Family Histories

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BENNETT Joseph Alexander

Compiled by Gordon Freegard based on research by Merilyn Stewart

History as written by his son, Kevin Bennett, April 2025

My father, Joseph "Joe" Alexander at the age of thirteen years, arrived in Western Australia on the S.S. Dimboola, in August 1921. He accompanied his father, Ernest William, his father’s defacto Agnes, her son, Barney and his brothers, William and George. His eldest brother, Robert remained in NSW as did his stepmother Rose and half sisters, Ruby and Winnie. Ernest and Rose were not divorced until 1929. She had the police looking for him to present him with a warrant for his arrest in regard to his desertion of her. He then married Agnes in 1930.

                            NEWSPAPER ARTICLE         #2

JOSEPH "JOE" ALEXANDER  BENNETT           #1
 

The family’s first job was clearing land around a small location north of Dumbleyung called Dongalocking. George and Barney went to school for while here, George for a shorter time. The school was three miles away. (Easy walking distance.)

In 1925 the family moved to place called Beenong, 13 miles northeast of Lake Grace. Brother William had a place of his own elsewhere closer to Dumbleyung.

 YOUNG JOE BENNETT & UNKNOWN  PARTNER         #4
 

     MAP SHOWING POSITION OF BEENONG       #3

 

A NATIVITY PLAY AT BEENONG SCHOOL Approx 1925
UNCLE BARNEY IS ONE OF THE CHILDREN PICTURED            #5
 

   GRAND-DAD ERNEST  PLOUGHING AT NARRIKUP        #6

  NARRIKUP SHED         #7

                                                                                NARRIKUP         #8
 

Around this time Dad left the home farm and worked for the Main Roads department building roads out east to Lake King. He was humpin’ bags of wheat (180 lbs) and stacking them in readiness for transport to Hopetoun from where they were shipped to Fremantle I suppose. He even had a camel team for a while. For the record a glass of beer at the Newdegate Pub cost a penny (1 cent) at this time. Pre-recession, approx 1927, Grandad Ernest applied for and received a selection of land at Narrikup

In 1929 ‘The Great Depression’ hit and they ‘walked off’ their land selections and went to Perth. Dad decided to try his hand at boxing and fought at the Luxor Stadium (later known as Luxor Picture Theatre, then later again known as Canterbury Court) in James Street, Northbridge under the name of “Kid something (or other),” according to Uncle Barney’s recollections, “He didn’t make that much but he had a go.” The family moved to Albany leaving Dad in Perth to pursue his boxing career. I recall he had the cartilage surgically removed from his nose as it had been smashed quite a few times and was beyond repair. After an unknown amount of time in the boxing circuit, he reunited with his family (his dad, Agnes and Barney) who were living at Middleton beach, near Albany townsite. There wasn’t much work to be found so he spent a lot of his time fishing thus providing protein for the family dinner table. Rabbit meat was also a large part of their diet. During the “depression years” my Granddad (Ernest) received payments 30 shillings ($3) per week. These were known as sustenance payments or “sussies”. My Dad wasn’t entitled to these payments as he was yet to be married.

 


 

In the early 1930’s Dad worked for a fellow called Guy Warthwyke, (whom my brother Terry was named after) in the pioneering days of Takenup Creek and Napier land settlement schemes. Sometime around this period Dad applied for and was allocated three selections of land numbers 3834, 4801 and 4918. He worked this land growing veggies and planting fruit trees, working towards establishing a dairy herd, while still working part time for Guy. 

In 1937 my father married Hilda Warthwyke (Guy’s sister), who had two selections herself, 1907 and 1901. Hilda died during a medical procedure on 13 August 1944, leaving Dad her two selections. With his three selections Dad had quite a large holding of approximately 670 acres.

In May 1945 Dad married our mother, Nellie Lloyd. Terry was born 1946 and I followed in 1947. We lived on the farm situated on “Bennett” Road for a short time, then Dad decided to build on what had been one of Hilda’s blocks. The builder, Charlie Smith was getting on in years and due to ill health, couldn’t finish the job. So we lived in the partially built house for one or two years. This was just after I was born and about the time that Dad’s GP told him he had “a heart problem” and if he wanted to see us boys grow up he should ‘give away’ farming.

Because of his newly diagnosed heart problem, in 1949 Dad sold the farm “White Gates” to Foster Bell. Lot 3834 in Bennett Road, he sold to Doug Astill. The “heart problem” turned out to be a stomach ulcer but he didn’t learn of this misdiagnosis until after he’d sold the farm. Terry and I never got a chance to try our hand at dairy farming (probably a good thing.)
 

