John Huddleston Harvey - Grandpa's Story by Paul Harvey

Grandpa’s Stories

By Jack Harvey 1

Cover photograph by Warren Jacobs, reprinted with thanks from Discover Otago, Kowhai Publishing, Christchurch,1979.

Grandpa’s Stories By John Huddleston (Jack) Harvey

September 2001

Contact: Paul Huddleston Harvey 2/24 Chaleyer St ROSE BAY NSW 2029 AUSTRALIA

Acknowledgements I’d like to thank my daughter-in-law, Marta, who got things started, my wife, Margaret, who proof read for me and my son, Paul, who printed, published and got it all into book form. Thanks also to my cousins, Betty and Gwen, of Omakau and Chatto Creek, who have helped find a great many facts abour our grandparents back on the Huddleston side. Gwen’s daughter, Jill, aquired lots of information dating back to 1773 with her computer. Both Gwen and Jill have visited the graves of Grandpa William and his second wife, Janet, in Dunedin’s Northern Cemetery, paying their respects and planting daffodil bulbs. Thanks also to my cousin Joyce Harvey from Gore who was very helpful in finding information on the Harvey grandparents back on the Harvey side. Final thanks to my grandchildren who gave me the inspiration to start “Grandpa’s Stories”.

I hope I can be Trusty, loyal and helpful Brotherly, courteous and kind Obedient, smiling and thrifty And pure as the rustling wind (Scouts and Guides Promise)

Introduction

I was born in 1926 and grew up on Chestermains, a large property in Central Otago, New Zealand. It is in a very fertile part of the Manuheriki Valley near the town of Omakau. There were seven children in our family. I had two brothers, Alan and Lester, and four sisters, Chris Jean, Evelyn and Eddie. We also had three cousins who lived with us after their parents died: Mabel, Audrey and Rita. I still think of them as my sisters. My father George Harvey had bought the farm in 1896 from Ben Naylor who had a general store in Clyde. Mr Naylor used to stock his store with pork, mutton and dairy products supplied from Chestermains. Clyde was a thriving place in those days because the Clutha River was still in the middle of the big gold rush which had started in 1861. Every two days Mr Naylor’s wagon and horses used to drive the 20 miles out to Chestermains to pick up the fresh farm produce. The old stone pig styes, horseboxes and stables at Chestermains are still in excellent condition and were put to good use by my father until he died in 1936.

The main street of Clyde in Otago, 1868.

After dad died, my mother held the farm together with the help of a manager and later with my brother Lester and I until 1951 when the property was divided between myself and my brother. Lester purchased the homestead block with all the yards and sheds, and a large five bedroom house (developed into a private hotel) in beautiful sweeping gardens. On a farm the gardens were difficult to maintain and my mother worked far too hard to keep them up. I purchased Spottiswood, the other half of the property. It was 550 acres of beautiful irrigated land but had little improvements except two small houses. Spottiswood had no sheep yards or wool sheds so for the next years until I got my own wool shed I was virtually at my brother’s mercy and he let me know it. It was at this point that my mother and sister Jean, who did not marry, retired to Embo Street in Dunedin. At the time of writing, I have heard that many trees we put in at Spottiswood, long since grown fully adult, are looking very beautiful with their autumn tints. To hear this makes all that work, tree planting between 1949 and 1963, well worth while.

My Dad

My great grandfather, James Harvey, was born in 1796 and grew up to become a farmer near Dalry, Scotland. He married Ann Crawford (born 1806). Their son, John, my grandfather, was born at Dalry on 15 June 1840, the fourth of five children. Grandpa John married Jane Rodger at West Kilbride on 25 April 1862. Jane was born on 11 February 1842, the last of twelve children born to Andrew and Martha Rodger (married 18 August 1813). Andrew was born in Dalry around 1781 to Robert Rodger and Elizabeth Lord (married 2 September, 1767). My grandparents John and Jane, had emigrated from Dalry, Scotland in 1862 landing at Port Chalmers aboard the sailing ship Helenslee from Glasgow. They settled in the Kilmog area, a big hill north of Dunedin, taking over the old Kilmog Hotel (the old stables there still stand). Grandad John went across to the Australian goldfields and won a fortune - not in gold, but in a Tattersall’s lottery. Back home, he never forgot his friends on the Kilmog. He instructed the grocer, Jack Chesney of Waitati to annually supply his old neighbours with 5lb of tea, a bag of sugar, a sack of flour and other necessities. This was humorously called “Harvey’s Pension”. One Kilmog resident wrote, “My mother was once embarrased when John Harvey visited and stayed for tea. But she didn’t really need to worry as, despite his wealth, he was still a humble man. At the end of the meal he remarked, “I’ve been to many a banquet but I have never enjoyed a meal so much as this one with my old friends.” My father, George Harvey, was born around 1871 on the Kilmog. About five years later the family left the Kilmog in 1876 to farm on a new sub-division at Waikaka Valley in Southland. Dad was a small boy of five and walked behind the dray which carried all their belongings. He was the fifth child of a family of ten. John developed the farm in the Waikaka until his untimely death in 1880 at age forty. After farming at Nightcaps in Southland for some years Dad purchased Chestermains. He was a good business man as well as a farmer and was very tough but fair. I was always sorry for the men on the farm. They had a hut close to the house which catered for four beds, but for washing and showering, nil. They could use a hand basin in our house but seemed to like using a small stream at the back of the hut. The one hole toilet (thunderbox) was far too far away. Most of the farms were much the same. My father was known locally as “Concrete George” and was always building some large solid item of concrete. Either large concrete posts (24 or 30 inches square) or a new building in Omakau for rental. He built eight houses or shops in all. He was also well known as a high-up Mason, a judge at the Omakau Races and a keen man who displayed his Clydesdale horses at the local agricultural shows. The old stables at Chestermains had dozens of prize ribbons of all colours on the rafters. Dad and Charlie Wallington were prime movers in the consolidation of the schools. Their plan was to transport children by bus to the larger school at Omakau, alleviating the need for the several small one-teacher schools in the district. It all happened in 1933. Dad died of diabetes and heart disease in January 1936 at 65 years old. He was one of the early ones treated with insulin. I do not remember much of him because I was only nine when he died and he had been bed ridden for two or three years before that. I still remember the evening Dad died. I was still very young then. It was a Sunday evening in January and there were quite a few folk about. Our blackcurrants were ready for picking and Mum had invited friends and neighbours to go ahead and pick some for themselves. Also Andrew Scoular of the County Council was visiting Dad. All of a sudden I heard my mother crying loudly and realised something was amiss. Later when Dr Scrimagour arrived from Lauder in record time I heard him asking for planks to lay Dad on. It was the end of an era and another was about to begin.

Top: An advertisement for grandpa John’s Kilmog Hotel. Above: My paternal grandparents, John and Jane Harvey.

My Mum Mum’s mother’s family, the Wilsons, come from Scotland. In Kelso, Scotland, 1819, my greatgreat grandpa William Wilson, a spirit merchant, married Allison Stoddart. Of their children, my great-grandpa, William Wilson II, born 1824, went on to marry Helen Weldie in 1842. William and Helen had two children, my grandma Agnes, born in 1849, and Isobella. Helen died and William later married Janet Johnston in 1859. In Scotland, they had three more children before emigrating to New Zealand, leaving from Glasgow in 1864 on the sailing ship, Gala. Grandma Agnes was then aged about 15 years. Settling in Otago, great grandparents William and Janet had another four children. He worked as a stockman at Puketori Station in the Manitoto region. Later they lived in Dunedin, he working for NZ Rail. Grandma Agnes did not have things easy. She had three husbands, my mother, Esther, being a child of her third marriage. Her first husband Joseph Norman was known for bringing one of the two water races along the Dunstan Range to Tinkers (later renamed Matakanui). You can still see the races cut along the hills in and out of gullies but long out of use. Joseph and Agnes had five children: Liz, William, Emily, Isobella and Harry. Before her first marriage, Agnes could not read or write and it was Joseph who taught her. After he fell ill and died she had to hire a man to run their diggings in the gold field. Agnes’ next marriage was to John Grubb of Tinkers. They had two children: Jessie who died at an early age, and Nancy, who later married a Mr Kirkaldy and lived in Scotland for some years before returning to New Zealand. John died at an early age and there is not much more information about him. Grandmother’s third marriage was to Christopher Huddleston in 1881, at the Manse in Alexandria. They initially lived on Manchester farm, Omakau. Christopher was a blacksmith and well known as a good singer, a popular act at fundraising concerts. Agnes and Christopher had six children together: Mary, Esther (my mother) born in 1883, Lester, Christopher (Tom), Robert and Earnest. Both Robert and Lester fought in the First World War. Their marriage lasted 31 years with grandpa Christopher dying as a result of an accident when driving a light cart. The horse was a new one and rather frisky. It is thought that grandpa broke his neck in a fall from the cart while bending down trying to retrieve the reins. The horse and cart arrived home, alone. Uncle Tom was the first to see it and hurried back to where the accident happened at Spottis Creek. My grandma Agnes happened to be visiting my mother (now married to George Harvey) at Chestermains that afternoon. I am sure she must have been overwhelmed with sorrow at losing her third husband and she died in 1915, three years later, aged 66. Agnes and Christopher are buried together in the Dry Bread cemetery and I regret not knowing of this until Gwen or Betty’s recent letters.

Mum’s dad’s family, the Huddlestons, come from England. My great-great-great-grandpa Thomas Huddleston married Jane Giles in 1774 in Slaidburn, Yorkshire. The youngest of their nine children, my great-great grandpa Christopher Huddleston, grew up to be a wheelwright and married Ellen Holdgate in 1816.

The third of Christopher and Ellen’s six children, great grandpa William Huddleston, grew up to be a carter and married Mary Smith, a weaver, in 1842. William and Mary had six children of whom my grandpa Christopher was the fifth, born in 1851. Grandpa Christopher’s family lived in Bury, England. His father, great grandpa William, followed the gold rush and travelled initially out to Australia and then to New Zealand, arriving at Port Chalmers in 1863 on the sailing ship, St Clair. He was quite successful with the gold mining and died back in England in the early 1870s. Grandpa Christopher then travelled out to New Zealand, arriving at Port Chalmers in 1874 on the sailing ship, Dunfillan. He later met and married grandma Agnes. My mother, Esther, was the second of their six children. Mother was the most generous and warm hearted woman I have known. She became sick only once. That was when we arrived back from a holiday in Timaru after staying with Jean and Clare Whitefield. I went down with measles first and a day or two later my mother started to show a rash. She got very sick and I think it was touch and go for some days. The steam came up in clouds when the girls changed mum’s sheets. But she was a survivor. The hardest knock she had to take was when dad died. My other brother Alan took dad’s death very badly and gradually developed schizophrenia. Alan was a great bloke and his illness hit me badly, along with Dad’s death. In 1938, with so much worry Jean and Mum decided to take a world trip for three or four months. They were nearly on the ship ready to depart when Chris called them back because Alan had worsened. What a pity they couldn’t have gone as they couldn’t help in the circumstances.

The Dunfillan, launched in 1868 at Glasgow, was the ship which took grandpa Christopher Huddleston to New Zealand in 1874.

Mum was very kind hearted. During the depression there was a work camp for workers on the nearby irrigation scheme not far away. A gang of about ten of them would have the job of digging by hand the distributor races (not even a horse and scoop). My mother would get the girls to supply them with pots of soup or Irish stew. How that would be welcomed on a cold winters day! I remember one of them (they called themselves navvies) saying “what a big hearted woman Mrs Harvey is.” I think Mum thought it a privilege to help these men. It was in the middle of the slump and through no fault of their own their business may have gone bust or they may have been thrown out of their job. Luckily many farmers helped them with firewood because the winters were very cold. The huts they had only had timber three foot from the ground, otherwise it was canvas walls and a corrugated iron roof. My mother was also a good communicator and conversationalist and a liberal amount of talk of local topics went on at meal times. I did get a surprise one day as I walked up behind her when she was having trouble with a couple of clucky chooks she was setting on eggs. Her swearing really shocked me. Another time it was myself who was on the receiving end. At the end of the war some of the local boys who had been in the army had quite a few army issue condoms to give away. Mum decided to press my suit before a dance. There happened to be condoms in the pocket and mum found them and I was in trouble. Imagine me an eighteen year old lining up for a large spoon of castor oil. It was a different world then! It was important for my mother to teach the hens to perch in the two fowl houses out of the frost instead of in the trees. She used to rope in all available helpers, usually in the May holidays when John and Dave were about and we would after a few weeks to teach them it was much better that way. While doing this one afternoon a very frightening earthquake struck. There was a loud noise that made the horses charge round the paddock. Then the ground seemed to move in waves and I swore the chimneys would be gone on the house but luckily there was little damage. It was the worst one I had ever experienced. There was 6 inches of snow on the ground. Also my mother took in my Aunt Mary’s family when she died early so that was an extra three or four some of the time. So it was nearly a “cheaper by the dozen” family. Not forgetting the farm workers, at least three or four, counting the cow (milking) boy. Mum was known as Auntie Esther to a wide circle of relations. Our relatives near Omakau were the Naylors, the Duggans, the Huddlestons, the Greenbanks, the Normans, the Harveys, the Masons, the Alexanders and the Berrys. Relations on my father’s side were nearly all located near Waikaka Valley and Gore. These included many Harveys and Whitefields. As someone said, they, the Southland people were more Scottish than the Scots. I mean in their friendliness and speech (a lovely Scottish burr). The Whitefield family were always very close friends with the Harveys of Chestermains. What a lot of chin wagging went on in those good old days!

