Presented by Mildura & District Historical Society
Compiled by Judi Hyde for Mildura Rural City Council Service
100 YEARS AGO
OLIVEWOOD: Mr Charles Chaffey, the youngest of three Chaffey brothers, erected his home, Olivewood, in Renmark. He was to Renmark what W.B. Chaffey was to Mildura – the house is a four-square, verandah-shaded building, a real station homestead but a type unusual in river settlements as it is built of pine slabs. He set about beautifying it in typical Californian style by planting an avenue of palms from the entrance gate to the door and is today one of the finest palm avenues in any Murray settlement. He planted olives, not only 20 acres of them, but planting olives as windbreaks and as avenues to other entrances to his home and they have grown so luxuriant and thick they became the sights of Renmark with their dense black shade forming an unusual and beautiful approach to the homestead. Mr Chaffey remained in Renmark for 17 years and returned to America in 1904 with his family. Olivewood was finally purchased by a syndicate under the name of Chateau Mildura and Olivewood Pty Ltd. (15.6.1921)
LAND: Ploughing matches in the early days were regular entertainment, advisedly so as one report states “Hospitably entertaining all comers with real old English cheer … the discussion which was a most interesting part of the day’s proceedings”. Those were the days. A ploughing match must have strongly matched a clearing sale of the present day in the Mallee. In the year mentioned Hirsch and Lenne had planted a quarter of an acre of with tobacco at Mount Alexander Nursery near Castlemaine with such success that the next year they planned to put in 20 acres. Evidently the success did not continue. The prices were 6 shillings a bushel for wheat, 11 shillings for Van Diemen’s oats and 15 pounds a tonne for hay. Yields were very high – 74 bushels of Golden Drop wheat at Smeaton and 90 bushels at Geelong. At Waygunyah, Captain Cadell’s steamboats had bought up a Ridley’s reaping and threshing machine – it was giving great satisfaction and soon to be superseded by the reaping hook, which could harvest six acres a day. Sufficient support to agricultural literature was not given by the farmers and with Volume V., the Gazette ending its days in December 1861.
Last week’s rain resulted in some eventful trips between Renmark and Mildura. A party who had been visiting Mildura set out for home early Thursday morning and were stranded at Bennett’s Hut and found by the Railways Standing Committee on Friday. They had no food or drink and finally reached home on Saturday night. Another car left Mildura for Renmark at 5.30pm but returned at 10 o’clock at night. The driver reported an unbroken sheet of water about 500 yards wide running strongly. Mr F. Treweek will attempt the trip this morning. (13-15.6.1921)
NEWS: The revenue derived from the Mildura telephone exchange for the month of May was 215 pounds 1/9, against 194 pounds 4/5. There are 409 subscribers who registered 23,619 local calls, and 8428 telegrams handled by local officials. At the Mildura Borough Council meeting, Cr Bowring said they should order 10 trucks of metal for the streets from down the line as waiting for it from Koorlong would take too long. Cr Chaffey said they should get ratepayers to work as they did in the early days – if a man was unable to pay rates he was given the opportunity of doing some work on the roads. Mr V. Treadwell, contractor of Merbein, has a contract for advertising in Sunraysia Daily.
Mr W. Short, the travelling representative of the Sunday School Union of Victoria, gave a lecture in the Methodist church at Ouyen. His work is interdenominational, saying Sunday Schools for children from all the different churches should be established.
Children from the Merbein State Schools will celebrate Arbour Day by planting shrubs and flowers to beautify their grounds.
Applications were advertised for a sister-in-charge of the new Chaffey Ward at the Mildura Hospital. The Mildura Settlers Club has forwarded 19 pounds 2 shillings to the Mildura Hospital – it is the cost of a bed and accessories for the new Chaffey Ward.
The new building that is being erected for the Mildura Recreation Club in Madden Ave is beginning to assume shape. The walls of reinforced concrete are completed, their ample height causes the edifice to stand out, the rafters are in position, fireplaces are built and several chimneys are beginning to rear themselves above the structure – a building worthy of the town. (14-16.6.1921)
75 YEARS AGO
WARTIME: Birthday honours approved by His Majesty King George include the title of viscount to Lord Louis Mountbatten. None of the three million members of the German armed forces demobilised in the British zone have been recruited into the British Armed Forces.
The British Government is about to make penicillin available against a doctor’s prescription to anyone who needs it for a few shillings.
One of the most unfortunate mistakes made in the settlement of World War I was that many areas allotted were too small. A settler was entitled to an allotment of sufficient size and productivity to give him and his dependents reasonable expectation of stability as his reward for his work on his land.
