Presented by Mildura and District Historical Society
Compiled by Judi Hyde for Mildura Rural City Council Library Service
100 years ago
GOLDEN DAYS: Cobb’s Coaches. What a host of reminiscences and old-time yarns the very mention of the words bring down upon the head of a visitor to any of the old established inland stations. They are part of our history of Australian pioneering days of blackfellow raids and hold-ups by bushrangers and gaily painted mail coaches that belong to a period that tore over the highways of England a hundred years ago. A trip in an old “Cobb” may not be luxurious but it is of the bush-bashy and as such had a curse of its own. Imagine an early morning in summer in a far-west township, the coach appears around the corner apparently from nowhere and pulls up at the “pub”- picks up passengers and luggage, waits while the driver has a “rodney” with a few cobbers then heads off for the open road. Out of the town in a cloud of dust, speeded by whistles and “hooray’s” from half-clad urchins, between paddocks and along reserves, the heavy coach creaks and rolls and humps to the top of the creek-bank. Down this at a headlong gallop tearing with a deafening rattle over the corduroy at the bottom and up the other side and on we go.
ITEMS: Mildura has been given a circular sent out by the Presbyterian Church of Victoria asking for locals to assist to secure the adoption of Villers Bretonneux. The appeal intimated that the object is to succor the immediate needs of the surviving inhabitants of the famous town who are now living in temporary shelters among the ruins of their former homes. Dengibin airship, ZR2 formerly known as R38, which was recently off to America and was undergoing a test for a trip exploded over the city of Hull – only two of the 50 people on board were saved when it fell into the river – two explosions were heard. In connection with the invention of the helicopter, Mr Louis Brennan, the Australian who invented the torpedo and the gyroscope railway is confident of its success. He declares that it will be a great surprise. Sydney bag snatchers are throwing pepper in their victims’ faces before grabbing their bags.
NEWS: The Ouyen Druids Lodge, in co-operation with the Progress Aassociation, is to plant trees at the west end of Cooper Street. It was agreed that each member of the lodge should plant a tree and the avenue be called Druids Avenue. Mr D. Hollis, Merbein, was riding his push-bike home along Fifth Street when the fork suddenly snapped throwing him to the ground. His brother Mr H. Hollis took him to Dr Spargo’s surgery where Sister Spargo treated his concussion and jaw injuries. The A Squadron, Third Light Horse held its first parade in Renmark and had a muster of 22, including 12 mounted men. They and their ranks are listed in August 22 Sunraysia Daily. Two new towns, Monash (being on the road what is locally known as Monash Lane Gum irrigation blocks) and Glossop (named after Commander Glossop of the Warship Sydney which sank the Emden) are officially proclaimed.
75 years ago
OVERSEAS: No one but a magician or a fool would forecast the future of Germany. It is a problem of such complexity that there is hardly a conclusion which cannot be challenged or a deduction which cannot be challenged. There, in the centre of darkest Europe, stands what is left of the Third Reich. Led first by a megalomaniac Kaiser and then by a megalomaniac Fuhrer, she has brought civilisation to the very brink of extinction. The problem is not the Nazis under detention – they will be dealt with – the headache is in the vast number of Nazis who are accused of no specific crime but are being dispossessed and turned loose without money or occupation. The wartime marriage boom is over, it is revealed that annual births increased from 122,000 in 1945 to 160,690 in 1946 and the number is declining. A 38ft sloop sailed into Miami Harbour with 18 refugees from Estonia on board after it was refused permission to land in the Portuguese port of Madeira. A Japanese girl journalist, during the hearing of treason charges against Major Charles Cousens, said he told her that, in carrying on radio work for Radio Tokyo, he was doing so at considerable risk as he could be court-martialled if it was discovered. She said that no woman broadcaster associated with Radio Tokyo had taken the name “Tokyo Rose” but one had assumed the name “Anne”, the troops called her “Tokyo Rose”.
ITEMS: It is suggested that immediate action be taken with the completion and presentation of a concrete case for the establishment of about 25,000 acres of Crown land at Robinvale for the establishment of a soldier settlement. Lorraine Creations, a women’s wear shop in Ilex Street, was gutted by fire on the evening of August 22 – the fire was contained to that premises.