Early days at Chestermains In my very early years my dad would take me for trips to Omakau and I was always shouted a raspberry drink at Frank Perkin’s hotel. Dad had on old ‘curtain’ car and at that stage there could not have been petrol bowsers in the area. He had a special shed where petrol was kept in four gallon drums. They arrived, two to a special wooden case. Later there were hand operated bowsers in Omakau and each gallon could be seen as it was pumped up into a correctly measured glass container. It would then be released down the hose and into the car. Very modern. I remember when young, Aunty Nance decided she would make some ice cream. It was before we had refrigerators. It was winter so a mixture was whipped up and one of the boys was conscripted to break off some icicles from the gutter around the roof. It worked like a charm. We went to Cromwell by train once to see Kingsford-Smith’s “Southern Cross” and also a smaller one he was using to take people on joy flights. It must have been a special train and about six of us were taken up for the trip. I remember Russell Milne had a joy flight. Another event in my early years, about six years old, nearly ended in tragedy for myself. My brothers and sisters had just come in from tennis. It was a Saturday evening and I was asked to go out to the kitchen and turn on the electric kettle for a cup of tea. I proceeded to do this but a drink bottle on the pot-cupboard took my interest first. Unknown to me the drink bottle contained spirits of salts which was used for plumbing purposes and was a deadly poison which would have burned my insides out. I nearly put the bottle to my lips then I thought I would have more manners and put the drink in a cup. I got the cup to my lips but then smelled the strong odour. Although my lips were burned, I didn’t actually drink any.

The old front gates at Chestermains homestead.

This photo of the beautiful old Chestermains homestead shows just some of the gardens that mum maintained.

An arial photograph of Chestermains farm, probably taken in the 1950s.

The adults weren’t quite sure of this and Mum rushed me in the car to my Dad’s nurse who was with her sister in Omakau. She poured much saline water down my throat but I just would not be sick. On the way back home, I said to my mother, “That was an exciting trip, wasn’t it.” Mum had a sense of humour too. She used to say, “He must have been behind the door when good looks were being given out.” Somehow I sensed she gave me a quick look whenever she said it! I was then about seven years old and because by now my father was quite ill, the men on the farm would always try to entertain my brothers and I. About this time I was given a ride on Bob Sutherland’s traction engine. I had a straw hat on and suddenly found I was on fire. My straw hat had gotten a spark in it. Bob used the traction engine for his thrashing machine and also for some gold mining but he didn’t ever strike much gold. Two of the men who worked on the farm, an Irishman named Mick and a Scotsman named George worked from when I was six months old till after the war when I was nearly twenty years old. George, who went to the two wars, was very good to me. From when I was nine years old we used to bike all over the place to the good fishing spots after trout. Thompson’s Gorge, Poolburn Gorge and Manaburn Dam were popular fishing spots. My three sisters who married were pleased to miss all the work that the house (hotel) entailed. Luckily I had three very nice brothers-in-law, all of whom I had the highest respect for. At Chestermains there seemed no end to the meals and cups of tea that were supplied to all the workers and guests. The guests were fat lamb buyers, stock and station agents and also relatives who often stayed four or five weeks at time. I felt sorry for my ever busy mum who preferred to be outdoors in her garden. For years she carried water in buckets to revive her plants. Roses and dahlias were very special. I was called in to help when I had time. As time went on, her job was improved by the addition of a heavy black hose which was very long and had to be pulled around the front. (Not really much of an improvement) We also had a large apple orchard of about eighty trees. Because of frosts some years there was no fruit. The area between the trees was kept cultivated each year and was used for potatoes and other vegetables.

Chestermain’s old stables and looseboxes, built around 1870. One of the boys brought me back a small stone from the stables front wall on one of their recent visits.

Mum always had a long row of rhubarb! One year I grew three hundred plants of strawberries but although it was a lovely crop not many were picked because a wet season caused the fruit to go mouldy. After the war while I was at Chestermains, about 1946, we got a large lawn mower with a long electric lead which was run into the house. Because of the big area of lawn this was a big help. Trouble was, I used to somehow manage to cut the lead now and again. Luckily no shocks. I was given a chance in 1940 to go to Waitaki Boys High School at Oamaru for a secondary education. Although I had some homesickness I still enjoyed my two and a half years there. I had to return to start work on the farm in the middle of 1942 because most of the workers had been called up for service both in New Zealand and overseas. My starting wage was 25 shillings with keep (board) and one weeks annual leave. When I arrived home from school at Waitaki I was pleased to be the driver of our new Massey Harris tractor which were being mass produced in the USA for the war effort. It turned out that our horses would be retired two or three years later. The team of horses often pulled me out when I was bogged down. Mick the teamster, would yelp with joy when I went down to the axles. He wouldn’t say “God save Ireland,” he would say “God save my horses!” Before the war Mrs Brittain lived in one of the cottages near Chestermains. She had two sons: Bricky and Joe (who was always saying he had one foot in the grave and the other on a banana skin).

Mrs Brittain let me play with her old HMV gramophone which had a lovely large trumpet on it. Trouble was I had to keep winding it as the spring mechanism was broken. About this time my father bought a new car; a Chrysler 1934 model. Once it caught on fire but was put out by one of my brothers with an old coat. The car had a lot of use up until my mother purchased a new Citroen in 1945. The Chrysler had no luggage boot but had a carrier rack about four foot by two that one could tie suitcases to. As the car had no draw bar, we used the carrier rack to occasionally lash and pull the trailer. A few years later, I was pulling the trailer down to Omakau with Tom Curruth’s heavy saw bench in it. I got up too much speed and the car was thrown all over the road. As I looked in the rear view mirror the trailer was nearly on its side. The carrier was not meant for towing and had given the trailer about two foot of sideways play where it was attached. When working on the farm during and after the war, Harry Inghram and then Hopper Robertson had an old chaff cutter running off an old, old McCormack-Deering tractor with solid rubber tyres. On a hot day the work on the chaff cutter was very dusty and if the wind was blowing (as it often was), it would get up your nose and down your back and neck. It must have been very unhealthy for the men working. One morning with very hard frost in the air, Hopper was trying to align the tractor with the chaff cutter. They needed to be lined up so that the big long belt, running from the tractor to the cutter, would stay on its pulleys. Because of poor traction in the snow, Hopper had fitted the tractor’s solid tires with metal cleats – several small steel blocks attached to each wheel. When each wheel came around, the tractor would jump up in the air. As well as this, Hopper had a boil on his bottom, making it all very difficult for him. Watching, we hid our faces because we didn’t want him to know we were splitting our sides, holding back the laughter.

The Harvey boys: Allan (left), Lester (at rear), and yours truly, photographed around 1933.

My primary school days I must tell you about my first day at school. My second cousin, George, also started the same day. Because of our young age, we were allowed to amuse ourselves for the last hour of school. I must have known something from a visit with mum the previous day because I led George through the fence and through one of the windows into the lounge room of Mrs Lester’s house. There we went to a cushion on the chaise lounge and underneath was hidden a tin of biscuits. George and I had our fill as Mrs Lester was a great cook. Next day at school, the other children were giving us dirty looks and I knew we had been sprung. George and I felt like little crims with our eyes downcast and our hands trembling. It was a pathetic picture and it was days before we were treated with some respect. This all happened at Spottis Creek School. It was only half a mile from our house. My father had given the Education Board free use of the land. He was also able to rent one of the two small cottages to the school teacher which was a pretty foxy move. My teachers over those years were good and bad. The men, Charlie Harman and Rex Cuthbert, were very good but the woman teacher was Daisy and she had virtually no control over us. The ceiling of the one room school in Daisy’s time was covered with darts made from pen nibs and paper very cleverly thought out. There must have been nearly forty of them and it was a bit hard on the box of nibs. The ring leader in this event I will not name. When at Spottis Creek School one morning, we had an extra ten or so pupils arrive at the door. They had decided that Ophir (Blacks) School was not very good and as Spottis Creek was not too much extra distance, they would try it. I don’t know whether the teacher was very happy with the situation but he took them in.

Some of them included Russell and Murray Milne and Col Gallagher. All from Omakau, Col had a pony and a small sulky. The rest followed behind. Sometimes they held on to save energy or save time. Around this time, my brothers and sisters used to run home for lunch. When I went, I would take my empty school bag and before going back to school would fill it up with apples from our car shed. It had netting shelves covered with straw to keep the frost out. Also mice, but we didn’t worry too much about that in those days. I think I took seventeen apples and gave one to each child at the school. I don’t know how long that lasted but Russell Milne always remembered and said there couldn’t be that much wrong with me! No one learnt much in Daisy’s time but the school was about to be shifted in sections down to Omakau and we were all about to get a good shake up.

At boarding school I began my stay at Waitati Boys High School in February, 1940. I had done well at Omakau School and went into Form 3A under Mr Cyril Deaker. I hoped to do a professional course and be an architect. Perhaps I was aiming too high because my marks were not very good. The school comprised a boarding department of 150 boys and about 250 day pupils. We ran about three miles after rising, to be followed by a cold shower, cold swim or both. To copy some of the other boys, I swam the width of the pool when there was ice forming at the edges. Only the once though. Inside the bath-house seemed much warmer. Of course, anyone who had received the cane could not hide the fact in there. I think caning was overdone at Waitaki. In my first term I got the cane from the head prefect for my socks not being pulled up. I was sure I didn’t deserve it. One day word went around that a boy had broken a girl’s arm in the school bus coming from Maheno. The rector Frank Millner gave him 25 on the backside and then passed the cane over to another master to carry on. I think the boy got 70 in all. It seemed unjust to me that the girl hadn’t been tested for chalky bones beforehand. I got the cane for various misdemeanours. Once, I got three for talking in class, meted out by the old French master, Tracker Hargraves; that was in third year. In my fourth year I was caught red-handed with notes in my blotter in an exam and wasn’t given the treatment until I got back after the holidays; given by Dr Scotter, the history master with red leanings. After school I often went smoking and luckily never was caught. To kill time, my friend, Benji Latta, who was later a stock agent in Omakau, and I would often go and have a smoke before tea time. One time, I was caught with tobacco in a weekend camp at Wainakarua. We had walked miles to get it the previous night and I should have been more careful. It was treated quite seriously and I think I got about 5 whacks with the cane. I didn’t blame the master as he was a very nice person and the whole school was in mourning when he was killed in a Spitfire over Europe 10 months later. His name was Jackie Paape. Now that we know how bad smoking is, kids, my advice would always be to keep away from smoking. Also they are now so expensive they will spoil your bank balance.

Our headmaster, termed ‘rector’ in those days, was Mr Frank Milner. Luckily I did not have to face him at any time. He was a very well educated man and an outstanding orator. He was so good with words he seemed able to invent new ones on the spot. In our morning assemblies in the beautiful ‘Hall of Memories” I don’t think there were many of us who didn’t look forward to The Man’s interpretation of world events and the current war situation. It was funny how our organist would change from the popular tunes to more suitable ones when he got near. On Saturday mornings we had to keep clear of the common room or thereabouts because The Man would be about looking to gather a team to work on the so-called Burma Road. It was a new drive in the back part of the beautiful gardens. I was only commandeered once. Usually I was out on the tennis court and was quite safe there. Frank Milner died as he lived. He dropped dead while making a speech at the opening of a sports pavilion. A lot of Waitakians would have shed tears that morning when the news came over the radio. While at school I heard rumours that the headmaster’s son, Hugh Milner, was a spy. He certainly had communist leanings. I was sorry for the family. It was later, around 1960, that a book came out proving he had been a spy. I didn’t read it. Joe Hendra was one of our excellent masters at Waitaki. He also was killed in the war. We all used to be on our toes when it came to Joe and our book-keeping classes. He had a ruler handy which he used on the back of the hand of any pupil who was not paying attention. But he had a lot of jokes, one that I remember was about all the hats his wife had bought.

Waitaki Boy’s High School, founded in 1878. 20

We all seemed to get good marks in book-keeping each term and his death was a great loss to the teaching profession and his country. One teacher (master) I didn’t want to get the cane off was Eggs Hall. He had a dire reputation and hit so hard that he was only allowed to give three hits. After three, too many kids were known to have fainted. He was near retirement but still had bright ginger hair. Whether his reputation was deserved or not, I don’t know as I was lucky enough to avoid finding out. A hard case who taught us the fine points of wood work was Mr Woodley. He was a large elderly man who would tell anyone taking it easy, that they would get corns on their bums. I also remember that when it was breezy and the door had been left open, he would say, “Would someone put that block of wood in the doorway!” Because of the war, we started to see one or two female teachers about. They mainly taught agriculture classes as they were not considered as important as ‘professional’ classes. For male students, we seemed to prefer the masculine presence and guidance of male teachers. Over the following few decades the school became co-educational, definitely a backward step. Every Sunday we had to walk into Oamaru to go to church. I remember hard white collars with studs and school ties that stuck in the windpipe. And it was such a long walk, three miles there and three miles back on the railway track. Each Sunday evening we had to write a letter home. Two pages we were told, so two pages it was. This was a good idea as it generally meant we’d receive a letter back each week. It was also good practice for the future.

