The days when 50 dairy cows were enough to permit you a good, decent life in the prime dairy farming country around Jamberoo have long gone. Geoff Boxsell, 84, remembers the days when there were 96 farms providing milk on a daily basis to the Jamberoo Dairy Coop.Now there’s ten. And the Coop itself has disappeared. Something of a local historian, agricultural consultant Lynne Strong describes Geoff Boxsell as a legend, a living link to the area’s colourful rural past.When Geoff joined the Coop as foreman in 1959 at the age of 20 after studying dairying technology at Hawkesbury College, there were 23 workers at the Jamberoo Dairy Factory and it was a central part of village life. Admired in the industry, Geoff worked at the Coop until 1985 when it merged with Nowra Dairy Co-op to form Shoalhaven Dairy Co-op, which involved building a new dairy in Bomaderry. As he explains, Jamberoo was unique amongst dairy Coops because it focused on producing butter, powdered milk for ice cream and sweetened condensed milk rather than bottled milk. Geoff’ remembers the profound impact of simple things, well simple from the vantage point of 2024, such as electric fencing, mechanisation, and the government run quota system, which ensured a continuous supply of milk throughout the year in the Sydney Zone (from Wauchope to Milton) but also made winners and losers in a tightly controlled system. As he recalls, the manufacturing would start up at 4am, and from 7.30am the forecourt was filled with the noise of carriers and farmers bringing in the milk off the farms building throughout the morning. “The coop employees would be upending the ten gallon cans of milk by hand. Meanwhile we would be supporting the manufacturing operations – the evaporators, the butter churn, the cream pasteuriser and the roller dryers for powdered milk.“When I was a kid, some used to bring milk down to the factory in a horse and cart. But a lot of dairy farmers used carriers rather than bringing it in themselves, the ones down at Jones Beach, East Beach.”Geoff puts down the demise of Co-ops to ageing plants, insufficient capital, and that the coops were owned by dairy farmers, causing a conflict between adequate payment for manufacturing milk and retention of funds for necessary works. Change, as far he’s concerned, was inevitable.One of the most evident signs is the disappearance of the cattle known as Illawarras, or the Australian Illawarra Shorthorn, which are basically gone now but were famous in the day for their rich colouring and milk production. Local agricultural consultant Lynne Strong wants to emphasise that despite the decreased numbers of farmers involved, dairy is not a sunset industry. “Those ten farms produce more milk than the 96 farms once did. After the deregulation of the dairy industry in Australia in 2000, the previously protected milk prices were no longer regulated by the government. This significant change exposed dairy farmers to market forces, removing the price guarantees that had been in place prior to deregulation and milk price per litre of milk dropped by half.“Our Jamberoo farmers were very very proud of their Co-op. We had quite a diversity, from large to very small farms. And the Co-op was an important part of their social life. They would bring their milk to the factory, then spend time talking to the locals, go over to the coop office to buy their butter. Everybody knew everybody. They could also get all their farm supplies there. “The odd farmer would go from the factory to the Jamberoo pub for lunch, it was a very social time.“One local character used to take his bull to the pub, it would stand at the door and wait for him. There were so many stories.  “These days it’s very very serious business, and you would never, never think of doing that.”Nostalgic as memories of the old dairy farming life are, for local historians and for the area’s increasing number of tourists it’s interesting to note that the south coast was one of the major centres for the birth of the coop movement which brought prosperity and certainty to the lives of many rural families.The very first dairy coop, indeed the very first agricultural coop in Australia, was formed in this area. A research paper on Illawarra Cooperatives by Mike Donaldson and Ian Southall from the University of Wollongong records that with poor remuneration from Sydney agents the 1870s had been tough on South Coast farmers. “On Friday, 15 October 1880, farmers met at the Kiama Courthouse and formed the South Coast and West Camden Cooperative and determined ‘by the instinct of self-preservation’ to revolutionise their industry with Australia’s first successful attempt at co-operative marketing. “Illawarra and Shoalhaven farmers immediately withdrew their consignments from ‘the system’ and sent their produce instead to the fledgling cooperative. On Mondays and Thursdays steamers arrived from Wollongong, Kiama and Shoalhaven.” The greatest agitator for the Cooperative turned out to be the owner of The Kiama Bugle’s predecessor, The Kiama Independent. Originally posing as an anonymous “Dairyman”, the then proprietor Joseph Watson used the pages of his newspaper to advocate forcefully for cooperatives. By the end of that decade the South Coast Cooperative was responsible for selling 87% of NSW butter, and the dairy coop movement spread up and down the coast. By the end of the 1880s more than a dozen dairy cooperatives were operating on the south coast. It would be more than a century, in the 1990s, before the Jamberoo coop would close.Dave Hall, a well known Jamberoo resident whose father was the local butcher, remembers the old factory fondly. “It was a real meeting place, because a lot of the farmers used to come down, mainly in the morning, with all the milk in cans. It was pretty social. All the people who worked there were locals. “We used to be friends with one of the farmers, and I used to go up for the milking. They would all put all the cans on the back of the tractor trailer, you could sit on the top of the cans and head through town. It was exciting. I used to love it. You’d never get away with it now. “The farmers are still around Jamberoo, but a lot of them have retired. Everyone knew it was coming.” And remnants of those vanished lifestyles, early hours, hard work, the smell and sound of the cattle you knew by name, trundling your milk cans down to the factory coop, the perhaps not so occasional raucous meeting in the much loved pub, can still be found scattered across the region. Times might have been tough, but they didn’t have to deal with the constant angst created by mobile phones, social media, nor the overwhelming feeling of scepticism which has spread across our country as people lose faith in their government, their politicians and their national identity. The pub is still there, the stone walls which kept the cattle in their paddocks are in many cases being restored, and dilapidated farm sheds still bring back that wonderful atmosphere of yore, a time of hard work and common decency.Jamberoo Factory Achievements:Pioneering Milk Quota System: Jamberoo Factory was the first to propose a quota system to the Milk Board in the 1950s, ensuring a consistent milk supply for sweetened condensed milk production. This groundbreaking initiative stabilized milk supply in the region and set a precedent for managing milk production nationwide.Manufacturing High-Quality Butter: Jamberoo Factory developed a process for improving the quality of butter by adding a bacterial culture, like yoghurt, to the cream separated from high quality milk supplies from local farms.Supreme Champion Dairy Product, 1976: Jamberoo Factory's bulk box of butter was awarded Supreme Champion Dairy Product in Australia in 1976, surpassing all other dairy products including cheese, milk powder, milk, yogurt, and ice cream.Innovative Spreadable Butter: Jamberoo Factory experimented with the creation of spreadable butter by mixing cream and vegetable oils, a highly successful product innovation created before it was legal, so it couldn’t be marketed. Dual Payment System: Milk destined for manufacture of dairy products was always paid for  on the basis of its butterfat component alone. In July 1965, Jamberoo Co-op introduced a dual payment system, the first operating in Australia, involving payment for skim milk solids content as well as for butterfat. The system is now universal in Australia but uses butterfat and protein, protein being the most important component of skim milk solids.