One of the members of the crew of the HMAS Shropshire is T.O. Telegraphist Keith Symons, son of the manager of the Bank of Adelaide, Paruna. While on the voyage back from England after taking the Australian Victory Contingent there, Symons met for the first time his cousin, Sgt Don Stirrat, of Mildura – both have seen much active service. (13-15.6.1946)
ITEMS: At the lantern lecture, Mr Chambers began by illustrating the work in Tanganyika, where 43 of the 65 Australian missionaries of the CMS are working in Africa. The need of medical work was indicated in that seven mission hospitals and one leper home were supported by one Australian doctor – the hospitals were separated by 1000 miles. The Mildura Returned Servicemen’s League is seeking permission to build memorial club rooms on land adjoining the railway, opposite the Warren Guest House in 7th St. Trials for the use of Bren-gun carriers as tractors were carried out successfully on the property of Mr G. Reed at Pirlta. (13-17.6.1946)
THE DAILY: “A first-class paper for a first-class people.” Those were the instructions given to the first editor of Sunraysia Daily, Mr H.J. Stephens, by the late Mr C.J. de Garis. On October 15,1920, the first issue appeared, the brainchild of Mr de Garis, of Kendenup, WA, who purchased the Mildura Cultivator, the Mildura Telegraph and Merbein Irrigationist and merged them into the one newspaper. Prior to establishing the newspaper, de Garis was director of publicity for the Australian Dried Fruits Assoc and he offered prizes for the best name to describe the dried fruits grown in the district – “Sunraysed” was the winning word and Sunraysia a small step from that to describe the district. (15.6.1946)
50 YEARS AGO
LADIES: Mildura’s recreation reserve was a mass of lovely legs. They belonged to more than 700 competitors in Mildura’s annual marching girls’ contest. It is the 14th of its kind and brought 1200 people to Mildura from all parts of Victoria, Tasmania and South Australia and the perfect weather was described as “probably the best ever”. Local teams did well in B and C sections, Mildura band Midgets won the Leader contest of the Mildura section, Cokette Seniors took the Chas Powell Shield, first in the Mildura team section. Debbie Jones has been dressmaking for years, she is now a qualified dressmaker at professional level after completing an Advanced Certificate in Designer Dressmaking and specialises in debutante, wedding gowns also offering a hoop/tulle petticoat hire service. (14-16.6.1971)
PEOPLE: Percy Weinert had to wait longer than he expected to retrieve his Victorian Country Football League life medal. He was set to receive his medal for his services to football at 2pm at the Lake Cullulleraine oval on Saturday but some of the Sunraysia Football League officials had set up camp on a fishing expedition and did not arrive till half time – late, but better than never. Wentworth Services Club members are looking forward to the lazy days of summer when they can go sailing on the Murray and Darling rivers. The club purchased the hull of an old Catalina flying boat from Dunveagan Station, where it has lain for many years – the hull is only a shell, decking, paddle wheels, motor and other fittings are to be added. (16.6.1971)
BUILDING: The number and value of building permits issued so far this year by Mildura City Council is heading for a record. So far there has been 114 proposing construction work of all types, 20 per cent up on last year’s figures. In 1966-67 the value of permits was around the $1 million mark and we are approaching that figure in the first five months of the year. In one month we issued permits worth half the value of the whole of 1968-69. (17.6.1971)
25 YEARS AGO
TEAMS: Mildura Deakin Lions Club members will raise money for the Royal Flying Doctor Service with an entry in the Back to Birdsville Outback trek, which starts in Barmera on August 30. Club second vice president Max Kleine said they raised $5000 in the trek two years ago by selling advertising space on his trusty 1967 Holden and hope sponsorship by businesses this year would assist them. About 50 people attended the Mildura Four-wheel Drive Club’s recent presentation night. Winners were Terry Gottschutzke (The Log Award), Bill and Jan Wass (The Black Stump Trophy), Don Price (best clubman) and Val Price (best club woman). (13-15.6.1996)
SITES: Construction workers have completed an important phase in the erection of one of Sunraysia’s largest retail outlets, the Harvey Norman store in 15th St. Roof trusses were jockeyed into place using large cranes. Hudaks Bakery will celebrate its 50th year of operation this year with the opening of a restaurant-style cafe comparable to anything of its kind in Australia. The 372 square metre building will seat about 150 people costing $750,000 and has been in the pipeline for over two years, builders Luke Tierney and Danny Riordan are pictured discussing the design plan.
Work on the Robinvale-Euston bridge is complex and would take an extended period to complete as it involves strengthening and widening of the timber approach spans and replacing timber piles. The existing timber decking will be replaced by a concrete deck, which will be widened to six metres. And all is expected to cost in the vicinity of $2.5 million, jointly funded by both the NSW and Victorian governments. (13-15.6.1996)
ITEMS: Comic strips are like fast food for the mind. Read one and just try and remember afterward what it was about that colourful good guy-bad confrontation in this week’s serial that so intrigued you. The Phantom from Paramount Pictures, this year’s comic-strip entrant into the big-budgeted movie sweep-stakes, is like that too. Dead Calm will be filmed in exotic locations from Thailand to Australia.
Lock Island is to become a “Treasure Island” fantasy land for children with the launch of a Landcare Environmental Action Program which is aimed at forming an important link in the Chaffey Trail concept. With super-models such as Cindy Crawford and Claudia Schiffer as role models, adolescent girls have enough to be anxious about. A study found that anxiety in adolescent girls can stunt their growth and be as much as 5cm shorter than non-anxious girls.
Red Cliffs Secondary College student John Panetta was presented with a certificate as part of World Environment Day for his highly commended graphics design – he was fourth out of 700 entries – a wonderful achievement. Almost 2000 British workers at the US-owned Levi Strauss are to receive an extra year’s pay to mark the millennium. (14-17.6.1996).