The war years During the war years I was called home from school back to Chestermains to help with the war effort. My older brother decided to put in a hundred acres of wheat and this was my first introduction to our new Massey-Harris tractor. Our first problem with the wheat was the actual tractor. It couldn’t seem to pull the plough. We realised that it needed water in the rear tyres to help gain weight and therefore, grip. Once this was fixed, we found we needed additional grip because of the ground being very boggy in places and fixed “grippers” to the sides of each wheel. Sometimes it was so boggy I had to call on Mick the teamster to pull me out. With discs and harrows we gradually got the ground ready for sowing the wheat. Our next trouble was that the wrong type of wheat was sown. This caused a great deal of trouble when it came to harvesting. When ready, this particular crop had to be cut by a binder and put into carefully placed stooks. The grain would be shaken out if the wheat was left exposed to our strong nor’ westers. It was a very wet season and the stooks already prepared couldn’t be left unattended. They had to be continually turned to keep as dry as possible and not rot. When all was ready we had to come through with the header going from stook to stook. Because of the stalky nature of the wheat, the header seemed to jam continually. Eventually we had to call in three soldiers from a camp in Becks to help with the wheat. After the header had thrashed the grain into sacks we still had the problem of rain. We then had to keep turning any wet sacks to try and keep them dry. At one point I was accused of being soft on the army boys and letting them have longer than the usual ten minute smoko breaks. But I reasoned I was the one who had to work with them, after all.

Early in the war years our local mechanic in the garage caused damage to the Chrysler by screwing in the spark plugs too hard and taking the thread off the aluminium head. The other trouble was that the reverse gear had broken and was not repairable during the war. If anyone parked nose in to the kerb it was often hard to find enough people to push it back out onto the road. Near the end of the war I managed to track down a cog through the daily paper. During the war, Ken Leask was taking a few of us twice weekly to lectures in Alexandra for the Air Training Corp. To us the ATC was the Afternoon Tea Club! Ken would use Tin Lizzy, his Model T Ford, to take us in. I’m sure he had a more modern car but he didn’t use it on the ATC nights. Four or five of us would pile in and the journeys would often be so cold we’d have to take blankets to make the trip bearable. Approaching Alexandra, there was a steep twisty hill called Bruces Hill. Tin Lizzy would have to go to low gear to climb it. Some nights one of us called Jimmy would hop out and run beside us as we were going so slowly. The Model-T only had two actual gears. Its transmission was a system of belts and you can imagine how much noise it made when it took off and got going. One night Ken kindly took us to a dance at Cromwell. My mother and sisters were very worried when we weren’t home by 4am. They didn’t have a car as I had previously taken the old Chrysler a couple of miles down the road. Waiting up, all of a sudden they heard the bang, bang of the Model T coming over Tiger Hill. They could all relax. I was back to fight another day. Another very enjoyable time we had, my cousins Bruce, Pat and I made a long trip on our motor bikes to Glenorchy where my Aunt Jean and Uncle Alex had a cattle property. Their farm, called Paradise or Arcadia, was right at the head of Lake Wakatipu, in the shadows of the Southern Alps. Sheelite was mined there for the war effort.

The Matakanui Peace Hall, where many a fine dance was held. It was also the local tennis club and the posts for the court net still stand. The boys believed that inside the hall there was an old mounted machine gun, a relic of the war, but I don’t remember it.

The old Newtown Hotel at Matakanui, an old gold mining town originally known as “Tinkers”.

I had a worn old Zenith I had acquired after being in Tairi Air Force Camp for a couple of weeks in the Air Training Corps. On the way to Glenorchy I got a puncture and after failure in trying to fix it, I got a ride on Pat’s motor bike. After steaming up the lake in the Earnslaw, we were picked up by Dave and John Morgan and whisked off to the farm. We had a lovely big plate of fresh blackberries and Dave had some great stories of the wild cattle up there. They had escaped up into the bush and would charge anyone. Apparently, you had to always be careful and have a tree handy. The stories had us young blokes in fits of laughter. Regretfully, I never got back to see my Aunt and Uncle again. I got a ride with Bruce back to Cromwell where I had to buy a new tube. I had to stay the night there and went back next day by taxi to fix the bike. A day late for work, oh dear me. It had been a long day out, extended to two. Another story during the war years, worth relating, regards the coldest day I have experienced. We had to get up at five am to help load our cattle onto rail cars at the Omakau railway station. The temperature was four degrees below zero. We tried to start the old Chrysler with hot water but it froze as it went in to the radiator. No go. Then we tried to start the tractor hoping to the pull the car but the tractor had frozen up too. In the finish we gave up and went into the living room. The fire there was always very poor so we had to run around the table till breakfast time at seven thirty am. It was no good going back to bed as we would have frozen more. Luckily the rail workers loaded the beasts on themselves so the problem was solved. That extreme frost killed a lot of pine trees twenty foot or more in height. No wonder Australian gum

trees will not grow in Central Otago. Every twenty or thirty years there are similar extremely hard frosts which literally burn them off. I must mention the “Matakanui Peace Hall”. It was first built, after the First World War in about 1920. Shortly after it was completed, a real Central Otago nor’ wester came up and was so strong that the whole structure was blown flat. Like many other local buildings, it was made of sun-dried brick and timber with a corrugated iron roof. Those miners were not to be defeated so it was put up again. This time, wires were put over the top and the whole thing was tied down so there would be no repeat performance. It is still there today, unused and lonesome, with the old tennis courts close by and overgrown with weeds. Those courts were where Verdun Donnelly learned the game to then become junior champion of New Zealand. The hall was used a lot during the Second World War and had a floor that was unique for square dancing (the Lancers and the Alberts). Whether intentionally designed that way, it sprung up and down about six inches. But it was claimed to be safe and never did let us down. During the later part of the war, after a few of us had been stationed at Taieri Air Force base, I purchased the Zenith motorbike. My cousin George and I went for a trip out north of Dunedin for about 20 miles. I was stopped by a police patrolman who reckoned he could tell (I don’t know how) that I was a new boy having my first ride. All the documentation was okay so away we went. George and I had nearly returned to the bike shop where I had purchased the beast when we came to a very poorly lit intersection. We had right of way but a car coming from our left decided to shoot through in front of us. No such luck. I couldn’t find the foot brake in time and we hit the rear of the car. Both of us went over the handle bars and took the knees out of our new uniforms. The car took off pretty smartly as they knew they were partly to blame. George and I picked ourselves up with little else wrong but a few bruises. That night we put the bike on the train to Central Otago as I felt it might not go the distance. From Omakau it was just a case of running George home from the train. What a dud of a bike! It needed a brand new carburettor but of course that was impossible in war-time. Some time after the war my sister Chris and I saw Gracie Fields performing and singing in Dunedin. She was getting on in years but could still do cartwheels across the stage. Two or three years later I saw South Pacific with my mother and sister Jean. It was a great show!

The Hyde train smash The Hyde train smash deserves a mention. The Dunedin Winter Show, held on the Queen’s Birthday weekend was always a popular event for country people. I decided I would like to go on the Friday train from Omakau to Dunedin. Unbeknown to me, because of the expected large crowds of passengers, my sister Chris reserved me a seat. This put me in the second last carriage which was made out of steel, the other ones being made of wood. I was pleased to be seated next to Jack Noone who I had been to high school with. At Ranfurly we had a 30 minute stop for tea and sandwiches. There was also a change of the train crew. The new crew taking over had been in the hotel for some time and apparently were quite intoxicated. Once the train left Ranfurly and was on its way south to Dunedin, many of the passengers became alarmed at the train’s speed and the way it was swaying. Jack and I didn’t really notice. The steel-built car ran a lot smoother than the wooden ones and we had three English merchant seamen performing with song and guitar. The first I realised something was amiss was when the carriage left the tracks and was bouncing along on the sleepers. Then all of a sudden our carriage shot up and over the wreckage of the forward carriages and we came to rest at a 45 degree angle. The wooden carriages were virtually match wood. We quickly discovered what damage our steel one had caused ramming into them from behind. We started to pull bodies from the wreckage, many of them terribly mutilated.

A photograph taken of the crash site, taken the following day.

On a recent trip across to NZ, I took the opportunity to visit the Hyde crash site. The Dunedin-Alexandra train line is now closed; the tracks have been taken up and the route converted into a tourist hiking and bicycle trail.

The crash had happened in a cutting after a long downhill section of the line around four miles south of Hyde. Because of the cutting, the train had nowhere to go except into one big heap around a hissing engine, the old steam variety. It was a wonder we didn’t have a big fire as well. I had travelled to the dentist at Ranfurly in the guard’s van a few weeks prior to the crash and had noticed a collection of tools needed in case of an accident in a glass fronted case. Now, after the crash, my first thought was to get the tools as they would be of help in rescuing the trapped and injured passengers. When I got back to the guard’s van the guard was sitting on the steps and was quite incoherent. I got the tools and took them back forward to where the rescue work was beginning. It took a very long time to get outside help and there didn’t seem to be many passengers still able-bodied. There were about seventy or eighty passengers, lying about injured. I wasn’t feeling the cold and I lay out my jacket on one of them for warmth. When I later went to get it the person had been taken away to Ranfurly Hospital. I did get it a week or so later and all was okay including my wallet. The death toll was eighteen at the crash site and three in hospital. Other school friends from Waitaki were also on the train and some had bad injuries. The crash was recently remembered in a Central newspaper:...

HYDE TRAIN DISASTER Grant McMillan’s first train trip 55 years ago is etched in his memory. A schoolboy then, he is one of a dwindling band the survivors of the Hyde railway disaster of June 4, 1943, in which 21 passengers died. “We seemed to be going faster than I imagined a train would. Luggage was falling off the racks and people were looking a bit uneasy as we went round the bends,” he recalls. Just after 1.30 on that Friday afternoon the train, heading for the Dunedin Winter Show with 117 passengers, left the small Central Otago station of Hyde. Minutes later, while heading through Straw Cutting, the engine overturned and five of the seven passenger carriages piled up in a mangled wreck behind. Grant, in the second compartment of the fourth carriage, felt an enormous lurch and then darkness. “I was unconscious for about an hour. Then I could hear voices calling out and thought I could hear the crackling of fire, but luckily it was just escaping steam.” Pinned under the debris he had no feeling in his legs and knew that if a fire started he would perish. “I had the wind up, but eventually we were hauled out. One of the rescuers was a bloke I’d been at school with.” On the bank, high above the wreck, the injured were tended by farmers, Home Guard members, and local GPs. The mid-winter afternoon was cold for the 46 injured, but gradually - and much too slowly for the injured - more medical and relief services arrived. “There were some awful injuries. On the bank we saw the odd person covered up, so we knew some were dead,” Grant remembers. He was eventually taken by taxi to Ranfurly Hospital and arrived as darkness was closing in. While praise for the people of the Manitoto was unstinting, the inquiry into the accident revealed a horror story. Railway staff, working long hours during the war years, were given insufficient time for a sleep between shifts and some filled in break-time having a few drinks at the Ranfurly Hotel. The driver, a popular and respected World War I veteran, was later to serve three years preventive detention for his actions. By the next day Ranfurly Hospital was like a battlefield hospital with about 30 injured patients cramming the wards. Alan Aldred, now retired in Nelson, was in his last year as a medical student. He remembers the Hyde disaster as his first big accident. “We’d taken serum because we knew there were some bad burns. One leg with gangrene had to be amputated. I was very much an understudy to surgeons Gordon Bell and Renfrew White. After we’d set the broken bones they returned to Dunedin and I spent the next couple of days sewing up cuts and stitching on ears.” He believes many of those who perished died of shock. The exposure to cold during the long wait on the embankment probably reduced their chances of survival. The Hyde tragedy was the worst in New Zealand’s railway history until the Tangiwai disaster of 1953. It is not well remembered as wartime events dominated the news in June 1943 with New Zealand troops celebrating victory in the Western Desert. Now, 55 years on, Hyde is remembered mainly by the people of Maniototo. A cairn bearing the names of the victims was erected at the site in 1993 and now only a few of those who survived remain. But they cannot forget the Hyde crash and the stories which came from it: The baby who survived unscathed; the soldier killed a few miles from home as he set out for overseas service; the heroic rescue efforts of the Gimmerburn rugby team travelling in a rear carriage.

Omakau At Chestermains soon after the war I purchased a black Singer sports car which had a removable hood. After a few months I realised it wasn’t a suitable car for either farm or Central Otago conditions. We had a visitor that Christmas and he called my Singer, the “Little Soprano”. One evening on the way to the hotel at Omakau I ran off the road and into a ditch, nearly tipping right over. I then realised that one had no protection if this happened and if it did happen both driver and any passengers would be badly injured if not killed. Also another time with the Singer, after playing tennis at Ranfurly at a tournament and heading back home in a nor’ westerly gale, the whole hood was nearly blown clear off. We all had to hold on to it and hope for the best. The thing looked like a big sail. On the farm one day, I had the car parked close by to where we were dipping sheep. After all the sheep were run through the dip, I decided to put the dogs through to help get rid of their ticks and lice, etc. This was fine but the first place they seemed to race to was the little Singer. They hopped straight in and spread sheep dip all over the little car. It wasn’t very nice. In my younger days I played a lot of tennis – or as much as farming would allow. I remember at one annual general meeting of the Omakau Tennis Club there couldn’t have been many present and I was made president. I was destined to hold the position for some years. The previous president, Francis Donnelly, was a good speech maker. He always started his speeches with “As mouthpiece of the tennis club, ..”. Francis had secured the privilege of selling beer at the local Agriculture and Produce Show at Omakau which helped ensure the tennis club’s financial viability. The trouble was when the new building for the show had been put up, they hadn’t allowed for the bar. I remember having to get up very early in the morning of the show and erect a wooden frame over which we would spread a tarpaulin to shade the drinkers. I knew that no matter how the show went, at the end of the day I would be exhausted.

