time of the land boom in Victoria. I remember Dad saying, Bill Fairlam (that was old Bill Fairlam) he was the hardware store and estate agents, he lost a lot of money in that. He bought houses and properties and when it collapsed it did collapse. And at the same time (and Dad never ever told us this) but he happened to say one day, well it would be in the forties I suppose, he got a cheque one day from the ANZ Bank and I said to him 'What's the ANZ Bank paying you money for?' We banked at the ANZ Bank - and still do. Well, it was the E.S.&A. then. And he said, when they closed up or something in the land boom, Grandfather had money in there and he lost it. And over the years they repaid Dad all that money that Grandfather had in it. Grandfather used to play cards. At the bank with the bank manager, I think it was, and Dr Scantlebury and someone else - one night a week, up at the E.S.&A. Bank on the Highway, and Dad used to go with him and he used to make the coffee. That would have been 1900 or a bit later. I don't know who the doctors were that they went to in those days. (J) Where was Dr Scantlebury? (L) He was next to the school (J) Well, perhaps Grandfather went to Scantlebury. (L) And then there was a doctor up in that house Dad had in Chesterville Road, too. Up there lived Dod Mills, who used to crack a stock whip. Saltbush Bill?

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(L) Well, Dad tells a story about them coming home from Market - there might be half a dozen gardeners in their horse and lorries and they tied the horses all together and they'd all ride together in the front lorry. .And, you know where the railway bridge crosses the Nepean Highway at Gardenvale? Well, on the right hand side as you're going in over there where the car yards and that and the houses and everything are, there was a Chinese market garden. And they were coming home from Market one day - of course they always used to come home this way because they all lived out this way - and there was a fellow been in to see these Chinamen and they took to him with their chop hoes - they were chop hoeing - and Dod Mills got his whip out and beat them off with it. (J) We're hoarders. We've never destroyed anything. (L) My two sons don't save anything but my daughter does. She saves everything. And my eldest grandson he probably is more interested in old things than we were as kids. (J) This is a photo of my grandmother - my Mother gave it to me - and she's wearing a little bag. The chain went round their neck and the bag clipped on to the belt of their frocks. Well ... I've got the purse - there it is! It was about the only thing that was resurrected . (L) They used to have to go into Melbourne to have their photos taken. (J) That photo's on glass, too. There's the bag. That's the one in the photo. I suppose it's silver - the clip - I don't know. It's got a suede back so it wouldn't damage the frock. No sovereigns in it, though, I'm afraid. (L) I've got the letters, or references, that Grandma got from her employers when she left each place. She was a housekeeper, companion, or a maid or something like that. Grandma came out here from Ireland when she was twelve years old - on a sailing ship. Took six months to get here. To be with her sister. She came from County Clare and she worked as a parlour maid - that was it. Around the nobs in East Melbourne. And Grandfather, he worked for his father in the market garden, but as the other children started to grow up there wasn't enough work for them all. So, he was a very good horse handler - very good with horses - and he took a job as coachman to Bill Broad, the biggest bookmaker in Melbourne. He was born in 1851 and he was 18 or 20 at the time. About 1876 or so, when he and Grandma got married, they came back and bought the land up here on the corner where LePage Gardens is now, had a house erected on it of weatherboards, worked the ground, and then at night, by candlelight, they filled the walls with mud and then papered over it. And Dad used to say, when he was a boy, they took him down the paddock with them to work - and left him in the horse and dray to keep him safe. (J) There's the little cottage. (Shows photograph) That's really a painting of it. (L) Then, as Grandfather prospered, he bought more land and so forth. What age was your grandfather at the time of his death? (L) Seventy six, wasn't he, Jean? (J) Yes. (L) His Mother - we only found this out a little while ago - I suppose you've been told about the Beaumaris Cemetery - well, there was no cemetery in Cheltenham. There was a Beaumaris Cemetery and it was in the church grounds at the Methodist Church in Balcolme Road, and there were 150 persons - a tremendous amount of babies - buried there . Perry's Circus used to let their animals eat the grass on it. And the Church decided they were going to sell it for subdivision and Dad was in the Council at the time and he objected to it because it was sacred ground. He's made enquiries, because he was on the Cheltenham Cemetery Trust, so as far as we know, those 150 bodies are still under the houses down there. It was used between 1855 and 1865 - a ten year period. A lady who was looking for where her great-grandmother was buried did a tremendous amount of research and she actually got every birth and death certificate of those 150. And finally, she went to Doug Clark to put a plaque. They wanted to put the plaque in the footpath. Well, finally they did get a plaque in the footpath . Then it got to the Cheltenham Cemetery Trust and they decided they were going to have a plaque cast with every name on it and their ages. And it was going to go up into the cemetery in a bit of an obscure place. I happened to hear about it and I said to the chaps at the cemetery,' That's not the place to put it - it should be inside the front gate where people going past can see it. Well, it didn't go just where I wanted but it

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did go inside the front gate on the other side and they had an unveiling ceremony, when - two or three months ago. (J) That's where I met Graham Whitehead. (L) We've got three great uncles and a great-grandmother buried down there, so they took a little bit of notice of me when I tried to get that changed. (J) We've all stayed here - bar one sister, whose husband was very ill and she's gone to live in Murrumbeena - but the other five of us all stayed here. (L) I was born in the house next door to this one. And I lived in it for 51 years. (J) Well, we were all born next door. You didn't go to a hospital to be born. You were born at home. By the way, Dad also learnt elocution. I've got a program that he was in elocution competitions. Pompei, the boatbuilder from Mordialloc was also in it. (L) They picked four to go to Chirnside's house at Werribee - that's Werribee Park today - to give a recital. Dad was elocution. The others did other things. It was a big trip and they stayed the night and came home the next day. He was about 14 or 15 at the time. I guess it was from his days at College, because he learnt French and all that - not that he ever talked much about that. (J) I think he'd forgotten it by the time we all came along! (L) About 1900, Grandfather and half a dozen others started the Moorabbin Cooperative Society. It later became the Cheltenham Co-op. And I've got the original name plate of it. Because Grandfather's house (he was the first Treasurer) and his house was the first registered office. Grandfather became Chairman of Directors and after a few years Dad became Chairman of Directors and I finished up a Director when it was sold - about 95 years later. But, Dad was going to start work as the office boy at the Moorabbin Co-op. on the Highway here at Cheltenham. He was supposed to start on the Monday morning but he didn't go - he stopped in the paddock and was a market gardener all his life. (J) And it was strange, when they sold the co-op store up - they wound it up - and we all shared the money that Grandfather had passed on to Dad. The six of us got the shares. Well, I spent mine. I don't know what you spent yours on but I bought each of my children a grandfather clock and I had a gold plate put on them from their Great-Great-Grandfather, their Great-Grandfather and their Grandmother, which was me. And that was how I spent my money. I gave one to each of my grandchildren. (L) Well, I never had many of those, but I'd bought a lot, over the years and put them in the kids' names and they used them to pay off their houses. I think there was something special about those early days - the determination, the dynamism, the leadership ... (L) Those things were born of necessity, Frank, but they had to work and buy together to get things that they could afford. Like, when you think back - a pair of boots was two shillings and all this sort of thing And that's how the Creamery was started here in Cheltenham. Because, the market gardeners were growing a lot of cabbage and that and that sort of thing and they couldn't sell them. (J) That's ... I've got Colin's clock here because he never had room for it and I kept if for him ... (L) So, at this particular time, the gardeners got together and started a creamery - a butter factory. In the early part of the century. Yes. Started a butter factory. It would be just before the start of the century. Where did the big capital come from for this kind of enterprise? I don't know. Dad never said. I would think the gardeners put it in themselves. And they took their milk down there, weighed it, got the skim milk back after it was separated, brought it home and fed pigs. So they had the cows they were milking, the pigs they were feeding and the gardens. That was just a matter of necessity to make a living. Now their butter was supposed to be the best butter in Victoria. It was called 'Gilt Edge'. In that scrub that Dad drove through to the Creamery the Gartside brothers they had the whole lot pegged out for gold mines. Over in the sand over there. In where Herald Street and all that is now. And up in W.P.Fairlam's window he had some rocks showing what looked like gold, see,

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and of course they were using it to get people to come to Cheltenham. There was going to be gold there! (J) When was Grandmother chased by the aboriginal? (L) Oh, that was before the train came through. She wasn't chased. To get to Melbourne, they had to walk to Glenhuntly Road - the Elsternwick Hotel - and there they catch a horse cab into Melbourne. Grandma had to go to Melbourne one day and she walked and this black fella walked a few yards behind her all the . 'Me no hurt you, missy. Me no hurt you, Missy.' King Billy was the head of the aborigines down here at Wooriyallock and nearly opposite where the Royal Oak Hotel is there was a big gum tree grew in Tuck's paddock there and that was always known as King Billy's Tree. (J) Now, that was something I wanted to tell you, Frank. In the early days down at the Kingston Centre - The Melbourne Home for Men - and they used to go to the hotel during the day and drink as much as they could from their pension and then they'd come home. Well, they'd come into Mum - could she give them a sandwich and Mum used to make them a sandwich and right along the side of the road - halfway along there was ti-tree and then up Grandma's corner was all ti-tree and you'd find them there sleeping next morning, you know. They'd stay the night and there was one old fellow, old Joe, and old Joe used to come along repeatedly. Anyway, old Joe slept under our hedge this night and, of course, kids, we used to run round in the morning to see if he's dropped any pennies ... (L) Some of them used to drink metho ... (J) Oh, yes. (L) If they stayed too late at the hotel they couldn't get in at the Home. The gates were locked at six o'clock at night. So they'd sleep on the side of the road. They'd sleep for a few hours and then they'd come and want food. Eleven or twelve at night. We always had a big retriever dog in the house and he used to sleep by the fire, because Mum was often by herself because Dad wasn't home from the Market. They laid a train line from the Cheltenham siding to the home in about 1910 to build the Melbourne Home and Hospital for the Aged, as it was called. The train had two engines and they were named after the builder's daughters. By the way, this is a square mile and it's known as Two Acre Village. We had a fair bit of land. Len Allnut's father said that Tommy Bent was responsible for buying the 300 acres where the Home was built ... (L) Oh, that could be right. Dad never said anything to me about that. I think that might have been Len's grandfather. And his house is still standing. He was a market gardener and road contractor. Len's father was Johnny Allnut. (J) He was in the Council with Dad. He told us this at his testimonial up in the Moorabbin Town Hall and that was this: the only reason he went into Council was that he had a nomination form for someone to go into Council and he couldn't find anybody and it was nearly time for nominations so he signed it himself. And he was a very very fine Councillor. He was a great mate of Dad's and Len is a great mate of Frank's. (L) Frank, the Councillors in those days - and I'm going back to Grandfather's days - they were working for the good of the community. They got nothing for doing what they did. They got no recognition for it. They got more brickbats than bouquets. They never got paid for anything. Today they're getting $12,000 a year just to be a Councillor. All the old Councillors - and let's face it, in those days most of them were on the land - and they just did it for the community. One of Grandfather's co-councillors was one of the men who opened the irrigation at Mildura. Grandfather used to say that when he went to Mildura he'd bring back oranges and give all the Councillors an orange or two and Grandfather would bring them home. And yet the Chaffey Brothers are the ones that are always as introducing the irrigation up there but it was this fellow from here. Can't think of his name, but he was on the Council with Tommy Bent and my Grandfather.

