I am looking at a sepia photo of an old woman, wearing an apron, watching three children climbing on the veranda rail.  She is our Nana Pascoe, photographed with my younger brothers and myself, at the front of her house in Lily Street.  It must have been one of the earliest houses in Violet Town, as it is built on the very corner of the block, with a step down from the veranda onto the footpath. Perhaps it had been a shop in earlier times.

I can still visualise that house and yard. To a child the garden seemed so big, with a chook run and woodshed far away on the back fence. The house was small and rather dark, with a detached bathroom and bedroom.  The kitchen opened onto a veranda which housed a Coolgardie safe, a table, Pa’s chair - where he read the paper and smoked his pipe - and a huge plant stand.

The kitchen was very homely, with a black wood stove, a huge black kettle and Mrs Potts’ irons. As children, we loved to go there after school to eat Nana’s endless supply of Gingernut biscuits and make Milo with hot water and condensed milk. Having no refrigerator, the local dairyman, Foster Mackrell, delivered milk several days a week. I remember him riding his huge horse along the side of the house, picking up the billy hanging on the gate, and delivering milk back when he returned the cows to the paddock.

Early photos show Nana as a pretty, petite girl with dark curly hair and dark eyes, but I think she had quite a hard life.  Pa was away a lot working at road building or farm labouring and she raised the children mostly alone.

When my mother was born, Nana Pascoe was over 40, considered a dangerous age to have a baby. She haemorrhaged badly and had to be taken to Wangaratta Hospital by train (no ambulances in Violet Town). To get her to the train, she was put in a cart and several men took the shafts and carefully pulled it to the station.  Times have changed since then!

Later in life Nana slipped and fell, hurting her hip badly. She bravely carried on, refusing to see a doctor, relying on her Bex tablets and making a makeshift crutch from a broom.

Toward the end of her life a burst ulcer in one eye resulting in the removal of that eye, while the remaining eye had a cataract. Her near blindness was difficult, but she did not complain. I clearly remember the day I took Ray along to meet her. To his embarrassment, she pulled him over closer to her, looked him over, and declared he would suit Margaret!

We regularly had Sunday lunch with Nana and Pa Pascoe. I really enjoyed the simple meals of cold corned meat and salad or vegies, followed by fruit and custard, or nana’s plum jam tart (we called it “stone jam”) on the back veranda in summer. Mum would sometimes send us down the street for a Family Brick” of ice-cream.
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I realise now that Nana Pascoe suffered a lot of pain, but I never remember her complaining or being cross.  We were so lucky to have her till she was 84, setting such an example to us.
 
Margaret Nelson
July 2020

​Our entrance area is now a centre for memories. 

There is a framed collage of family photos on the wall.  These were originally separate photos that sat on the entrance unit.  But it got to the point where the whole surface was covered with no room for more.  Some were even hidden behind others even though I tried to place the larger ones to the back.  So we made the collage and had it framed.  Now I can look out my study door and see these family memories on the wall.  It includes 17 years of memories with both our children and four grandchildren and reflects the changes that have occurred over these years – moves around the country, children growing up, and the changes that have occurred for them in that time.

But what to do with the empty surface?  This now serves as a place for many of my knitted dolls.  I have not knitted any dolls for a few years, but these show what I have done in the past. And there is a knitted floral arrangement from last year’s “Benalla Rugged Up” event.

On an opposite wall, another smaller collage of a family holiday in Noosa (well, it was a holiday for those of us who do not live there).  The is also an Irish music poster from a trip to Ireland.  I cannot remember whether this was a visit 10 years ago with my husband, or a business trip three years earlier.

Yes, our entrance hall is full of memories!

Joy Shirley

Joy Shirley
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My sporting achievements are somewhat underwhelming. I did play football, basketball and tennis from an early age, but I can confidently say that I participated.

Going through the storage boxes I found some unused tennis balls. They were still firm, but I would suggest if hit, they would disintegrate into a cloud of dust. I did play competition tennis initially for Wollert, and in later years for Beveridge. I did not make it to the higher ranks, however we did have a great coach in the early years. Lancelot Greer was a former prisoner of war, and was in Changi with Weary Dunlop. ‘Lanie’ as he was known, was still winning district competitions and championships when he was in his fifties. I must have been somewhat of a disappointment to him, but he actively encouraged myself and the other children in the district to persist and practice, practice, practice.

It was whilst playing for Beveridge that we were competing at Yan Yean. We had been relatively successful throughout the day and were well up in the games score as we entered the mixed doubles. It was the last game of our set and as I reached to return a low ball, I felt something like a kick to the back of my right leg. I finished the set a little uncomfortable and then started to feel pain as I cooled down. I returned home with the assistance of other team members and the leg stated to swell. Nothing could be done on Sunday, so first thing Monday morning we rang our doctor in Whittlesea for an appointment.