My friends, George Naylor and Jack Tippet, at Spottiswood after our final duck shoot in 1963.

Tennis was one of our main social events. One time after a match over at Ranfurly, we all stopped for the dance afterwards. I was driving the old ’34 Chrysler and of course we couldn’t go to the dance without having a few drinks beforehand. So we purchased a carton of beer and had it in the car. As it turned out, we should have been a bit further from the dance hall. I was dancing away inside when Jock came in with the news that the others had been caught drinking and the beer was confiscated to the police station. Also, the constable wanted to see me, the driver. So we all lined up in front of the man himself and I admitted to being the driver. He had a good look at me and said “Well, I can see you are quite sober,” and we all nearly burst out laughing. At any rate, he was a good man because before leaving for home, we were told to pick up the beer. Everyone was happy and the night turned out to be a memorable one. I don’t remember much about the tennis but what a great night among friends over 50 years ago. ‘Chestermains’, the family farm, was divided up between my brother Lester and I after mum retired to town in 1951. My 550 acres was known as ‘Spottiswood’. My right hand man and myself moved into the two roomed house in which my brother, his wife and children had been living. Both of us were bachelors and were to put up with each other for the next five years. He would have stayed longer but I worked him a bit hard. We soon learnt how to make milk from powder and heat up meat pies. When heating pies for shearers and shed workers earlier on in the piece, I burnt the lot. All the crew were very understanding. We had a disconcerting freshwater well positioned up against our kitchen which occasionally would run dry in hot weather. As per the advice of one of the fellows in the pub, I decided to improve the flow with a stick of gelignite. The explosive didn’t go off so I had to climb down the well and try again. Although our little exercise proved to be quite dangerous, it did actually help the flow of water. On Spottiswood, we were the first in our area to shear sheep in August, before lambing. This was a great step forward in sheep farming in many ways.

Margaret, aged about 17, pictured with her horse on her parent’s farm at Chatto Creek.

It was in about 1948 that some of us headed up to see the newly opened Coronet Peak ski fields. There were four of us: my sister Jean and her friend Barbara Duggan, and my cousin Bruce and myself. We all enjoyed ice skating, even Jean who had broken her ankle in the war years while learning to skate. Back then, she had hobbled for two miles before I could help her. We left Omakau in the morning having to drive nearly 80 miles. We found the large car park but mistook the track to the bottom of the chair lifts and ended up walking up the old Shotover Road. Unbelievably, we walked for miles upon miles, eventually coming to a very old hotel, the “Welcome Home Hotel.” We thought our host may have run us back in his old car but the battery was being used in his radio. By the time we had walked all the way back down to the car park, skiers were already coming off the slopes. It was a bad start at to our learning the finer points of skiing. Our next trip to Coronet Peak was in 1951. Three of us from the footy club: Owen, George and myself headed off in my new Morris truck. This time we knew where to go and like a bull out of a gate, were all lined up for our sets of skis, etc. I took the bull by the horns and went right up the three sets of lifts to the top. Then I had to get down. I had to learn those finer points of skiing, fast. At one stage I came to grief in the thick snow and could not move. One ski was pointing one way and the other one the opposite. Luckily my knees were okay and with a little help from passers by I was able to get back on my feet. All in all, we all enjoyed the day. It turned out to be my last effort at learning skiing. I remember another enjoyable trip some of us local boys took. Quite a few years later some of us decided to see how the white-bait were running over at Haast on the West Coast. White-bait are a very small fish that are cooked into patties. There was Ken, Murray, Jack and myself. We went over on the Saturday and Ken’s friend, Bozzie Thyers, got us a hut to sleep in. We were lucky because the White-Baiter’s Ball was on that night. There was no actual police station in the isolated town of Haast and the night turned out to be just like the wild west with most of the people very inebriated. A long established family, the

Margaret and young George enjoy a quiet moment on the front lawn at Spottiswood, mid 1950s. It was when the boys learned to walk that we had to watch out. 30

Nolans, were sort of ex-officio police and when they went home at around 3am, the place really came alive, with even drunken fights on the road. Although a rough night, the supper at the ball was great with huge plates of white-bait patties. A great weekend was had by all. A couple of years later I met a young local lady, Margaret Grace Mercer Love. Soon after we had met, I popped the question and in 1954 we were married at the church in Alexandra. The reception was held in the Chatto Creek Hall. As Margaret had been saving steadily for a trip to Australia to see her Grandma, Aunt and cousins, it was not hard to pick the destination for our honeymoon. We were booked on the Wanganella from Wellington to Sydney and return, and what an experience on that lovely ship. My half of Chestermains, Spottiswood farm. I went to see John Stevenson who was working as a police officer in Wellington. John was a year behind me at Omakau School and was a real bright boy, a star at our school concerts. He saw us off from the wharf and I will always remember him waving goodbye till we were out of sight.

The Wanganella, a cross-Tasman passenger liner which took Margaret and I to Australia and back on our honeymoon. During the war she had served as a hospital ship. 31

Young George and Jim after playing with liquid raddle, Spottiswood farm, late 1950s.

Actually it was a rough trip both ways and most of the women on board spent much time in their cabins and didn’t see much of the dining room. We arrived at Margaret’s grandmother’s place in Greenhills Street, Croydon, and stayed there for a few days until we went on a bus trip overland taking us to Adelaide then to Melbourne via the Grampians. I remember ordering a beer at a hotel and it came out cold like ice. This seemed a bit odd - not like at home. Because we were running late for our voyage home on the Wanganella, we flew from Melbourne to Sydney. Even though it was winter, we enjoyed our month away very much. We were very impressed with Australia but didn’t guess we would one day live there. Back in Omakau, over the next six years there were four little Harveys born at Clyde Hospital. George Kenneth in 1955, James Russell in 1956, Paul Huddleston in 1957 and William John in 1960. Margaret coped with all this including shearing and other farm work with little help. No wonder when later I suggested we move to Dunedin, she was very quick with a reply in the affirmative. While on the farm, the kids loved to play on the tractors, especially the small one. When the children were around five or seven years old, the keys were left in the little tractor and we once found them driving it around the yard. Early one morning, George and Jim playing at make believe mechanics decided to change the oil in the big Fordson tractor. They had all the tools and three or four buckets at the ready when Margaret arrived just in time to save gallons of the black stuff out of the gear-box. Another time, the same two got hold of a big bag of liquid Raddle, a coloured powder used at lambing time. When Don and I arrived home, both were literally covered in the red stuff. We had a large bull in the sheep yards across the road from the farmhouse. It was tethered by a ring and chain through the nose. One day I was looking for Jim and found him quietly leading

the bull around the sheep yard. I got quite a shock as we all treated bulls with the greatest respect. I soon had Jim out of there! I guess, being the eldest, George and Jim seemed to be getting into the most mischief. Another time could have ended in calamity. They were playing in our new shed, parts of which had come from the Roxburgh Hydro Dam before it was finished. The shed had only one door and the floor was covered deep with wheat straw (we grew a crop of wheat each year). The boys were playing with matches and started a fire that turned into an inferno. Very luckily they both had the sense to run and managed to escape before the fire grew out of control. My Uncle Tom saw the conflagration from his house and he said the shock nearly killed him. When I arrived from a far paddock the worst of it was over and I called for just two men from the local fire brigade to help save some wheat in a nearby silo. Twenty of them arrived along with the local Catholic Father.

My mother, Esther, holding our son, Jim.

About this time, when George was five years old I took him for a ride in the truck to Jimmy Jannink, the local blacksmith and metal fabricator, to order some parts for my automatic irrigation worked by large metal plates that would drop down into place in the water race (channel) to block the water flow thus directing it elsewhere. I had bought some old fashioned alarm clocks to automate the opening and closing of the plates. Overall it worked well but I didn’t have time to perfect it all before later leaving the farm. George, around this time, was not well and couldn’t walk. I had him in a push chair sulky so he could move around a bit by his feet. We had several doctors look at George and he was being tested for different conditions. One doctor believed it might be polio but another discovered it was due to rheumatic fever. George spent four months in Clyde Hospital in recovery and has had little trouble ever since. When we came to Australia, the kids swam under the famous coach, Forbes Carlisle, who said George had a perfect breast-stroke. Russia used big five year plans to build up their country and I adopted a similar approach. I decided to level all the paddocks by bulldozer and put in border dyking with a large grader I’d purchased from Mosgiel Council. This would all make irrigation much easier. The old way was the worst job on the farm and broke many old farmers’ hearts. In eight years, all but one paddock had been completed. Spottiswood was the biggest prepared irrigation farm in New Zealand at the time. On the farm we built our own wool shed during the winter months. Following in the footsteps of my father, it was a two storey concrete affair with a large ramp at one end where the woolly sheep went in. The bales came out the other end. What an improvement it was for loading the wool bales onto the trucks and it provided space for sheep underneath during shearing. Working part time, it took three of us two years to build up to roof height. We contracted local builders to finish the gabled roof, grating and flooring. The builder noted how level the walls were built and how easy this made completing the roof. When finished, we organised a shed opening. Margaret kindly cooked up dozens of saveloys for the fifty or so guests from

neighbouring farms and town. It was a lovely night with the only mishap being my right-hand man running his car into a bog driving back to his home (luckily not too far). It was on quite an angle when I saw it next morning. Another thing that happened on Spottiswood was George’s accident with the tomahawk which was used for cutting up kindling wood for the fire. He was too young for this type of work and inadvertently cut one of his thumbs nearly right off. It was just hanging there and I remember thinking I could see growth rings as on a cut tree. Margaret rushed George to Clyde Hospital where Dr Hunter made a very successful operation of sewing the thumb back on to his hand. George made a full recovery and has had no problems ever since. On the farm, I made a habit of taking my two employees on a Sunday outing after our very busy period in the Autumn. Our first was a walk through Thompson’s Gorge at the back of Matakanui (an old early mining town). It was a walk of about 15 miles and we’d arranged for a friend to pick us up on the other side. At tennis at Becks the previous day another friend who heard we were going through said he would fly though in his aeroplane to see how we were going. Next day we reached the 10 mile hut, near the top of the mountain, but somehow got into the wrong gully on the way down the other side. We were lost but our aviator friend just then flew over the gorge. He had done us a good turn, showing us the right gully and where we should be. After a big climb across to the right track we made our way down towards Bruce who we knew would be waiting for us with his vehicle. As it turned out we didn’t have to go too far. Bruce had managed to get well up into the hills.

This photo of the old Omakau racecourse shows the betting stalls, left, looking across to the home stretch, far right. Modernisation of the NZ racing industry has left the racecourse seldom used but in our days, it was a hub of the local social scene.

The Omakau primary school. The house in the middle distance is where our relations, Ken and Pam Scott (Margaret’s sister) now live. In earlier days, Ken and Pam lived at Matakanui. Often our boys would be bundled in the car and taken up to play with the Scott kids - so Margaret could have a chin wag with Pam and a rest!

On our way we came across the unusual sight of two deer with large antlers that had been fighting near an old fence and become entangled with the wire and were locked together. One was dead so we decided to shoot the other as it was so entwined and we had no way of untangling it. The next year we decided to look at the Leaning Rock which was the highest point on the Dunstan Range. When busy on the farm we had often looked at it and thought what a lovely place to go. So off we went, the three of us, leaving from near the homestead at Waikiri Valley on a mountain road made by a bulldozer (my uncle called them bullnozers) that went to within a mile or two of the summit. I was driving our one ton Morris farm truck which at times I regretted was not a four wheel drive. It was such a terrible road and I’ll never forget it. I’d never seen such a narrow road with such steep drops – thousands of feet down into the Clutha River. At any rate there was only one direction to go, upwards, and although it seemed an eternity, it wasn’t long before we reached a small level plateau which marked the end of the road. We’d driven as far as the road would allow and now Shanks’s Pony was the order of the day. We could see it was going to be hard work. We put on our packs with food and drink and away we went. The rock was huge when we reached it. We found many names carved into it and evidence that quite a few people had climbed it with ropes. The view of the Manuherkia Valley was magnificent and we could faintly see Omakau in the distance. After lunch we made our way back down to the truck. With the heights, I’d lost my nerve for the drive back down. I asked Ted if he’d like to drive us back down and was relieved when he agreed. So the young lad and I jumped on the back and away we went.

An Omakau school photo, taken late 1950s. Can you spot young George and Jim?

Racecourse Rd, at the Harvey Rd turnoff. Matakanui was where Margaret’s sister Pam Scott lived.