SCHOOLS: Shades of old English village greens were seen by 500 parents when students, gaily decked in bright costumes, danced merrily on the Mildura Recreation Reserve in a display by the children of the Mildura Central School. The object was to provide a change from the usual sports afternoon but it was far more than that, it was a mixture of beautiful sunshine, clean-limbed and invigoratingly energetic children and music. Tripping the light fantastic and doing Maypole dancing was a delight for all. The headmaster, Mr Pemreath, said he had become tired of the usual drab sports afternoons with very little interest shown by parents and the beautiful display enabled all children to take part, not just 200 of the 700 students. The head master of the Mildura West School (Mr W. Pascall) said that during this month, senior pupils at the school were receiving instructions under a system of integration which involved the correlation and interlocking of subjects in the curriculum – a modern method of instruction.
50 years ago
WARNING: Watch that mirror when you shave on a Friday the 13th, beware of black cats and don’t walk under any ladder at work. Odd things have been known to happen on Friday the 13th. For a start don’t let mother take the car out of the garage, don’t forget if you spilt some salt at the breakfast table to throw it over your left shoulder. If you have any black cats as family pets, let them go hungry today as its safer not to get near them. Keep the family china way out of the reach of junior and try to stay indoors most of the day. If the sky is clear, it will certainly pour rain so don’t plan a barbecue tea. For construction workers, watch your step as proverb said, “Man who walk under ladder liable to get a bucket of paint over head”. In fact, it is probable best to stay in bed all day providing the door is locked, the windows shut and hope your house is above flood level.
SCHOOL: Dareton Public School’s new $160,000 school room and amenities block presently under construction is the first of its type to be built in western New South Wales. The double-storey building of thick bricks, white roof tiles to reflect the heat and insulation will have two classrooms, a cafeteria, recreation room, school medical clinic, sick bay, toilets, showers and storeroom. A 15-year-old schoolgirl was guest speaker at the last meeting of the Sunraysia branch of the National Council of Women in Mildura. Miss Angela Smith, a student at St Joseph’s College, talked about the problem of youth and how they could be overcome. She said young people needed the support and active interest of their families as they adapted to the world around them. Most began to attain new values and ideas but needed their parents’ trust and respect despite some irresponsible behaviour which might suggest the opposite. Adults must be patient with young people in the same way they expect young people to be tolerant and respectful of their ideals.
MACHINE: Big Lizzie, the 35-ton clearing machine used by pioneers in Sunraysia and rescued from a Balmoral farm, will arrive in Red Cliffs today after it was carted 270 miles to be here as a tourist attraction. She looks derelict but she is unique, Cr Wolfe said, “We will restore her”, she made the trip at an average speed of 22 mph.
25 years ago
FAVOURITES: A recent report outlines how damaging the sports drinks can be to people’s teeth with a high sugar and food acid content and they are wrongly advertised as health products. A test was done by putting a baby’s tooth in a glass of a popular soft drink and left overnight and was not there in the morning gives you an idea of its high potency of acid. The next highest content is fruit juices followed by food acids flavour, colours and water, sugar is the second highest content followed by glucose, fructose syrup, sucrose, food acid, flavour, salt and sodium nitrate. In laboratories across the United States, scientists are experimenting with the ingredients of chocolate, hoping to create a modern-day alchemist’s equivalent of gold, a chocolate that is both guilt and fat free. They are spurred on by a growing consumer revolt of a high-fat diet and perhaps even concoct an entirely fat-free chocolate bar. An average of $14.08 billion was spent last year for an average of 5 kilograms of chocolate per person.
ITEMS: The Mildura Ambulance Service recorded its busiest month on record attending 474 emergency cases – the 25 road ambulances were “flat strap” and the level of service remained excellent. The Mildura Rural City Council signed contracts for the construction of the Alfred Deakin Centre complex on the corner of 13th Street and Deakin Avenue. It will be built by J.E&M Kelly, contractors, for the cost of $10.5 million. Work will start in March. The $1.2 million extension to the Mildura RSL, including a new bistro, bottle shop, snooker room and a courtyard with umbrellas over the tables in the alfresco dining space is expected to be completed within five years.
MEN: People did not make enough use of their pharmacists’ expertise, preferring to self-medicate said pharmacist Selwyn Patterson and they put themselves at risk if they select medicines and other therapeutic products without the expert advice of their pharmacist. A PSA survey showed 95 per cent of pharmacists believed they were under-utilised. While the Bureau of Meteorology is mostly concerned with getting tomorrow’s forecast right, the experts at the Mildura weather office have been dusting off old record books. They have been going back 50 years to August 26, 1946, to see what happened on the first day of official operation at the airport office. That morning it was zero degrees, it reached a mild 19.8 degrees and the sky clouded over in the afternoon and a north-west wind strengthened to a gusty 40 kilometres an hour. The officer in charge, Tommy Fernandes, has been responsible for the records for 24 of those 50 years.