I was indeed fortunate, as our local GP’s at the time were Dr. Bruce Reid, who became the club doctor for the Essendon Football Club and Dr. John Tickell, who left Whittlesea to take up a position with the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra.

A quick examination revealed that I had in fact torn my Achilles tendon rather badly. An appointment was made for an operation at the Warringal Sports Hospital in Heidelberg and the tendon was eventually restored, albeit after some weeks in a cast over summer.
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Barry O’Connor.
July 2020.

Sifting through the old boxes, I came across a corded touch pad telephone. This prompted a flood of memories from days past.

Whilst the touch phone is still in use today, it has been very much superseded by the cordless model.

I do not use the landline system anymore, instead utilising the mobile device network for our communication needs.

In the early days the automated telephone system was not available for every home to have a telephone, so public phone boxes were strategically placed around the suburbs. Unfortunately in early 1950, the suburb of Lalor was very new and the only public phone in our area of the suburb was at the railway station, some 560 mt. from our house. The streets were unmade and when wet, were a challenge to navigate, especially for my mother when pushing a pram with a child in it. The local families actually had a large wooden box at the railway station where people would leave their gumboots whilst away on the train. Most people left their phone calls until they were in the vicinity of the station. The automated telephone installation did eventually come in late 1952, but the eastern end of our street was one of the last areas to be connected.  We were not connected for some time, instead relying on nearby family members in an emergency.
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My second experience with the telephone was at my Grandparents property near Woomelang in the Mallee. This line was known as the ‘party’ line, with two wires strung on insulators between mallee tree trunks. 

​There were no allocated phone numbers, just a special series of ring sequences. These ring sequences were a series of either ‘short’ or ‘long’ rings. Each person on the ‘party’ line had a different sequence. I always remember my grandmother and aunties racing to the phone, holding the hanger down and lifting the receiver to listen in on the other conversations. Nothing was private in the bush, everybody knew everybody’s business. To call outside the area you had to ring the exchange in the nearest town and have the telephonist connect you to the desired number.

I often wonder if our grandparents could see what is available in communication equipment today, what would they think?
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Barry O’Connor.
July 2020.

My lifetime – I’m 88 years of age – includes memories and stories from the Great Depression of 1932 to the current Corona Virus pandemic of 2020.
 
In 1932, many jobless males walked the countryside looking for work, any type of work, if only to obtain a meal.  Farms were routinely visited by these desperate men.  Indian hawkers and their horse-drawn vehicles were regular visitors selling their wares.
 
In the 1930’s polio was termed infantile paralysis as there was then an epidemic to which my brother Basil (two years older than me) succumbed, but fortunately recovered from.
 
At my school in the late 1930’s we were regularly visited by men known as “swaggies” or swagmen because they normally carried a bag (swag).  They were prepared to cut wood, tend the garden, milk the cows, or do any job that may be available.  We had one regular who was affectionately called “Billy Butterfly”.
 
In September 1939 we saw the commencement of World War II.  Our school was adjacent to the main Melbourne railway line.  In the early 1940’s America joined the war and their troops came to Australia.  We saw many “Yanks” and their tanks, jeeps and other warfare on the never-ending trains that went by.
 
One of my school mates left school and the next year, at age 14 years, came back to visit in an Army uniform.  He was later deployed to Darwin where bombs were being dropped.
 
During the war years, and for a long time afterwards, we had to get used to the “ration tickets” which were required for practically every commodity, food, clothes, petrol.  This saw the introduction to gas burners attached to the rear end of cars.  It also saw the introduction of the popular, illegal practice of using kerosene to propel motor vehicles.
 
May and August of 1945 treated us to the termination of warfare in the Pacific and Europe.  There were great celebrations by way of processions in the streets of every town in the country.  My brother Pat returned from Tobruk.
 
1950 saw me entering the workforce.  There was also the beginning of the Korean War and later on, National Service.  I was too young to go to Korea and, believe it or not, too old for National Service.  I had completed my registration form for National Service and went to the Post Office to mail it.  At the entrance was a notice telling all eligible males to register and on re-reading it I became aware that I was one month too old.  With some regret I destroyed my registration form and returned to my somewhat mundane job.
 
Work continued and I transferred to St. Arnaud, then Wodonga, and Melbourne in the early 1960s.  At that time the Vietnam War was current, and my niece’s fiancé was drafted for service.
I then got married, completed my accounting qualifications, and had a successful business career.

I retired in 2000 and all was well in the world.
 
Then, in early 2020, the Corona Virus struck, and we now find ourselves in lockdown.
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So, there you have it, “As Time Goes By”, reflections on historical events across a lifetime spanning 88 years (to date!).
 
 
Ray O’Shannessy
7 July 2020