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INTERVIEW with JOYCE PETERSON

September 5, 2000 Mrs Peterson, I want to do a trip down memory lane with you particularly about the period 1901 to 1927 and specially as it relates to the City of Kingston and the district. I'm happy to think that your Mother saw a great deal of that time. She was born? She was born in Cheltenham and I think she started life in Farm Road next to the Benevolent Asylum. My grandmother had a fourteen acre property there and that was sold and then Grannie came to live in Dingley and she had quite a big property in Dingley. And so, your Mother was born in what year? 1900. October the 5th, 1900. Did she ever talk of when she first went to school? Just little snatches. She went to Heatherton school. I forget the name of the head master but I can remember her saying that if you got things wrong you got a hit over the knuckles with the ruler. He was a very cruel man. Was it a big school, do you know? Well it was the only one around. I think Cheltenham was the other - the nearest one to Heatherton. Did she ever talk about what you might call the tools that were used at school - were there slates or books or .. Oh, they would be slates ... And a lot of rote memory perhaps - once one is one ... that kind of thing ? Well I can remember myself, that's how we learnt, so I would imagine that's how they learnt.. I wonder if they had the Monday morning ceremony of saluting the flag ... Oh, yes. I would say so, yes. Would your say she had a feeling of what effect her schooling had on her future life? Was it significant, or was it just a transitory thing?

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Well, she started life - working - and looking after her grandmother. The grandmother was an invalid. She was confined to bed for seven years with, I think it must have been arthritis. And that's how she started life. She just worked in the home. I don't think there was any idea - well, that you did anything else. You know, education just wasn't thought of, particularly for girls. Her expectations, perhaps, would simply have been to go to school, go to work in whatever situation there was, and be married. And raise a family and live happily ever after. Yes, that's right. Did she ever talk about any particular incident, except the rap over the knuckles, when she was at school? No, she didn't really. In fact I don't know where she lived at that time - whether she lived at Farm Road, although I think she must have lived here at Dingley. so it would be a fair walk. I wonder what the situation was for the boys at school, what their expectations were. What they saw as their first job. Was it likely to be related to the family activities ? I think the expectation was, when you left school at the age of about 12 and you went and worked on the farm or in the gardens. You think that was fairly common? I think that was so - particularly around here. Because there was no transport. No transport to get anywhere - they had to walk. You could call it parental influence but it was really commercial. Were there exceptions, do you know? Did your Mother ever refer to young Joe, who was smart at school, and went on to become ... No. No. No, she never ever mentioned that . So there were no opportunities. No. No opportunities, at all. Did she ever refer to any memorable, disastrous sort of event that occurred in that time - particularly her early years? There was, of course, the Great War and ... No, she never even mentioned the War. The big thing I think they mentioned - one of the big things - was the warships coming up the Bay , and I don't know what year that happened. Because we had a big pine tree up in Booker's place and I can remember my uncles saying they climbed up this - I think it might have been a Norfolk Pine - and they saw all the Warships coming up the Bay. The American Fleet, it was. So, things like strikes left the district pretty much alone? Oh, I don't know whether there were any newspapers or anything. She'd have been aware of the fact that after the First World War the influenza epidemic was absolutely disastrous the world over - it killed more people than the War. Yes ... but, I think, a little community like this ... I don' think it affected ... it remained untouched.

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What picture do you have of her leisure activities in her younger years? As a young child, well, I'm saying as a young child, say fourteen, she didn't mention anything. She - my uncle Jack Gartside used to be the Post Master. Armstrongs used to live up Tudor Road, and Uncle Jack used to - it was his job, that he gave to my Mother, and paid her thrupence a week, to do it. She used to have to walk up to Armstrongs, collect the mail, then take it down Boundary Road to Drysdales - I think it was Drysdales - and deliver it down there and she got for that the magnificent sum of thrupence. Did she, in fact, pick up skills in that time in knitting, weaving, sewing, crochet? Mum was a jack-of-all-trades. Well, I think you had to be. She was very good at sewing, very good at knitting, a good gardener ... These sort of skills would perhaps have been fairly common for girls of her age ... I think their main activity - the church seemed to be the focus for anything that was going on - there would be concerts there - I don't know whether there would be dancing - no, she didn't mention dancing - At 24 she took up tennis and I think that was after my father died. My Mother was quite a good tennis player. So the church, then ...It was very important ... It seems to have had a profound influence, apart from its religious side, as a centre for social activities, too ... Socials, they had - they used to put on plays and people would come from miles away. Now that would have been current then, in the particular period that we are concentrating on, but it continued for quite some time, I think. Oh yes, well at the church here we had - it sort of stopped and then it started again - then it had quite a good group in 1973 when the Church Hall was really built for the ones that were in the theatrical ... Do you have a picture of what the role of the clergy may have been, particularly in your Mother's day? Well, we didn't have a clergyman here - everything came from St Matthew's. The Minister would come up. Mary Attenborough built the church in 1873 and they used to, well what did they do. the Minister used to come up and they had a service once a Sunday, from what I can understand. When there was trouble, a breavement, whatever happened, the husband left - that's if husbands left in those days - was it to the clergyman that families would have recourse? I would think so. Yes. Plus - I wonder if you think so - it may have been that the family was a central element to an even greater extent than it is today. Oh, yes. Yes, definitely. So, if some tragedy struck, it may well have been contained in the family, the near relatives ... Well, the family was all close - around - So this was before the days of the counsellors, and the grief counsellors ... Oh yes, oh yes. Didn't have any of that. No. No.

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So there was a self reliance. Yes. And that characterised, I think we can say then, family life, reliance on the family situation in this community. Yes. Yes. And everybody was poor. There weren't people that stood out. Everybody was in the same boat. On the other hand, I was told the other day, that voting, say for the municipal elections, in the earlier days and in this period, was related largely to land ownership. So, you, with a fair bit of land could have three votes and and me, with my little block down the street would only have one vote. That's sort of continued hasn't it ? To some degree. But it didn't excite any feeling of jealousy apparently. No. It seems to me, in those days, the role of womenfolk was very strong in some areas and almost non existent in others. Very strong - let me see if you agree with me - very strong so far as the parental and grandparental influence on the family was concerned. Grandmother, Mother, and Grandaunt, if any. Perhaps the older women were a sort of port of last resort, after discussion round the kitchen table. Would you see that as being a fact or am I imagining this? Well I think , probably, the maiden aunt, she was the one who was taken from one place to the other to fill in the gap. She didn't have much say in anything but she was always there - to take over the role, say something happened to the mother, she took over the role. In addition to that, my own recollection is that there were - if there was a family of three girls and older parents - getting old, now, the parents - one of them was likely to remain single and care for the mother and father or the survivor That appeared to be taken for granted. An implied responsibility. Yes. I can remember my Aunt Hilda - the girls had to go out and get a job - it usually was housework, working as a maid or what have you, and they had to bring the money home to support the boys. Ha! What a good idea! No they were very - Aunt Hilda particularly - was very hostile about that. She said, we had to bring the money home and it was given over to the boys. See, well, it was all market gardening, mostly market gardens round here. No water. You were dependent on the weather, whether you had crops or you didn't have crops and that's how they started the factory - the Gartside factory. They couldn't make a living out of the gardens, so they decided well that they would can and they started making pickles. That was the beginning It's sometimes suggested that, because of this attitude to finance, like the girls bringing home their pay, that there were, what would be regarded now as, inequalities. In other words, the little wife had no money. The little wife did have no money. No. Nothing. She didn't own the property. No.

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That was overdue for change. She didn't have a penny piece to herself. Usually you had to account for what you spent the money on. It wouldn't do these days! So, the Gartside episode was an example of the development of industry in the district. But when the boys, perhaps, couldn't get work in the accepted fields, what other opportunities, if any, were there. What jobs were going? Well, only working for someone else in the market garden. Because they didn't have an education. I know, the uncle I lived with he left school at the age of 12 and there was nothing. Their father was an engineer and he used to work in Melbourne, and come home at the weekend. And there was great rejoicing when a train line went to Mordialloc. Well, he used to come home on that train and he would walk from Cheltenham up to here because they rented the Church house and there were five boys lived there. I think my uncle said they lived in the stable. And they made beds out of hessian bags and there were fleas everywhere and they used to go along with a candle ... and get rid of the fleas but ... Grandad Gartside used to have a sheep on his back. He would bring them the meat home and he would carry the sheep on his back and, of course, I believe he used to drink a bit, and he used to be a little bit under the weather and he'd have a bag of lollies and give the lollies to the kids on the way and I think there might have been a lot of flies 0n that meat by the time he got home. You know, and they used to have a big barrel and they used to put that in the barrel and they used to corn it. Salt it down. So those five boys would be looking to local employment in the market gardens. Yes. I know Uncle Gerald, he used to work for people called - I think it was Williamsons - I don't know where they had their gardens, but that's where he used to work. As the Gartside enterprise developed were those the boys who had some involvement in it as well? Yes, they were the ones that started it. And Charlie and Bill, I think started it and then the others all came in and they all worked together By the way, going back to the church for a time, I suppose there were church picnics. Oh, yes! I suppose there was Sunday School. Oh, you looked forward to that - Sunday School picnics. We also used to have a Violet Service, an Anniversary Service, there was a big Tea Meeting at the Anniversary Service. I can still remember those. Were you conscious or did your Mother ever refer to any antipathy among the various sects that were in existence in the Christian Church. For example, the Roman Catholics and the Protestants? Yes. But the Church over here, we had - it's an Anglican Church - but we had all sorts. It was a mixed church. We had Presbyterians, Methodists and so forth - but there was sort of no mixing with Roman Catholics and that continued right through until ... in the 30's. I suppose, the various congregations forgathering at the one, the Anglican, was a matter of convenience, because they had no alternative.