We quickly realised Ted was driving too fast and the engine in low gear was making an awful din. I yelled to slow down but he couldn’t hear me. All the while the lad and I were watching the sheer drops and preparing to jump ship if we thought she was going to go over the edge. Somehow we made it to the bottom and I asked Ted why he had driven so fast. He said he was saving the brakes! I’d have preferred he’d worn the damned things out! We opened the engine cover and there was oil everywhere but nothing in the sump. It had all got blown out. We drove slowly down to a homestead and luckily there was someone home. They sold us enough oil to get us home. I played lawn bowls for a few years but I was not good enough at it and eventually gave it away. Another sport I did like was duck shooting. For years we were on unsuitable ponds and then three years before we left Spottiswood, I made another pond that seemed to attract ducks and was a great success. We were at last able to get our “bags”. Both my helper, Jack Tippett, and my cousin, George Naylor, were very sorry as I was about to sell the farm and move away.

Old Omakau characters Sandy Alexander

Tom Carruth

Sandy was always “Just on my way home.”

A builder and contractor in Omakau. He was a good scoutmaster to us scouts. He also worked hard on a harvesting machine during the war. I caught the most fish in my life with him on Lake Hawea.

Battler Bain One of the last gold miners in Matakanui. He assured everyone at Felix Donnelly’s Newtown Hotel that he had once bent a Ford front axle with his bare hands and that was his main topic of conversation for years. George Barker Father of Ray, who had a small dairy farm close to Chestermains. George belonged to some unusual religious sect that promoted the notion of British superiority. Otherwise, a nice person. He used to show how brave he was by getting a bull to charge at him. At the last minute he would stand aside. Apparently you could not move aside too soon or the bull would change course towards you. I wasn’t lucky enough to actually see one of George’s demonstrations.

Ned Clouston When he saw his son in law heading for Omakau he would say, “He’s away to fill up at the bowser.” Pa Clouston A patron of the local football club, when he drove from the bottom pub to the top one, he would drive between the fence and telegraph poles. There was barely enough room but he was keeping well off the road. Bob Cousins

He was always asking, “Liz, what will I do next.”

A fearsome looking man who liked to poke fun at the local constable, Walter Ward. When Don McLean called to see Bob and some others at the duck pond, they took his hat and blew it to bits. The others were Billy and Barny Wilson.

Bill Breeze

Bob Craig

Mine host of the Bottom Hotel in Omakau. When it was raining he was always saying, “If this keeps up we’ll get more of it.”

The local butcher who was notorious for aiming and missing the vital spot on a big bullock. Then there would be a bit of a rodeo all over Ophir.

Harry Berry

Cliffy Caldwell Was the proprietor of the ‘other’ garage in opposition to the one my father had built. One of my friends remarked in jest that people were liable to fall over if they got too close to Cliff. He had a beautiful wife who even in those days would travel to Alexandra every fortnight to have her hair set in the latest fashion.

Bill Daley He had a lot of experience in the First World War and knew a lot about guns and bullets. He was a local rabbiter. When he was camped with some others he would throw a few bullets into the fireplace. The others would scatter while Bill just sat and laughed. He knew the bullets would just bang and not do much harm. He had a humorous exchange with Mrs Perkins, publican’s wife of the local hotel.

Bill was fairly well inebriated and claimed “I feel like I could lift an expletive ton.” Hearing the bad language, Mrs Perkins said, “Tut, tut, Bill. Break it down.” Bill simply replied, “Well I feel like I could lift half an expletive ton.” Bill worked for Francis Donnelly quite a bit. One day Francis said, “Daley, your face looks like the backside of a cow.” I’m sure Bill would have made an appropriate reply. Lou Denton Lou was our local plumber. He was a keen punter who liked to work on Saturday afternoons so he could hide his betting from his better half. Christmas Donnelly Felix’s father. He had long white whiskers. Someone burned one side off one night and he was very upset. Felix Donnelly Mine host of the Matakanui Hotel. At night’s end he would say “More tomorrow”. During the day he always had a nap in the shearing sheds. Francis Donnelly Noted for his habit of running off the road but not coming to much harm. Francis was also the “mouthpiece” of the Tennis Club and a good friend of Bill Daley. Jack Donnelly He was our rugby union coach at one stage. He would say, “If you haven’t made a mistake, you haven’t done anything.” Teddy Duggan Teddy was called “the Merchant” because he kept his shop in Matakanui open long after he had any customers. He was also secretary to the Omakau races. A real raconteur, he used the term “his nibs” a lot. He was famous for smoking cigarettes right to the end without dropping the ash.

Frank Duncan A fat-lamb buyer who lived in Alexandra, Frank was always seen in a wide brimmed hat. He was famous for sending away more trains filled with his lambs than anyone else. Jack Fridd Jack took a great interest in the local Rugby Club. His peculiarity in speech was, “Howsomever.” Ossie Glassford Always took an interest in sport. He lived to a ripe old age and lived with those members of his family who would supply him a few drinks at night. Bill Harper Our local banker, Bill was a friend of the family. He often played at our tennis court at Chestermains. He had the funniest serve I’ve ever seen. Ernie Huddleston He lived at Drybread at a farm called ‘The Poplars’. He and my Uncle Bob had a big hill block near Thompson’s Gorge. We often went over to The Poplars when I was small. Ernie was a harsh critic of the Rabbit Board killing policy and often said he wanted to “screw their bloody necks” (the rabbits?). Tommy Huddleston A brother of Ernie and Bob, Tommy often had marathon suppers and would drink cups of tea all night. Jimmy Jannink Jimmy came down from the Dutch East Indies after the war and ‘made good’ in Central Otago. He was an excellent blacksmith and his favourite saying was, “We will make shumshing of it, Jack.”

Jim Jeffs

Arthur Marslin

He was always keen to use big words which he sometimes didn’t seem to understand. He once said of Mary Perkins, “I believe Mary is stagnant.”

When Paddy Moran visited Arthur’s farm, Artie had new white overalls on. Paddy asked if he had borrowed them from the neighbour. Paddy said Artie had come out with both barrels blazing.

Amy Jones

Keil Mawhinney

Amy ran the boarding house in Omakau during the boom time just before the war. Amy had a lovely little green coupe with a dicky seat in the back. She was revered as a fine cook and Jim Scouler and I had lunch there during the school week whenever we could. My Uncle Sam helped in the boarding house but was not allowed to carry dishes or plates as he dropped too many.

He was Sergeant Major of the Home Guard and often had trouble with some of the unruly members of his troupe. I used to go to Keils with a pig in exchange for the use of his ridger to sow our mangle crop.

Bill Leask Bill was the mainstay of the local dance band. Sometimes there were two or three members but mostly it was Bill by himself to produce some good old tunes. Sam Leask I don’t remember seeing Sam but he had the farm halfway between Omakau and Ophir. Father of Ken, Gordon, Wallace and Lloyd, Sam was fatally injured by an allegedly quiet cow which turned on him, goring him from behind. Roy Love Roy was a strong supporter of football and horse racing like Ted Scott, his host at the Chatto Creek Hotel. One notable saying of his was “No, no, it’s not British,” if he didn’t approve of something. Harley Macdonald He took over his Uncle’s farm after the war. When someone asked him why he hadn’t finished the paddock he was ploughing, he said, “All day I was thinking of my mortgage.”

Don McLean From being the thinnest man in Omakau, Don went to being one of the fattest. He was a railways worker and then took up farming. Wolf Milne Wolf was the station master at Omakau. Always known as the ‘big bad wolf’ who owned the race horse, Ginger Rey. Wolf was one of the Home Guard and liked to put some enjoyment in his guard duties. He also took over the hotel at Poolburn. Micky Moran A hard worker for the County Council who had a bit of the Irish in him. On seeing Andrew Scouler’s big new house at Matakanui Station, he exclaimed it could hold “Tousands and Tousands.” Paddy Moran One of the most notable local characters. He was always ready for a yarn at anytime. He and his brother Jack were the main growers of potatoes and gladiolas in the district. He told some good stories of when in the occupying forces in the Rhine after the First World War. Joe Naylor Joe was the first man I had heard say, “Religions have been the cause of most wars.”

Uncle George Naylor

Alex Robertson

After the war he had a nice old squarish sort of car. Someone told him he should grow tomatoes in it. He was not amused.

Alex was MC at all the Matakanui dances and very good he was too. He occasionally had one too many and swore that one night when he arrived home late the doors on his house had been shifted.

Andy Nelson He and Alby McElwee took over the ‘other’ garage from Cliffy Caldwell after the war. They were very good with motor bikes so that’s where I went with my old Zenith. When the fire station was opened, Andy was a foundation member and led the brigade for many years. Doug Neville Our next door neighbour was Doug Neville. He had a love of big American cars and always seemed to have the latest model. He was a real show off and always travelled well above the speed limit. Everyone who knew him wondered when he would kill someone on the roads. He would take off from a standing start outside the hotel at Omakau and the gravel would fly through the air and hit the hotel with a bang! He was not involved in the Hyde train crash but had travelled by car to Dunedin for that Winter Show. In a twist of fate, he was killed the next day by a car as he was walking across the road to the Bay View Hotel.

Ralph Scorgie Ralph was the squire of the large ‘Downshire’ property near Omakau. The son of an Anglican bishop, he had a well-known weakness of bad language. We hoped he hadn’t learnt if off his father. Some time back in the 1950s, he was helping to dip his sheep. As they went through the dip he would push each one under using a sheep crutch. Somehow Ralph missed a sheep and went hollus bolus into the smelly poisonous dip - he was completely immersed. Holding back laughter, the others helped him out and he went directly for the front door of the farmhouse, not too far away. They say that Mrs Scorgie’s reception could be heard as far away as Omakau. Ted Scott Mine host of the Chatto Creek Hotel. When he was busy he always took about ten matches to light his pipe. Andrew Scoular

Harry Oaten Harry had the local drapery shop. He and Mrs Oaten had a good business there but unluckily, it burnt down. Harry Perkins Harry was ‘mine host’ of the local hotel after his parents had both passed on. His main saying was, “Tip top”. Harry was always pleasant. He had a run in with Walter Ward after the hotel cows had discovered that Walter’s garden tasted very nice. After that Walter would say Harry was a “useless so and so”.

Owner of Matakanui Station and also a County Councillor. He was the first in to help any deserving cause in Omakau and a keen fisherman on Lake Hawea. One of his notable sayings was “You might as well be dead as not in the fashion.” Hughy Sinclair The local baker, Hughy was put out of business when sliced bread began to be delivered from Dunedin and Alexandra. He was notable for being so unaffected by the cold that he never wore anything above the belt other than his thick blue singlets, even when there was hoar frost (a frost that hung around all day).

Mr Sinnamon

Jim Truesdale

When in the hotel he would always ask for a “wee Dock and Doris”.

Our neighbour on the farm. Jim was most notable in the area when his car was hit by a railway engine at the level crossing at Omakau. His car was turned upside down yet he stepped out of it okay and was still smoking his pipe. He was also a keen bowler.

Jim Smith The proprietor of the local garage and a very obliging chap, Jim worked very long hours to keep farm vehicles mobile during the war years. George Steven Our leading man at Chestermains. He bought his own farm after the war. On the plane when going back to Scotland to see relatives he met someone he knew. They said “We’re a long way up”. “Sure” replied George, “but more importantly, it’s also a long way down”.

Charlie Wallington Mr Wallington had an amusing way with his farm workers. If a man was taking it easy, he would say “cough, sneeze, fart, do something, man!” Walter Ward

A local lamb buyer who lived in Omakau during the busy season. Frank Duncan, a rival buyer, believed anyone dealing with Dicky was ‘riff raff’.

Our local policeman during the war years. He was very strict but fair. Even for the weekly picture show he would wear his uniform and policeman’s helmet. One day after rugby I stepped into the top hotel in Omakau in full view of Walter. Shortly after he followed me in and asked me my age. Although I was truthfully able to say my birthday had been just that week, he didn’t believe me.

Mr Thomson

Morly Warhurst

Our Presbyterian lay-reader during the war, Mr Thomson hailed from the north of England. He and his wife were of very short stature and had the habit of speech where they dropped their “aitches” and added them elsewhere. They often spoke of their daughters as Havis and Hiris. He must have felt quite guilty when explaining Mrs Thomson’s broken leg. He pushed her out of bed but said they were “honly aving a bit of fun.” I still recollect many funerals that Mr Thomson presided over.

Morley was a real English gentleman. A chain smoker, he had the unusual habit of dropping his ash into the cuffs of his trousers. He worked as head agent for Wright Stephenson & Co. Each January Morley would give us a big box of Dawson’s cherries just to keep us sweet.

Dicky Taylor

Timashenko I don’t know his real name as he was always known thus. He worked for the Public Works Department and was the instigator of the name ‘Balkan States’ for the small farms around Matakanui and along Wallington Road.

Billy Wilson Another good neighbour of ours on the farm. Bill liked a few drinks at the local so I knew him very well. Stan Wragg Overseer and head of all the race men (irrigation workers) in the area under the Public Works Department. He called one day and I offered him a cup of tea. He had been having a few at one of the many hotels in the area. All of a sudden he was trying to get under the table and acting very irrationally. Stan had been affected by shell shock during the First World War.