It is clearly understood that early settlers, both men and women lived a hard life. Something that is often lost forever is the folklore of the times. In order to retain some of this, we print the following anecdotes that epitomise the character and comradeship of the Foxground folk. Cedar-cutting was an early industry. Logs were felled and drawn over a deep pit or gully, where one man, Harry Stokes, as ‘bottom dog’ could saw all day, and then leap out of the 180 cm deep pit in a standing jump!    Another strong man, Frank Herbert, had been known to put two half-grown pigs in bags, and walk out of the Valley over Saddleback Mountain without putting them to the ground.            Pat O’Keeffe spent the whole of his long working life testing milk at the factory, smelling and /or tasting hundreds of thousands of cans of untreated milk. Let it not be said that milk is harmful - he lived to be 98.Pat knew his job, and once rejected a supplier's milk for two days in a row for a foreign odour until it was discovered one cow in the herd was grazing a patch of garlic.    One farmer who hailed from South Africa used to cool his can of cream in a well overnight, raising the lid for ventilation. During the night his greyhound pup knocked the lid off and fell into the cream.The farmer had to rush to rescue said pup. It came out covered in cream. Telling his story, he was asked what he did with the cream. ‘Well, I scraped him down and put the lid on and sent the cream to the factory, of course.’ It was hoped Pat didn’t taste that one! Nearly every wedding in those times was celebrated with a tin-kettling. Neighbours and friends would foregather at the home of the newly-weds and serenade them by banging tins and billies and other objects that could generate noise. On one occasion the newly-weds would not open the door to them, so a wet bag was placed over the chimney to smoke them out! Jokes of all kinds were attempted, and on one occasion a young calf was put to sleep under the young couple’s bed. Like all young calves he woke up for a feed early in the morning, with a hair-raising result!      One early settler was known to have walked over Saddleback Mountain each Saturday night, to court his girlfriend and back home to do his milking the next morning. He should have brought her with him!         Foxground in flood. Date UnknownEntertainment was simple in the early days; corn-husking parties were held on nights with dances on the verandas or in the barns, to the tunes of an accordion. Card-playing was popular with the older folk.Bill Cullen was a proud breeder of red Illawarra cattle, and when one of his best cows calved one night, a joker took the red calf and replaced it with a white one, probably a jersey, to the shock of the owner when he came to inspect the newly born!A true story is told of a farmer who used to balance his one keg of butter with a bag of stones on the packhorse on the trip to the Kiama wharf. When his production required an extra keg, he borrowed another horse to carry the second keg and more stones! Surely it would have been easier..if..?    Late one summer’s night during the war an aeroplane crashed on Bong-Bong Mountain, on the rim of the Valley. In the rush to be first there in the pea-soup fog many got hopelessly lost. Close to one hundred men rushed to the scene. Len Flint and his party reckoned they climbed over the same log three times during the night! Doug Blow and his party arrived home late for the morning’s milking. They all wished the plane had landed on Cullen’s flat!Sly grog was made in the early days, in a still located in a mountain cave. One man used to take along a second can of grog with his can of cream to the factory. One day on being confronted by the police, he took off for the bush with one of the cans in hand - hotly pursued by the Law. In the hurry he had grasped the can of cream, and the can of grog was disposed of by persons unknown!A girl from the same still traded the brew to a Kiama Hotel and for years was never caught. She rode a horse side-saddle with a hooped skirt, with the bottles wrapped in a blanket inside the hoop of the skirt!         Stan Leaney was a great axeman, and followed the profession to the show-ring. It was said his wife chopped the wood at home!   When we were kids at the Foxground school, one of our favourite sports was to see who could be first to tease a funnel-web spider out of his hole in the ground with a grass stem. I still shudder to think about them. Kids were cheap in ‘those good old days!’  

The GLaM Museum in Gerringong has recently closed its Scouts exhibition. However, don’t worry if you missed it, as the exhibition will now be on display in the main museum for the foreseeable future.The opening was a wonderful event, attended by many former Scouts, Cadets and Girl Scouts. One highlight was a Queen's Scout from 1963 to 1967, Marelyn Embry. She arrived in her original uniform and reminisced about her youth, including receiving a letter from the late Queen Elizabeth II.Artist Trudi Voorwinden, who has been painting since she was 10 years old, spent a week restoring a mural of the Scouts in Gerringong. She carefully preserved the original colours and vision of the artist. Many of the Scouts depicted in the mural have now been identified, and the mural can be seen at the GLaM Museum.Merelyn Emery in her old uniformPresident of the Gerringong and District Historical Society, Colleen Jauncey, expressed gratitude at the exhibition opening. "Thank you to the parents who kept uniforms, memorabilia, and badges. They have enabled us to put this exhibition together," she said.David Hindmarsh, an ex scout himself, also spoke, pondering why the Scouts struggle today. He questioned whether it’s due to the electronic age, a rise in self-interest, people leaving the area for work, or perhaps the popularity of surfing as a hobby. Trevor Nixon, Neil miller, David Hindmarsh, Gary Rodger’s, Ken Mitchell, all ex scoutsHe also noted the historical gender differences in Scout badges, with women's badges focusing on domestic skills including ‘Matron Housekeeper’ and men's on outdoor challenges. David, who joined the Scouts in 1954 at age nine, shared a humorous story about finding frozen uniforms after a soccer game. He laughed, saying he is still tying knots to this day.Despite these challenges, there is still a Scouts group active in the area. Reuben Frost, pictured with his Scout leader Debbie and friend Hugh, meets with the Kiama Scouts at Kiama Harbour on Tuesday afternoons. New members are encouraged to join.Reuben Frost (Gerringong Scouts), Hugh Hassall, Debbie Gibson.This exhibition preserves invaluable memories and history, thanks to the effort of everyone involved. Their work ensures these stories will be preserved for future generations. Thank you to all who contributed.

Who have been the South Coast’s most significant women?That’s the question South Coast History Society is asking as it attempts to identify them. The Society’s search began at a local market when a lady asked its President, Peter Lacey, to identify the parts of their book, ‘Extraordinary Histories: Amazing Stories from the NSW South Coast’, that related to women from the NSW South Coast. This led to the inclusion of biographies of 10 interesting South Coast women in an expanded second edition of the book to be released later this year.‘It's a very easy task to nominate the historically significant men from the South Coast. They are well known,’ Peter suggests. ‘But coming up with a list of the area’s important women and recording their stories has been a real challenge because, surprisingly, not a lot has been written about them. And, whilst a little has been recorded about some pioneer women, the contributions of outstanding local women in the 20th and 21st centuries have largely been ignored.’A little digging has so far identified 22 significant women – the 10 being included in the second edition of ‘Extraordinary Histories’ plus another 12 whose stories are included in the June issue of ‘Recollections’ magazine.‘But,’ Peter added. ‘We have a very uneasy feeling that there are probably as many significant South Coast women again whose great stories we have missed. So, we’re now asking the community to help us identify other women who rightly deserve to be recognised.’ So, who are the South Coast women being featured in the second edition of ‘Extraordinary Histories’?They are author Charmian Clift, nurse Pearl Corkhill, pioneering woman Elizabeth ‘Granny’ Sproats, contralto Eva Mylott, carrier Emily Wintle, Aboriginal activist Jane Duren, ‘The Three Ladies of Tathra’ who were conservationists, shopkeeper Mrs Mac, newspaper editor Olive Constable, and world-renowned economist Persia Campbell.‘And I wonder how many of these illustrious women the average South Coast person knows of?’ Peter asks. ‘I suspect, for most people, it would be just one or two.’And who features in the June issue of ‘Recollections’?Four additional authors or journalists – Olga Masters, Mare Carter, Kate O’Connor and Jackie French; the soprano Marie Narelle; pioneer woman Rose Hunt; hoteliers Ann White and Sabina Pike; nurses ‘Kitty’ Porter and Bernice Smith; doctor Dagmar Berne and, because her death had a significant impact on the Eden area, Flora MacKillop who was the mother of Saint Mary MacKillop.Peter was then asked to nominate the most interesting South Coast women he had identified to date. ‘That’s easy,’ he replied. ‘An extraordinary schoolteacher by the name of Bridget Johnston. And I bet you’ve never heard of her!’‘She was the teacher at a one-teacher school in Eurobodalla village (which has since disappeared) from 1882 to 1927. Her boast was that no pupil, however reluctant a student, would ever leave her school without being able, at the very least, to write, read and be arithmetically competent.’‘Her abilities became widely known. Students were sent to board in tiny Eurobodalla, and one family even erected two tents near Bridget’s school so their child could receive his education there. One tent housed their young son, the other a female carer.’ ‘Bridget, being the only teacher in a one-teacher school, was required to teach all levels from kindergarten to matriculation. And every year, one of her students would receive one of four scholarships available from the local inspectorate, enabling them to stay at school past the Intermediate Certificate to study for the Leaving Certificate.’‘One year, her students won all four scholarships! So, the Education Department sent an Inspector to investigate. He examined the successful four scholarship winners, while Bridget took the remaining pupils out to the playground and conducted classes there.  Two hours later, the Inspector emerged, thanked and congratulated Bridget – the scholarships had been correctly awarded! Three of those boys subsequently became doctors, the other successfully completed an Arts degree.’‘Bridget married while teaching at the school. No woman when married could then be employed as a teacher unless ‘there are special circumstances which make her employment desirable in the public interest’; retaining Bridget as Eurobodalla School’s teacher clearly was ‘in the public interest’!’‘And when Bridget reached the normal retiring age of 65, she was asked to continue teaching…which she did for a further three years.’‘Eurobodalla village also benefited in other ways from having Bridget in town. She was a driving force behind the construction of the village hall, the village cricket pitch and the village tennis courts,’ Peter added. Copies of the free South Coast Women ‘Recollections’ magazine will be available from this week at all South Coast libraries. An email copy will be provided to anyone sending ‘Send Recollections’ to [email protected] information or to make a Nomination?  Contact Peter Lacey at the South Coast History Society on 0448 160 852 Or Email: [email protected]  Charmian Clift, one of the 12 South Coast women featured in the June issue of ‘Recollections’.

