FAULKNER Eunice Edna  

Compiled by Gordon Freegard based on research by Merilyn Stewart

Eunice was botn in 1926 and with her brother Lindsay Nelthorpe lived  in the little old family home in Cross Street in Shenton Park, which their parents bought with a mortgage in 1926, only to lose it to the vagaries of the Great Depression when the building industry in which he worked collapsed. After a short time living with relatives in Maylands, her father eventually became Manager of the Bristile pottery at Belmont and for fourteen years they lived in a rented two-bedroom house in Bayswater and it is where Eunice’s and Lindsay’s memories of their growing years were firmly forged.
Apart from working had as a stenographer, during her early working life she also developed a passion for dancing. Diminutive she may have been, but she was nimble on her feet and very popular. Mabel McLachlan, remembers well Eunice dating her eldest brother Joe Hodgson, having met him dancing at Waroona. That was the nature of rhe much smaller post-War community in Western Australia - everyone seemed to know everyone else.
In about 1926 to 1933 they lived in Cross St, Shenton Park. Her parents bought the house, with a mortgage. Her father worked in East Perth, in Wunderlich’s pressed metal division. They made pressed metal decorated ceilings and walls and installed them in houses and buildings.

21 YEAR OLD EUNICE FAULKNER (nee NELTHORPE)       #1
 

During the 1930’s Depression, he lost his job, the Bank foreclosed on the mortgage and the house was sold. They had to move out. They went to live with their father’s step sister and husband in Maylands During that time Eunice probably attended Maylands Primary School.
Mr. Nelthorpe eventually got a job as a fireman, working shift work, shovelling coal into kilns at H.L. Brisbane Ltd (Bristile) pottery in Belmont, opposite Ascot Racecourse. At that time his eyesight deteriorated and his wife had to learn to drive our 1926 Chevrolet soft top car to take him to and from work. Later he was promoted to Manager of the Bristile pottery at Belmont, and Mr H.L. Brisbane had a very high regard for his management skills. Bristle later bought out Wunderlich Ltd, and he was promoted to manage 3 other Bristile factories and he got them operating efficiently. Eunice was very proud of her Dad’s achievements, as they all were.
Eunice and Lindsay attended Bayswater Primary school and later Eunice went to Midland Junction High School. She walked from home to Bayswater Railway station every day to get a train to Midland.
At the end of school she did a shorthand/typing course in a business school and then got a job at Griffin Coal Mining Co. in Newspaper House in St Georges Terrace where she worked as a shorthand typist secretary.
It was during this period that a rather dashing young Len Faulkner made an appearance in Eunice’s life - and in a manner consisted with Len’s subtle Australian male wooing style - by hitting her on the back of the head with a tennis ball. Obviously having made such a strong first impression in more ways than one - they were inseparable after that and enjoyed a great social life together - again with lots of dancing!
Freshly apprenticed as a Car and Wagon builder in the Midland Government Railway Workshops (WAGR) - at a time when Governments actually fostered young people in trades for life - they became a couple to be noticed. Married at St Mary’s Anglican Church in West Perth in May 1950. Then ten months later they made the move to country around Ongerup that had just opened up, with Jerramungup later on - arriving at Wigboro, where it was intended that Len would work for the Vaux family and use his carpentry skills to build a house for his sister Kaye and husband Don - whilst also helping on the farm.
 

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