JOE & NEL BENNETT  WEDDING        #9
 

      JOE & NEL BENNETT ON THEIR HONEYMOON      #10
 

JOE BENNETT WITH HIS TWO BABY BOYS 1948       #11
 

 TAKENUP 1947        #12
 

   1948/49 DAD JOE, WITH NANA (MUM NELLIE'S MUM      #13
 

    1951 SITTING ON MITSY      #14
 

From 1949-1954 Dad worked at the Whaling Station, (over two seasons) Borthwicks Abattoirs and he also went rabbit trapping for about 18 months (he sold the pelts), until the introduction of myxomatosis put an end to that venture. While at the Whaling station we lived in a 6m x 6m army tent which just happened to leak. Someone told Dad that it was probably erected ‘inside-out’. So, they pulled it down and put it up the other way. It still leaked. I can still remember the tent down, with all our worldly possessions sitting there. We certainly didn’t have very much. To us kids, living in the tent didn’t matter much. We had a possum come and camp with us for a while. It slept in Dad’s overcoat pocket. I don’t know what Mum thought of our living conditions, but I don’t recall her complaining. She’d had it pretty rough in her single days working for her dad’s selection out from Denmark.
 

   1953 ALBANY WHALING STATION ("X" BEING APPROX LOCATION OF OUR TENT)      #15

 

 2024 ALBANY WHALING STATION      #16
 

 2024 ALBANY WHALING STATION      #17
 

I have very fond memories of Albany – ‘The Whaling Station’ would have to be one of the best places that a kid could ever live. Smelly as it was, we had an absolute ball there, playing around the rocks, fishing and sliding down the sand hills. Life was pretty good for a couple of boys. During the off season at The Whaling Station, we lived a little closer to town of Albany on Roberts Road (Robinson area, north of Torndirrup). The accommodation was a little better there. A new corrugated iron shed, probably about 9m x 4m with two partitions extending to where a ceiling could have been. But it had no lining or bathroom, just a tub that was placed in the middle of the kitchen for our weekly baths. I don’t recall a laundry, but the toilet was an outside ‘thunder-box dunny’. It was at this place where we learnt to ride bikes as well as Mum’s milking cow ‘Creamy’. Another life lesson learnt - milking cows are not made to ride, due to their skins being quite loose on their body, unlike beef cattle. We also lived on a farm called Robertson Estate. I’ve seen photos of this place, but I can’t remember it.

 

IN THE BACK OF THE SOFT-TOP UTE       #18
WITH VEGIES TO SELL IN TOWN 1950

TAKENUP 1950       #19
 

 MIDDLETON BEACH 1953      #20
 

In my pre-school years I was very ill with tonsillitis, consequently having a tonsillectomy in the little hospital (now Vancouver Arts Centre on Vancouver Street, Albany) in which Terry and I were both born. Terry began his schooling in 1952 and I in 1953. The school which we attended was ‘The Albany Infant School’ situated at the top of York Street and is now the ‘Dome Coffee house’.


 

 ROBINSON AREA/ROBERTS ROAD , ALBANY      #21
OUR COUSINS, BENNY, BOB, WIN, TERRY, LORRAINE, KEVIN & GLENIS
 

 ALBANY HOSPITAL (NOW VANCOUVER ARTS CENTRE)       #22
 

 

 

 ALBANY INFANT SCHOOL (NOW DOME COFFEE HOUSE)      #23
 

   1953 KALGAN RIVER      #24
 

   1954 YORK STREET, ALBANY. GOING TO HAVE PORTRAIT TAKEN         #25

 

  1955 ALBANY, ROBINSON AREA. WITH OUR NEIGHBOURS       #25
 

   KEVIN & TERRY       #27
 

I remember in 1954 (the year of her Coronation) being very excited as Queen Elizabeth II visited Albany on her tour of the Commonwealth. All of the school kids were granted the day off from school so we could see her and wave our little Aussie flags for her.


BOB, GEORGE, ERNEST & JOE 1955 - ALBANY       #28
 

  ALBANY (ROBINSON AREA) WITH MUM, NELLIE & TERRY      #29
(TERRY'S 8th BIRTHDAY)
 

An ice cream in a cone at this time cost six pence (5c). Due of the lack of permanent work available to Dad in the Albany area, Mum and Dad decided to leave the Albany district and seek employment as a married couple working for farmers further north in south-west region.

Leaving Albany, we headed for Narrogin in our ‘soft-top’ Buick. The journey took about 8 hours. I don’t think those 8 hours were all in the same day, but we stopped at a lot of puddles and dams to top-up the radiator. Dad had found a job working for a well-to-do farmer by the name of Richie Wiese. I think that Dad did OK with the job, but our accommodation was a large, old, cold, stone house which we shared with Richie’s elderly mother, whom Mum was to help look after.

While at Narrogin I spent some time in their hospital. I had Polio-type symptoms (there was a polio epidemic at this time), which turned out to be blood poisoning from an infected tooth. Again, I had chloroform administered to me for the second time in my life while the infected tooth was extracted. I’m not sure how long we stayed at Wiese’s, I think about 12 months. I don’t think our parents were very happy with our lodgings and the strings attached.

Our next stop was down the road, just outside of Williams. There Dad was to be working for a farming company owned by ‘Fowler Brothers’. Now this farm had its own little shop where employees could buy groceries etc. It was a big farm. The Job advertisement stated- “school-bus passes by property”, but we lived on the other side of the farm. The family car was out of action again, and it was too far to walk. Consequently, we kids didn’t attend school for the six weeks that we were there. I remember we had a great time there too. While working here, Dad would use a horse and sulky as transport around the farm.