IntroductionThe Wodi Wodi people of the Dharawal language group were the main Aboriginal inhabitants of the Illawarra area, and a clan was centred around Werri Beach and Crooked River/Gerroa. Here is a great story of a cricket team, which was formed from the Crooked River area 130 years ago. It’s an important piece of Gerringong history.The formation of the teamThere is no record of the cricket club being formed, and the reasons why it was created.However, it can be surmised that ‘King’ Mickey Weston was the person behind the formation of the team. Mickey Weston was the Elder who oversaw the tribes from the Illawarra to Seven Mile Beach (at least) and he would regularly travel to these places. I imagine that he had a great interest in cricket and was keen to put together a team.Was the team just made up of indigenous men from Crooked River? It is possible, but it is also likely that some came from other places. There were mentions of Sims and Longbottoms in the team. The Longbottoms were prominent at Kiama and the Sims at Werri Beach.The name Crooked River was not always used as well. Sometimes, it was mentioned that the team came from Gerringong or maybe the South Coast. However, it may have been a convenience as I imagine the name Crooked River was not well known outside the Gerringong District.A sure thing is that one of the first challenges for Mickey was to get the proper playing equipment. One thing that is consistent with most of the games played was that the team would, ‘put on a show’ after the game. This might include a corroboree and a demonstration of boomerang throwing. The ‘hat’ was taken around to collect money from the spectators. Often, there was a ‘goodly’ crowd there to watch the match and the entertainment. Another thing that seemed to happen at most games was that the Indigenous team were always the visitors and, as such, were entertained to a luncheon/afternoon tea. Apparently, on one occasion against Gerringong, this did not happen and the players were most put out according to a letter to the editor!Apart from newspaper advertisements announcing the coming games, the first mention of an actual game report was from Saturday, 27 January 1894, reported in the Kiama Independent and Shoalhaven Reporter. Thank you to Trove.CRICKET.(From a Correspondent.)A match was played at Gerringong on Wednesday last between Mickey Weston's Team of Aboriginals and a 2nd team of the local club which resulted in a win for the former by 22 runs. The scores were:           GerringongA, Wilson, b Cummins ........ 13M. Hanrahan, lbw,b Sutton ... 7J. Wilson, b Longbottom........31R. M. Miller, b Button........ 0J. Fields, b Cummins ......... 0J. W, Francis, c and b Cummings3T. Hanharhan c Simms, b Longbottom......- ..........      0B. Johnstone, b Cummings ...  3M. Burke, b Cummings ........ 2T. F. Seage, not out .........8R. Gordon, c Matto, b Cummins.0- Sundries …                  17Total .....                   87Aboriginals.B. Hoskins, b Wilson .....,     4Sutton, b Wilson                0Walker, b Wilson ......... . .. 0W. Broughton, b Wilson ....     8Hunt, b Johnston                1T. Simms, b Wilson .....        8G. Longbottom, not out         51Judson, b Wilson ........       4Matto, c Fields, b Miller..     6A. Cummings c Hanrahan b Miller 5Edwards, b Wilson ...        . 12Sundries ...... ...... .       13                               109A Cummings appears to be a very good bowler!The next game mentioned comes up in the paper 3rd February in a game against Jamberoo. The ‘Gentlemen of Colour’ arrived with plenty of time for the match and were entertained at lunch by ‘the white fellows’. They were one player short, and a Gerringong white boy substituted during the game.Micky Weston’s team scored 31 in the first innings and 77 in the second. The Jamberoo team got 84 and were 2 for 27 when stumps were called.After this the large number of spectators were entertained by a demonstration of boomerang throwing. It was noted that the crowd was the largest that had been to any Jamberoo game that season.The visitors were then entertained at ‘tea’. A collection was taken up to help the team and 1 pound, 7 shillings and sixpence was collected. The next match was only a few days later at Kiama. There was an extensive report on the proceedings in the paper.   The next mention is a game between Gerringong CC and the Crooked River CC on 17th February with Gerringong scoring 128 and the Aboriginals 69. W. Sutton scoring 27no.On 22 March, the Gerringong Aboriginal CC, as it was called in the article, travelled to Shellharbour to play a match. The Aboriginal team won the game scoring 78 to Shellharbour’s 40. Top scorers were T. Simms and Joe Dixon, who both scored 20. It does not mention how they got there.The next game mentioned was a trip to Wollongong. A ‘goodly crowd’ was in attendance. The papers were all in praise of the Aboriginal team, displaying great skills. The team was described as ‘Mickey Weston’s team from Gerringong.’ The Aboriginals scored 36 and 8 for 25 and Wollongong 78. When they travelled to Comerong on May 8 to play, they were called the South Coast Aboriginal Cricket team. In this match, they scored 35 and 31 as against Comerong with 44 and 70.This is the last game mentioned in 1894 and the last mention of the Crooked River team. Mickey, however, appears to have put together another team of Dharawal men and played in the Wollongong areas in later years.Joe Dixon was the best player from the team. He forged out a career with Gerringong CC.

Gerringong has many facilities for people of a ‘mature’ age to assist them in their later years. These may include retirement villages or nursing homes. In some cases, however, nurses or other people may come to an elderly person’s own home to assist with daily tasks including preparing meals, housework and gardening so they don’t have to move out. Of course, many elderly people live with relatives through choice, but the point is just that: many now have a choice.These choices were usually not available many years ago. Care of the aged and infirm invariably fell upon the shoulders of family members. A single family member may have often had to ‘sacrifice’ part or all of their own life to do this ‘duty’. This ‘sacrifice’ was usually given freely and without complaint.As a Chittick, I can remember part of my own family history, which was pretty typical of the time. A family in Ireland on a farm in the mid eighteen hundreds. Dad died leaving mother and large family destitute, being unable to run a farm properly. Mother then sold the farm and left with all the family and what possessions they could carry on a boat to Australia. On the way out, she died.As a result, the eldest girl, Ellen, no longer had a life of her own. No marriage. No children. No career. No, her life was one of duty, caring for her siblings. All we have of Ellen Chittick is a photo and a Bible.Ellen Chittick’s BibleI remember reading biographies of family members which would often state that, ‘Auntie so and so spent the last five years of his or her life living with their sister’s family’. My father wrote a story about such a duty. And often the duty fell upon a selected female member of the family. His name is Clive Emery, and this is his story …It has never been my privilege to understand just what represents a level playing field in a person’s lifetime. How some members of a family can seem to have a dream run, lots of opportunities in work and relationships. Other members of a family can seem to have a life of duty and service. How inequities seem to appear, often through no fault of any person.Take the case of two maidens, sisters of my acquaintance who would normally work on their father's farm until they married.  At sixteen and eighteen their grandmother fell ill, and this was where the inequity began. The grandparents lived and farmed a long way from their neighbours, in a town 10 kilometres distant.They did not have the convenience of a car. The road to their mountain farm was rugged in the extreme, so the only connection with civilisation was by sulky or cart.  There was no electricity and no water, except what gathered into a tank off their roof. They called on their daughter for assistance because she could easily spare one of her two daughters as a housekeeper and companion for granny. But, which one?The decision did not come from the toss of a coin. It came from the need, and from their individual accomplishments, such as who was the best worker and could milk the cows the fastest! And so the younger girl lost and had to go and look after her granny and grandpa.  For how long? One month … one year? No, five years, until granny's death! It meant being parted from her family during her youthhood. Parted, too, from the comfort and protection of the family unit.It was five years of virtual imprisonment before she was able to return to the fold and be accorded a twenty-first birthday party at her home! How wonderful?! That gap in a young girl's life could not be assumed to be helpful, nor could an equation be reached to evaluate her loneliness - the escapades and jollity of family living, of sleeping in her own bed and the companionship of her two brothers, sister and parents! She went without a word of protest as a silent companion and carer of an aged woman. Try that for size! A level playing field, indeed!Then there was the case of my own cousin, who from 5 to ten years had to sleep in the same bed as granny. When granny died it was the first time she had a bed to herself!She always loved granny, she said. It was a mournful way to spend her girlhood, but at least she had the school days to herself and her playmates.

