| Notes |
- ( Written by Theresa Hallam near 1996.)
I have collected so many photos old and new; While reflecting on Irish origins a picture of my grandmother come into my mind. I seem to begin with my memories of her when I was 4 years. She would have been 80 years but remember my disappointment when I could not make her run even by pulling her arms and me running backward. At that time she was a widow with dad’s two unmarried sisters Annie ( Honera and Nell who was called our grandmother Ellen Mary. It must have been a mammoth for my dear father to carry. There was no government aid for the widowed or the unmarried or the unemployed. My father was 40 then and he and my mother were married. He built he had built a cement brick house hand having made the bricks by himself, lived there for 12 years.
When I was about 3 a portion of our land was sold to a neighbour and our grandmother and two aunts moved 12 miles into Kerang where they bought a neat home in Nolan Street.
Aunty Annie became a housekeeper for the rather comfortable widower we knew as Thomas Murphy. Aunty Nell was a “Martha lady” seeing to the welfare and comfort of all who called on her. who cared lovingly and patiently for granny until she died at 103 years was supported by keeping young men boarders. I wonder where the joy in her day could have come from. It all seemed to be love going outward.
My grandmother was a small very playful lady and her god always beside her and you could hear her aloud in her prayers at times. . died when I was 20 years and I had been working in Melbourne 3 years.
The depression was upon us and the farms could not produce enough food for grown members to be kept at home and this fact of the family having to seek education and work away from home is still a minus these days.
As my two brothers Jack and Con gained some birthdays we would come to stay a couple of days with Aunty. I was one and a half years older than jack and three years than Con who bore a family name of Cornelius. These must have been happy days as I have no memory of any sadness or even disappointment even though Santa in those days bought mainly clothes and a small toys.
We obviously were healthy too and grew up on our farm until I was 14 years. The property was sold but I am sure now there would have been no surplus funds after we bought a house in Kerang at 136 Victoria Street. It was an older timber home but very well kept especially after my very tidy and hard working mother took hand to it. I remember life on the farm unrelenting milking of 40 to 50 cows and it was an irrigation property.
I remember when autumn came and it was time to plant crops after a fall of rain. My father worked his team of horses through what would have been lunch time. My mother would cut slices of roast lamb onto a plate always with a tomato and cucumber (home grown).
I would carry this with a bottle of cold tea to my father. There were nights when irrigating a paddock of crops when Dad would have to get up in the night and walk with shovel in hand to cut the water off or divert the flow.
There were some outings we as children looked forward to. Dad had a pleasant tenor voice and in our opinion mum played our piano ably. I really was proud of his ability as I had no such ability at all.
We would visit the home of Jack and Lillian Lake and the Jim Matthews where Mum & dad played and sang with these neighbors. We played in the night in their garden and on their verandah. There was always lovely smell of brewing coffee and many cakes to end our evening and then homeward in our ford car No 128. 701.
There were times too when there was an event in Myall hall about three miles from our property. It was a small hall really, (end of page 3) but the young and some others danced to the music from Len & Alan Fasams’s Band piano violin banjo. My Dad was happy to be MC for the set dances as a caller is now to square dancing. I knew he loved this and so enjoyed dancing. He always folded a white handkerchief over his hand so no not to leave perspiration on the frock of his partner. My Mum did not dance but eu ? ) and card games well played by a dozen or so on the stage. I feel my mother envied Dad the joy he found in dancing. There was the “ante room “where supper was prepared. Oh! the cream puffs, the sponges the Swiss rolls and again the beautiful smell of coffee. Sandwiches were cut that evening.
Towards the end of the dance- a clothes basket now filled with thick white cups was carried around to all seated dancers who lined the walls of the hall. Each took a cup as I recall not a saucer. The sandwiches came around on a very larger tray all neatly packed on clean white linen tea towels. Then the cakes came and finally huge pots of milky coffee.
Once again as children we were happy to have our 'run about" play outside and get beside our parents to get a share of their supper. It was quite an interest to us children to see whose big sister was dancing how many dances with whose older brother.
These happy events were to phase out gradually after Jack and I began school. I was nearly 7 and jack was 5. We walked two and a half miles via the main irrigation channel through Murphy’s property and Joe Austin's then by George Townsends orange orchard. We never ever stole oranges and by Jove we could count on two hands those given to us.
The school teacher always boarded at Charlie Hill's property and that was comfortable walking distance for him or her-about 5-10 minutes. My ambition as a child was to be a school teacher.