Dunedin After selling Spottiswood, the farm in Central Otago, we moved to Dunedin. Our first home was a beautiful two storey house on Elder Street. It was set back from the street and had a nice small front garden and large lawn at the back. The house had four bedrooms and two large entertaining rooms. The first full day in Dunedin we were moving furniture and setting up in our new house. Suddenly someone came in the front door with a small boy, three year old Bill, covered in blood and her own bloodied handkerchief. “Is this your boy?” she said. Bill had somehow opened the front gate and had gone full pelt down our Elder Street and onto the busy Pitt Street on his little tricycle which was all buckled up. Bill was okay but badly shaken. He had ended up under the lady’s car. Bill’s other bad experience happened about two months later. Some of the older boys pushed or dropped Bill headfirst down a steep wall onto a concrete path. He was knocked unconscious. I was not about – possibly at work. Somehow Margaret heard about Bill and carried him (as no car at home) in her arms to Dunedin Hospital a mile away. He had concussion and recovered enough for Margaret to bring him home that night. As Bill recently joked, he still hasn’t recovered. Dunedin was less eventful for the other boys. I remember though Paul walking all the way home on his first day at Arthur Street School. I was late to pick him up! The boys had a good mentor at Sunday School in the person of Jim Smith’s sister. During the war years Jim owned the garage at Omakau and worked prodigious hours keeping the farmers’ machinery and equipment operating.

Playing at the Peter Pan statue which I think is located in the Dunedin botanical gardens. Do you notice the tree stumps two new branches?

I remember our first family outing in the good ship Harpua. She was a 24 foot cabin cruiser I bought for 1000 pounds. I had spent many days caulking the hull as it had been out of the water for too long. Christmas arrived and the whole family received life jackets from a beneficent Santa Claus. We all arose early on Boxing Day for a nice trip of Dunedin Harbour. We went to the boat club about 11am and no boats were moving. All was remarkably quiet – except for the strong wind blowing from the south. After asking for advice on the weather, it was thought okay for a short trip to the wharves and back so out we went through the opening in the breakwater. The sea was so rough, the family had to retire to the cabin to avoid the sea-spray all around us. No one enjoyed the trip in the least and we were all pleased to get back to dry land. When we had completed our mission, a very upset Paul said to me “I’m going to tell grandma on you.” Needless to say, some small boys had life jackets for sale shortly later. But we did enjoy some nice fishing trips – sometimes to the heads at Port Chalmers. On one trip out I remember when the boat was wallowing in the waves while we fished. Jim got very sea sick and it wasn’t long before I followed suit. I felt so bad I had to ask my brother-in-law, Bluey to take over. He had never driven a boat before. On another trip, after studying the charts, I decided to vary the course by heading directly to Portabello. What a trip. We were banging on sandbanks for about a mile before reaching the deep channel again. All the visitors including Margaret’s dad had to move up the pointy end to keep our propellers off the sand. On the way back from the heads, we noticed the sand banks high and dry above the water. We were lucky we hadn’t been stranded on them.

Our home at Oban St, Dunedin. It was a lovely house, facing north and catching lots of sun. This photo, taken in 1999, shows my fence of woven metal slats still standing. At one point in time the young boys had taken an axe to it!

The Harpua had some quite bad habits. At any time the engine would cut out and no matter how hard we would try, it would not fire. One day I got within a few feet of the rocks before it started. Later in Picton where I had it for sale, a mechanic found a large amount of petrol in the bilge and discovered a tiny hole in the fuel line. We were lucky that no one had lit up a cigarette. We could all have been blown sky-high. I’d found work as an office worker at the Dunedin Iron and Steel Company. Although a nice change and very enjoyable, office work got a bit tedious. After six months I began to long for the wide open spaces. After our first Christmas at Elder Street I changed jobs, working at a factory producing sheet metal products – these included glass house frames. Around this time, we also bought a hobby farm at Waitati. Later with mixed feelings we packed up and moved to the Waitati farmhouse. The boys were to spend 12 months attending the local school there. We had goats, sheep and cattle on the farm. The goats occupied the steep hill near the farm house and were kept in place by electric fencing. The boys used to get in there to practice their Boy Scouts skills in the scrub and were often chased by the billy-goats. Having to avoid an electric shock on their hasty exits, this made them all nimble and quick to move. Wanting to improve the farm I built a light gauge trolley track that allowed a feed trolley to be pushed from the feed storage area into the barn next to the animal pens. At some point in time, little Jim had his toe run over with the trolley and nearly cut it off. The sheep and cattle on the other flat areas of the farm were not producing profits so consequently we decided to cut our loses and move back to town. Back in Dunedin we bought a large wooden house in Oban Street, near Highgate and I got work at another sheet metal factory. About this time (1966) my mother died in her sleep. I think she was over 80 years old but this was a very big shock to all of us. We had a small service at the home at Embo Street then the cortege proceeded to Omakau where another larger service was held at the Ophir Church. I remember when helping to place wreaths in the hearse before proceeding across to the Omakau Cemetery there was a huge number of honey bees buzzing around (I was allergic to them). In that year of 1966 I went each week night endeavouring to get my school leaving certificate. In four subjects I did well but completely crashed out in Technical Drawing. At the beginning I had not been familiar with it. In those days we had to repeat all subjects again so the following year I decided against attempting that marathon again. Because of Margaret’s bad asthma we had to consider moving somewhere warmer. We thought of Nelson as it was the town with the most sunshine according to the New Zealand climatic records but Australia looked very tempting. Margaret’s mother’s family hailed from Australia and she had relatives there. We made the decision for Australia and I headed off three weeks before the others to arrange somewhere to stay. We were beginning to feel like gypsies. After saying my good byes to Margaret and the boys in Dunedin I left on the bus heading out to Taieri Airport. My cousin Mabel wished me bon voyage from the bus station.

While living in Dunedin, we took a holiday up to Picton. There’s still debate as to whether Paul actually caught the fish but it was certainly a beauty.

Australia All too soon I was walking on Australian soil. Making my headquarters in Kings Cross I booked into a cheap hotel. The next day being my birthday, I decided to celebrate. I purchased a bottle of wine and went to a restaurant to enjoy a nice dinner. I don’t remember much more and at 10am the next day I woke up in my hotel room still in my suit and lying on the top of my bed. How lucky I was because my wallet was worth stealing. I began trying to rent a house. After several attempts and with little luck finding anything suitable, Margaret and the boys arrived from New Zealand. We all stayed at a motel for a few days before moving into the North Ryde Caravan Park. It was on one of Sydney’s first big “ring roads”, large arterial roads that traversed the city. We stayed at the caravan park for about three weeks and the boys began at the nearby school. Soon though we purchased a house in West Ryde. Our house in Melville Street, West Ryde, was small and backed onto the Agricultural School not far from the shops at Top Ryde. By this time we had our first car in Australia, a great old Holden with number plates COD500. I’d bought it by selection from the Sydney Morning Herald and was very pleased because it was so much cheaper than comparable models in New Zealand. My only disappointment was the very cheap set of retread tyres which all flew to bits in a matter of months. I did quite a lot of driving about Sydney in those earlier years and took it all in my stride. I only had two accidents and those were caused by other drivers running into the rear of our car. I did get one unholy fright one night on the Cahill Expressway, a busy road feeding the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Coming up from Woolloomooloo, I was on the wrong side facing all the opposing traffic. I took the only way out possible and drove over the median strip – a smooth crossing luckily. On a more relaxed occasion, Margaret and I enjoyed a lovely trip all the way down the South Coast via the Princes Highway to Eden, near the Victorian border. We spent a fortnight staying at various seaside resorts.

After a short period of time we decided we would invest our very meagre savings into a caravan park. I had spent about a week looking up the coast as far as Kempsey but the Central Coast looked as good a prospect as any place I had inspected. I went to see the manager of a caravan sales place in Wentworthville and we travelled up to see Wilson’s Caravan Park at North Entrance. The place was very empty and rough but it had a great position – right on the lake with the ocean just across the road. Margaret and I knew this place had potential and we decided we would try to raise the money for its purchase. We were successful and in early 1967 we packed the Holden and travelled up what is now the old Pacific Highway to our new home for many years. Our first goal was to prepare as much as possible for the huge crowds that would arrive for the Christmas holidays. We were not very happy to find Mrs Wilson still in the house but two hours later after some loose ends were tied, we were able to take possession.

The boys pictured at the Entrance North Public School. It had about 40 pupils and was closed down when a double carriageway bridge was built linking North Entrance and The Entrance.

Early days at North Entrance - Clockwise from me, Jim, Bill, Paul and George.

The Entrance When we took over the caravan park, the house was not finished. Among other defects, for some reason the lounge room floor had a 2-4 inch gap all the way across it and the bathroom floor was not complete. We found a builder who was to do all our work for the next 11 years. He was the best. In the lead up to that first Christmas holiday period, our first, most urgent, job was to purchase and install more water tanks so that piped water could be run to various points across the property. This we achieved through a network of black polythene pipes running underground to numerous taps. We did this on the advice of Pat Clifford, my next door neighbour who also owned big nearby tracts of land and the main fish shop in town. Pat was a great help and loaned me some of his land adjoining the caravan park so that I could accommodate more caravans and tents. We had a reasonably good water supply with a large underground concrete tank under the house patio and an electric pump. North Entrance would not receive town water supply for another two or three years.

Although laying down a better water supply was the priority, there were many other important tasks. These included the laying of markers so that campers would know the boundaries of their site. We also had to convert one of the various fibro cabins into a shop. Here we made a mistake by not putting the refrigeration motor in a small shed. Instead it was placed under the shop and was open to sand which was whipped up by wind. That pump gave us lots of trouble and was very difficult to service. The shop was staffed by two girls and I decided to get them some eggs to sell. I was too long away and when I arrived back I had an emergency. The toilet system for the whole amenities block was not working. It was a septic system and I worked until 2am before I got it unblocked. There was no time for electrical improvements and we had to make do with what had been done previously – lots of electrical extension leads running from the house all over the lake front area. It was nearly a full time job fixing fuses. Over that first Christmas holiday period, many people arrived at night and tents finished up all over the place. Many campers, most of whom had booked in with Mrs Wilson, disregarded my letter about having no pets so dogs were hidden in many tents. At the caravan park we had a tragedy during this first Christmas. A family had pitched a big tent right on the edge of the lake and I got a call from one of the occupants that someone was unwell. A man of about 50 or 60 had taken a heart attack possibly because the heat in the tent was oppressive. I sent for one of the girls from the shop knowing she was a nurse then got down and gave him artificial resuscitation. When the girl arrived she knew it was too late. He had gone.

Our home at Two Shores, right on the lake and minutes from the surf beach.

My training at high school did help when I had a young boy, about 10 years old, who was nearly drowned in the lake next to the house. The lake was quite dangerous because the previous owner had made many deep holes when dredging sand to build up parts of the park. The young boy’s breathing was restored with artificial resuscitation and of course it was great relief we all felt to hear those first wheezy breaths. I took another course in resuscitation in Sydney some time in 1981 to refresh my memory in case another emergency might arise. During that first Christmas one of my favourite nephews arrived from New Zealand with some friends for a visit. They camped on our front lawn but Peter was absent the next morning, New Years Day. We checked with the local police and found Peter had been held on suspicion because of his long hair and whiskers. Sometimes it was so wild at The Entrance at this time that they would have dozens of blokes chained up to the police station’s front fence. We had been extremely busy over our first holiday period and I remember we had forgotten to clean the stove in one of the fibro cabins. One of Bessie Wilson’s old privileged customers arrived late one night and was not amused. We had a real heated argument through the bedroom window. The boys (then between 9-13 years old) helped me a lot over this first holiday period, especially the older ones. Although it was a short holiday period because of heavy rains, it was exhausting and we were in need of a holiday so Margaret, boys and one of their cousins from New Zealand, Kevin, packed into our old Holden and travelled to Canberra. We enjoyed our stay there having a quick look at all our national buildings. I was very impressed with the quality of the roads.

Two Shores Caravan Park in the early days - pre curbing and asphalt.

The above photo shows how just close to the lake was our house at Two Shores.

We then headed back having a stay at Katoomba in the Blue Mountains. We intended to see the Jenolan Caves but because of dense fog, had to cut our stay short and head home. The previous owner, Fred Wilson, did contracting work on the then partly complete F3 freeway and had a large shed at the front of the caravan park which had to be pulled down. He had built himself an aircraft propeller driven boat for the lake in which there is a lot of weed. Pelicans break it off and it floats to the surface and blocks up conventional outboard motor propellers. I would often meet other caravan park owners while dumping our rubbish up at the Council tip. I once met an old fisherman who had lived in the area for years. He warned me of the big floods and how they would cover the area that was now my caravan park. We were lucky because there was no such flooding for the next six years. Then on the seventh year, the rains came. We had four floods in 18 months. It was hard work trying to pull as many caravans as possible to higher ground saving them from filling with brackish water. Although we then went on to build up the lower areas of the caravan park it was still prone to flooding. The Tuggerah Lake system was silting up, especially at the mouth and was becoming less able to discharge floodwaters to the sea. There were many other memorable events over the next few years. I contracted Mr Frost to push up a small sand bank in the lakefront with his big D4 bulldozer. I planned to back fill to the new bank with additional sand and topsoil to make more space for caravans. Luckily we had a large sand supply pit not far away. I had told Mr Frost not to actually go into the lake because although it was generally very shallow there were dredge holes about. When I got back from town I found the bulldozer in the lake, not more than five yards from the shore and out of sight except for the exhaust pipe sticking up out of the water. It took a whole week to get it out. Once while the men were having a “cuppa” a pair of kookaburras close by started up with their bird call – what seemed like a laughing session. The men, still peeved with having to retrieve their bulldozer from the lake couldn’t stand it. “Get rid of those birds,” they shouted.