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Yes. I don't know whether some of the Catholics joined in with the concerts and plays, whether they joined in or not . Fortunately, that sort of attitude seems to have largely disappeared, hasn't it? Yes, it has. It was ridiculous, wasn't it Oh, we had so many Roman Catholics coming to our Church and so many others I think they outdid the Anglicans. You mentioned water, earlier. It's a very important consideration - the sources of water and the restrictions imposed. There was no water reticulation, I assume, at that time. Oh, no, no. You had tanks. Dams, perhaps? No dams. Just tanks. They just depended on the rain. So there was also the sewerage problem ... Oh well, you just dug a hole in the ground and that was it. Did you ever have the feeling that your Mother had some interest in politics? Local? State? Federal? No. My Uncle Charlie, he was a Councillor and then he became State Member for the Liberal Party and he was the Minister for Health, I think. I think in the Holloway Government. But your Mother's view was that that was rather for the men ... I don't think she ever thought about it. So she wouldn't have been interested in, say, free trade legislation and all that sort of stuff. Oh, no, no. She was a practical, Jack-of-all-trades, as you said. Yes. She was - well - not terribly well educated, a great reader. but girls weren't educated in those days. But, they had their place didn't they? Yes. Their place was in the kitchen. Now, this is an intangible sort of thing but one can sense a sort of community spirit in a place - especially if you've lived there a long time. Sometimes you can get a feeling of animosity that's deep seated and family feuds and that sort of thing But, how would you think your Mother would have described the community spirit that existed during her earlier days? Was it a comfortable scene? Was it exciting? I think it was comfortable. I don't think anything terribly exciting happened. There was one thing that happened that was very, very sad. Where airport is now there was a family of Brownfields. They had cows. Cuddy Brownfield was - he was milking - this morning and I don't know whether Gladdie, his wife, who was a friend of my Mum's, she looked back at the house and the house was on fire and there were two children in there. She rushed in

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there and the three of them were burnt to death. Bruce was one of the children and I used to play with Bruce. Gladdie was Mum's very good friend and there was the little girl, but I can't remember her name. That was a dreadful tragedy. That would have left a searing memory in your Mother's mind. Oh, profound effect. It really had a terrible effect on the whole place. Would you say that your Mother had a 'best' memory, that she sometimes referred to? Perhaps she remembered when Uncle Fred came back from the War, or she remembered this that or the other? Mum never talked about that much. You see I didn't live with my Mother. I wasn't brought up with my Mother. And the only time we really talked about things was when I got her to ... got my husband to interview her ... What else can you remember? Well, I can remember, we had dairy farms. Now there was a dairy farm where the airport used to be - Brownfields. There were Kingstons. And they lived ... Kingstons would be a little bit further on from where that new golf course is built - they had a dairy farm. And Whitfords were on a dairy farm right next door - here. And, every Tuesday, there used to be cows being driven to Dandenong Market - every Tuesday, there'd always be cows and that went on for years and years. I can remember it - it happened years before because Dandenong was the big centre, it was the gateway to Gippsland and there was a lot of commerce went on there. But, I can remember there were cars that used to go along the road and you would know who were going out by the sound of the car . And we had a butcher, Mr Hewitt, came up from Cheltenham, once a week with meat - no ice in the cart - just a piece of bracken to shoo the flies away when the cart was opened and the meat nearly walked out to me. There was Aldridges, the bakers, there was a fruit man, there was the co-op grocer, they used to come round one day to get the order then they'd deliver it the next day. Who else ... What about bread? Bread - oh yes - Aldridges the baker. I remember coming home from school - the baker's cart used to have a step and there would be a sort of a fight as to who was going to sit on the step and get a ride home. Or the market gardeners, they used to start out from up Keysborough way around about 2 o'clock and they'd reach the school around about three to three-thirty, when we got out. And we - what we used to call a ling - we would have a ling on the cart and the poor horse, he'd have about a dozen children hanging onto the cart getting a ride home. Our school only started, I think, from about 1922. We got electricity here in around about 1929. I can remember having lamps and I can remember my uncle saying "Now don't walk heavily, the cat's whiskers will come off. ' And then you graduated from the cat's whisker with the headphones - there was a battery operated set and a great big trumpet there . What else can I remember? I had a blind great-aunt who used to walk to Cheltenham, and she would do some shopping and walk back. See, people walked in those days. Yes, yes. Well that's the only way they got supplies, otherwise ... Even a trip to Melbourne must have been quite an event ... Well, I can remember, my Grandmother taking me to Melbourne - I'd be about five - it would be round about '28, and you would go in the likes of Myers, and there would be seats and 'madam' would sit on a seat and somebody would come and serve 'madam'. And it was a big event. But it was service. Service that you don't get now. What about the local doctor, if any? Cheltenham. Dr Hudson. He was the doctor.

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In your early childhood? That was - Dr Hudson - My Father died in 1925 and Dr Hudson had just started his practice and my Father was one of his first patients. And my Father had peritonitis. And one of his first patients died. And he was wonderful. Right through until he retired. He was wonderful to my Mother and to me. How did he get from Cheltenham to here? I think he must have had a car. I think he must have. I wonder how his predecessor managed. Oh, it would be horse and cart. I can remember them coming to church and they would come in a jinker. A pony and jinker. It was always my ambition to have a pony and a jinker. You see, cars were very few and far between. And so, we can say, that is a picture of what had gone before for quite a lot of years. You know, this period 1901 to 1927 has to do with Federation to the opening of Parliament House in Canberra but it is also a period isn't it where there was a great deal of development from the foundations that were made in the earlier years. Take the Church. Did you say 1873 . 1873. O.K. well there's twenty seven years or so before when we're talking about when foundations were laid, weren't they. And then they developed. They stayed put, I think, for a little while and then they started to move on with the car and the railways. Well, you see, the Attenboroughs, they lived on the property next door here and it was Mary Attenborough who built the church and endowed the church which was something wonderful in those days and she endowed it with 73 acres of land . Now she wasn't poor. Oh no, no, no. They were gentry. Now, the chappie that wrote From Turnips to whatever, Sandpits - he has got it wrong. He has got that Marcus Clarke named Dingley. Dingley was not named from Marcus Clarke. Dingley was named by the Attenboroughs. It's only two miles from where they lived - I think it was Brampton - to Dingley. Now my husband and I went there in 1973 and when you ... this is before building took place ... we came home and we went down Lower Dandenong Road and we looked back, and it looked exactly the same as it did in England. And, it was Attenboroughs that named it. Their place was Dingley Grange. And that's how Dingley got its name. It wasn't named after Dingley Dell ..Now, here I've got the start of the Dingley Dossier. This is the start. It was a church newspaper. And that was started by Philip Kent for our Church. And then, Philip had an argument with the Church - he didn't agree with something and that's how Dingley Dossier started. But it was really started as The Challenge and it was just distributed amongst the Church people. Then Philip, when he left the Church, he decided that he would start the Dingley Dossier and then it's gradually grown and grown and grown.

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INTERVIEW with BOB PICKERING and JOYCE PICKERING

February 27, 2001

Please tell me, Bob and Joyce, something of your long involvement with Moorabbin. (J) Well, Bob's lived here all his life. He just lived over the Highway in Perry Street. (B) Yes, I'm 72 in a month's time, and I've lived here all my life. I went to school here, played cricket and baseball and tennis and bowls, more recently. More than that, I think you've had a community involvement as well ... Yes, at the school, and also through the church, the Methodist and now the Uniting Church. And you've been involved, too, Joyce ... (J) Yes, well, Dad was on the Council ... When was that? From 1947 to 1974. And where were you born? I was born in Bentleigh and we lived in Ormond. I didn't realise that your maiden name was Coates. I had a great respect for your father and met him several times during his three terms as Mayor of Moorabbin. Yes. He was the longest serving Councillor. What was his occupation? He was a cigar maker. Before that he was working in the gardens for a long time. But, before he got married he went to British Australian Tobacco and became a cigar maker. Do you remember when he was born? (B) I think it was 1898. So, he would have been about 16 at the beginning of the First World War.