Next place was a farm (‘Koonje North’) around Tenterden where dad worked for a man called Mr Brumley. Now this fellow could have been called “a gentleman farmer” as he got around in jodhpurs. I never saw him do a days’ work or get his hands dirty. He employed Terry and I for one of our school holidays, shifting irrigation pipes on the farm for the princely pay of six pence (5 cents) each, for the week or two that we toiled, I think that Dad topped up our pay a little.
 

1956 TENDERDEN      #30
 

 1956 TENDERTEN      #31
 

The house that we lived in at ‘Brumley’s’ over-looked Lake Nunijup, a fresh water lake about 15 kilometres south-west of Tenterden. This is where we boys learnt to swim. The lake was full of leeches, but they didn’t worry us too much. This was another great place to live. NB The lake is no longer fresh water.
 

1956 TENTERDEN, LAKE NUNIJUP, LEARNING TO SWIM WITH DAD      #32

 

 1956 ALBANY. VISITING GRANDMA AGNES & ERNEST (DAD JOE'S PARENTS)      #33
L - R: AGNES, ERNEST, TERRY, MUM NELLIE, WYN, GLENYS, DAD JOE, KEVIN
 

34

THE BOSS'S HOUSE AT BRUMLEY'S       #
 

  LAKE NUNIJUP          #35
 

Our father, the practical joker – During wintertime at Brumley’s farm we were walking across a nice green paddock, with Dad out front and myself and Terry lagging behind. Dad threw his hat on the ground (he always wore a felt hat) and yells out ‘Hey, you boys get up here – I’ve caught this little green sitter!’ (a bird). We positioned ourselves, one each side of the hat and the plan was to grab this little bird when the hat was lifted, and it all went to plan. However, when we made a grab for the bird, we found that ‘the little green sitter’ was in fact to be a soft, smelly sheep’s turd. Dad reckoned that this was a hell of a joke as we both stared at our hands covered in sheep shit. One needed a good sense of humour growing up with Dad around.

While living at ‘Brumleys’ we attended Kendenup School, via a school- bus. Mt Barker was the town where we did the weekly shop. Mum and us kids went shopping while Dad went to the pub and usually consumed a little too much beer. We had some hairy rides home on shopping days. For obvious reasons Mum decided to get her driver’s licence. She got it. We still had hairy rides home from shopping. Mt Barker also had the nearest hospital which I attended twice, once to have all my baby teeth extracted (another dose of chloroform) and the other time to have my leg stitched (results of a bike prang).

In 1957 we moved to Gnowangerup, as Dad had a job to go to at ‘Eugenup’, a farm about three kilometres out of town on the Broomehill Road. The farm was owned by Edward House, (Monty’s Dad). We didn’t stay there too long, less than a year, I think. Getting to and from school was an issue. Mrs House used to pick us up from school along with her children and then go visiting bringing us home late
 

 1958 GNOWANGERUP, WITH ONE OF MY DOGS NAMED "TEX"         #36
 

 TERRY, "TEX", MUM NEL & KEVIN        #37
 

Our next place of abode was a house that was to be about 100 metres into the paddock off Walsh Street (there is still a couple of trees there). We reckoned we were pretty special there because we had an aeroplane parked outside our bedroom window. The plane was owned by a Peter Downing who did a bit of charter work including patient transfers. He would take-off and land in ‘our’ paddock. Peter Downing later died when his plane fell out of the sky, which apparently wasn’t a one off for these types of underpowered aeroplanes.

It was here we were living when our Nana, Mum’s mother, died in 1958. She was seventy-two and had lived with us for most of our lives. While living here I think Dad was finding work clearing and burning mallee roots. There were mallee roots aplenty in those days.

The next job (approx. 1958/9) for my dad was manager of the Gnowangerup swimming pool which was run at that time by the local P&C Association. The President was Mr Geoff Peet, someone I became friends with later when we both worked at ‘The Building Supply’. For the first season that Dad ran the pool we actually lived at the pool. There was a room (a ‘hut’) about 5m x 3m where Mum and Dad slept and also doubled as kitchen and dining area. Terry and I slept in an ‘A frame’ army tent at the rear. Mum also ran a little kiosk selling lollies and cool drinks. We reckoned that was a bit of alright.
 