We lost a good customer who would come up from Sydney most weekends. His wife opened the door of their caravan one morning and found a large Brown snake on the door step. She wasn’t bitten but they didn’t come back. At one point in time we were taking our garbage to the tip in Noraville. It was there that I came across the biggest snake I have ever seen. Luckily it was already dead but it must have measured over 10 feet long (over 3 metres). It had yellow markings on it crosswise and I’ve been told it was probably some type of python. After a few years at the caravan park we built an indoor heated pool. This drew a lot of customers but was very costly to run. It always seemed to be colder than most people wanted. We had a little dog called Trudy who loved to play on the wooden floats left by the Wilsons and hired out to our holidaymakers. The boys had much fun down in the lake paddling around on the floats with Trudy on board. Later when the boys were growing up, one night Jim did not return home so about 2am we went out looking for him. We found him asleep in the car up at the Red Gum Forest, about three miles from home. He had run out of petrol. Another day, I found George and Jim surfing when they should have been at school. I was very annoyed at this and attempted to cane their backsides. I don’t think I inflicted much pain as they jumped around too much. Bill was a naughty one at times too. Our house, in a lovely position beside the lake, was built about a metre above ground level because of floods. He had cut a square hole in the floor, covering it with a small bedside chest of drawers. He used it to escape at homework time but

The above photo shows just how much closer the lake would come at times.

A family portrait taken while still at The Entrance - mid to late 1970s.

Margaret and I didn’t take long to notice him missing. Another time he went catching prawns with friends using a drag net which is drawn along between two people. These were illegal to use and they were caught by the fishing inspector. He was lucky to be let off. One time young Paul arrived home with the police after he was caught with others shooting at the Council dredge with air rifles. Apparently they had broken several windows. He was also lucky to be let off lightly. After the first two years we let the shop out to anyone who would take it on. Old Mr Hedji and his wife decided to open it over Easter. All went well until the freezer motor broke down. He had just got in his stock of ice cream. I was very sorry for him but at that stage could not do a thing. It was around our third year at the caravan park that Margaret’s cousin, Betty, her daughter Sandra and Sandra’s girlfriend came up to visit on Boxing Day. The girls wanted to help because of the huge crowd about (on Boxing Day up at The Entrance, people just seem to sprout out of the ground). Mrs Mahon seemed to be snowed under at the shop so I sent the girls up to help. The girls apparently started helping without asking or introducing themselves and got chased out of the shop. Before we left the caravan park we had built a nice big shop of brick construction which was to become a real asset.

While at the Entrance I had two trips down to the Melbourne Cup, flying down and back the same day each time. The first time was in 1976, I went by myself. The second time there were about six of us including my friend, Don. I’m sure that was the year Think Big won the cup. I should have been on to it. That was also the year the Melbourne skies opened up with a sudden downpour of rain. I managed to get to shelter but the others got soaked to the skin. In September 1978, after exactly 11 years at The Entrance, we sold the caravan park and bought a larger one at Banora Point - on the Tweed River near Tweed Heads which is up at the Queensland border.

Margaret and I at our son Jim’s wedding, 1982.

Tweed Heads The new caravan park at Banora Point had been started just the previous year and showed a lot of promise but costs were higher than expected and instead of creating profit it was a black hole. Fifteen months later, in December 1979, the previous owner took it back over. Margaret and I retired for 1980 to nearby South Tweed Heads to recover from both the financial and physical trauma. My health had suffered badly even though Margaret and George had given great help. One funny interlude at the Banora Point caravan park was when I found some bent spoons - often used to take drugs - on the riverbank. I rang the police and some very enthusiastic detectives arrived. I gave them some idea of who it might be and for the next week they staked out a caravan by taking over an empty one and keeping watch. One night two of the police were visiting in our home when a car came in we all had to turn off the lights and crouch down. Another night I had to meet them in the dark on the other side of the river. We waited and waited but none of the culprits turned up. In the finish, both boys (the suspects) were caught and given jail sentences, their black hands helping to convict them. Margaret and I were presented with a “Certificate of Commendation” for our help. Otherwise it was not a good year to look back on. While at Banora Point I built an extra amenities block and I bought all the taps from New Zealand, having noticed them on a trip back there. The trouble was that New Zealand generally operates on low water pressure while Australia has a much higher water pressure. It wasn’t until all the taps were installed that I realised my mistake. They looked great but gave an awful shower. I wonder if they were ever changed! My health was suffering and I had gone to a Dr Clark who ran tests and x-rays. He diagnosed a collapsed lung and an enlarged heart. I was told to stop smoking but this seemed funny coming from the doctor as he was a chain smoker – much worse by far than Frank or Morley in Omakau. Dr Clark had actually trained in Dunedin. While at the caravan park we had a woman who was a lot of trouble when she hit the bottle. One night I remember having to get Dr Clark to quieten her down. When we had first settled at the new caravan park we got a huge fright from a snake which was under the table. We had been busy preparing the shop for its opening. We’d all sat down to have a cuppa. There was Betty Phillips, Margaret and myself. When we noticed it we all three ran in different directions. George and his wife, Janis, helped us while at the new caravan park. George said it was the best part of his life (the worst part of mine). When the previous owner, Noel Collins, took the business back over, we retreated to live in a little caravan park at South Tweed. It had just opened and that was the trouble. There were far too many caravan parks in the area to make enough of a profit. So for the next fifteen months we were on holiday. We often went to Coolangatta Beach where it was safe to swim. Both of us really enjoyed the sunshine and sand. It was during this time that I heard of Nathan Pritiken and his theories that good food is the prime reason for good health. I was keen to read as much as I could on this great man. When on occasion, I would visit Sydney, I’d look in all the good bookshops for his books and others on the subject.

Sydney After fifteen months of our “holiday” we felt it was time to make plans so Margaret and I answered adverts for two jobs. One was on a farm near Tamworth, the other managing a Miller’s Self Storage facility in Sydney. Luckily we picked the latter as it turned out to be a great experience. We made a lot of good friends amongst the managers and assistant managers of Miller’s other facilities providing lots of memories which are good look back on. So in 1981 Margaret and I started as managers at Millers Self Storage facility at 444 Jones Street, Ultimo. We were close to the city centre of Sydney and were Jim Miller’s second facility – Tempe being the first. We were sited in an old five storey wool store serviced by one large goods lift. After buying the building, Jim Miller installed Colour bond walls to subdivide the whole floors into different sized units. The metal walls were about eight feet high with wire netting then going up to the ceiling. If we needed to, we could get a ladder and check on people’s units by peering over the top. This was often done if someone was slow to pay their fees. If anyone got too far into debt we were allowed to confiscate their goods by cutting their padlock with large bolt cutters and putting on a lock on of our own. Nine years later we were still employed with Millers and had got to know a lot of other managers and assistant managers, visiting them often. When we left, there were eleven facilities around Sydney and two in Queensland. Jim Miller was a very tough man and in the end we had to fight to get what was owed to us. He is believed to be now worth over $50million. We have a lot of vivid memories of those times from 1981 to 1990. One person with a West Australian address had missed paying his fees for a couple of months so I looked over the top of his unit to see if he had anything in storage. All I could see was ten large 44 gallon drums. Following our normal procedures, Margaret and I cut his padlock and checked the drums. What we found was a black tobacco-like material in large packets. Suspecting drugs we tried to contact Jim Miller but being a Sunday, this proved difficult. So we went ahead and phoned the police. Four detectives arrived and confirmed the drums were full of drugs. Then Jim Miller arrived in a very bad mood. “Why hadn’t we rung him first?” Margaret and I were in his bad books after that.

Miller’s Self Storage, Jones St, Ultimo. It was our home for several, mostly enjoyable years.

He asked the police how he was going to get his lost rental. He even insinuated he should be given the drums in lieu of his rental if he couldn’t get anything else. The detectives couldn’t believe what they were hearing! An underhand act we regularly had to perform was to pay the local council garbage men to carry away all the flotsam and jetsam that customers left, accumulating in our loading dock. This cost us $10 each week and wasn’t much but of course the garbos weren’t allowed to do it and an inspector used to come around occasionally. We had to be careful. We didn’t want our garbos to get in trouble as we’d probably end up in their bad books too. While at Millers we nearly had the office safe robbed. Margaret went upstairs to check on something and I was “holding the fort” at the office. About five or six young Lebanese looking boys walked in through the main truck loading dock area and brazenly disappeared down the centre passageway. Their plan was to entice me away from the office and it did just that. I went halfway down the passageway and yelled for them to come out. Unknown to me, two of them were already in the office and at the safe which was unlocked. Margaret luckily came down from level one just in time and they ran before finding all the cash which was there. On another occasion, early in October, 1987, some young people hurried past our bedroom window late at night talking in subdued tones as if they had been misbehaving. Shortly afterwards we heard the sirens of fire engines and noticed a red glow outside. Looking out, we saw that the huge old wool store diagonally across the street corner was well alight. The wind was blowing away from us so we were safe but embers were being blown on to the roof of Millers Ultimo No. 2 facility. We rang Jim Miller who arrived in quick time. We also woke up the other managers at No. 2 who were able to assist the firemen. Jim Miller had a hard hat on and was rushing around as if he was enjoying it all. That night he made sure we didn’t get much sleep although we had our ‘phone day’ in the morning – a busy day of the business month. There were a lot of fire brigade units but because of the wool grease in the timber the fire burned fiercely and took over one day to extinguish. Klaus and Alice were our assistant managers for quite a long time (we had two days off per week yet the office opened seven days). They were very nice people and Alice was a real mod show pony but worked in with us very well. They had a nice camper van and were often ‘on the road’. In April 1988 we had our first indication that Jim Miller was considering moving us to a new facility at Mona Vale. Les and Barbara Hart were Millers General Managers and they asked if we wanted to go. We weren’t keen but in the end were forced to go as assistant managers at Mona Vale. We had already bought a home unit at Newport so we gave notice to the tenant who was renting and moved there in February 1990. We stayed there for three years but were already planning our retirement from Jim Millers Self Storage. The home unit was owned in four equal shares by Paul, George and ourselves. While they had worked on the high rise building sites they were easily able to help with the repayments and we will always be thankful we used our combined resources to pay off the place in record time.

The round Australia holiday Early in our stay in Ultimo, about 1983, we had a great holiday visiting some wonderful places in Australia we had only heard of. We had a full month in June and we used the time flying to different cities and towns. From Sydney airport, we flew to Brisbane. From there we caught a bus to Mooloolaba where we stayed three days with our friends, Ivor and Phyl. Then back to Brisbane where we flew out heading for Proserpine, the closest airport to the Great Barrier Reef’s Whitsunday Islands. We stayed for another three or four days of boating and visiting islands we had heard so much of. Then it was off to Cairns where we had a good look around for another three or four days. From Cairns, we flew to Darwin, stopping at an airport in the Gulf of Carpentaria for a short time. Darwin in mid-June was really hot. The heat was reflecting off the tarmac when we disembarked from the plane. We had budget accommodation in Darwin and were troubled by the local people moving in the hallway all night. Perhaps it was pay day! We saw a crocodile farm and also took a bus trip across to Adelaide River where there was a large war grave cemetery. We also went to a pub where some cowboy characters put on a wild west show with their old car. We guessed the show was put on especially for tourists. The locals couldn’t have been that wild! From Darwin, our next hop was by air to Alice Springs. There was a bit of trouble with fighting outside hotels. This left a deep impression and was at the same time, quite depressing. None the less, we had a two day bus trip to Uluru and this was marvellous. Both Margaret and I climbed Ayres Rock. I must have been very unfit at the time because my legs gave way coming back down the rock. It took so long we were last and missed the bus to the nearby motel. Luckily it came back. Next stop from Alice was Adelaide. We had been there before, in 1954 when we were on our honeymoon. For the first time on our trip, all of a sudden we had to rug up. The winter chills were back with us. Adelaide was nice for the next few days then we took the plane back to Sydney and work the following day.

A classic old outback Aussie pub we came across on our ‘round Aussie bash.

The Milford Track holiday While at Millers Self Storage we also had a trip to New Zealand which included the four day walking of the Milford Track. We did it on a budget so had to carry our own food and bedding with us. We were in a big group of about forty five called the Freedom Walkers. With us was Margaret’s brother Jim and a friend. The other forty or so walkers were looked after by the Tourist Hotel Corporation and as well as being in different huts each night, they had cooked meals provided. Each day on the track there would be around eighty people making their way down from point to point. So rain, hail or shine, you had to move on to the next huts regardless. The Milford Track was a very popular place and certainly lived up to our expectations. We had nice weather all the way. We were even able to dispense with some of our excess gear half way down the track. With Jim being in the aerial topdressing business, he was able to arrange for a helicopter to drop in and pick it all up. What a help that was. If one breaks an ankle or can’t carry on for some reason, it costs $1000 to be lifted out by helicopter. We felt very privileged to have had a helicopter come in for free. I was always away ahead of the others because I feared getting caught in any rain. Many years before, my sister Jean and Barbara Duggan had walked the track but had a very bad experience in atrociously wet conditions. They were lucky to get out alive as the rivers rose very high. Some places on the Southern Alps have over 400 inches of rain each year.

On the boat heading towards the Milford Track.

How different it was for us. It was in a drought when we were walking and showers for washing were not available. The river was there for those keen enough but the water was straight from the snow topped peaks. The whole trip from where one leaves Te Anau travelling by boat to the start of the walk, to the end, a place near Milford called Sandfly Point, is four days of wonder. After it all, we took a bus back to our motel at Te Anau. It was one of my great experiences.