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(J) Yes, but he didn't go to the War. He was called up in - what was it - the Militia. Did he ever talk about those days with you? (J) No, not really. Uncle Gus did. Did they ever talk, for example, about the influenza epidemic? (B) My parents did. It must have been a terrible time. It killed more people than the War, didn't it? (J) It's the polio one I remember. We were all kept home from school. That was in the 30's. I was born in 1930 ... (B) It was about 1936, I think. (J) One of the girls in our street, she died, so that sort of brought it home to us ... (B) Talking about the War, Uncle Gus used to tell a bit about the cadets. I think the Junior Cadets were about 11 or 12 and the Senior Cadets were a bit older. I think he used to play up a bit ... There wasn't any conscription because the two referendums were defeated, despite Billie Hughes' best efforts. Let's talk a little more about your parents. Bob ... (B) Dad was born in Smeaton, which is near Ballarat. My Mother was born in Coburg. Dad came down here to work - he worked at the Mail Exchange - I think he lived in various places but somehow he came to live in a boarding house in Cheltenham. The woman who owned it was still there twenty or thirty years ago, apparently. My Mother's family moved from Coburg to Cheltenham, too. They were both about 30 when they got married. I gather they both sang in church choirs - she in the Presbyterian and he in the Methodist. I don't know how they met, but it may have been because of their interest in the choirs. When they got married they bought a block of land around about 1927 or a bit before that. Joyce, when you were at school, you would have been a bit too young to have taken much interest in the Second World War ... (J) It did give you a bit of a fright. Especially when my brother got called up. I don't think we too much notice of it. Does that apply to you, too, Bob? (B) I can vividly remember, stopping with my Aunt at Box Hill, they had a dairy and I used to go and stay there on a Sunday night. I remember the announcement on the radio that we were at War. Bob Menzies. Do you remember what you felt like? Fear, I suppose. I was ten. I was aware of what was going on. I used to read the papers. I remember we had to take shovels to Mordialloc High School and we dug trenches so that if we got bombed we could go into these trenches. Slit trenches, they were. What happened was, they just filled up with water! When you went to school, Bob, what was your ambition? I don't know. I went to Moorabbin School until Grade Six and then I went to Mordialloc High. Joyce, coincidentally, went to Mordialloc High, too. (J) I didn't know him then, though ... (B) I don't think I wanted to be an engine driver. My father wanted me to go to work after I'd finished the fourth year there. I wanted to go back to school and do Leaving. Mum talked him into it and he said to me at that stage you'd better go to work, we can't afford to keep

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you. So he made me sit for admission to the Public Service, which I did and I passed that. So I became a technician and later became an engineer. - and served for 43 years. (J) He had some lovely trips overseas. But we were all left home... (B) I worked for the PMG and worked in the Sate Office and later in the Head Office. Do you remember the Great Depression? (B) It didn't really impact on us so much, my family, because Dad had a job all the time although, if you remember, they cut the wages of all public servants by ten per cent. But, at least, we always had food and that sort of thing but there were people who lived near us who lost their houses. I was aware of that. You could see some of the kids at school - they had big holes in their clothes. There was no social welfare. They used to call some of the kids out to go down to the office to get books and such like. There must have been some sort of a welfare fund. Joyce, did the Church play an important part in your early days? (J) Well, we lived in Ormond and the Methodist Church was opposite to us, but we used to come down to Hemming Street, because Mum played the organ there. So, if it was a nice day, we walked down, although if it was wet. we'd come by train. Sunday was full of good things, with family and cousins. (B) I think you should tell about the Youth Club at the Church ... (J) Yes, we had a big Youth Club at the Church. I just belonged to it. We had socials and we'd go hiking. On public holidays we'd always go up to the hills. (B) We still have a reunion. There are still about a dozen or fifteen couples. You two are socially inclined ... I've heard you mention Probus and bowls and the like ... where does that come from? (J) Probably from our parents. Dad used to be in everything. Once I was out at a function in the park and they were talking about Councils one of the ladies said that the best Councillor in Moorabbin was Les Coates. And I said, "I'm Les Coates' daughter." and she said she would never forget one Christmas there was trouble with the stormwater drainage and they couldn't get anyone to fix it so we rang your father and your mother answered, and she was a darling lady, and she said he's was just sitting down to his Christmas lunch can you wait for a little. So, she said, we waited and about an hour later up he comes. She said, you couldn't get anybody else there and he got it all organised, so she thought he was it and a bit. (B) I think you get a social conscience, to some degree, from your parents. My Mother and Father worked for the Hospital and so did Joyce's. Joyce is Secretary of the Ladies' Hospital Auxiliary now. We both help with the kiosk. Where did people go when they were in trouble? There weren't any counsellors, were there? (J) In earlier days, it was your family, wasn't it? You certainly didn't go to a counsellor. (B) If you went to a psychologist years ago they'd think you were a nut. Bob, you've obviously read a great deal - reading is important for you - was that so at school? (B) No. It developed later. I went back to university when I was 48. I did a Commerce degree. I had studied engineering when I was in my twenties and thirties, but I wanted to know a bit more about Economics but I became more interested in Economic History. As a lad, I lived next to Neil Wishart and he was very good to me and I believe he had quite an influence on my life. When you think about it, Moorabbin had three grocers shops then, in the 1930's, and some of those people would have been there a long time. There was Loves, Bobby Evans, and Marks had a grocer shop. There were two butchers: Willy Jobson and Bertrands. There was only one Bank.

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Let's return one more time to the church - focal points in the community. There were instances, however, of intense antipathy between the Roman Catholic and the Protestant elements. (B) My Father was very anti-Catholic. Intensely. Dad's older sister married a Catholic and her Father wouldn't talk to her - for years. What happened in our day was that the nearest Catholic Church was up in Jasper Road, so there weren't many Catholics who lived near us. So we didn't witness the antagonism as much as it might have in some other areas. People tended to buy houses near their respective churches. I lived in some country towns for a time and there was intense parochialism - even about their football and their schools. I think that sort of thing has lessened now. And there has been a considerable drop in church attendences. (J) We think we'll have to join up with another church, for that reason. Let's have a word or two about sport, because you, Bob, have had a lot of involvement over the years. (B) I was a mad Collingwood man. That's the reason I stopped going to the football because I used to get too wound up! (J) He used to come home with a headache. (B) We used to play cricket. There used to be about half a dozen of us who lived in the area and then Horscrofts actually built a cricket pitch for their workers out in the back and we used to wait until they went home and we would play on that pitch. When I got to about 15 or 16 I went up to Moorabbin, got a game, and I played until I was about 40. And then in the winter a few of them said they were going to start a baseball game so I joined the baseball club about 1946, I think. I didn't enjoy baseball as much as cricket. I used to play a bit of Winter tennis at the church. I was pretty ordinary. But then, when I retired, I started playing bowls - I'm Secretary of the Bowling Club now. I used I say I wasn't old enough. But I wish I had started younger. The young blokes can beat the old fellows any time they like. There's a social aspect to it too, of course. Probus? (J) Yes ... but I'm not very keen. (B) I'm not wrapped, either. On the other hand, it's good for a lot of people. The secret seems to be to have a constant program of interesting activities - otherwise you just rot away.

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INTERVIEW with ALF PRIESTLY

August 29, 2000 I wonder whether I can ask what memories you have of your own schooling, what knowledge you have of your father's schooling and, in particular, when that took place - your Dad's. How long ago since he was at school? My father would have been at school in the 1890's - yes. Your father didn't go to school for very long ... He was practically running properties, or anything off the dairy farm, from Yanathon, for grandfather at that stage - and, I'll just give you an example of what he did. Yes - they had stud cattle - Ayrshire cattle, he took a bull and five heifers to Sydney Royal Show from Yanathon, on his own, at the age of ten ... ten to eleven years old ... and that was walking the cattle from there to the station, and from there they had to change trains at Albury - and also walking it from the Sydney station to the Sydney Showgrounds. What age did you feel he might have been then ... ten? Yes. Hah! It's impossible isn't it? No! It's not impossible - he did it. When did he come to this area - this general area? Our district. I believe he came here in the nineteen - right at the turn of the centuries. The period that we're dealing with here. He would have been about what age then? He would have been around about ... oh ... He was 21 when he went to War. That was in 1917. Right ... so. Did he talk about these times with you, when you were a kid or later. Not a great deal. No. The War was something he didn't want to talk about. That's interesting, isn't it.

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He didn't really want to talk about that at all. The one who spoke more about it was my mother. What were her broad feelings? Did she feel this was a ghastly interruption to general life? Did she feel that these were heroes? Did she feel that it was just awful, or what? Do you remember. No, they all had a - a national interest - a general concern. And the War was a necessary part in keeping the world - as far as they were concerned, going along the lines it should have been going. When the influenza epidemic followed the War - do you have any knowledge of what the reaction of the people was, within in your family structure? No. I can't tell you. It killed more people than the War, as you probably know ... Yes, but I think that they were mostly very much in the country Yes. Well now, it's easy to work out how your father, in those days, the period that we're talking about, adopted the course of action that he did because, because there was the strong personality of his father, wasn't there? Oh yes .. yes. I'm thinking about this ten-year-old episode that, in today's circumstances it's hard to realise that it could have happened. Yeah - because the other brother - he was older than him - he was up looking after another property. The two of them were obviously very close together - very close - I mean, not in age, but in the way they worked with one another. But they were nearly always on different properties. So that the parental influence here, in this family, was extraordinarily strong, wasn't it - at that level? Yes, it was. Did that continue in the next generation? From your father to you? Yes. I'm sure it did! Has it kept on since? Yeah, it has rather. Although they, now, have gone in different directions, as far as my family is concerned, since we got away from the land. Which we have now. Now, your father, however, continued primarily on the land .. Yes. Throughout his life?

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Yes. And, father was rather more to be the one to be in politics than I ever was. He was very good at speaking, and he took control wherever he was. He was usually President of the School Committee, even when we were up in the Mallee. Was he still involved in that sort of thing when he was in this district? Yes, at Carrum, he was. He was President of the Carrum School Committee, It sounds as though he became president of whatever he joined. Yes, he was President of the RSL at one stage. They were at the Masonic Hall That would have been quite the early days after the War, do you think? No, no it wasn't till around the 1940's. How old was he when he enlisted in the Great War in 1917? 21. So, he already had a vast experience, on the land .. Before then, that's right. It seems to me that it didn't ever enter his mind that he should be anywhere else than on the land. No.. But he ran the hotel at Camperdown. So he was fairly well versed in Licence situations. He seemed to be very adaptable. I think they all were. Yes, it seems so ... Very adaptable ... Like he'd been a dairy farmer and then becoming a publican. It's a pretty big - it's a different step - and yet they handled it very well. Father ... both of them never drank in their lives. They were both teetotallers. They did very well. They were very good ........... As a matter of fact I think, in the Mallee, I remember he was President of the School Committee up there - his biggest battle was against sly grog. Do you remember something of those days - particularly in the hotel and liquor industry? The hotel at Camperdown was before my time. But yes, I can remember him when he was running the bar at Patterson River. Yes, he did that while we were working on the farm. Do you remember what the general situation was in regard to unemployment at that time? Was it a problem or was there plenty of work? There seemed to be plenty of work about - but there wasn't a great deal of money. But to me there was always - I've never had a period when there wasn't something to be done ... I can't remember anyone being there - to work on any of our properties - in the early days - that didn't want to work or didn't get a job. Now, when he started up in Patterson River, around about what age would you have been?

