Old Farts Memories

RedVHeartbeat

RedVHeartbeat

SGI NSW Cup
Thanks for getting the ball rolling Jo. Relive here what you did growing up, the happy, sad and in between times. The events that helped shape your character and your life.

For me it started in the outer southern Sydney suburb of Engadine a place that was just beginning to find its feet with a scattering of new homes being built but roads still unpaved. I recall my early childhood being a contented one with my mother, father and older brother. We lived in a garage on our property while our two bedroom fibro house was being built, which must have been hard on my parents but not us kids as our dirt road made a great place to play cricket or footy or ride on our home made billy carts. Then my school teacher father died suddenly and my happy life was about to come crumbling down when my mother sent off my brother and I to a strict, austere Mason- run boarding school (below). I had just turned seven.
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Only original shot I could find. Still being constructed. Instead of demolishing this dreaded place it was refurbished into a wedding venue.
 
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jodragon40

jodragon40

Staff
RedVHeartbeat said:
Thanks for getting the ball rolling Jo. Relive here what you did growing up, the happy, sad and in between times. The events that helped shape your character and your life.

For me it started in the outer southern Sydney suburb of Engadine a place that was just beginning to find its feet with a scattering of new homes being built but roads still unpaved. I recall my early childhood being a contented one with my mother, father and older brother. We lived in a garage on our property while our two bedroom fibro house was being built, which must have been hard on my parents but not us kids as our dirt road made a great place to play cricket or footy or ride on our home made billy carts. Then my school teacher father died suddenly and my happy life was about to come crumbling down when my mother sent off my brother and I to a strict, austere Mason- run boarding school (below). I had just turned seven.
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Ah a mason , do you still use your secret handshakes?
 
RedVHeartbeat

RedVHeartbeat

SGI NSW Cup
True story the so called sporting fields at my school were where cows grazed and naturally crapped, so before playing footy, cricket, ruggah we first had to clear the cows dry and fresh 💩. I think I have a pic to verify this. A video actually, propaganda used to lure parents of prospective students. To my astonishment the two Swanson brothers are in this vid.
 
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RedVHeartbeat

RedVHeartbeat

SGI NSW Cup
Tell us all about conditions there Jo. I have some idea as I watched Ten Pound Poms the mini series and enjoyed it. Or did the series embellish the facts.
 
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jodragon40

jodragon40

Staff
RedVHeartbeat said:
Tell us all about conditions there Jo. I have some idea as I watched Ten Pound Poms the mini series and enjoyed it. Or did the series embellish the facts.
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Tough very tough. It was stinking hot in summer. I was 9 when we arrived, 4 of us kids. Mum and Dad of course, Dad had to walk across the bridge to get the bus into Liverpool to get a job so was gone 12hrs a day. It was very crowded.

We all gathered in a hut that had a canteen for our meals. My first school was Hammondville Primary which was near the then Holdsworthy army base.
 
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