In the mid and latter months of 1942, Australians fought alone against 10,000 battle-hardened Japanese soldiers as they marched over the Owen Stanley Ranges in Papua New Guinea towards Port Moresby. Then as now, Australia was considered not strong enough to defend itself - but it did.The names of brave Australian soldiers who stopped the Japanese are carved on war memorials in country towns and outside of council buildings across Australia. We barely acknowledge their existence: Private Bruce Kingsbury (VC), Corporal Charlie McCallum, Lieutenant Colonel William Owen and Captain Sam Templeton, to name just a few.Winston Churchill finally relented to urgent pleas from Prime Minister John Curtin for the return of Australian troops from the Middle East - but not before Churchill tried to divert them to Burma.As the Japanese marched south towards the Kokoda Airfield, two largely untrained conscripted Militia battalions from Sydney were sent to defend it. These were the 39th and 53rd - approximately 500 men - called the ‘Maroubra Force’.Their average age was 21. They were called ‘chocos’ because the public thought they would melt like chocolate soldiers in the heat of battle. Most of the 39th were home guard. They knew nothing about jungle warfare. Many had never fired their weapons. Now these warriors of the working day were defending Australia.The mountainous jungles seethed with life. The trees formed a dark dripping canopy and the heat and humidity were stifling. Moss-covered trees lay over fast running streams as Australian soldiers, many born in cities, lay in dug-ins and waited for the enemy. Some shook with malaria while others held their guts, cramped with dysentery.The Australians held the airstrip against 3000 Japanese soldiers, lost it, counterattacked, but were forced back to Isurava, 10 kilometres to the south. As they waited for reinforcements, more enemy troops made their way up the Track.Just as it looked like the Maroubra Force would be wiped out, Brigadier Arnold Potts arrived with two battalions of about 1000 men: the 2/14th and the 2/16th. Potts was a short, tough and nuggety Western Australian farmer. He had fought at Gallipoli and in France in World War One and was a gifted military strategist.The head of the Australian forces, General Thomas Blamey – who was safely ensconced in Brisbane - kept directing Potts to attack, but to do so would have been suicide. The Australians were undersupplied and outnumbered five to one.The Japanese threw everything at them and pushed them further back. However, not before a string of extraordinary last stands, which yielded more Allied decorations than any other battle in the Pacific, including a posthumous Victoria Cross for Bruce Kingsbury.One of the last gestures of defiance at Isurava was by Corporal Charlie McCallum, a farmer from South Gippsland. This is from Paul Ham’s book, ‘Kokoda’.“McCallum sprayed the enemy with his Bren gun and when it ran out of ammunition, he grabbed a tommy gun from a dead mate, all the time firing in to the advancing Japanese. He was wounded three times but kept on firing. He killed 25 Japanese and received the Distinguished Conduct Medal. He died later on the track.”The Australians fought a decisive game of cat and mouse. They attacked, broke off and attacked again. This was the Fabian strategy, after the Roman dictator Fabius Maximus, who fought a war of attrition against a much larger army led by Hannibal. Potts knew the difficulty of trying to supply an army over the mountains. It was a lesson he would teach the Japanese.In the hour of greatest danger, the Japanese stopped. They had run out of food. The Japanese had relied on speed to capture Port Moresby and now their soldiers were starving and riven with disease. Potts’ defensive battles had exhausted their supply lines.Potts’ strategy and the Australian victory at Milne Bay, left the Japanese with no choice but to withdraw. They were harried all the way back to New Guinea’s north coast, where they were wiped out.When the 2/27th first arrived in New Guinea, it had 777 men. When it pulled out of Gona in January 1943, only 70 walked away. Everyone else was dead, wounded or hospitalised with tropical diseases.Potts was sacked by Blamey on 22 October 1942, despite having demonstrated inspired disobedience in winning the withdrawal. He later commanded with distinction the 23rd Brigade of II Corps in Bougainville.The Kokoda heroes believed in Australia and the future their country held. This is a covenant written in blood. Australians complain, ‘where is the vision? Where is the story?’. This is the vision. This is the story of how 1,500 men turned back the Japanese advance.At the going down of the sun and in the morning, remember Arnold Potts and the diggers who fought on the Kokoda Track.

Coupons and rationing are things many young people know nothing of, but everyone who is old enough to remember the Second World War can recall strict regulations on food and clothing only too well.Elva, of Gerroa, remembers rationing and coupons which we used to buy everything from sugar, butter, meat, petrol and clothes. Elva and her husband, Clive, were married in 1947 and Elva said her husband had to buy his suit for the wedding with ration coupons. “If memory serves, about 56 coupons were enough to buy one suit or one overcoat per person, per year.”“Clive had to buy his suit for our wedding with coupons and I was lucky that one of our bridesmaids had an uncle who was a lace importer.”“My wedding dress was made out of cotton lace and the bridesmaid’s dresses were made out of the same lace, but we dyed them different colours,” Mrs Emery said.“I remember sitting in front of a large tub with dye all over me and worrying that the lace might shrink or warp”“Even my honeymoon bedroom attire was purchased with coupons and the whole situation was quite traumatic for a bride-to-be,” she said. “When we returned from our honeymoon, we lived on Clive’s father’s farm at Foxground for about three months.“Like many farming families in Gerringong, we were lucky to have eggs, milk, cream and meat, but there were other items which were difficult to have a plentiful supply of because of the rationing,” Mrs Emery said. “There were four hungry men on the farm, Clive’s mother and myself and somehow, like more people, we had to make do with what we had. “One of Clive’s brothers, Clifford, had served in the Army and he was used to very big meals. “All the men on the farm were accustomed to large meals and lots of cakes and treats and unfortunately, they had to get used to smaller portions,” she said Mrs Emery said that the Gerringong community would always hold a dance or a ball whenever a serviceman returned from war, even if it was only for leave. “Those balls really tested the ingenuity of the ladies of Gerringong because women had to make do with the small amount of food available.“The ladies would have to make the limited butter and sugar go as far as possible and I believe we all did a very good job,” Elva said. Mrs Emery added that she realised Gerringong residents were luckier than most because of the number of people who lived on farms and contributed coupons for the dances whenever they could.“It is amazing what qualities are drawn out of people during hard times,” she said. “Everyone pulled together because they had to,” Mrs. Emery said.

After decades in mainstream journalism, and having written literally thousands of stories, there aren’t too many things I haven’t written about.But there was one story about the world’s last survivor of the Gallipoli campaign, Alec Campbell, that has stuck in my memory all these years. Alec lied about his age in order to enlist in World War One, claiming he was 18 years and five months old. Throughout his extremely colourful life, Alec used to joke that because he was in fact only 16 when he went to war, he could become the oldest surviving Anzac. But thus it came to pass. He passed away in 2002 at the age of 103. I was working at The Australian as a general news reporter when, on the occasion of Alec officially becoming the last surviving Gallipoli veteran, I was directed by the Chief of Staff to do a phone interview. Most people, particularly the elderly, are pretty chuffed if the national newspaper rings them up over one honour or another. Not Alec.In the first instance, Alec’s protective wife said she wasn’t sure if he would feel like talking. An old carpenter, he was way down the back shed “banging away at things”, as she put it, and didn’t usually like to come to the phone.Alec took his time, that was for sure. He hung on the phone for a good 20 minutes or so. And when Alec did finally make it to the phone, he wasn’t honoured. He was grumpy that he had been disturbed. My generation grew up during the Vietnam War and many of us are decidedly anti-war. As a young reporter, I was very reluctant to interview old soldiers. I didn’t want to hear their war stories. But the opposite is true. There is no one more anti-war than a returned soldier. They have seen their mates die in front of them in often pointless conflicts, and do not want to relive the moment, or see anyone else go through the harrowing times they themselves have endured. I found Alec well, taciturn; utterly dismissive of politicians, proud of his union background, “up the bosses”, and contemptuous of the military commanders who had sent his comrades to their deaths in their thousands, the terrible slaughter he had witnessed firsthand.Alec refused to march on Anzac Day until very late in life because he didn’t want to glorify a lie: that war was a noble enterprise. He almost never spoke about his experiences at Gallipoli. There were better, more positive things in life.He joined what was then known as the Australian Imperial Force in July of 1915 and promptly earned the nickname “The Kid”. He arrived at Anzac Cove in November that same year and was wounded in the fighting at Gallipoli. He caught a fever and suffered facial paralysis as a result. He was invalided home and discharged in 1916, a veteran at the age of 17. Unlike many Australian veterans, who never recover from their wartime experiences, Alec got back to his home state of Tasmania and simply got on with life.Alec worked many different jobs, as a stockman, carpenter, railway carriage builder and, in his later years, researcher and historian. He gained an economics degree at the age of 50. His love of life extended to an enthusiasm for sailing, and he also circumnavigated Tasmania.On his deathbed, Alec pleaded: “For God’s sake, don’t glorify Gallipoli. It was a terrible fiasco, a total failure and best forgotten.”He was survived by nine children, 30 grandchildren and 32 great grandchildren.On the occasion of his death in May of 2002, I was also drafted to write a story headlined “Tributes and praise pour in for an ordinary hero”.Then Prime Minister John Howard’s media office had done a fine job of polishing up the Anzac myth for public consumption: “On behalf of the nation, I honour his life. Alec Campbell was typical of a generation of Australians who, through their sacrifice, bravery and decency, created a legacy that has resonated through subsequent decades and generations.“All Australians will forever be in debt to the Anzacs. Not only for what they did for us, but for the legend, for the tradition, for the stoicism under fire, sense of mateship and all those other great ideals that, increasingly, young Australians see as part of their Inheritance.”Then Governor-General Peter Hollingworth said Alec’s death was an occasion to reflect on the passing of the generation that helped give us our identity and character as a nation.    “Having recently returned from Anzac Day at Gallipoli and Anzac ceremonies in France, I have a renewed sense of the utter futility of war, which was such a constant message of the Anzacs like Alec Campbell.” Veterans Affairs Minister Danna Vale said Gallipoli held a unique place in the hearts of Australians.   “With Mr Campbell’s passing, we have lost our last living link to the birthplace of the Anzac spirit, which is a great loss,” she said. “Mr Campbell and his fellow Anzacs fought with the kind of courage, integrity and honour that we will never forget. It is a legacy that will live on.”   Alec, it is fairly safe to say, would have been contemptuous of the political sycophancy that accompanied his death, and disapproved of Australia’s involvement in America’s endless wars, including Afghanistan, Iraq and now Ukraine. Lest We Forget.