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I was born in 1926, so that when Patterson River started it was about that year or just before. That's the reason I was born in Numurkah - it was because we were running the dairy farm there and that was when my grandfather decided that that property would be good as a golf course and father didn't want to get involved in it. In the days that we're talking about, was there any discussion about any disasters that had occurred - personal disasters in the family, major disease outbreaks, accidents apart from the War, floods, fire - all those sorts of things. Is that something that impacted on your early childhood - a consequence of what had gone on before? No ... I can't say it did. When you were in the farming situation - the property situation - in this area, in what way was leisure time used? (You didn't watch the telly!) No, leisure time was community effort at something. Well, in Carrum, there were three residents' associations, if you like, and each one had their own hall. There was East Carrum Ratepayers' League; at the Masonic Hall was the Carrum Ratepayers' - and they all had community efforts, mainly to raise money for kindergartens, schools. It was very much there was something going, either a dance or there was a fund raising something to attend. Mostly the social outlets were for some organisation or for some purpose in the community. How did people get to those functions? Either walk, ride a bike - that was mainly the way. Very little road transport then. Very little motor transport. What was the impact of the developing of the rail system then? Excellent ... it was that, really, that opened most things up. Let me ask you a couple of other questions. You have spoken in very favourable terms about your mother and her influence. In general, as far as we can see, women's place in the community ... what were the expectations? Were they supposed to shut up and mind the kids or were they supposed to take not too much interest in politics or were they supposed to keep the house tidy or was there something more ... characteristic of that era? I think there was something more characteristic of that era but less to the forefront. Because I think I mean this was a big part why families got on so well . They thrashed all the problems out at the kitchen table. The kitchen was the main room of the house those days. It used to be a very big kitchen, very big table in the middle ... Big families? Generally four was a small family. Which our's was. But no, that's about the size of it and there was always a discussion and, in those days, always the visitors were relations. When the children arrived - when the babies were born - where were they born? We were all born in hospitals. The extent of the womenfolk’s' interest in politics ... you mentioned about your father being of a more political inclination ... did your mother share this interest? No. No, that wasn't so. She might have had her say, but no ...

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That was for him .. Yes ... that was his outlet. Do you think that was fairly general, as far as one can tell these things? Yes, it was, I'd say. Let's talk for a moment about churches and the influence on the community of churches. It seems to me, looking back, in nearly every place I've been to , in Australia anyhow, there's been at least one church which is the prominent feature in the little hamlet or the village or the town - and it went up early in the piece. So I assume that there must have been a pretty strong influence of the church - speaking very generally - on the community As a social centre, and a centre for whatever religious beliefs people had. Does that make sense from your observations. Yes, it does. I can deal with the Mallee, which was where I really spent the first ten years ... of knowing what was going on ... in the Mallee the religion that came out there was the Lutheran religion ... A bit like the South Australian scene ... That's right. Very much because there was a fair amount of German population or immigration to the area, and they were particularly good farmers. You learnt a lot from what they did. Yes ... let me ask you was there a similar situation in the local area, here? In the local area you got back to the question of unity on the church line. Either you were a Protestant or you were a Catholic ... Yes ... and that was very characteristic of those times, wasn't it? It was, yes. I noticed that when I came back to Carrum. While we were in the Mallee it was not a worry. As a matter of fact, back in the Mallee, nobody worried As a matter of fact, the Minister came out from Mildura, and we were some sixty mile out, and all the community used to have their church on our front verandah, Yeah, well there was no church so they all collected there and that was once a month. They didn't have it once a week because, obviously the Minister went to different places every week. Now, when you came back to Carrum, as you said, you faced up to that again. Oh yes, I didn't realise until ... well, I didn't face up to it again - that was the first I was inducted in the fact that there was a difference between Catholics and Protestants. And nothing was more prominent than it was at school. I know some instances of where there was an absolute cleavage ... What's your assessment of the role of the clergy - talking about a non-denominational case there ... Today we've got counsellors, grief counsellors, counsellors for which coffee would you like. In those days, it seems to me that it was the clergy. Is that your feeling - or was it the family that was predominating still?

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I think the family still predominated. The clergy did a much broader role in those days than they do today. In the family, was it the older woman - grandma, great-aunt - who really had the 'wise woman role'? Um, well I think if they'd stretched it out among themselves they went to them at the end. Because they were never really the ones involved but they were good judges. The elders of the tribe? Yes, that's correct. And that did exist, right through I'd say, until probably the Second World War. I think that came to the end then. I think it must have been very strong indeed in the days we've been talking about - in the first quarter of the century, when neither you nor I were taking too much notice. Yes, it was going on. In your view, were the churches then a significant setting for a gathering point? I'm talking about church socials, and church gatherings - apart from the religious aspect - the coming together of people. Or, again, was it the family - the family oriented social centre? Oh, I still feel it was the family. Really? Well, of course, I was in the Mallee at that stage and there was Irish, there was German, who all went to a Lutheran church so out there it was a family outing. So there wasn't an ethnically structured or ruptured situation ... No. Italians there as well. So I would say the Catholics were fairly well represented, but did not stick an end up. But that was different in Carrum? Different entirely. Ok, now on to another subject. We talked earlier about the development of the rail and the impact it had on the development of the area generally - what jobs predominated. You think ordinarily of farming , of market gardening but there must have been others.... To do with the rail ... ? No. In consequence of the rail. For example, it was no good a Bank coming here if there no people able to get to it . No good shops opening if it was difficult to get transport to them. Transport, I would have thought would have to be a significant factor in development ... Well, Carrum, in those early days, was very much a rail depot. This was where machinery was unloaded, not only for farmers, but also --- no I don't think there was a milk pick-up here but this was a development of Woodwards - very big butcher's business, because there used to be unloading an enormous amount of stock, because we used to see them passing in McLeod Road. And, remembering then, in those days, little as the place was, there were three butchers - slaughtermen with their own slaughterhouses as well. They weren't like today - butchers buying from slaughter houses - Reynolds was one, who had one, over

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where the Carrum High School is now, their slaughter yards was there. And Hawkins had his in there - back Seaford somewhere. And Woodwards, which was ... started right opposite us but it moved to bigger premises out on Wells Road. And the rail meant a lot to them. It had to, because there was no road transport for stock then. And they became very big butchers. They were killing for others. It was the beginning of butchers not killing their own stock. Pubs? Coffee palaces ? Pubs were controlled by 21 miles from Melbourne. And that's why the Riviera became able to be opened on Sundays and because you were outside that inner-Melbourne zone. What date can we put on that? It must have been long before my time because ... that was there before I came down in ... that might have occurred between the 1900's and the First World War. Well, it was quite a thing, wasn't it? Yes. Well there was a wine saloon in Carrum - that was the only - that was right opposite where the present railway gates are. I wonder if that was affected by 6 o'clock closing that came in in 1916. I can't tell you. Now, let's talk a moment or two about water. You can't get too far without water. You need something to drink, in one form or another. Sources. Originally, springs, bores? There was very little in bores. I just remembered that's the reason why the dairy farm was where is was. There was water. It did come in spring form there. The main water was catchment from roofs and, um, farm dams. Because, in those days, you could have them. There was no water reticulation from a major supply ? Well, Carrum had some. Do you remember when? I can remember it was there when we came down, which was 1935. The reticulation didn't come to our property. We were without pressure water, or mains water, until after the Second World War. And then we had to dig our own main drain there, so that's why it ran across our property instead of along the front. Well then, of course, there's sewerage ... Yes, well that just wasn't there for disposal until the 1950's. Or even later, I imagine. Yes, yes. Now, just a word or two about government, of all sizes and shapes.. Shire Presidents, Mayors, Local Government ... the main interest, the main role, of Local Government in this area was what? City of Chelsea? It was there - when I first came down, I think when Dad was in Council it was what must have been a house, in Station Street. Not where it is at the moment. It was more up where the Fire Station is. I'm only just going from memory.

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Who could vote? You voted according to the properties you held - the value. Yes. Women? If they owned it, yes. In the days we're talking about, how was the voting conducted, for the municipal council? The ones who voted were actually the land or property owners. They had to show that they had a valued interest in the district. To be allowed to vote, it was graded from - the value of the properties - from one to three votes. I know Dad and Mum both had three votes. Did it savour of class distinction? I don't believe so, no. Would you say that, in the case of your own parents, that although they had three votes each, there was not a sort of social jealousy - that they had all that land - all that voting power? Where did it leave the labourer who doesn't have any land at all? Was it something that was accepted or rejected? To me it was accepted because the labourer in those days used ... he owned a block of land. A block of land was, approximately, five pound. And generally he had an interest in one. All the boys that I basically went to school with were landholders. But they all managed to buy or ... buy a block of land and, eventually, put a house on it. It was mainly ... this was the beginning of the community funds. They contributed while, you know, they were in their teens ... mid-twenties, generally, when a lot of them got married.- and to funds that they were able to draw on - to start a house. And none of them considered renting, they all when they got married they started to build a house. There was a procedure, wasn't there, for getting married. There was a meeting, a courtship, the development of the 'glory box', Yes, it didn't happen quickly. It was normally over one or two years. These days it happens in the corner pub. In those days it happened at the church, perhaps a friend of a relative who came to the home - that sort of thing. Yes. And there was a procession, wasn't there? A sort of coming out - girls approaching a marriageable age, young fellow, good future, saving type, all these things? Yes - it was all that, and, it was generally discussed at family level ... In other words, Mum and Dad thought he might be a good match ... Somehow or other, the subject would come up. They thought if you were getting a little bit tied up with somebody, well ... Of course there was a financial aspect to all this. In other words, if we could get our daughter married off to young Joe over there we'd have adjoining properties. No.

