I was working as a second year trainee nurse at the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne and it was approaching Christmas time in 1962. There were six of us living in a “flat” in Punt Road, just up from the then St..Kilda Junction.
The flat was a two storied terraced house, since pulled down to eradicate the said junction. Marge Hauser. Nee.Laing and I shared the front room on the ground floor. The other half of the building was a mirror image of the side we lived in. At the time this was a “sly grog shop”. It was not legal then to buy alcohol out of drinking hours. Some individuals set up their own establishment and illegally sold grog on the sly. There were times when we were disturbed by a knock on the bedroom window when someone mistook our place for the one next door. It was not really a problem and was handy if we had a party. The neighbours would not complain about the noise knowing that we would dob them in for the sly grog.
Some of our friends shared a house near the Toorak Station. They were planning a Christmas party. On the day of the event they realised they did not have enough drinking glasses. Karl and several of his mates were living in the house at the back of the girls place. One of the girls approached the boys to ask for the loan of some glasses. Karl answered to door and said “Yes, we will make the loan if we can come to your party”. That is how Karl and I ended up being in the same place at the same time.
At that time I was keeping company with a chap called Bob Watson. He was an electrical engineer but at the time of this occurrence he was in Antarctica. He had applied for the position as a weather observer a couple of times. Each time he grew a beard in anticipation of landing the job. Each time he was unsuccessful he shaved the beard off. Eventually he was successful and left for a 3 month term in Antarctica. So I was without a date to take with me.
As I said, it was approaching Christmas. Each year the Alfred nurses held a formal dinner dance at the Dorchester, a reception place by the Yarra just near the boat sheds and Princes Bridge. With so many nurses the numbers to attend were limited, but I was on the waiting list. On the day of the “do” I finished work at 3.30 pm and received a phone call to say there had been a cancellation, that tickets for two were available if I wanted them. I accepted, then had to find a partner to go with me. Bob was not available. I remembered Karl, who I had met the Saturday before. I did not have contact details so caught the tram to the girl’s house to await Karl’s arrival to invite him to come with me.
The party when I met Karl was typical of it’s time. Dim lighting and empty Chianti bottles (they had a raffia outer covering), each with a candle in the top. During the party Karl told me his name was Rudy and he was a “commercial artist”. He said that he was painting a mural on a wall at Research near Eltham. In an effort to talk with him to ask him out, I had phoned a couple of businesses in Research to see if anyone knew of an artist painting a mural. No one did.
Karl arrived, whistling, at about 4.45 pm. I was surprised to see he was a red head. With only candle light at the party I did not realise his hair was red . If I was asked out by a boy with red hair I would decline. He was wearing white paint spattered work overalls with a stick figure of a Saint with a halo embroidered on the pocket. Not quite my image of a commercial artist. He had stretched the truth. His commercial art mural was a King Neptune advert on the side of a petrol station wall.
I asked Karl to the dinner dance, explaining it was a black tie affair. He accepted. Later I found out that he had borrowed a friend’s car and driven to Niddrie to borrow his brother Clive’s dinner suit! He did not have a car as he had sold his because he and a mate were going to NZ for a working holiday to work on a hydro electric scheme in the south island.
At our flat we often had boyfriend’s visit .even after they became ex boyfriends. We would sit on the floor in the lounge room and drink coffee, smoke cigarettes, the room lit with Chianti bottles dripping with candle wax, Marg’s record player playing The Kingston Trio and Frank Sinatra in the background. Because we six worked shift work there was pretty much always someone home. Marion and Jenny Milkins, twin sisters from Casterton who ended up as our bridesmaids also had some of their boy mates who were living in Melbourne, drop by.
A couple of days after our night out, Karl called in. We were all sitting chatting, smoking and listening to records. Karl was asked what he was doing over Christmas. He said he was going home to Tonny for a few days to see his parents. Marg pricked up her ears as she was also from Tonny. This was a local. name for Tongala. She said to Karl, What is your surname”? It transpired that they lived in the same street in Tongala and were at the primary school at the same time. Marg moved to Melbourne to continue her schooling as a boarder at MLC, so had not seen Karl for many years.
I ended up accompanying Karl to Tonny to meet his parents a few days after Christmas. We walked into the kitchen and Karl said to his mum and dad, “I would like you to meet the girl I am going to marry!!!! I had known him for about 2 weeks. We became engaged 3 months later and married on Sept 7th 1963 at St Mathews in Cheltenham.