  1959 GNOWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL        #38
SHOWING DIVING BOARD, CHANGEROOMS & THE HUT WE LIVED IN
 

     1959 GNOWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL      #39

 

1934 OPENING OF GNOWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL        #40
 

 1934 CELEBRATING THE OPENING OF THE GNWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL        #41
 

1959 DAD JOE AT GNOWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL        #42
 

MUM NELLIE AT 3 YOUGENUP ROAD, GNOWANGERUP         #53
 

The following season we rented the little house from Reg and Pearl Austin at 3 Yougenup Road that my parents and your mother and I finished up owning. It was only a few hundred metres across “House’s” paddock to the swimming pool.
The price of a milkshake escalated from one shilling to one and a penny (11 cents) at ‘Davies & Son’ general store. I got my first job at ‘Davies & Son’ (local grocery store) filling bottles with turps and kerosene from the 44-gallon drums in which it was transported in. I can’t remember how much the pay was. During the time that Dad managed the pool, he took it upon himself to teach kids, and a few adults as well to swim (free of charge). There were no other swimming lessons available at this time. How many people he taught to swim, I don’t know but there were a lot. He was never publicly acclaimed for this extra service that he provided. There were no bad mishaps or any other casualties to speak of, while he oversaw the pool. He spent all his workdays (seven days a week), just watching the swimmers in and around the pool. He pulled a few little ones out. The water was olive green in colour and opaque, the visibility of anything under the surface was nil. So, I and many people in Gnowangerup had nothing but good things to say about the job Dad did at the pool. Alas, the old swimming pool is no more. We were told it was the first pool to be built in a country town in WA. The pool was fed by the ‘Aylmore Mineral Springs’- which still exists. The mineral water escapes the ground “crystal clear” but oxidises when it warms, giving it the unclean appearance. This spring has been bubbling out of the ground since the year “dot.” The pool water was regularly tested by the local health inspector and always had a bacteria count of nil.

    1958/9 RENTING 3 YOUGENUP ROAD, THE OLD ORIGINAL HOUSE      #44
Note: The path lined with "Swan" king browns
& the chimney painted with red lead (paint long ago bannned)

 

 AYLMORE MINERAL SPRINGS THAT FED THE GNOWANGERUP CREEK           #45
 

At about this time Dad and Alec Burley got together and started a “Boy’s Club” in the lean-to on the west side of the then Methodist church. I think about twenty or so boys would attend each week and Dad and Alec would teach us the basics of Boxing and wrestling. I’m not sure how long the club went for, but it was good fun while it lasted.

Dad found employment at the local school as a gardener and Mum a contract to clean the school, that contract put paid to my after-school activities as my services were required to sweep the school verandas. Terry started his apprenticeship at this time, with the local baker.

In 1959 (about grade 7), Gnowangerup and surrounds were subject to an abundance of mice. Millions of the little rodents causing much damage, especially on farms. To give you an idea of what a mouse plague looks like, it was like the ground was moving with them, especially at nighttime, you couldn’t take a step without treading on one. Our school (unsure if through the Admin or P&C) decided to hold a Faction competition to see which faction could kill the most mice. For the faction to be the eligible winner, the tails of the dead creatures had to be presented to the school for counting. I recall I spent a weekend out at Rodney House’s farm – just to kill mice! One mouse got Rodney – ran up his leg and took a bite sized piece out of the inside of his thigh. I can’t remember numbers, but I presented dozens if not hundreds of mice. Together our faction, (Gold) would’ve easily been in the thousands and we were declared the proud winners.

We moved yet again to a house in McDonald Street (where in later years I built a house for Lou & Pat Blight). We had another shift to a new state house in Richardson Street, a couple of doors from DeSando’s. Our final move (approx. 1965) was back to 3 Yougenup Road after my parents bought the little house off Mr & Mrs Reg & Pearl Austin for a thousand pounds ($2000).

The final job that Dad had was with the ‘Gnowangerup Shire Council’ as a truck driver. He worked there until he had a duodenal ulcer removed from his stomach. He never fully recovered from this operation, after one attempt at resuming work, he suffered a relapse and was then granted a disability pension.
 

  1965 MUM NELLIE, TERRY AND DAD JOE         #46
  

     1966 - MUM WITH ONE OF HER KID GOATS IN GNOWANGERUP        #47
MUM ALWAYS KEPT GOATS (or cows), SERVICING SOME LOCAL FAMILIES
WITH GOAT MILK FOR THEIR CHILDREN WITH ECZEMA
 

School in Gnowangerup went quite well for me, with grades and teacher’s comments were pretty good. I always enjoyed singing and at school I was chosen a few times to perform in school concerts.
Later in high school, I and four other boys were selected to take part in two musical productions performed by the local repertory club in the town hall. I can’t speak for the other boys, but I really enjoyed this experience. I bought a guitar at about this time and Hans Thomas taught me a few chords. I drove the rest of my family mad while try learning ‘The Maori’s Farewell’.
 

KEVIN WITH DOG AND GUITAR        #48
 

 KEVIN WITH PET CAT        #49
 

I had wanted to leave school after I turned fourteen (around 1962), so Dad took me over to ‘The Building Supply’ to apply for a job only to be told, “bring him back when he’s a bit bigger”. So - back to school. My grades took a real dive, and I spent a fair bit of time in ‘the sin bin’ and I received more than my share of the cane. I enjoyed my last two years of school, probably for the wrong reasons, as I really enjoyed giving the teachers trouble – and I wasn’t even the worst! (Many of my friends were in a specially made class of about twelve kids who were deemed ‘too hard to teach’ – the only class in WA like this. In high school they were only taught elementary subjects and did manual work around the school. To their credit, many of these students still excelled in life, despite their unruliness in high school). I finished school in 1963, junior certificate in my hand and started my carpentry and joinery training in 1964. I really enjoyed work, but my apprenticeship years were not good, in-as-much as I was kept in the workshop a lot, stacking timber in the yard, dressing timber, making door jambs. So, I wasn’t getting much experience in the carpentry part of my training. I asked my bosses on numerous occasions to let me out of the shop, but to no avail.