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No? I don't believe so, but then I could have been naive enough, at that stage, to not recognise it. Now, the strength of political parties, coming back to government for just a moment, was there a cleavage. Were those on the right and those on the left as strongly pronounced in your very early days? No. Or recollections of your parents. No. No, it wasn't. I would say both parties, if they were there, they were very much ... well, very much together. There wasn't an extreme right and an extreme left. I believe there's more prejudice in that field today than there was then. The attitude towards free trade in the development of industry - again talking about this district - was it apparent? Did you ever hear any discussion of this? We didn't have shoes coming in from Italy, did we? Not really. Dad was very strong, and I believe he was right, in that the type of trade they had in those days, which was if you bought a million dollars worth of stock to move we would sell you a million dollars worth. I think that's the way it should be today. Trade reciprocity? That's in a pure sense. I must admit it has to vary at times . People have different opportunities. We were in a country that was blessed with raw material. We obviously had more wool than we needed, therefore we could export wool so that we could import something or other. But, your father's idea was equal trade. Yes. He believed in that would develop the country. Now, voting, in Federal and State Parliaments, at that time, was not unlike - with aspects based on ownership - the upper houses particularly - the municipal scene. Was there discussion of this sort of thing in your family? No. Not a great deal. We come now to the general question of community spirit. and I want to focus on this one area, rather than what it was like in Australia generally or where I was at that time. We might take a comparison - or contrast perhaps, between what we believe to be today's community spirit and ... a very changed community ... multi racial and multi this and that today ... and that time. In those days, you have a sense that it was much more close knit . Was there an air of excitement about it, too? I believe there was more of an air of excitement in those days than there is today. only because small achievements were great events. And I feel that even to be able to buy a new machine one year was a great achievement whereas today they put it on a Bankcard. But, in those days, it was buying what you could pay for and, also, being paid for what you did. And you believe that was a much more healthy state of affairs. I do. So much so ... now there was ... this ethnic business is punched up far too much. Back in the era ... say the 1930's - there were a lot of Italians and that sort of thing but they were out here then but they weren't looked at as wogs at that time ...Well, I would say, and I've read some books on the early history and I refer back to a book now, written by an English

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immigrant that came out here just after the war - after the First World War - and he was met with ... on the wharf ... in Western Australia, with the very same prejudice that our Unionists met them you could say in the 1960's. So yes, it did exist. And that's what drove him from out of Perth into the wheat area or very near Kalgoorlie to find a job. He was a Pom! And a Pom was I think, considered in those days to be worse than the Chinese and the Asians. Contributing towards this community spirit that we are discussing very broadly, do you think in those days we shared the pleasure when somebody distinguished himself - perhaps as an athlete - - or perhaps somebody got into Parliament - or perhaps somebody painted a picture that got into an art gallery - that sort of thing. Did we share the individual effort on a communal basis? Yes, definitely. Can you think of a specific instance? Say, a sports figure or somebody who went round the world in strange circumstances My father always had a strong feeling for Hubert Opperman. You could feel the glow and share the glory. It was going out, perhaps, more in my era, though this is where the problems of jealousy come in, although I blame the media a lot, you know. So you've got the idea that, in the time we're talking about, because the numbers were fewer, because we were concentrated in smaller area, there was a feeling of ownership. Yes. What about scholastically? What if somebody got to the fourth grade in school and left - didn't like it - and later he became a well-known surgeon, I exaggerate, perhaps but ... No, I don't think you did exaggerate, because both of my parents left school very early and they studied themselves all the way through and, as far as I can remember, when they were thirty to forty year old and they were still learning. They learnt shorthand - they could both write shorthand - they could both do - oh - do anything mathematically. What would you say - this is the final question, you'll be glad to know - what would you say that you think your father's best memory was as he got older . He occasionally might think back. It might have been as a ten-year-old on that trip to Sydney. I was going to say - I was going to bring that up first - because to do that you must have had a great sense of strength of character within yourself and know that I can do it and when it's over I did it. In amongst his colleagues, his contemporaries, do you think this was exceptional - young kids taking on more than we might imagine they could ... I don't think it was exceptional. It happened out of sheer necessity and there was no fear of what today ... of being molested ... you weren't interfered with in your way of life if you didn't interfere with anyone else. So you're thinking perhaps that could have been not the highlight; there were doubtless others - I'm sure your birth was a highlight but we're not giving birth certificates. But I wondered if there was another experience in this particular era - something that hit him fair amidships which he always remembered.

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Well, I'd say, he always remembered when the decision was made to leave the Mallee to come down here. The reason was the Government realised that they'd made the allotments far too small so they wanted to get half the farmers off and give the rest to the other half. My father was offered two other farms but he decided no - I think there were two reasons, he was glad to go back to Melbourne because grandfather had been a naughty boy with the licence a couple of times and there was only one more strike and he'd lose it, so Dad really came back to do that, to run that and remain independent enough on a another farm. So he decided that he wouldn't accept the other farms that were offered and he'd be one of them that went out. He shifted the whole damn lot - that's horses, cattle, house (the house was all dismantled) machinery, everything came down on one train. From there to Carrum. That was stock, everything. Poultry, the whole lot came down on one train full. To get that together ... I've always marvelled at it, because its logistics boggle the mind - all within two days and get it all down. This was exceptional, I'm sure, but it must have been characteristic of the attitude of many people who came into this area' Yes. Well ... Thank you very much. I'm grateful to you.

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INTERVIEW with BOB ROBERTSON

September 19, 2000 Now, Bob, the sort of thing I'd like to ask you is just to cast your mind back to early school days - where you first started school. Well, that was the first school ever I went to - down here. In Wells Road. How many kids? Well, I don't know - I'd say one teacher we had ... I reckon we had thirty kids sometimes. Got down low at times. All in the one room? All the one building. When you first started, would you have been using slates? Yes ... yes. Slates, yes. Did you ever have copy books? Copy books? Well. on our exercise book as we called it, it had all the times tables on the back and all the weights and measures and yards and inches - all on the back. You don't see that nowadays. And did you do the tables - two twos are four ... All that. Right up to twelve. You wanted to know a measure you just looked at the back of your book and it would tell you - you know, what you wanted to find out.. Stays with you for ever doesn't it? Yeah, but nowadays, these computers - they're alright, but they're not learning much.. You must have found those early school days pretty good ... Yeah ... 'cos we enjoyed it. Our one teacher ... she'd be flitting around from one to the other, up to the eighth grade . What about the discipline?

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Oh, we were well schooled - she had a strap about this long ... Did you play sport? Yes ... We went away playing games at different places - Dingley, and out that way. In them days we had a vegetable garden and a flower garden and we used to show flowers at different little ordinary shows. That's a good feature that you don't see today ... Friday was our working day in the garden and we took a sheet of tin with a bit of wire on it and a stick and go to the neighbours and get manure. And that was opposite the school down there - that place there - we'd go over and fill up the bit of tin and we'd drag it over ... every Friday was garden day. And we enjoyed it. Nobody interfered with our gardens ... What about the parents - did they take an interest in the school? Yes. Was there a school committee? I wasn't ever on the committee - the brother was, Harry, and his wife. I was never on the committee. Wasn't smart enough! Shovel and a rake was around, I was happy. Was there ever a school picnic? Oh, yes. The Grandad had the school property over there and there was some great big gum trees there - about three of them - and he's keep the cows away from there and he'd rake it and keep it tidy and we'd all come out - carriers used to bring us out, horses and dray or lorry, Curzon was one bloke who used to - you know he was a carrier. He used to bring us out. What did you have? Races? Oh, yes. Yes. We had a big picnic day and ... we had a lot of fun. Made our own fun, you know. We had the races. Did you have any formal sort of things, like standing up and saluting the flag ? Yeah, the flag every Monday morning. When the kids got through school, what expectations could they have? What could they look forward to doing. You was looking forward to milking cows. Aw, there was a lot of smart kids amongst them you know. The majority of them were dying to get home on the land ... everybody was milking cows. Everybody had a herd of cows. They were dying to be fourteen. Turn fourteen you were right. Any kids from your class who went into other jobs? Aw, well, going back's a long while now ... I think some of them would ... smart kids. Now, away from school, what did people do in their free time? Some were racing people. But we used to hold dances for the soldiers and that. Send parcels over to the soldiers ... Down there, I was just saying, the old Hill Billys - you wouldn't see them at the school down there. See they moved ... they built what they called a pre-fab one up here. We planted trees in the War time all around the school ground for the soldiers. They were all sort of named. There must have been a good community spirit. It must have been a good place to live.

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It was all right ... it was good. We used to hold dances there. They'd come for miles. How would they get here? Horse and cart. Push bikes. What were the roads like? Only metal roads then ... Thames Promenade was the first road made out this way. We used to cart the milk up and put it on the station there. Up Chelsea Road - a sand track. Where was the nearest telephone? In them days ... aw well ... you'd have to go to Chelsea, I spose. I don't know how long the Post Office was there. Do you remember ever going into the City when you were a little fellow? Yes. We went in to buy a wireless - me and the brother - one night. Where the little man tapped on the window. We bought a cat's whisker. Come home and tore it in half ... you know. Cat's whisker. And the headphones? That's going back a bit, isn't it? It is indeed. Did people come to one anothers’ homes for social evenings? Oh, yes. More social than they are now. They used to put on dances and they’d come from miles around. It was a home supper. Everybody had to take a plate for supper and Grandfather Beasley he boiled a kerosene bucket full of coffee made of milk. That was his job - to look after that through the night ... they'd all want that bloody cup of hot milk . What about in the home itself. What if some people had a piano, say? Aw, some of them ... some of them , yeah ... We had an old - Fraser there he had an accordion - and we used to get him to play the music. You'd get an old time dance - barn dance going - he'd never stop! They had a lot of good fun there. Card nights? Yes - well those that didn't dance were playing cards in the other little rooms they had there. They built a stage there, you know - put a stage in the wall. Here's a very serious question for you, Bob. What about the role of women. How were women seen in these days? Did they have a part in the management of the family? Well, they looked after their own rigouts ... If there was a family that had some problem - somebody was sick ... Aw, they'd be ... somebody would be around ... The neighbour - not necessarily a relative ? No. No. We had a lot of ... going around and help people ... try and help them ... Where were the babies born?

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In the home, a lot of them. Well, who attended? The midwife? The doctor used to come from Mordialloc. How did he get here? Horse and jinker. Now, what can you tell me about the way people thought about politics - government? It wasn't talked about like it is now. They were decent bloody blokes in them times, you know. I listen to 'em on this television and if I was going to school and I carried on like that I'd have been put in the bloody corner. It's a bloody disgrace. They just go there to argue each other. I know that's what they're here for but they rubbish each other there terrible. And as for the woman trying to keep order she hasn't got a hope. They haven't got a ruddy - I don't know what it is - I don't know what you call it now - but when you were told to be quiet years ago you never said another word. Till you had your turn. Understood. Where did you get your water? Off the roof. So, on the property, when you were milking cows, for example, where did the fodder come from? Grew it. What if it was a bad season? Aw, well ... well ... you had to buy it out. Buy it off the produce store. Did you have to milk a cow or two in your day? Huh! I'd like a shillin' for every bloody cow I sat under. Before school and after. And bring home some firewood. What did the girls do? They didn't milk the cows, did they? Yes ... oh, yes ... lot of the girls were handy under the cows, yes. When they left school where did they go? Girls? Well they looked for jobs. Two of the sisters went into Melbourne and then they were working in Mordialloc and Chelsea. What sort of jobs did they do? Clothing. Clothing. But, if they were wanted they would stop home. Like everything else, if you wanted to go out you had to get a shillin' to go somewhere. What happened when they got a bit older and the girls were of marriageable age and the young fellows were thinking oh well - how was that arranged? Oh well, you know, in them days, they went with each other until it was time to get married and away they went.