My mother, Elva Emery, who passed away in 1997, was asked to do a talk for Gerringong’s 140th anniversary on what life was like for families in the early days of Gerringong. If our records are correct, she gave the talk in 1994. My mother was born in 1923 and so remembered the Great Depression of the 1930s with great clarity. Elva Emery on her wedding day in 1947Gerringong may now be associated with expensive real estate, but life back in the early years was not easy by today’s luxurious standards.Here is an edited copy of her speech. By Elva EmeryEarly settlers lived in what we would consider small houses, built from logs or slabs of the local timber. These homes usually had two buildings, for the kitchen stood apart from the bedrooms because of the danger of fire. The main feature of the old kitchens was a large, open fire, sometimes large enough to seat several people round the inside ledges, or benches, which was great on a winter’s night. These fires were fed by large chunks of wood, which sent, when a new log was added, a huge blaze roaring up the chimney, together with dangerous sparks. On and around this open fire there were black, heavy iron kettles, always boiling and ready to make tea, a camp oven for cooking and bread-making and often a large pot of soup in winter.Of course, there was no water in pipes or taps; it had to be carried from the tank in buckets for there was no sink in the kitchen. But there were lots and lots of flies and other insects. Screens for doors and windows were not heard of. A tablecloth was a luxury and table-tops and benches were scrubbed down with a hard brush and sand-soap, a gritty sort of soap which helped remove the stains and grease. The family drank from enamel or tin mugs, with the same sort of materials used for plates, knives, forks and spoons. They spent most of their family time in the kitchen and just went to the larger building to sleep; there were no such rooms as lounges! There were usually quite a number of children in the family and they often slept, three or four together in one bed, which kept them warm in winter. The houses were open underneath, so the winds whistled up through the floorboards. There were often cracks between the wallboards and often they would be papered over with newspaper, or brown paper. The old-style hair and fibre mattresses were very hard to sleep on; altogether, life was pretty hard.But things improved when there was running water in pipes and taps, and sinks in the kitchen, but it was a great luxury to have a real bathroom, even if we had to carry the hot water to the bath. Later on chip heaters were invented, a sort of drum at the end of the bath, with a pipe through the room, which one filled with water and then lit a little fire underneath – it was a rather slow bath! Fathers shaved in the bathroom using some hot water in a shaving mug, with some soap, to first soften their whiskers. Then, with what was called a cut-throat razor, they would slowly and very carefully scrape off all their whiskers; one slip, and your throat was cut – hence the name. No washing machines then, but Mother had a laundry which usually housed a large, built-in copper, under which, again a fire was lit, for the water had to be boiled to properly cleanse the family’s clothes, sheets, towels, etc. Up-to-date laundries had two tubs, one to rinse the clothes after boiling, and one beside to ‘blue’ the white articles. The clothes were transferred from copper to tubs with a pot-stick, which was hot and heavy work, and each piece of clothing, including sheets and towels, was wrung out by hand, until wringers were later available. The clothes were then placed in a cane basket and carried out to be hung, by ‘dolly’ clothes pegs on long, wire clothes lines, propped up here and there by clothes props when the load started to sink to the ground; no Hills hoists then! Members of a church picnic line up for a group photographNot steam-irons, either. Ironing was done with a heavy ‘flat iron’ which had to be continually reheated on the top of the fuel stove. Many of the items were starched, and so had to be ‘damped down’, rolled up for a time, and it all made for a very slow ironing session.Soon after I started school we were lucky to have electricity extended to the Seven Mile Beach area and we were able to put away our lamps and actually buy a wireless, which you would now call a radio, but it was quite a large piece of furniture, and quite magical to us. But very few people could afford to buy electric stoves, or fridges, and for many years we still cooked with a fuel stove and kept our food reasonably fresh with a Coolgardie Safe, or an ice-chest, which carried a block of ice in the top compartment and melted slowly into a tray underneath. Screen doors were still in the future and we controlled (partly) the many flies either by inserting an L-shaped small funnel (something like a Poppa) or by attaching a small, round box to the ceiling of the kitchen, and pulling it down to reveal a very sticky strip of paper, about three feet long, from which no fly ever flew away. We had had a telephone since I could remember, but more remote places like Foxground, were quite remote until it was extended to there. It was a worrying time when anyone was sick, for the only way of contacting a doctor was on horse-back, or by horse and buggy. Many small operations were done in the home. I recall before I was of school age having five stitches in my leg by a doctor from Kiama as I lay on the kitchen table. Elva’s son Mark Emery comments: They bred them tough in those days, and my mother was a very tough woman. Everybody was. 

By Margaret LesterTwenty years ago, Mary Cronin, now deceased, was an active member of the Gerringong Business Association.  She informed the Business Association that the NSW Education Department was proposing to sell the Department’s remaining portion of the “Old School Park” in the centre of Gerringong. It was the former site of Gerringong’s Primary School which was demolished when the new Gerringong Primary School was built.  Plans for the land showed two story development, shops and units resulting in a much smaller open space for the park. The “Save our Park” community group was formed with the support of the Gerringong Business Association to save the park from commercial development. On a cold, wet and windy night seventy people attended a meeting at the Gerringong Town Hall to express their concern and disbelief regarding the NSW Education Department’s proposed sale and the development planned for the park land. Residents of all ages addressed the meeting and requested that Kiama Council seek to have the land kept for community use as open space.Residents in large numbers attended several Kiama Council meetings to voice their concerns. Bright pink balloons printed with “Save Our Park” appeared at rallies in the park and at the Council meetings. Petitions with hundreds of signatures were presented to the Education Department. Sandra McCarthy, the Mayor at the time, and the Council’s Town Clerk accompanied two “Save Our Park” members to a meeting with Andrew Refshauge, the Minister for Education and Training, to request that the park land be gifted to the community through Kiama Council, and not be sold to developers. After much discussion, the Minister said he was unable to gift the land but agreed to sell it to Kiama Council for “the Valuer General’s Valuation” and that the land was to be for community use.  The cost of the land was $750,000, equal in value to three blocks in the Elambra Estate which were being sold by Kiama Council at that time. It was nowhere near its commercial value if sold for development. Initially, Kiama Council was reluctant to purchase the land for community use sighting competing financial issues. A Community Action Team, comprising of five community members, not politically aligned, was formed and registered in time for the upcoming 2004 Kiama Council elections. Its aim was not only to save the park but also to achieve greater access for residents to Kiama Council and more transparency regarding community concerns and issues. At the time residents were still able to attend and speak at the council meetings.  However, this access was not maintained. At the council meeting held just prior to the 2004 council elections Mayor Sandra McCarthy announced that Kiama Council would purchase the land from the NSW Education Department for community use.Twenty years later Gerringong is being faced with a large development, a four-story hotel with 49 rooms in the main street of Gerringong, backing on to the IGA between the Anglican Church and the Newsagency. Are people aware of this new development? Before Christmas there was an objection period of two weeks for people to register any concerns. Was this sufficient time?Is the future for Gerringong’s main street destined to be three and four story buildings?Are residents happy with such a future and do they think it will impact on our seaside town?In the Development Application, the developer argues that the four-story building is actually just a precursor for what Gerringong’s main street will look like in the future. Gerringong residents and shopkeepers are expressing their concerns regarding traffic, future tenancy, parking issues, access to the IGA and the proposed development not being in keeping with the streetscape. Who is representing Gerringong’s interest on Kiama Council?  For years Gerringong’s Precinct Committee, established by Council, has been the vehicle by which the community can express their concerns to council. However, at this point in time the future and effectiveness of local Precint Committees appears to be uncertain. In 2004, the Gerringong community rallied to save their park. Since then the “Old School Park” has been fully utilised and enjoyed by residents and visitors to Gerringong. Kiama Council developed the park and built the playground and park furniture. Gerringong Rotary has conducted monthly markets in the park for years.  Will the amenity of “Old School Park” be impacted by medium density development in the main street? Where is the community engagement for this development? Community action can achieve results. It worked twenty years ago to bring about a positive and favourable outcome for Gerringong and the “Old School Park”. Can it work again?