Only two families had gigs to come to school in. The McDonald had one. In the years I was at Myall with my brothers, the McDonald's rig had carried Flora, Jessie, Edna. Malcolm and Margaret who was my friend in my grade. The McDonald's were rather prosperous for those days, as the depression had dampened down so much ambition drive and hope. How did I know they were wealthy? .The children ate violet crumbles at school.
I loved every moment I was at that school and was filled with joy and learning. I did want to be a teacher. Every girl then wanted to be a teacher or a nurse. I don't think Jack and Con enjoyed their years at Myall School. There was hockey to play in winter. Sometimes” Hawks and Doves “and football for the boys. The girls gathered and some told secrets about sisters, boyfriends or the clothes they wanted to get.
I remember about once (end of page 5)-a month on a Friday afternoon a Methodist Minister came to give religion instruction to the children. The catholic children were to tend the school garden in that time. My two brothers and I were to go the garden. I loved the garden and thought my strip was among the best. All who wanted a plot could have one.
Teachers planted seeds in seed boxes and eventually were ready for transplant in our plot. We could chose from carnations, wallflowers, cornflowers, marigolds, lupins and oh yes the Iceland and Shirley poppies. Our plant was short but wide and 20 feet long and we dug and prepared it ourselves. Yes, sons and daughters of the land.
It probably was not recognizable then but the boys planted vegetables. Looking generally backward on those school days I remember it with happiness- The weather seemed usually hot to very hot and there seemed to be frequent thunderstorms and how we would have welcomed a ride home from school at 3.30 pm in the heat or the rain.
There was lovely hot bread to hurry home to in the afternoons and on Thursdays my mum made raisin loaves and buns. She called the raisin loaves "brownies". They came from a yeast recipe as did the bread. After eating our raisin loaf with golden syrup which I loved we would change clothes and help Dad with the milking.
They came from a yeast recipe as did the bread. After eating our raisin loaf with golden syrup which I loved we would change clothes and help Dad with the milking.
Dad was usually able to employ some poor guy worse off than us or a young man (teenager) son or relative of neighbours. I enjoyed milking and loved the animals but I knew too it was helping Dad who was wonderful- I never ever heard him complain of health, pains or the situation he was in. He must have found resources meaning and comfort in the catholic faith.
He had told us as a child on the way to mass on a Sunday. Sometimes the (his) family would drive in the Phaeton (a 2 seater vehicle with seats facing) to Kerang or to Koondrook on a Sunday. Remembering how cold it was. He said he and his 2 sisters would get out and catch on to the back of the phantom and run some distance.
I have a few photos of my mum and Dad but they were not at ease in front of a camera although Dad enjoyed the process of developing his own prints from the negatives. My brother and I would stand around Dads chair in our lamp less kitchen and wait with anticipation as images were developed on the film and later on the print.
Given the opportunities of available today I would wonder what he would have chose as his life’s expression. He was a sensitive kind man very honest and just and this he expected in others too. He loved to sing Irish ballads and to read poetry. He read poetry to Mum and serials which well adapted from novels and appeared in papers.
Mum had another dream other than being a farmer’s wife in depression. Could anything demand more? I sensed her (end of page 7) feelings of isolation on our farm, 12 miles from Kerang and also 90 miles from Bendigo where she spent happy days with her cousins. Gladys Cooper and Lillian who married Art Harman. I think she believed in Bendigo some of the dreams could come true. I don't think she really fitted in as a Troy. I could be wrong but even though she was friendly with Tom & Sarah Troy, Jim and Hannah Troy.
Dad was the letter writer and Mum would ask Dad the form of writing. I would say they both had 6 basic years of schooling. I don't know what they hoped their children would do on life's way. Mum had a firm belief in the security of life in public service and as years went on Jack and I both entered that field without being aware they prayed for such or hoped for it.
Jack and I both left Kerang when we were 16 and 17 years-a tragedy my parents felt that so young we had to work away but the depression was with the country still. It was in 1936 that we came to live in Kerang. We both went to ST Josephs School until work came for us. Jack went to local Grocery store and I went to a Kerang branch of agriculture suppliers mainly petrol ect but managed by Les Fenton.
Actually the day "for going away” had occurred years well before when at the onset of War, my then employer had joined the RAAF and left his country town family and business.
I decided I would follow Jack to his address in Melbourne and then apply for work. And So on the morning I left family and home that day we all realized Kerang and the family time would no longer be my home. My friend Noreen helped me pack and plan.
It did not help us any being a catholic family in those days. I can still recall the cold of that reality but I so strongly knew even then that I would always find my harbour in the expression of the catholic faith.