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What part did the family play in that? Did the family say no we don't think you should marry this Bob, he's no good? Oh, I suppose they did, but I don't think that mattered much. I don't think that arranged - you know you've gotta marry this or you've gotta marry that - I don't know - I don't think that went on, but they did stop together most of them. But Christ, you read of them getting married one day here and the next day they're divorced. And don't tell me why it's happening. Big families, weren't there, in the main? Oh yes. Mum raised nine. She had ten of us. One died. She reared nine of us. Now ... one... two ... down to three now I think. Four. I might make mistakes, but there you are, I forget them. How they reared us I don't know. Dad got five pound a week on the road - drains, planning the drains - we had a cow and we always had a garden going. Vegetable garden. What about the things you couldn't grow in the garden? Make your own butter. Had your own eggs. Mordialloc was the nearest for shopping, I think. I think Mum used to walk up there in the early days when they first come down - even for butter, a few pound of butter. Then first thing in the morning, walk over to Keysborough picking mushrooms. Who got a vote those days? Women didn't get a vote, did they? I don't know much about that. Bob, what about the church? Yes, they had the Church and the hall down there. Higgins - Mr Higgins - was teacher at Sunday School. Then Harry Wells took it on. Was he one of the Wells family that Wells Road was named after? Aw - a relation of them. I worked for Harry Wells. Before school, after school until I was 21. Thirty dollars a week. Sometimes they'd give me a meal. I could have got a meal if I'd wanted to. We lived about half a mile down the road. All we knew was bloody work and get a couple of bob. You want to go anywhere you go and get a couple of bob. You didn't take your Bankcard, eh? No, but there was some red accounts around I'm afraid, but, anyhow, we survived it. Was the church a sort of gathering place for people? Years ago there was always a lot at Church. I used to go to Sunday School every Sunday. I went so many years without missin' a bloody Sunday. Well, it would have done you the world of good, wouldn't it? Well, is hasn't improved me language. You don't have to be churchified to be right. No, I'd sooner go through the old time than go through the times now. Specially trying to rear a family. I don't know how they ... We were never short of a meal. There was always something on the table. If some people were in on a Sunday, dinner time, they'd always find another plateful you know. We used to say to Mum, 'When are you going to have your dinner, Mum?'. She'd say, "I had mine out in the kitchen.' We knew damn well she didn't. What was the situation if some terrible thing happened in the district - a disaster; a bad accident; a fire?

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Oh well, they'd try and help them out. You know - might have an evening for them, or something like that. They always had something going. Do you remember being very interested in what was going on in the world? Well, there was only the bloody main wars, wasn.t there? Now, this is going on every day. It goes on for weeks and weeks. What impact do you think the First World War had on this district? Well, it took a lot of the men, I know that. There was quite a few went from around the district, you know. The Honour Roll, I think it's over in Chelsea - just up the road here, I think - all those that went from here ... those that didn't get back. I had three brothers that went to the War and they got back ... lucky to get back, too. Where did you come in the family, then. Were you one of the younger ones? No - I had to go down and face up to the Army down at Frankston. And seeing me and my brother was milking the cows, we got let off. This was the Second World War, wasn't it? Yes. The First World War, well that was 1914, wasn't it? You didn't know much about that at school? We were dying just to get to fourteen to get out and get working. Milking before school and after school - they wouldn't do it now. And there wasn't the concrete around there is now. Bloody dog used to go in to get the cows and the mud and stuff we had to go and lift him out. My God, it was bad in them times. When the cows were milked and the milk was to be sold, how did that happen? Well ... we used to take it up to Chelsea - and put it on a train at quarter to nine in the morning. This is in the big cans? In the cans - in different sized cans. We'd take the empty cans back - or leave 'em to the next day. Later there was the road carrier, you see. Trucks started.. That stopped the work puttin' it on the train. What was the main breed of cattle you used to ... Aw, any kind that would give a bit of milk. A lot of them went into the Jerseys, but you didn't gain much by it. They only give you a certain price for your milk . Jersey milk used to be - you know - a lot better than ordinary milk - richer, more cream in it ... and then they all went in for Friesians because they give a lot of milk. As long as they got a certain test they were right. But Friesians give a lot more milk. Did the properties breed their own? Some did. When you were a kid how many cows would have been milked on your Grandfather's property?

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Aw well, he ... him and his son were milking over there and they would milk, I suppose, twenty or thirty. A few more. The son said he was going to Gippsland - there was better land up there. You know - better feed and that. Then me and my brother Harry - or Harry and me - Grandad said why don't you have a go at it so we rented it for a little while and then bought it. How many acres in that property? Hundred. And you could run twenty, thirty cattle on that ... More than that. We were milking forty I suppose. How long did you do that for? Thirty - thirty years we were over there. It's a hard part of the farming industry, isn't it? You earn everything you get out of it. Because you've never finished. We never had many holidays. We had a few, but you don't know when to get somebody to look after things properly you see. Well, they might be looking after them all right, but you're thinking about it. If you had it all over again, Bob ... ? I wouldn't bloody well milk cows. I might go into Parliament, if I can ... Well, I've found talking with you very valuable ... No ... I should of wrote a book about this place. This was all under water bar the hills you know ... Is that right? In '34 the water was running in my front gate. I wasn't living here then. It was running in where my gate is. Just around Christmas time. We used to grow, I suppose, about forty- fifty ton of oats and we always got somebody to cut it, you know. Then we got a few bob and then the brother said we'll go and buy a new binder. So I went and bought a new binder and brought it home. He went down to open it up so he could go a coupla rounds, you know. And it rained that night, and we got up in the morning all you could see was half the binder in the paddock. New binder! From here to Mordialloc was under water. Had that ever happened before? Oh yes. Well, not as bad. We used to have a bit of a flood round here nearly every year. Chelsea Road was under water. Edithvale Road. We're now talking about even the time when you were at school? That was going on. It'll come again! It's happening everywhere else! They all laugh at me - silly old bugger. I say- I've seen it: you haven't! It's nice to go round see all these new homes - Patterson Lake - and all down here - beautiful homes ....I've seen the whole bloody lot under water. You try and tell anybody. I feel sorry for them. They're building such big houses and they've all got boats and ... We used to play cricket between North and Wells

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Road - well South of ... 0n a Sunday between ... and we had a pitch down at Patterson Lake - under water half the time. In the time we're talking about, were there some very rich people around? Hah - I never seen all their accounts but some… What about the Wells family, for example? Well, they were on the cows. Very big properties? About 75 acres they had. All over that side of the road was full of people with 75 acres. See we got a paddock over there - well the freeway comes through there . Now it's been cut into three different lots. We got nothing over here now. Well, that's how you get a few bob, if you happen to be in the right position, you see. You can be on one side of the road and nothing happens and, on the other side, going ahead. They're paying some awful prices now.

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INTERVIEW with BOB WRIGHT

September 18, 2000 Bob, I'd like you to cast your mind back to your school days, if you will, because that's in the period 1901 to 1927. What are your general impressions of your schooldays? I believe our schooling was very good because Chelsea, the first school that I attended, was in the hall behind the Congregational Church. I was about 4 years old and from that, the following year, I went to the Chelsea School in Aylot Avenue and perhaps I was lucky because my Father being an ardent lifesaver and the founder of most lifesaving clubs along the bay, I got the job of being lifesaving instructor - and, sometimes, gardener! But, I thought that, generally, schooling was much better. We did learn to read correctly and pronounce our words and spell correctly - much as against the present trend of the commentators who say 'Ustrilia'. Small classes or composite classes? I think the classes would be close to forty and one teacher and we all had to behave so that we took the message in. And the teacher always had a strap so any of us got out of order we were brought back to order and take notice of what we were being taught. We were to become better citizens. The girls would get a tap on the backside, the boys would get it on the hand. Did you have slates? I think in primary it was a slate and slate pencil - that would be the first year, I think. After that I think we had a copy book, it was called. Ruled lines for small letters and large letters. There was an emphasis on hand writing? Yes. We just followed suit and my grandkids say, specially when I do business, 'we can always read your writing.' What about the traditional aspects - saluting the flag? Yes - I think there are two things missing today, and one is, when I was going to school, once a week you saluted the flag and, on Australia day, it was a very important day. To teach us about Australia and make us think about it. Generally there were little gifts handed out with an Australian flag on them and, sometimes, there was time off to go to a movie about Australia Day. There was always a ceremony at school and we were young enough to let it sink in - what it was all about.

