(DIR) Return Create A Forum - Home
---------------------------------------------------------
Minimbah-Bundagry
(HTM) https://minimbahbundagry.createaforum.com
---------------------------------------------------------
*****************************************************
(DIR) Return to: Remembering those no longer with us
*****************************************************
#Post#: 3--------------------------------------------------
The memories came flooding back... March 23, 2019
By: Ray Bell Date: February 1, 2021, 7:07 am
---------------------------------------------------------
I posted this on the Facebook page on March 28 after totally
enjoying my first meeting at Bulahdelah:
[quote]It comes back to me..
When I was a child we lived in Merrylands. Not too far away we
had our grandparents, David and Agnes Bell. From time to time -
maybe for the Easter Show or other events - there would be
visitors from up the coast.
Uncle Roy (my father's uncle) and Auntie Ethel came down once or
twice in his nice Ford Pilot. It was dark blue and was a fine
looking car. He owned this well into the sixties as I recall.
But more often we would go 'up the coast' and visit various
family members. These were people on both Dad's and Mum's side
of the family, but I'll concentrate on dad's side here.
Uncle Alan lived at Mt George for a while, we visited him there
in 1954 and then went on to Coopernook to visit Auntie Nan, who
was married to Jack Unicomb. They were on a small farm with a
spring-fed dam up above the house which was always full.
Further North we'd go to Uncle Knox's place. He share-farmed on
a dairy at Thora, near Bellingen, while a couple of times we
went on to visit Uncle Ron and Auntie Vera, in 1950 at
Boggabilla and in 1956 at Cadarga, North of Chinchilla.
Hard workers they all were. At Thora and at Cadarga there was
milking twice a day, with tractors out and about plowing for
crops, even into the night at Cadarga as Trevor and Kevin helped
out on that farm - which was owned by the Beasleys.
Share-farming was undoubtedly hard work.
During the course of the 1949/50 trip we went out through Nabiac
(from Taree) when it wasn't even the highway. The road seemed to
take stepping-stones across one swampy creek, and that led to
Wang Wauk and the Harwood home, which was also the local Post
Office. It was just behind where the Rest Area is today.
As Dad did a lot of growing up at Coopernook, it merited special
attention. He showed us the old house near the station where we
lived and told us stories about walking from there to school,
about his father always having a wad of money in his wallet so
he could barter and deal with people and always get the upper
hand in those dealings. He told about watching the Coopernook
bridge being built from the school grounds and of catching the
train to high school at Taree and of competing in bicycle races
like the Port Macquarie to Taree event.
Not far away was Moto. Uncle Percy and Auntie Violet lived
there, and as our visits were usually over the Christmas
holidays it was always a home surrounded by long grass, while
poddy calves were kept nearby. Reg had a twin-plug Nash going to
waste between some fences around the corner but there was still
lots of other things to do so you don't worry about such things.
Do you?
As we moved into the sixties, Uncle Alan and Auntie Maude moved
to Wingham, the Unicombs bought a green Mini, Uncle Knox moved
onto a hundred acres of his own at Cooloongolook and raised ever
more daughters in the double-barrel house which we were told was
moved there by our Grandfather. Bodily, behind bullocks.
But these were our travels. Back at home the mid-fifties had
seen our Grandfather die and so we Grandchildren took turns
spending weekends with Grandma. This was really a treat.
They lived in a small house in Rowley Road at Guildford, they'd
built it during the war at the same time as dad built our house
in Merrylands. Wartime shortages meant that they couldn't get
the tiles they wanted for their house, while Dad could get tiles
but wanted corrugated iron. They did a swap there.
We would typically visit them of a Saturday afternoon. Dad would
get home from work and drive us over there after dinner. Grandma
knew we were coming so would be pulling a batch of patty cakes
from the oven as we arrived.
Apart from enjoying the patty cakes and the scones, and her
famous orange marmalade, they had two whole acres of adventure
for us to play in. Right up the back, at the top of the hill,
you could see the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Below the house the cow
bails were ready for their cow to be milked, while the garden
near the front fence as always a splendid spread of flowers
interspersed with vegetables. Snapdragons were a lot of fun for
us, and we'd take the occasional climbing bean and empty a few
pea shucks.
We needed that energy because there was a mulberry tree to
climb, perhaps we'd try to chop some firewood and one school
holiday time we built a bridge across the low ground which
became so swampy when it was wet.
The year before Grandad died he spent a few weeks in hospital.
While he was there, Dad organised for a plumber to put town
water onto the house and the neighbour who did that work used
some heavy nails to mount his vise to the clothesline post so he
could cut the threads on the galvanised water pipes.
Just how cranky Grandad could get was seen when he found these
nails and assumed that certain Grandchildren had been belting
them in there!
But his cranky ways were muted by the sweetness of our beloved
Grandmother. Such a dear person with a wonderful loving and
giving personality. She told us when Grandad died that she'd
only last two more years and the last one of those she spent
being cared for by Auntie Nan at Coopernook.
Years later, in talking with Trevor, he wold repeatedly say,"She
was the loveliest, sweetest lady who ever lived." Nobody ever
challenged that statement.
I was eleven when she went away. I never saw her again as mum
and dad went to the funeral at Failford without us. But in a way
I did see her again, and it was an instructive experience for my
son.
He was that same age - eleven - when I took him to Brisbane for
a weekend. On the way back, driving through the night, there
were many suggestions I made to him about things we could do
along the way. He rejected them all.
Until I said, "How about we call in on the Drurys at Moto?"
He didn't know them, but he agreed, so we turned right off the
highway and soon found the old house. It was 1983, a long time
after my last visit there in the sixties, and we pulled up at
the front gate just as Percy and Violet were getting up for the
day. Uncle Percy at the front door with his walking frame,
Auntie Violet now much older-looking than the straight and tall
woman I remembered from previous visits.
They asked us in for breakfast. That was an unexpected treat,
but we couldn't resist. Or at least I couldn't, for here was a
lady just like the Grandma I missed so much, and the way they
spoke, the fuel stove going in the kitchen, the way the
breakfast was put out, it was just like what I experienced when
it was my turn to stay with Grandma all those years ago.
But for Justin, it was something new. I explained to him later
that it was just what I'd known and he was taking it all in,
absorbing the loving family ways. As we drove away, I said to
him: "Now you know you come from a nice family!"
And I know that if I reminded him of that day he would recall it
with a smile just like the one he gave me that day.
So it was a very pleasurable event for me to make it to the
meeting on Sunday. I met Dawn there and in talking to her and
Sue all of these memories came back to me. Dawn knew what I was
talking about, too.
Of course I met others and I wish I had been able to make time
to spend a couple more hours. I had gone a long way to get there
and made some difficult arrangements so I could do it, but it
was worth the effort.
Thank you all who were there and helped make my day so
enjoyable.[/quote]
*****************************************************