 1954 TRIP TO PERTH        #50
 


1954 TRIP TO PERTH       #51
 

1954 TRIP TO PERTH       #52
 

Social life in Gnowangerup was hectic, hockey,basketball, badminton; darts took care of six nights of the week plus parties. At this time the local Drive-in Picture Theatre was a popular social meeting place as well. We tried to work as many weekends as we could as our apprentice wages were not enough to support our habits. My mates and I would pick mallee roots, cart hay and even shift wool bales. Ten dollars a day was the going rate at the time. It wasn’t much as one could wear-out a pair of jeans in a weekend. But when our wages were only about $27 a week that’s what we had to do. I know that you, Aly and Zac had similar experiences as I. A small country town is a great place to live and grow up.
In 1967 (aged 20), a friend of mine was leaving Gnowangerup for Darwin, so with a year left of my apprenticeship and my bosses still intent on keeping me in the joinery shop I decided to quit and try a new start in the NT. Well, I got a job as a carpenter. I don’t know how I got the job or how I kept it, as officially I was an unqualified carpenter or with zero on-the-job experience (as always in the workshop). The pay up there was $100 a week, which was about $62 more than my fourth-year apprentice wage.

JOE BENNETT AT YOUGENUP ROAD 1966           #53
 

Darwin was a real frontier town at this time. If you didn’t know how to drink when you arrived, you soon learnt. One needed ‘blowfly eyes’ to see where a punch or flying chair might be coming from, there were lots of booze and fights. Consequently, my time in the top end was a bit blurry, but a good time in the Aussie way. I celebrated my 21st birthday In Darwin with a pub crawl. I stayed at a Boarding House close to the town centre not far to walk to work as I didn’t have a car. Fifteen blokes in the house, only two Aussies, but we all got along pretty well.

While stationed in Darwin my job took me to Katherine. My foreman and I ‘cut-out’ a house in Darwin to be assembled out in the bush at Tyndall Air base about half south of the town. The house was built on 2.4m stilts. So, we had the frame sitting on the stilts with the roof on, including the cladding, when someone asked where the septic tanks were to be situated. After taking the required levels, it was decided that the house was facing the wrong way. Seven days’ work to shift every wall frame, some of the joists and even a couple of bearers. I’m glad that I was only ‘the boy’ on that job.

Back to Gnowangerup in 1968, I joined a team of carpenters, Alec and Eddie Burley and Ken Lesk - we worked mainly in the Gnowangerup Shire but ventured out to Kondinin in the east and Lancelin to the north. Alec and I had worked well together at ‘The Building Supply’ and continued to do, he was a great mate, and we had some good times together. We were making about $100 a week as subcontractors, about $40 more than the carpenter’s award rate.

A meat pie could be bought 35 cents from the local Baker and a middy of beer for fourteen cents.
 

 

    WITH TERRY & "JACK" (ONE OF OUR JACK DAYS) YOUGENUP RD,       #54
 

  KEVIN         #55
 

It was in this period of my life that I met your mother, Josephine. She had been in Perth working as a seamstress and looking for a job ‘up north’. Well, she ended up ‘down south’ somehow, working at the Gnowangerup Pub for the duration of ‘the footy season’. There was pretty much an instant attraction; we became an item. The rest is history. Your Mother stayed in Gnowangerup until late August. In that, five months or so we had a good time, but she had to go home for Doris and Graham’s wedding in April 1970. Not long after she left, I decided that I should go too. “Funny thing that.” So, early April 1970 I hopped on ‘The Indian Pacific’ train for Adelaide where I spent a week or two, then flew onto Brisbane via Sydney.

In Brisbane I stayed at Nana and Pop’s place for a while before moving over to board with John and Sandy Gallaher at Coorparoo. I found myself a job around the same area with TR & MK Gaddes, Builders. 

It must have been around this time that we decided to get married on 24 October 1970. We were married in the little church in Mayfield Road, where your Mum went to school, directly in front of Nana and Pop’s house (you could see from their glass- front veranda). The reception was at ‘The Homestead Reception Complex’ north of the city. My Mum, Dad and Terry drove across for our wedding, they got themselves well and truly lost in a tropical down-pour after the reception. Still, I was glad that they made the effort to be with us on our big day.
 