************
Claire Rudolph,
June 2020
The flat was a two storied terraced house, since pulled down to eradicate the said junction. Marge Hauser. Nee.Laing and I shared the front room on the ground floor. The other half of the building was a mirror image of the side we lived in. At the time this was a “sly grog shop”. It was not legal then to buy alcohol out of drinking hours. Some individuals set up their own establishment and illegally sold grog on the sly. There were times when we were disturbed by a knock on the bedroom window when someone mistook our place for the one next door. It was not really a problem and was handy if we had a party. The neighbours would not complain about the noise knowing that we would dob them in for the sly grog.
Some of our friends shared a house near the Toorak Station. They were planning a Christmas party. On the day of the event they realised they did not have enough drinking glasses. Karl and several of his mates were living in the house at the back of the girls place. One of the girls approached the boys to ask for the loan of some glasses. Karl answered to door and said “Yes, we will make the loan if we can come to your party”. That is how Karl and I ended up being in the same place at the same time.
At that time I was keeping company with a chap called Bob Watson. He was an electrical engineer but at the time of this occurrence he was in Antarctica. He had applied for the position as a weather observer a couple of times. Each time he grew a beard in anticipation of landing the job. Each time he was unsuccessful he shaved the beard off. Eventually he was successful and left for a 3 month term in Antarctica. So I was without a date to take with me.
As I said, it was approaching Christmas. Each year the Alfred nurses held a formal dinner dance at the Dorchester, a reception place by the Yarra just near the boat sheds and Princes Bridge. With so many nurses the numbers to attend were limited, but I was on the waiting list. On the day of the “do” I finished work at 3.30 pm and received a phone call to say there had been a cancellation, that tickets for two were available if I wanted them. I accepted, then had to find a partner to go with me. Bob was not available. I remembered Karl, who I had met the Saturday before. I did not have contact details so caught the tram to the girl’s house to await Karl’s arrival to invite him to come with me.
The party when I met Karl was typical of it’s time. Dim lighting and empty Chianti bottles (they had a raffia outer covering), each with a candle in the top. During the party Karl told me his name was Rudy and he was a “commercial artist”. He said that he was painting a mural on a wall at Research near Eltham. In an effort to talk with him to ask him out, I had phoned a couple of businesses in Research to see if anyone knew of an artist painting a mural. No one did.
Karl arrived, whistling, at about 4.45 pm. I was surprised to see he was a red head. With only candle light at the party I did not realise his hair was red . If I was asked out by a boy with red hair I would decline. He was wearing white paint spattered work overalls with a stick figure of a Saint with a halo embroidered on the pocket. Not quite my image of a commercial artist. He had stretched the truth. His commercial art mural was a King Neptune advert on the side of a petrol station wall.
I asked Karl to the dinner dance, explaining it was a black tie affair. He accepted. Later I found out that he had borrowed a friend’s car and driven to Niddrie to borrow his brother Clive’s dinner suit! He did not have a car as he had sold his because he and a mate were going to NZ for a working holiday to work on a hydro electric scheme in the south island.
At our flat we often had boyfriend’s visit .even after they became ex boyfriends. We would sit on the floor in the lounge room and drink coffee, smoke cigarettes, the room lit with Chianti bottles dripping with candle wax, Marg’s record player playing The Kingston Trio and Frank Sinatra in the background. Because we six worked shift work there was pretty much always someone home. Marion and Jenny Milkins, twin sisters from Casterton who ended up as our bridesmaids also had some of their boy mates who were living in Melbourne, drop by.
A couple of days after our night out, Karl called in. We were all sitting chatting, smoking and listening to records. Karl was asked what he was doing over Christmas. He said he was going home to Tonny for a few days to see his parents. Marg pricked up her ears as she was also from Tonny. This was a local. name for Tongala. She said to Karl, What is your surname”? It transpired that they lived in the same street in Tongala and were at the primary school at the same time. Marg moved to Melbourne to continue her schooling as a boarder at MLC, so had not seen Karl for many years.
I ended up accompanying Karl to Tonny to meet his parents a few days after Christmas. We walked into the kitchen and Karl said to his mum and dad, “I would like you to meet the girl I am going to marry!!!! I had known him for about 2 weeks. We became engaged 3 months later and married on Sept 7th 1963 at St Mathews in Cheltenham.
************
Claire Rudolph,
June 2020
RSS Feed