Kiama Historical Society hosted a talk on Saturday 16 March featuring renowned historian Dr. Karl James, the Head of Military History at The Australian War Memorial in Canberra. Dr James presented his talk on ‘A Day in the Life of a War Historian’ to a room full of local history enthusiasts. He shed light on his journey through high school and university in Wollongong, where he completed his honours and PhD, and later his Masters in museum studies at the University of Sydney. The James family have a history rooted in military service. Karl’s grandfather and nanna both served in WWII, serving as his introduction to a love of history. With a career spanning over a decade, his expertise in Australia’s involvement in the Second World War resonates among his peers and his audiences. He has risen to become a prominent figure in Australia’s historical landscape. Attendees were treated to a behind the scenes look into the Australian War Memorial, as Karl discussed his role as a lead curator for major exhibitions, including ‘From the shadows: Australia’s Special Forces’ as well as ‘Rats of Tobruk 1941.’ Karl’s talk examined the challenges and rewards of being a public historian, emphasising that there is work to be done in the industry. His passion for his work shone through and he has been working towards this role his whole life. He touched on the importance of sharing in his historian career, stating that the research is important but disseminating the information is just as important. Karl left the audience with a growing appreciation of the impact of historical research and storytelling and the vital work he and his colleagues carry out on a daily basis. The presentation was a great insight into our military history as a nation and Karl’s as a part of the James family.  Kiama Historical Society holds monthly meetings, the next one is listed here. 

My father Clive Emery loved history, and often recorded local stories, some of which were written up in The Kiama Independent, the precursor to The Bugle. Looking through my father’s many stories, I came across a story my great-grandfather recalled from his days at Omega Public School. It makes for an amusing tale.Before I hand over to my father’s writing I need to set the scene with a number of points.Firstly: the railway in the 19th Century was a boon to country areas. The South Coast Railway ended at Bombo in 1887. It was proposed to be extended to Bomaderry but there was one problem. The mountains rolled steeply into the sea between Gerringong and Omega flats. It meant that five tunnels had to be built. In those days there were none of the boring machines which make tunnelling relatively easy these days. Tunnelling required the services of railway workers known as fettlers, who would dig the tunnels using a combination of dynamite and pick axes. They would set up a camp with their families. They were tough, hard men and their families were equally tough. While the men worked, their children would attend the local school, in this case Omega Public School, which was established in 1860 to cater for local farm families. The school, originally known as Omega Retreat School, finally closed in 1945. It took six years for the railway line from Bombo to Bombaderry. Omega Station opened in 1893.Secondly: Omega Public School was located in what is now a private house about half down the hill towards Gerringong on the left hand side of the road as you head South. Children would usually walk ( no buses or private cars) to school. After school they would head home and start their chores on the farm. There was no television or computer games back then. Many children had dogs. The dog would follow them everywhere, even to school, sitting outside the fence waiting for their owner to return home after school. These dogs had a loyalty to their owner and would do anything to protect them.One of these children was a boy named James J. Quinn, the ‘hero’ of our story. There have been many great families in Gerringong and one of those is the Quinn family. In sport they have excelled. The most famous was a farmer named Paul Quinn who played for Gerringong rugby league. He represented Australia and later played for Newtown. He used to travel to Sydney from Gerringong for training after milking. The person he travelled with used to complain that on the trip all Paul did was sleep.  But back to the story as my father wrote it. From Clive Emery, longtime Gerringong residentPrior to my family leaving Omega, the railway, which had formally ended at Porter’s Garden Beach, or Bombo, was in the process of being extended to Nowra. The necessity of quarrying through the rocky spurs running down to the sea caused the planners to baulk, but now the work had begun on the four tunnels. The biggest was at the Omega end, and work commenced at either side to meet at the middle. This was achieved with a disparity of only two inches (five centimetres). The fettlers pitched their camps at the job, and their children, some 16 years old, attended the Omega, swelling its enrollment to nearly 100. The boys had been reared on hard times, where only the fittest survive. By their numerical as well as physical strength they proposed to take over the school playground. Fights almost to the death ensued but the fettler’s sons had not gauged the toughness of the farmer’s sons. The battles raged during every dinner hour down by the fig tree while Richard Hall, the teacher, was at lunch. Bruised and battered the game little lads of Omega gradually fell to their bigger opponents, and it was left to James J. Quinn of Omega to uphold the honour of the school. He had to take on the biggest and toughest of the fettlers. It was a fight that had to be fought, and in recollection it is suspected that the teacher, Richard Hall, knew that, and kept wisely and discreetly inside during the conflict. There was no cheering that would have brought out the teacher, just a grunting and punching match for the whole dinner hour, while the supporters had bunched into their respective camps to watch.James Quinn, overmatched by his larger opponent, refused to give in, and fought with the tenacity of a tiger. There was one stage when he tripped on a root of the figtree and his assailant fell on him to deal the killer blow. That was deemed unfair by both camps and they were hauled apart and made to stand up and fight.Early in the fight James’ blue cattle dog, who always followed the three Quinn boys Tom, Jim and Peter to school, came in to lend support. He rushed in and grabbed the fettler boy by the calf of his leg. With a roar of pain the fettler boy kicked away the dog but he had left his mark. He prowled around at the back of the crowd of onlookers during the rest of the fight, hoping for another opportunity.It never came. The five minute bell rang and the antagonists were pulled apart and taken to the creek nearby to wash themselves down and prepare for school again.As for the fight, neither had won. A silent truce manifested itself and the two camps settled into a more or less peaceful coexistence.From local historian, Mark Emery 