 1970 DAD AT OUR WEDDING IN BRISBANE        #56
 

  1970 MUM AT OUR WEDDING IN BRISBANE        #57
 

  1970 OUR WEDDING IN BRISBANE             #58
 

     1970 NELLIE & GIOVANNA AT OUR WEDDING IN BRISBANE           #59

Our honeymoon night was spent in a nice hotel in Coronation Drive on the Brisbane River. We had a coin-operated vibrating bed in our suit but with all our coaxing and persuasion and a few 20 cent coins wasted, we couldn’t get the thing to work, no matter hard I kicked it, so it was back to basics. Pretty much straight after our wedding we put all our gear onto an Opec furniture truck to be taken to the “West” and then left ourselves, in the Cortina. Headed north (stopped one night with friends at the Sunshine Coast) to Townsville here we intended to stay, went upstairs to look at hotel room, didn’t bother taking our gear up. The room was disgusting. Can’t remember where we stayed that night.
 

Next stop was Mt Isa, where we did a tour of the mine. Then while travelling west toward Camooweal, our windscreen was broken. Next was a dust storm, then hit a pigeon (slowly on account of dust). The pigeon landed on our back seat, looked around then promptly died. We couldn’t get a new windscreen at Three Ways (north of Tennant Creek) so off to the Alice we headed where we had a new one fitted.

Travelling south toward Port Augusta, there was plenty of rain, no bitumen, no fuel. We ended up having to buy fuel at cattle station. Anyway, on to Port Augusta. Turned right toward the Nullarbor. Ticking along the dirt road just on dusk, a kangaroo hit us and broke the driver’s side window. At that point we decided to stop for the night to sleep in the car (way too late, should’ve stopped much earlier – then maybe we may have totally missed hitting the ‘roo) and bloody cold. We awoke the next morning to find battery flat. Your mum got into the driver’s seat, and I went ‘round the back to push and discovered the back passenger-side tyre flat! Thankfully, the rest of the trip went on without a hitch. It’s a wonder we didn’t give-up there and then. Still things could only get better.

Back in WA (late 1970), we stayed a little while with my Mum and Dad then onto Perth. We found a fully furnished flat in Maylands. Jo got her old job back in Inglewood and me, a job with ‘Kent Craft’ - a small boat-building firm in Melville. I was hired as a cabinet maker to fit out pleasure craft. I was required to fix laminate to every surface on the inside of the cabins except the floor. The first boat took me three months.
 

At about this time we discovered happily that Aly was to join our family. So that made things a little more interesting. The boat building work finished with the completion of the second boat. I finished the job with an enjoyable launching party. I almost acquired a taste for champagne as we test-drove the new boat up and around the Swan River.

At this time Peter Kent decided to quit his boat building business in Melville and shift to work at Gove, NT. I think he had trouble extracting money from the yuppies he’d built boats for.

We took a trip to Gnowangerup, to attend Ted and Isabel Goldner’s wedding. On our way back to Perth the Cortina ran out of water and stopped dead just on the south side of the Causeway. Had it towed the next day to a Servo on Guilford Road, just down from where we lived in Caladonian Ave. $500 (thank you very much - about 6 weeks wages) to fix the thing and 6 weeks without a car. The garage let us take the car and payoff the money we owed. That was good of them (so we thought at the time) as I was working away, and Jo was getting lifts to and from her job. We were later told, well after the event that a reconditioned, short motor could be bought for $120. So - they did extremely well out of us (they ripped us off).

I applied for a job with ‘Thiese Brothers’ to work in the north of the state. ‘Missed out on that one as, they had ‘filled their quota’. So, I left my address with them (mobile phones were only in comic books in the early 70’s). Instead, I got a job as a chippy working around Merredin, camping out for two weeks at a time. A telegram from Thiese Brothers arrived at home while I was away in my first week away, informing me that they had a job for me. Too bad, I couldn’t be contacted, and I missed out again. I sometimes wonder “what if?”

From the job in Merredin, we moved north to a job east of Perenjori for about two months. When that job finished, I was unemployed again. My next job was for Vic and Val Davies, a builder from Jerramungup.

Following work, we shifted back to Gnowangerup again. We had tried to find a rental in Jerramungup to no avail so decided to commute from Gnowangerup (over an hour one way). Vic had quite a lot of work around Newdegate. The first job was building a ‘seed cleaning factory’ in the townsite for a bloke called Vic Newman. Part of the job was shifting an old shearing shed from the farm onto the block in town. We had to unbolt the metal stumps underneath the shed that were holding the shed down. It didn’t take long to discover while crawling around underneath, that the dirt there was flea infested. Not very nice, as I recall.

I was still working for Vic and Val when Aly was born. I took time off to be with Jo on Aly’s birth (born) day. We were still living with my Mum and Dad when Jo brought Aly home. We also had Nana and Pop ‘drop in’ for a short stay on their way home to Brisbane from Malta (proceeds from Nana’s Casket Lotto win). So, Mum and Dad’s little house was hectic to say the least.