In a while Jack had been accepted by Victorian railways and became a station assistant in south Yarra. It was fortunate because when I was to sit for a public service exam where I was shortly appointed to the Taxation Office where I was very happy for the years 1944. It was good days as I was working at the Taxation Office when I rejoiced in new friendships of Eileen McKenna and Marie Kelly Rona Carlson grace Marshall Pat McNamara and many others.
Marie Kelly had a kind of lifestyle. I had never heard of in my country days and ways.There were two girls in her family and 3 brothers. Ever again they were a musical family and soon I was being invited out to Camberwell to her large colonial home for family celebrations which to my delight were quite frequent. (End of page 10) There were musical evenings with singing and dancing.
All the girls at Taxation were young woman because married woman were simply not employed. There could have been some husbands belonging to some girls but they did not wear rings or change names if that had happened.
I went to share boarding facilities with Jack at the home of Mary Carlson, a Swedish widow who shared a lovely and substantial home at 17 Macfarlane St South Yarra.
It was a delight for me last year( in 1989 ) when Gerard took me to visit that house after we had seen a warm and film called "Da"I was delighted to feel again the joy of living in south Yarra.
World War 2 had broken out before Jack and I went to live in Melbourne. How well I remember the voice of Robert Menzies P.M as he told the world and our small family sitting by the warmth from our wood fire stove that from moment our world had changed. Our country was at war with Germany only 25 years after the “war to end all wars". The young men of Kerang and all districts towns and cities were already directing their young manhood to defend the values of their families and country. The threat seemed immediate and dreadful to us all.
The effects of the depression were only the beginning, to move away but sadly young men solved the problem of "where to now" by enlisting in one of the services.
The dance was in Elizabeth St City and it was a Services dance. In those days it was considered nice to be introduced to friends or even enemies. A mutual friend did introduce me to Tom and for a very short time we went to places together but soon he was posted to Darwin and a marathon letter writer duel began. Yes we did write daily and all this time I was writing weekly absolutely weekly to my mum and dad.(It was my mothers proud boast that I wrote every week for about 30 years until my mum and dad died.
I was by this time sharing a unit or was in a flat with Noreen and Eileen Walsh in 22 Davis St South Yarra. It's a lovely tree lined street still and occasionally I see it. To this day it has not changed or been renovated as has much in South Yarra. . There is the Longford Cinema now where the Toorak cabaret was. When jack and I were at Mary Carlson’s we would buy an occasional pack of fish and chips there. Officers and their resplendent ladies danced there. A little bit up market!
At the end of 1944 a letter came from Tom saying as the end of world conflict was insight and planning for peace had began and he was engaged in food production at the time on his enlistment, the RAAF was going to discharge him at the end of the year to return to essential services. In war time people became accustomed to not making long range plans or for that matter not making demands. All the prayers and energies were directed for peace for our world and the (end of page 15) return of those we loved. It was a great surprise to realize this letter was really saying we could be married in quite a short time. It was unbelievable to have so many plans to be made and try to imagine Tom and me living in a world of peace.
Engaged couples in war time hoped and prayed for re unions, marriages family and home life again, but dared not plan it. We had seen workmates friends and neighbours and family too reeling from tragic news from command HQ that they regret to say"....your son or your husband has been killed in action" or "has been posted missing in action ". I had been delivered from this thankfully, so began to prepare wedding plans.
One first regret was that I would be unable to have a family wedding. So many restrictions applied. Clothing coupons were rationed, so too was food coupons, petrol ration tickets, travel restrictions, no interstate travel.
I rode the train daily from South Yarra to the city I would read the headlines of War news in the newspapers of seated travellers. Such grim headlines, such long lists of”killed in action” listed and printed each day. We certainly sorted out our priorities in those days. My mother was caring for an aged uncle. Con's sisters may and June was only 5. It was just not possible that they could bundle up their lives and come to Melbourne to a hastily prepared wedding. Where for them to stay? Where the money for splendid clothes? It was decided my dear Dad would come down and give me away on our day.
Father Con Troy a sacred heart missionary was asked to perform the marriage celebration. Father Con said he had surrendered his faculty to perform marriages and devote all his time to the elderly . He suggested I ask Jim Troy who was recently ordained a redemption priest and was waiting to be posted to a mission field. Shortly after he did go to the Philippines for 2 terms- up to 35 years. I asked Gwen McDonald who was a friend of my brothers at the time to be my bridesmaid. We saw the Parish Priest at Oakleigh and planned the day 18th November 1944. With food coupons we bought a wedding cake from Patterson’s traditional wedding cake specialists.
Written by Theresa Mary Hallam (Mn Troy) around 1996.
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1922 - 2015 (93 years)