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What was the attitude of the kids to the Headmaster? Was he regarded as a dictator or a benign figure? There again, I think I was lucky. We had a Headmaster at Chelsea called Mr Rogers, 'Boss', and I believe that his brother was Headmaster at Edithvale. I still remember them as being gentlemen. Whereas, some of the teachers, like Miss Rooney, were very handy with the strap. I think 'Boss' Rogers was everybody's friend. Sport? Sport. Originally there wasn't much room for sport at the Chelsea school. The land opposite the school, by the side of Powlet Street was acquired later on, so we didn't have much room for sport. I think it was a bit of hop-scotch and marbles and cherry-bobs in those times. Little things, but they created a lot of pleasure. Life saving. The school was - everybody was expected to be involved in a bit of life saving work. Well, it was an enormously important aspect of your life at that time and later, wasn't it? Yes. It certainly was. At school was there an emphasis on rote learning - on memory? Yes ... I think the two most important subjects at State School was Arithmetic - teaching you tables - and Writing. At least those seemed to be the most important things to me. After Chelsea, I then went to Mordialloc High School where some of the subjects there I didn't grasp very well. I was quite happy after two years there to go to Caulfield Technical School and come up the grades again than try to learn language which was of no interest to me, but I enjoyed the work because those things were not available up to Grade VI at Chelsea school. What were the employment expectations of the kids at Chelsea? I think at that particular time - well, it was hard times, in my experience, and you took any job you could get if you were lucky enough to get a job. I don't remember - through primary, high and technical schools - I don't remember it being brought up to me about any particular occupation. Going back to your earlier childhood, what do you think of as leisure activities? Well, there again, I was lucky, to be in a family that had a small business, on the corner of Morey Road. And, even though there was not much money there, my parents had a player-piano. And, for customers, friends, there was always a sing-song once or twice a week, round the player-piano. Specially of a Saturday night, when the shop was open a bit later than normal. Good healthy activities. As far as the boys was concerned we played marbles or cherry-bobs or something like that and the girls played the hop-scotch. You don't find many player-pianos on Saturday nights at the moment ... You don't find any ... to me, today, you don't find any community activities for the children. I have ten grandchildren and eight great grandchildren and I feel sorry for them because they're missing out on a lot of things. I look back on many good memories. Think about the Church for a moment - not any particular denomination - what was its role? Perhaps, a meeting place for friends ... we were never forced to go to church - there was always Religious Instruction at schools. Taught us the basics, but I, for one, didn't follow

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through much on church activities. I went to Sunday School, but rarely went to Church. Anybody to do with the church was always well regarded. Sunday School picnics? Always the Sunday School Picnic, yes. Sometimes we'd change Sunday Schools to get an extra picnic day. In the area, was there water reticulation? There was always water reticulation, in my memory - but, prior to that, perhaps just before I was born, there were a lot of pumps about and I can remember my Grandmother, who lived in Woodbine Grove, I can still picture the pump and the well in her backyard. A plunger pump to bring the water up. Whether they used that or not I don't know. I think they had tanks for drinking water. In my home we had reticulated water. There weren't many made roads in Chelsea in my early days. They were all sandy streets. I can remember a lot of the streets being made - the hard way, with a tip dray and a half-yard scoop behind a draught horse. So much so, for six and a half years, my Father had the mail contract - delivering mail - on horse back. And he did from Chelsea Road, I think, down to Carrum Creek or thereabouts and my older brother, on foot, did the other half towards Edithvale. I can remember. I was born in '17. So that must have been in the 1920's. When most of those streets were being built, it was sometime in the '20's. Do you remember the big event of going into the City? No. The biggest event that I can remember was going to Port Melbourne in a horse drawn vehicle - a horse and lorry - that Curzon, I think, used to have - and bringing the first life boat in Victoria from Port Melbourne to Chelsea. And I had the first ride in it because, from Port Melburne to Chelsea, I sat in the life boat. In later years, of course, I sat in the life boat for real, including helping people in the bad floods in the back of Chelsea. Surely this life boat - life saving incident must have been a forerunner of activities along the Bay ... Your father must have been something of a pioneer in this field ... My Father and his brother were two of the first six life savers in Victoria. And they were ... the certificates came from the Royal Life Saving Society of London. There was no Victorian branch then. Frank Beaurepaire was another one. And my Father ... I think he was a Life Member of Chelsea, Carrum, Edithvale, Mordialloc and Mentone Life Saving Clubs. He was an examiner and he was chief examiner for this area and also chief of life saving at the Henley Carnivals for years. He had a beautiful blazer. It was ... it had a real gold thread pocket on it of the Royal Life Saving Society of London, of which he was a vice-president, I think. Life saving was a big part of our lives. To purchase equipment there was a Queen Carnival and my sister was Queen of the life saving and Francie Barnes, she was the RSL queen. That raised a lot of funds. I think that was towards the life boat. And other activities that were very important were the annual dances - simple things. The old Fox Theatre and the Chelsea Theatre - which is still standing. The women would prepare the suppers. I can recall my Mother boiling coffee in a bag at home to make the basis of two big copper-fulls of coffee with milk added. That was where people got to meet one another. It says a lot about the community spirit, doesn't it? Yes. I can remember there was always a big distinction between the Roman Catholics and the Freemasons. But, when the Annual Ball ... they would all intermix. Even though they had a certain amount of enmity at the Annual Ball the Freemasons would go to the Catholic Ball and the Catholics would go to the Freemasons Ball. Did this sense of community spirit show itself in the face of tragedy - bushfires, say?

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I would think so. I don't think there was any line of demarcation. What about a serious illness ... a bereavement ... personal tragedy in a home? Where did the help come from? Well, I think from the neighbours and the general community. Facilities were not available in those days as is now and having to do with childbirth and babies ... I think there were two classed as midwives in Chelsea. One lived in York Street and one who finished up being a neighbour of ours. She was Nurse Cullaly. There was only one doctor at Chelsea and eventually a practice was started in Edithvale but the nearest, then, was Mordialloc. No doctor at Carrum, so the nursing midwife was a great help to a lot of people, but the people helped one another. Again, more so than today ... Oh, tremendous. Today, everybody's relying on a handout. Or a councillor? That's right. That gets me. Long before the Chelsea Hospital I can still remember having my tonsils out on the kitchen table. One of the doctors held the chloroform bottle over the head and the other one pulled the tonsils out. Just out on the kitchen table. What would you think was the attitude to government - local, State and Federal? Oh - perhaps I was a bit young to know, but I can remember one man who was always well thought of. He was a local Councillor - Roy Beardsworth - and he was also a Member of Parliament. He was always spoken of very highly. Other than that - I don't think I had any interest in politics. Do you remember the way in which voting was carried out? No. That's fair enough. The role of women - generally - is something I'd like to canvas with you for a moment. The little woman's place was in the home ... that sort of thing... Oh yes. That was very much so. She was the housewife. She looked after her children. No matter how many there might be - and in most cases there were quite a few. A woman's life was quite hard. I think that they were all respected. I think that if any boy or girl was disrespectful to a lady his father would give him a fair belting. That happened with us, I know. We were taught to respect women. But they were very hard working. I can remember my Mother, she was no different to most others ... there was a copper in the middle of the backyard. And she boiled a ... how the hell she ever did washing there's no way of knowing - and sheets and things and hung them on the line. As well as looking after a small business while Dad was away ... She brought up seven kids, too! In general, who owned the property? The man; the man and his wife ... I think joint ownership. Husbands and wives were very close ... and permanently close! There are some differences today ... Yes ... there was a lot of talk if a husband and wife separated. I remember my elder sister she had quite a size family. Her husband was a hell of a good bloke but alcohol beat him, for a lot of years, and what my sister put up with to keep her family together ... She didn't leave home. No. She stayed there and put up with the bashings that she got. That was characteristic of that time.

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What are your happiest memories? Things that stand out would be something you mentioned earlier - like a Sunday School picnic. And being involved in life-saving activities ... born into me ... running to the beach down Mordie Road on the gravel and ripping the ends off me toes because I only had one pair of shoes for a Sunday ... I have a granddaughter who moved into her new home a little over a week ago and the things they've got I say to them ... they sometimes say to me you've got as nice home and I say yes - I built this. I employed bricklayers. I cut every stick of wood in it - with a handsaw. I used something last Friday which has been hanging out in my shed for fifty years I suppose - an old hand brace. I used that for a little job for that granddaughter. In a sense, you are carrying on a tradition ... That's right. Where we lived, behind the shop, I think, by the time I can start to remember, my sisters were married - but, my older brother and myself we slept in a tent in the yard for quite a few years. And then there was a bungalow built, which was lined with hessian, with whitewash on it - there was a great thing to move in from the tent to the bungalow. Eventually there was another room built on to the house. But that didn't worry us. It was normal. What was the impact of market gardening in this particular area? I don't remember what you refer to as the potato farms in the back, but what I can remember, at the end of Thames Promenade, as school kids we used to go out there and get stuck into the maize cobs and they used to grow a lot of maize and cows. Apparently, in the earlier days, right through to Mordialloc, it was the original potato area for Melbourne. I did have a bit to do, later on, after the War, with the market gardens. I ran a fruit shop for seven years. In the Chelsea area, back off Wells Road, it was mostly dairying. I think the maize was to feed the cows. Cows and farms came to where the Aspendale-Edithvale RSL is. Dixons had their cows there. And there, further along, at the bottom of Thames Promenade, there was also a milk run. On the other side of Wells Road, it was mostly the family named Wells had that, down almost to the Carrum Creek. When the people came to the player-piano sessions, what sort of occupational representation was there? I wouldn't know. I can remember there was a very old retired gentleman, with his moustache, used to come up in his horse and jinker from Carrum to come and join in. And Gathercoles - people who came and did their shopping on a Saturday night - they'd come and join in and Mum used to belt out a bit of a song - Danny Boy or something - somebody would handle the customers while other were sitting round the piano.. I wouldn't know what their occupations were. In that business, how did the stock come? They had a wagonette ... horse and wagonette ... I don't think that they would go to Melbourne. They used to go to market gardens up as far as South Road, but that was after they got a motor vehicle, I think. Probably done by carrier. A mixed business. A little bit of everything. Rail services? They may have got some by rail I don't know. In those very early days, of course, it was a steam train. I can just remember the electric train starting I was outside the shop on Saturday night ... the two Musgrove boys used to be on the footpath selling Heralds - there

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was a hell of a crash - Freddie Carpenter, who used to deliver ice, one of the old hardnuts about there, he'd stalled his motor vehicle on the crossing. The train hit the truck, Freddie had jumped out. He didn't get hurt. But it pulled the train off the line and it took down two of those stanchions right outside of Hinchley's electrical shop. And, activities, I can remember my brother - older than me - I wasn't old enough at that time to frequent a place of bad repute, like a billiard saloon - (there used to be two in Chelsea, behind barbershops. There was Billy where Safeways is in Chelsea now . There was a hairdresser and tobacconist and behind there was a long room with possibly three tables and then, opposite the railway crossing at the Railway Station there was Tom Naylor, he had a barber shop and tobacconist and behind that he had a long room with several tables in it. We used to go to Boy Scouts' meetings. We were involved in Scouts and life saving - we didn't have any television to watch! I don't think we had so much homework, either, like the kids have today. The teacher taught us.