Sitting around the dinner table or in an easy chair, most elderly folk enjoy telling a yarn about people or places from long ago.My father was no exception. He would regale us with stories about old family members, Gerringong identities and great events in Gerringong history.One day I went to visit him and he brought out a large wooden serving plate he had picked up from a woodturning shop in Berry.In the middle of the plate was a grain as all wooden products have. If you look closely at this and use a bit of imagination, on the left it appears to show the image of Seven Mile Beach as if taken from the Kingsford Smith Memorial. To the right it appears to have a face as if looking over the beach. Dad said that the face belonged to Joe Dixon as he looked over his home.I first came across Joe’s name when researching the history of the Gerringong Cricket Club. He was a member of a cricket team ‘King’ Mickey Weston (an important elder in the Dharawal nation) put together mainly from Wodi Wodi people living in Crooked River (Gerroa) in 1894.Joe then carved out a distinguished career with the Gerringong Cricket Club.Dad met him much later but he had a great effect on him. He wrote a collection of Gerringong stories, including memories of Joe. My father would love to know that his memory is to be honoured with the publication of his story on the great man in the old Kiama Independent, which has now been replaced by the Kiama Bugle. Many other people in Gerringong held fond memories of Joe, including the original member of the Gerringong Historical Society Clive Emery.All these great characters, who helped make this region the place it is today, have passed away. That is a good enough reason to honour their memory now.From Clive Emery, longtime Gerringong residentWhen I first looked into the eyes of Joe Dixon they were red-rimmed as if from an open fire at his camp site on the bank of the Crooked River. Joe kept wickets for the Crooked River Cricket team on the Saturdays of 1923, and you can be assured nothing passed him by. His eyes could brighten in a flash.With a charcoal complexion and hair greying at the temples from under bushy brows, he surveyed the world with a kind of tired acceptance, as if accepting there was little he could ever do to change it. Like his parents before him, he was a hunter and gatherer, and the coming of the white man had brought many changes to himself and his kinsman.Joe was not a tall man, about medium height I would say, rather solidly built with greying hair on his sturdy arms. He wore the clothes of a white man, mostly flannel shirt and woollen trousers and sockless feet fitted into leather boots, with a felt hat showing signs of age pulled tight over his forehead. Often, he would be seen with his pants rolled above his knees as he prawned in the shallows of the river. Joe never took from the river more than was needed to fulfil the requirements of himself and his family. Their needs were not great and in those days there was plenty for all.He knew the tides that beat upon the shore of Seven Mile Beach and the waves that broke upon the rocks of Black Head, for even as he slept, he was conscious of the undertone of the sea. He knew the relevance of the moon on the tides, and the fish of the slumberous river and the restless sea. He harvested the pipis in the littoral zone and the shellfish of the rocky shoreline.With his family he lived in a tin humpy on the bank of the Crooked River, where the forest growth gave a measure of protection from the whims of the weather. For how long it would be hard to say. A couple of dogs of indifferent breed were always lounging about the campsite. Nearby was the camp of the Bloxomes, and as Joe's brother-in-law John Bloxome joined him in the collection of sustenance for their families. Between them the combined brood were mostly girls; Jimmy and Les, Annie and Louie the only ones I knew. That aside their numbers equalled the white school children along the Crooked River Road on school days. They were very happy and full of fun.Joe, the top man in the camp, was well versed in the comings and goings of King Mickey from Minnamurra under whose “Kingship”' they existed. Joe was able to point out where King Mickey used to camp on his infrequent visits to the area and called the spot "King Mickey's Island".Joe frequently worked for my parents at gardening and on the farm. Often I would watch him when he was tussocking on the side of the hill facing Seven Mile Beach. When he wanted a spell, he would turn and face the sea and sit upon his hoe handle and dream of days gone by, when the lobsters came to the rocks to breed in their season and fish could be speared in the shallows of the river beside his camp.He was to fashion a boat from a cedar log brought down by the floods. Sadly it was destroyed by a terrible fire in the Roundbrush in 1925 together with their camps. I only remember the blackened sheets of iron left after the fire after the families moved away.It is remarkable that Joe should return in ghostlike form to watch forever over his beloved home, Seven Mile Beach, immortalised in a piece of Cedar, along with the Coolangatta Mountain and the long curving shoreline with the wavelets kissing the golden sands of the beach in an everlasting procession of journey's ends.

Nestled at the end of Reid Park overlooking the Kevin Walsh Oval is the Jamberoo Youth Hall, a physical manifestation of the community spirit that defines the town.Opening in 1988, the Jamberoo Youth Hall has provided a centralised location for countless community groups, especially, youth-based groups, to gather and carry out their activities. Some of the groups that have and continue to use the Hall includes Guides, Brownies, Scouts and Cubs, Jamberoo Playgroup, and Little Groovers Dance and Acrobatic Lessons.Organisations like the Jamberoo Country Women’s Association use the hall for meetings and to host children’s groups and environmental talks, but it can also be rented out for birthdays, Christmas parties, weddings, or whatever other occasion you may have to celebrate.If you’ve never visited the Hall before, now’s your chance as the Jamberoo Youth Hall Association is holding an event on 23 March 2024 to commemorate the hall’s history, and the community that built it. There are stories to tell and anecdotes around the assembly of the hall and its tireless workers. A chance to celebrate its formation and the multipurpose of its use and history.Kiama Council has granted funding to the Jamberoo Youth Hall Association, which will largely go towards preparing a series of historic photographic display panels.As part of the celebrations, the Jamberoo Youth Hall Association wanted to recognise those who helped build or contributed anything to the Hall’s construction. This was a tall order though, given the overwhelming support the Hall received, and organisers said identifying each contributor was like asking how long is a piece of string! The heart and soul of those that helped with each aspect of the building process is testament to the community spirit and the hall continues to cater for the community. Jenny Judd, provides a small insight into how the Hall came to be, and those who contributed to its construction and maintenance.During the early 1980s, Jamberoo’s youth groups like Scouts and Venturers met in an old tin shed behind the School of Arts, while the Guide Group and Brownies used the church halls, and none of them had any space for storage.Les Hartenstein originally had a vision for a single venue in Jamberoo where youth could meet and older social groups could store their equipment.A committee was formed to develop the concept, and a deed for the Hall was signed with Council in 1982. The entire community pitched in with fund-raising efforts, while the building itself was completed with voluntary labour and donated building materials. None of this happened overnight, and it took a few years of planning, permission-granting and title changes, and finally opened in 1988 during National Bicentennial Celebrations.Council at the time matched the community’s funding dollar for dollar, and was responsible for providing refurbishment and repairs, while maintaining management under the Jamberoo Youth Hall Association. It is still run by and for the community to this day.The Youth Hall Committee also established a catering committee to help with fundraising, with Dianne Swanson leading a team that catered for functions and events at the Jamberoo Bowling Club and Folk Festival.Other founding committee members include former Mayor Neville Fredericks, who was instrumental in the planning stages, as well as Coralie Fredericks, Mike Swanson, Col Hannigan, John Marsh and Jenny Judd.The new display of historical photos is being coordinated by Stuart Richards, and anyone who has memories or photos of the Hall’s construction can contact Stuart at [email protected].So much activity is still happening at the Youth Hall - a true hub of Jamberoo life. Support the celebrations and take your memories along with you.

As previously reported by The Bugle, it was unclear what had happened to the Jubilee Gates where only the pillars now remain in Blackwood Street Gerringong. A number of Gerringong residents expressed interest in what actually happened to the gate, formerly the entrance to the park, and now Blackwood Street.Gerringong Museum has very kindly given The Bugle all the information it has on the Jubilee Park Gates Pillars in Blackwood Street Gerringong. David Hindmarsh also very kindly came forward with photographs his grandmother, Edith Sharpe with her husband, Gerringong Mayor Stanley Sharpe officially opening the Jubilee Gates on 14 November 1936.Some mystery remains as it is still unclear what year the Jubilee Gate was actually removed and when Blackwood Street was opened to Rowlins Road.The gate still exists at a residence in Greta Street. According to the material from David Hindmarsh, it became the property of Norman Parrish who lived adjacent to the gate’s way. Reports say the gates still exist on a property in Greta Street.The gates were designed and built by Alexander George Carson of Kiama at a cost of £54 to commemorate the opening of the new pavilion and sports ground.The gates were commissioned by Gerringong Municipal Council and named in honour of King George V.The gates were officially opened on Saturday 14 November 1936. Although rain had been predicted for the weekend, everyone welcomed the beautiful afternoon which was enjoyed for the official opening of the new sports pavilion and memorial gates at Jubilee Park. Here is the entire report for the Kiama Reporter on 18 November 1936:  The Kiama Reporter published an article on the opening ceremony in the Wednesday 18th November 1936 edition There was a large attendance, including visitors from neighbouring centres, and were loud in the praise of the fine new sports area and substantially built pavilion, with its beautiful views over land and sea. The memorial gates are also very artistic and a fitting entrance to what is one of the nicest parks along the coast. At four o’clock the people assembled at the gate and the Gerringong Band, conducted by Mr J.A. Winley, augmented by bandsmen from Kiama and Berry, played a selection.The mayor (Ald. S.N. Sharpe) said that Gerringong Municipal Council had thought it very fitting to dedicate the entrance to their park as a token of respect to the memory of the late King George V., their beloved Monarch, who was one of the best Kings who ever sat on the throne of England.His Worship then handed a nice pair of presentation scissors to Mrs Sharpe who cut the tricolour ribbon, which was stretched across the gates, and also unveiled the brass memorial tablet, thanking the Aldermen for their kind invitation to perform the ceremony and declaring the park officially open. Mrs Sharpe then distributed pieces of the ribbon as souvenirs of the memorable occasion. The Band played the National Anthem and the Town Clerk called for three cheers for the King, which was heartily given.A procession of cars was then formed and drove into the park and up to the pavilion. The mayor said that Mr Spooner, the Minister for Works and Local Government, had been unable to come, but they had a very good substitute in Mr H.J. Bate, M.L.A. the member for South Coast, and an old friend of the Gerringong district.As regards the park, council considered it one of their duties to provide facilities for the sporting bodies, and they thought that the money had been well spent on the reconstruction of the park and the building of the new pavilion, so that this park was now second to none on the South Coast.Mr Bate said that the dedication of the gates to the memory of the late King Geroge was a gesture such as might have been expected from the Gerringong people. They were to be congratulated on their fine new pavilion and reconstructed ground, which had been carried out with the aid of a Government Grant. Mr Bate used a fine presentation silver key to open the pavilion. This was combined with a paper knife and presented to Mr Bate by the mayor. If you have any other Sherlocking you would like the Bugle to undertake to solve local mysteries send an email to [email protected]