   1971 MYSELF & YOUR MUM JO, MY MUM NELLIE HOLDING ALY,
AND GRANDMA AGNES        #60

 

    1971 ALYSON & DAD KEVIN       #61
 

     1971 - MUM NELLIE, NANA GIOVANNA, YOUR MUM HOLDING NEWBORN ALY
& DAD JOE, STANDING IN DAD JOE'S VEGIE GARDEN
LOOKING TOWARDS WALSH STREET       #62
 

 1972 THE OLD EH HOLDEN       #63


     ROGER SAMMY & KEVIN         #64
 

I decided to try for work around Gnowangerup as we wanted to move out of Mum and Dad’s. So, we moved into a house owned by WE and M Parnell in Searle Street. Around the same time, I found a seasonal job with the CBH for the harvest. Regretfully, it was a drought year so not a lot of work and a very boring time. We then had to move out from Searle Street as Bill and Jonless Beaton had just gotten married and as Bill was employed by Parnells, we had to vacate the house for them.

We shifted from Searle Street to Yougenup Road, next to the National Australia Bank, were only there for a couple of weeks (Jo couldn’t get along with the ghost). House no. 3 was in Hughes Street, next door to Rob and Dolly Sadler then onto House no. 4 in Bell Street, a railway house with cheaper rent.

While we were doing all this shifting I had numerous jobs, GS Hendry in the Panel Shop for eleven months, Eric West (building) and Keith and Case DenHann (building).

In 1972 a new Holden HQ could be bought for $3,000.00 It was around this time that Josephine decided to take Aly to Brisbane and show her off to her family. They were away for about three weeks before returning home via the air ways. During my time at Hendry’s, I bought a EH wagon as a wreck with the vision to ‘do it up’. Iforgot to mention that we had gotten rid of the Cortina (thank God!) and bought a Falcon 500 which was 100% better than the Cortina. Anyway, with the EH we could now quit the Falcon along with the HP payments. That was a step in the right direction to our way of thinking. The EH served us well for a few years, right into the 1980’s (at which point I decided to cut the rust out of the rear end only to find it was too far gone. Had to scrap that idea which led us to buying out first of our two Holden Commodores. The first sedan was canary yellow and the second one a few years later was mission brown!)

Now things weren’t going too well as far as getting a good, steady job in the building trade around Gnowangerup. So, I got a job in Geraldton with a Danish bloke called Ernie Tolennin. He was pretty good to work for and was a very fussy builder. I learnt a lot from him. The only boss I ever had who was a member of the union.

We liked Geraldton and were looking around for a house to buy, but my dad was becoming very weak and frail. We received a call from my Mum saying that Dad wanted to see us. We drove down and spent about a week with him before heading back up to Geraldton. I received another call to see Dad again, so we decided moved back to Gnowangerup again. Our finances couldn’t support our trips back and forth and the loss of wages. Dad didn’t last much longer. He died when Aly was two years old. It’s a shame he didn’t get to see our kids grow up a bit. He thought the world of Aly and never got to meet Zac of course.

       1972 CAR BABY SAFTY       #65
 

     1974 OLD HOUSE, JUST BEFORE ZAC WAS BORN, 
WIT BURNT ORANGE STOVE        #66

 

      WITH BOYO, OUR CHOW CHOW DOG (HE HAD A BLACK TONGUE)
DEVELOPED A LIKING FOR FRESH SHEEP MEAT (WE DIDN'T OWN SHEEP......)
   AND HE HAD TO BE PUT DOWN     #67
 

My next job was at the Building Supply again. My Mum decided to move to Kojonup to be with Terry (he was working at the Kojonup Co-op) and to sell us her house. For $4,000 (half then and other half later) we became the proud owners of our little house in Gnowangerup – which ultimately became our family home.

Things ticked along pretty well, with Zac being born in 1974 - so our family was complete. I was earning about $65 per week. At the time and we were saving a bit of money then (thanks to Goff Whitlam) as my wages went up to about $110 per week. By 1975 we had saved $3,000. With this amount the bank gave us a loan of $6,000.
 

      YOUGENUP ROA - THE OLD HOUSE WITH STRIKING LINO!       #68
 

        SITTING IN THE THEN KITCHEN, BECAME LOUNGE ROOM AFTER RENO      #69
 

Three months after Zac was born, we decided to celebrate his first Christmas in Brisbane. We dropped the rear seats of the EH, put Aly (aged 3) with a few of her toys to crawl around and play, Zac in his wicker carry basket, a couple of suitcases and set off for Brisbane. We drove for about 6-8 hours each day, stopping in onsite vans and relaxing around swimming pools. Aly (although she asked if Prichard’s house, 5 kms out of Gnowangerup, was Nana’s house), just played and read while Zac slept in his basket. Once he nearly bounced out when we hit a bulldust hole (there was still 200 kms of rough, limestone road on the SA side of the Nullabor plain). It was also the time before seatbelts – they were not to be fitted in vehicles for a few years yet. We had a great trip both ways, with our EH never missing a beat).

I started on the building extensions (weekend work) in 1975 when Zac was around 18 months old. We didn’t get off to a good start with rain upsetting the first concrete pour. Terry came over from Koji to help me, along with four other mates. There was no ‘Readymix’ available in 1975. The main part of the build took us about 3 years, using all the $9,000 at our disposal. We then asked and received another personal loan of $3000, used that and then the work started. It’s a lot easier to build when you’ve got money. Anyway, we got there, and everything turned out pretty good.