Margaret’s brother, Jim, and myself on the Milford Track. Directly behind us is a large deep pool of crystal clear water.

Once on the track, there was no going back.

The Milford Track in all its splendor - but imagine it when the weather turns bad!

Life: be in it Earlier on, around 1983, I decided to reduce weight with a diet better than the high protein one my doctor had advised up in Tweed Heads. So from 103kg in 1983, with my new low fat diet and plenty of exercise, I gradually lowered my weight to 92kg in 1986. With an even better diet I took up later, I was able to get my weight down to a very fit 70kg in 1991. At Millers on Saturday mornings I used to leave Margaret in charge and away I would go to Paddy’s Markets for fresh fruits and vegetables: the basis of my new diets. During this period, we did 50 fun runs and eight City to Surfs. Life was good then but for my 70th birthday I got an unexpected surprise: a triple bypass heart operation. I think I had timed my run too late. I should have begun my get fit program ten or so years earlier. But I can’t turn the clock back and I have to grin and bear it. One day I took my life into my hands by riding my bicycle from Newport to Croydon, a ride of 45km done in four hours. I went down all the main streets including George Street in the middle of Sydney. What an experience. In February 1991, Margaret, George, his girlfriend Pauline and I conquered the summit of Mt Kosciusko. It took us five hours in very windy conditions. At this time I was doing a lot of running, mainly from the unit down to the Surf Club at Newport. One day I met Bill Scott on the beach and didn’t realise then that I would be doing many walks with him in the Ramblers Walking Club a year or two later.

In September 1991, I did 26 hours of walking in eight days. The major disappointment that year was when in November, my sister, Eddie, died. I could not attend the funeral as I was recovering from a hospital operation. In 1992 I walked with the National Parks and Wildlife volunteers and through my regular bush walks, exercise and diet, attained my goal weight of 69kg. One of my memorable walks in December 1992 was an extra long one from Wondebyne to Patonga, a distance of 18km in six hours, thirty minutes. On Christmas eve I again climbed Mt Kosciusko with Margaret, George and some of his friends. It was awful weather, cold and raining, but we did it! It was a 16km round trip from Charlotte Pass. Early in 1993 Margaret and I started to walk with the Ramblers Walking Club. Over the next few years we walked dozens of walks with them. The walks ranged from the Royal National Park to Cooronbong and inland to Lithgow in the Blue Mountains. We would meet at Central Station and catch a train out to the area where we would walk. It was usual that we were walking three times a week, often exceeding 12km per day. In 1994 Margaret and I attempted a great challenge for bush walkers: the Great North Walk. We gradually started to complete individual sections of the 260km walk, which were easily accessible from the train line. After a year or so, the only section I hadn’t completed was the “The Watagans” which was an area well away from the railway line and about 80km in length. Aiming to complete the entire walk, we did the southern section of the Watagans in around a day and a half. It was wet the second day and a friend, David, and I unknowingly picked up quite a few leeches. They were huge by the time we took our socks off. David laughed when I took off my shoes and banged them on the tiles outside the front door. It looked like an abattoir. Another day and another leg of the walk, my son Bill and I hired a taxi at Morisset which dropped us near the start of walking track, fifty dollars later. We started off southward and after a day and a half, we arrived at Yarramalong, behind Wyong, where David and I had started off previously. At this stage I had only about 44km to complete. Margaret and I inspected the hill south of the Gap and in fact we climbed it. I realised, though, that with my big backpack I would have great difficulty climbing down the other side as it was very steep and had no handrails. Because my health was starting to decline I never did those last 44km. In 1996 Margaret and I were still enjoying our walks with the Ramblers and also doing some with a local group at Berkley Vale. We had an unnerving day when I led a walk from Wondabyne to Old Sydney Town in June. It was a 16km walk and there were five of us: Joyce, Mary, Joan, Margaret and myself. It rained most of the day and the creeks were high. We were looking for a place to cross a creek near Girracool and lost our original path. I didn’t know which way to go. Soon after, I had a big walk while we had a week at Barrington Tops. I walked to Casey’s Peak and back: a trip of 22km in seven hours 30 minutes. I was the last man back and terribly tired. Five weeks later my doctor rang with bad news. He had detected trouble with my heart due to fibrillation. It was a pity that I kept running, walking and cycling. I thought I was immune to trouble. In May 1997 I had my first trip to hospital with chest and neck pains. I was then in and out of hospital until I had my by-pass operation two months later on 17 July. Two months later, I was recovering well till I had a small prostrate operation which upset the whole apple cart. I experienced a bad heart attack while under sedation and when I awoke I was frozen. Not even six blankets warmed me up and instead of one day in hospital, I was there for six.

“On Golden Pond” Now I am resting at home much more than compared to my bush walking days. I have more time to think of the family and what the boys have done since leaving school so long ago.

Kenneth George George, the oldest son, is now 46 years old. He was the first to leave school and he married Janis Proud in 1978. They both moved up to the second caravan park at Banora Point with Margaret and I to help. Afterwards he and Janis moved back down to the Central Coast to Chain Valley Bay, a little town on Lake Macquarie. Janis’ father, Mick, was able to get George on at one of the local power stations that were under construction. He started out as an assistant to a Dutch welder who he got on very well with. After three years on the power station, their marriage began to fail and George moved to Sydney to work as a scaffolder on the high-rise constructions in the city. George had acquired several qualifications and eventually worked as a rigger erecting and dismantling the large tower cranes on the building sites. He also became a leading hand of a rigging team who did various other jobs on the building sites. A few years later he became a landscape gardener for a Mr Ken Lamb who was well respected in Sydney as very good with Chinese gardens. George also took up a carpentry course at night school and soon started his own small business doing house renovations which he is still busy at. He now lives in the Chatswood area of Sydney.

James Russell Jim is 45 years old and left school the same year as George (they had been put in the same year at school) and started work in a bank. He didn’t like the work and after a year, decided to return to school and get better marks with his leaving certificate. He wanted to attend Teacher’s College and become a high school Physical Education teacher. Jim married Kim Jacobs in 1982 at Moss Vale where they had been working at a horse stud. Kiera-Lee their first child was born on 24 April 1982. He got his first teaching job a short time later and was stationed out at Lake Cargelligo which is a long way out west in NSW with very poor roads. They needed our help badly when it came time to move and I remember Margaret and I towing a large trailer containing most of their earthly goods behind our old Holden Kingswood. On our way home we stayed at the lovely old hotel between Katoomba and Blackheath called Medlow Bath. What a long trip! On the way back, our muffler and exhaust pipe dropped off and we had to stop beside some grain silos near a railway line and tie it back on with fencing wire. I hadn’t been a farmer for nothing! Jim’s next school posting was to be at Muswellbrook in the Hunter Valley, about a three or four hours drive north of Sydney. Jim taught there for 13 years and they purchased their own house there. Their second child, Nathan, was born at Muswellbrook on 1 June 1986.

A family portrait taken while living at Wyoming, probably in 1998 or 1999. I wonder if we planned it in front of the previous portrait taken so many years ago?

In 1996, Jim and Kim separated and he took on the caring for the kids. In 2000 he received a transfer to his old school, The Entrance High. He and Nathan now live in a rented house right on the beach very near the old Two Shores caravan park. Kiera-Lee, now a beautiful young woman, lives in Muswellbrook, working at a legal office and hoping to go to university. She is a serious minded girl and I am sure she is headed for a bright future. Kim now lives in Gatton in South East Queensland and Nathan goes to visit her every school holiday, travelling up and back on the interstate bus. For the past 12 months, Nathan has come across to stay with us one night per week so that he can attend his Hepkendo (karate) classes.

Paul Huddleston Paul, now 44 years old, is colour blind - as are the other boys. Because of this I had difficulty getting him into an apprenticeship when he left school. He worked at Two Shores for a short time and then left on a working holiday with two friends, one of whom was a bricklayer. Together they travelled up to Queensland, working on building sites on the way. They arrived at Mount Isa in the outback north and after a long wait doing any jobs that came along, including cleaning toilets at the Mt Isa Rodeo and labouring work on a cattle station, Paul got a job in the big silver, lead and zinc mine there. His two mates headed off in separate directions and Paul stayed for 12 months before returning to The Entrance, then moving to Sydney for work. His first job there was as a courier driver using my old Holden ute for the job. He didn’t find this very profitable and eventually the ute was defected off the road. For a while he worked in kitchens before doing a course in crane driving. He then got work laying pipe work in Sydney’s northern beaches. There he met Barbara Tenney and soon after, they left Sydney to travel around Australia on a working holiday. With two dogs and a cat, they travelled out for a season on the grape farms near Mildura but the season was marked by bad weather and they headed on to Western Australia. With engine trouble on the way they arrived almost penniless and immediately took up work on a wheat farm near Esperance. With his crane driver’s qualifications, Paul was put to work driving huge tractors pulling up to three long sets of disk ploughs at once. The work was hard and the wages very poor but they saved their dollars and eventually came home, shouting themselves a trip on the Indian Pacific rail train. They arrived up at Tweed Heads as by then I had sold Two Shores and moved north to the new Banora Point Caravan Park. Paul got work on the Gold Coast driving cranes. Not long afterwards, Paul and Barbara separated and he travelled back to Sydney. By this time we had taken up our job in Jim Miller’s Self Storage Ultimo facility. Paul had a series of jobs in Sydney until his brother George moved in with him. George convinced Paul to go to college and get his rigger’s qualifications. Paul did his course and got a job as a tower crane dogman with Concrete Constructions, the company George worked for. He held his job for several years, moving between dogging, rigging and scaffolding, occasionally working in George’s rigging gang. It was during this period that the boys saved enough money for us to buy our investment property in Newport. While in Sydney, Paul met Katia Josua and their baby girl, Lauren, was born on 16 March, 1990. Although Paul and Katia now live separately, they cooperate very well in looking after Lauren. She is a very lucky girl because her grandparents from Brazil have moved to Australia and they live together, helping take care of her in getting her to school, ballet and music lessons, etc. In 1993, Paul went back to college for a Community Welfare course. He was then able to procure a job at the Hepatitis C Council of NSW. He now lives in a nice unit he has purchased in Marrickville. His pet project is helping to get the sailing ship, James Craig, fully fitted out. They are getting very close and as I write this, they are preparing to sail the ship on a voyage to Newcastle, two hundred kilometres north of Sydney. He tells me the ship’s second voyage in 1876 was from England to Port Chalmers, Dunedin.

In 1998, Paul still had his motorbike and sidecar. It was a very neat set-up. He decided to take a trip in his holidays right around the state of NSW as near the borders as possible, and to visit the farthest part of the state, Cameron’s Corner, where NSW meets Queensland and South Australia. I’m sorry to say that he didn’t make it to Cameron’s Corner as he got a puncture two hundred kilometres on the dirt road north from Broken Hill. His inner tube was so badly damaged it could not be salvaged. He had to hitchhike with his rear wheel to Broken Hill and back. By then he had run short of time and headed back towards the coast and home. He said he will try it again sometime, but in his car!

A photo of Margaret and I taken in front of the old James Craig.

William John Bill is our youngest son and was born on 1 April, 1960. Like all the other boys he is a very honest and hard worker. When he left school, we managed to get him into a business course at Bathurst where he did very well. To celebrate, he bought a new BMW motor bike and rode around Australia including Tassie. He met a male nurse in Western Australia and found out about that type of work (that’s how he got the idea of studying nursing). Like me, Bill was a bit impetuous and he even went to Cape York crossing various rivers. By the time he got back home, to Banora Point Caravan Park in 1980, his bike was practically a wreck. Boys will be boys. Bill’s first marriage was to Karen Rae in 1985 and Rebecca was born that year on 2 October. Victor was their next child and was born on 13 August 1987. Their third child, Kathryn was born on 21 February in 1991. Bill and Karen separated and Bill travelled to Saudi Arabia on a nursing contract. In 1998 Bill married a lovely girl called Marta Bird who comes from Canada and who had also been nursing in Saudi Arabia. They now have a son, born 9 September, 1998, who they named Jack after yours truly. He is a lovely little boy and is now talking like a book. Bill and Marta have their own house in Newcastle and are both hospital nurses.

Words of wisdom While we were all at the Entrance there was a real surfie drug culture and we noticed our three older boys marks in High School deteriorated badly. We were very lucky that although they were affected at the time, it was only a temporary phase and they soon straightened out as they got jobs and grew older. Some of their friends were not so lucky and two that I know were badly affected and still remain that way. I say to all the grand-children, please don’t take any drugs or the effect could be horrific and ruin all the good things that you can enjoy in life like finding jobs, holidays, hobbies, getting married, living in nice homes and having children of your own. You should aim for a university education and a happy future. I wish the best of luck to you all and I hope you make your parents proud as our boys have done for Margaret and I. Never forget your family. There are lots of people in the world but you only have a small number of brothers, sisters and cousins so spend lots of time together and enjoy your time with each other. As you grow older in life they will be there to help and support you when us grand parents are gone and your own mums and dads grown older. Love Grandpa Harvey.

Margaret and I having a bit of fun. Photo taken in 1998 or 1999 at Wyoming.

Post script I regret not having more photos of my brothers and sisters. This photo is of my sister, Evelyn, who died in Christchurch in 2001. I am now the last of the Harvey clan from Chestermains farm.