Family History WA

Cappawhite to Meekatharra

Is it a loaf of bread you be wanting, my lad? … Be you alone or have you a mate? Shure ‘tis hard times my boy, but take this and good luck. - Quoted from “Brodie”: Memoirs of Sir Laurence Brodie-Hall, Access Press, Northbridge, Western Australia, 1994, p39

Pake had seen it all before. Twenty years ago he had been there himself, walking for days, camping in any available shelter, chopping wood in exchange for a decent piece of fresh meat and the luxury of milk and sugar for his billy tea. He understood that glint in the eye – the prospect of the crock of gold at the end of the rainbow, his very own mining ‘show’. The 1901 census of Ireland had shown Pake Timoney as an electrical engineer’s indentured apprentice in Cork City, nineteen years old and sixty miles from his home village of Cappawhite, Tipperary. For twenty years electricity companies in Ireland had generated fragmented networks, some of them harnessing alternating current (AC) and others direct current (DC), according to location and the size and purpose of each grid. Pake’s training in Cork was DC-based, and of little value in the emerging AC networks in Australia. Pake had other skills acquired through his family’s central position as shopkeepers in Cappawhite since 1877. Their shop at the heart of the village, today occupied by the Centra grocery and convenience store, consisted then of a general store, bakery on the side, tavern at the rear and the family’s residence upstairs. The parched and dusty goldfields town of Meekatharra takes its name from an Aboriginal word meaning place of little water, and it was here that Pake called up the skills of his youth to bake the bread that filled the bellies of local gold prospectors and the travellers passing through. Many had no money to pay for what they ate, but Pake fed them anyway. He had learnt that some skills were universal, and bread was as much a staple in this semi-desert country as among the lush, green hills of County Tipperary. ~ Christine Timoney

Pake Timoney’s ‘Pioneer’ lease outside Meekatharra was located in front of the small hill on the horizon, extending left to the middle of the picture. Photo by the author 2017, from my private collection.

The Irish SIG in 2022

The next quarterly meeting of the Irish Special Interest Group (Irish SIG) at FamilyHistoryWA (FHWA) will be on 17 July 2022. The meeting will be online and will feature The Irish Settlement of Baker’s Flat - An Irish Community and Their Occupation of Common Land at Kapunda, South Australia, presented by Christine Cavanagh. New members and visitors are always welcome - simply book your place using the online booking site TryBooking, details below. FHWA also hosts many other face-to-face and online presentations, workshops and meetings, some for beginners and others for experienced researchers. Bookings are essential, and a small payment may be required for some events. See links below. We invite you to visit FHWA’s extensive library and resource centre at 6/48 May Street, Bayswater. Please consult the FHWA homepage for current opening hours, capacity limits and conditions of entry, if applicable. Happy and successful researching!

USEFUL LINKS

Contact Robyn O’Brien, Convenor Irish Special Interest Group: irish.sig@fhwa.org.au Book a place at the next Irish SIG meeting at TryBooking: trybooking.com/BLPZM Book for future FHWA events at trybooking.com/eventlist/genealogy Go digging for Irish resources at fhwa.org.au by selecting Interest Groups then Irish Join FamilyHistoryWA Facebook group – researching family worldwide, open to all. Join in the chat or ask a question. FamilyHistoryWA: fhwa.org.au T 08 9271 4311

World Irish Dancing Championships in Belfast from 10th to 17th April 2022

Congratulations to the incredible WA team who competed at 50th anniversary Oireachtas Rince Na Cruinne (World Irish Dancing Championships) in Belfast from 10th to 17th April 2022.

WA RESULTS:

Ciara Stobbie

The Academy MA/WA 29th Senior Ladies Dara McAleer The Academy MA/WA 5th Senior Ladies Sian Fitzgerald-Cain Trinity Studio Recall to day 2 Senior Ladies Shannon Kennedy Kavanagh Studio 34th Senior Ladies Sinead Daly The Academy MA/WA 45th 17 - 18yrs Maeghan Oldfield Kavanagh Studio 21 - 23yrs Niamh Leahy O’Hare School Recall to day 2 19 - 20yrs Caoimhe McAleer The Academy MA/WA 19 - 20yrs

Ciara Stobbie, Dara McAleer, Sian Fitzgerald & Shannon Kennedy. Dara McAleer.