        1974 - NEWBORN ZAC, WITH ALY AGED 3 YEARS      #70
 

     RENOVATIONS NEAR COMPLETION        #71

While renovating this old part of the house, I was wishing I had knocked the lot down and started afresh, but funds were a bit tight, and we would have had to find alternative lodgings for the duration of the build. With the renovations complete, our house was the highest Council rated in town. Couldn’t complain as there was a chance they might penalise us more.
 

I’ll now relate a rough history of the original house as well as I can using (guess-like) deductions made from observations of the building as I proceeded with the renovations. The original ‘old’ house on the south side of the building (became our lounge room) was built at ground level with a wash area and a small veranda – lso with a dirt floor. This part of the dwelling was probably erected around 1930- 1940. The next part – two bedrooms (which later became our dining room and kitchen), was probably built in the 1950’s. These rooms were built with a wooden floor with 2.4 ceilings. The original rooms then had their walls extended to match the 2.4 ceiling height of the then new bedrooms.

 

      RENOVATION FLOOR PLAN       #72
 

Aly, as I did, suffered from tonsillitis at an early age but she outgrew it over a short period of time. Other than that, both our kids were pretty healthy. We had bit of trauma when Zac tried to drink kerosene. Luckily, he didn’t get to swallow any but inhaled some fumes thus putting him into Katanning hospital for about a week. We went over to see him once and that’s all we were allowed to do. The hospital staff decreed that it would be better if he didn’t see us. That was a bit hard on his mother and me.

 

 

 

 

                        MID 1970'S - PARTY AT OUR HOUSE (Lounge Room)      #73
                                              L to R:  ARTHUR PARKER, ALY, MICHELLE PARKER, KEVIN,                                               DIANNE PARKER, TERRY &  ZAC IN HIS                                               MUCH-LOVED COWBOY SUIT
                                             Note: MY HOMEMADE CHESSBOARD COFFEE TABLE

           

     KOJONUP APEX PARK WITH UNCLE TERRY        #74
 

    OUT FRONT OF GRANDMA'S HOUSE, 155 ALBANT HIGHWAY, KOJONUP           #75
 

Your mother kept $20 a week for ‘Housekeeping’, with a little leftover for fuel, sometimes. A large bottle of gas also cost $20.
 

    TIMELINE OF OUR HOUSE - 1958         #76
 

       TIMELINE OF OUR HOUSE -  1979     #77
 

        TIMELINE OF OUR HOUSE -   
NEW OWNERS, AS IS IN 2025    #78
 

Life in Gnowangerup went along smoothly with sport, Brownies, Cubs (I was Cub leader for 10 years) and Scouts. Zac stacked it off his BMX and broke a leg when he was about eight years old and spent a week in Gnowangerup hospital, which slowed him up for a bit.
 

     EARLY YEARS 1977 - FIRST SCHOOL DAYS        #79
 

    1980 - FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL          #80
 

Our kids did well at school. Both were chosen as Head Boy and Head Girl in their respective final year of school. The best I could do was “Head Boy’s Mate”.
 

 ALY & ZAC ON GDHS HONOUR BOARD            #81

 

    BENNETT ROAD, NAPIER/ TOKENUP - SPELT WRONG! 
ALBANY SHIRE LATER CORRECTED IT          #82
 

After Aly and Zac had left school l decided to branch-out and become self employed. So, I left Gnowangerup Building Supplies for the last time, after (mostly enjoyable) fifteen years. ‘The Building Supply’ was like a big family of about fifteen blokes with brothers, Nick and Gino Caramia as Fathers. We had a lot of good times.

Now with $2000 Super I bought the Falcon XR Ute, (with three in the tree) and some tools I needed and with more than a little trepidation - I became a Builder. Work started off quite slowly but improved with every passing year. We managed to save a bit of money along the way. After nine years of self-employment and Aly and Zac leaving home, we decided to sell-up our family home and work our way around Australia. By February 1997 we’d sold everything that we didn’t want to keep and stored all we were going to keep in a shipping container at John and May Kiddle’s’ farm. We set off with the idea of travelling for about five years. Well, ‘took seven years to get out of WA! Another eight years working around most States and the NT. We arrived back in Perth at retiring age. Had a great time both working and travelling and if I had my time over I would do it all again, maybe even longer.

      1980's GNOWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL        #83
 

       1980's GNOWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL      #84
 

   1980's GNOWANGERUP SWIMMING POOL           #85
 

YOUGENUP ROAD GNOWANGERUP 1980's             #86
 

Every endeavour has been made to accurately record the details however if you would like to provide additional images and/or newer information we are pleased to update the details on this site. Please use CONTACT at the top of this page to email us. We appreciate your involvement in recording the history of our area.

 

References:                 Article:       Aly Mollica

                                  Images:    Aly Mollica
                                                 
                                                   

 

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