Last year, The Bugle published an article about the 100th anniversary of the Gerringong and District Cricket Association. There were five clubs that existed, Gerringong Town (The Seagulls) Toolijooa, Omega, Crooked River and Foxground. When the Association folded in 1938, all those clubs ceased to exist. This was a pity as they were such a big part of the community in those days. Foxground 90 years ago was such a vibrant community with a school, church and post office. There have been get-togethers from time to time, whereby old residents have met and remembered the good times. Horris Kemp, the schoolteacher, was a favourite topic.I was talking to Brad Speering, President of the Gerringong Cricket Club, about this and he said “no worries, I have established a social competition of cricket with five teams starting this year.”The teams will have the names of the five clubs from 100 years ago. He has even designed brightly coloured shirts. The name ‘Foxground Renegades’ will be prominently displayed on one of the shirts. I felt a tinge of excitement thinking about how proud the ghosts all of the residents of the old Foxground village would feel seeing the old Foxground Cricket Club live again, if only in a social competition.It got me thinking about an old article my father, Clive Emery, wrote about a cricket game between Foxground Cricket Club and a visiting group from Tonga. It does not have a date but I am sure it would have been in the 1930s sometime as that is when my father lived in Foxground.I wanted to share his story of the day as it mentions such a large number of those wonderful people from that community:Other writers may tell of their games, but I will restrict myself to one in particular that was as a fun game which the Foxground team played against a Tongan team brought to Australia by the members of the Methodist Church fraternity, Tonga being under their jurisdiction.  The game was to be played during the week, so as not to impinge on the Saturday competition games.  All hands and the cook attended as if it was an International game.  School holidays were on, so most of the boys from the Foxground School were present, hoping to be included in the game if needed, which we were, since the Tongans brought along fifteen hefty fellows, all anxious to be part of the teams.  It was therefore decided that all should have a bat, so our team picked enough of the schoolkids to make up to fifteen as well.  It was the first and only time all the fielding positions ever invented were fully manned. We could almost hold hands around the batsmen!It was a terrific morning with plenty of sunshine. I had the stove hot before I went to the milking yard, to assist mother with her cooking for the great day, and I know most of the women in the Foxground Valley were doing the same, for we were doing the entertaining and a big crowd was expected.Irvine Thompson would be taking his kerosene can along, blackened by the many services it had rendered for the making of tea, and a factory can of water for all purposes.  Mollie Foley would be making her prize-winning sponges, cemented together with ample whipped and flavoured cream.My mother would be making enough scones and sandwiches to feed an army, and this would be replicated in the homes of all our players and supporters.Our home ground was really in Broughton Village, a mile south of Foxground, and an assortment of cars and sulkies gathered about and horses were tethered to a fence in the shade of the gum trees beyond the boundary line by the time Stanton’s truck load of happy Tongans arrived.  They were dressed in the home costumes of shirt and skirt, with happy smiles and bare feet with pink soles and heads of massed curly hair.   It was the first time most of the schoolmates had seen men coming to play cricket with bare feet, and thought it an odd thing to do, especially as we had a couple fast bowlers in Stan Leaney and Jack Thompson! The ladies arrived with their baskets of food, and Wenty Craig helped them across the stream that was one boundary of the ground.  The pole bridging the stream was a bit daunting for them, so members of our team took their baskets across and then helped the ladies safely across to the shade of four gum trees where the meal was to be held, Irvine suggesting we should not trust them to carry the food across, else it might be lodged in the stream and be lost, but if a lady fell in she would surely survive and he could dry her off when he had the fire going to boil the water for tea. Venie Craig took him up on that, and said if she fell in she would take him with her, which he parried declaring if he had to fall in he hoped it would be with a younger woman, which brought a grimace, and a rather scalding response.  By common consent the visitors were allowed to have first bat, and Stan opened the bowling, with Wenty stating he would be one umpire and Billy Winter at other end.  Before the game started I heard Wenty whispering in Billy’s ear that he could close his eyes a bit to appeals, and Billy nodded his approval.Harry Miller was our wicket-keeper, and advised Stan to bowl on the off, not so much for the comfort of the visitors as much as for himself to get a good sight of the fast deliveries he had to stop.  The wickets began to fall, but the Tongan captain, a huge fellow about fifteen stone proved a defiant batsman and began to take charge of our bowlers, and Irvine called upon Stan to lob one on his big toe nail as the way to get him out, but Wenty declared it would be a no-ball if he did, but Irvine said he would be able use the toenail for a shovel (as it was larger than a crown piece). Meanwhile, Stan kept bowling on the off as directed, then he bowled one on   the leg side that the batsman could not handle, and neither could Harry, for it struck him right in the middle of his large paunch and knocked the wind out of him for a while, and he had to sit down and have the spot massaged by the slip fieldsmen to get his wind back.This caused a deal of merriment for the Tongan batsmen, but not as much as when Alan Motley slipped on the pole and dangled his feet in the stream, unable to resurrect himself, and had to shuffle along the pole to the other side.Then it was lunch time, and Irvine, who had the can of tea boiled and wanted to call everyone to lunch, so he asked one of the Tongans how to call their fellows to lunch, and the fellow said: ‘Kai-Kai’, so Irvine kept calling out: ‘Kai-Kai’, until his wife told him to shut-up, ‘he sounded like a young magpie swallowing a grub!’  The luncheon was a hilarious occasion. Everyone was in a joyous mood, and suitable speeches were made, with Irvine declaring Mollie Foley’s sponge cakes were high enough to make a milking-stool, when she proudly accepted as praise when she brought them forth.The Tongans had scored one hundred and five runs and would have scored more if the ball had not been hit into the stream. A thorough search was required to find it and so much time was lost.With luncheon over, the Foxground team went in to bat.  The two Thompson boys Jack and Tom opened for us, while the rest of our team sat under the Coral trees to watch, along with my sister Olive who was the Foxground scorer.  One of our chaps hit a ball high into the air and it was going to come down where we sat, so Billy Winter, who had been relieved of umpiring, made to catch it, but the nor-east wind caused it to swerve and, in its descent, caught Billy right on the nose, which sent him to the stream to stop the bleeding. He had to have a handkerchief knotted around his head to protect the skinned area. He explained how he ‘had his eye on the ball, and the wind caught it, and…’ but Wenty Craig assured him if he had his eye on it he would have a black eye and not a bloody nose!  Meanwhile, we sat and applauded every stroke and run, to try and urge our players to greater efforts. It was all great fun; even the tricks played on the unsuspecting spectators by Frank Thompson, one of our schoolmates, when he tickled the ears of the intense barrackers with a straw of paspalum grass and had them repeatedly slapping at the imaginary flies all the while.Frank was our fifteenth batsman and managed to win the game on an overthrow! We loaded our visitors on the lorry and gave them three mighty cheers and a basket of left-over food as they moved off, while we rolled up the mats and stacked the gear away. Altogether it had been a great day; one not to be remembered for the game itself, but by the comradeship and good humour of players and spectators alike, not to mention of course, the Billy tea and superlative luncheon provided by the ladies.’ 

When my father, Clive Emery, passed away, I was tasked with sorting through his historical treasures. Among these was an article from the Kiama Independent from 1951 which was entitled ‘Cricket in the Nineties’, meaning, of course, the 1890s. It outlined matches played by Gerringong against other teams. The author had based his research on some scorebooks he had borrowed from Athol Noble, who is arguably the greatest sporting official in the Kiama district, let alone just Gerringong.I spent my time thinking these scorebooks must surely be one of the most valuable historical artefacts in Gerringong cricket history, if not all Gerringong history.Athol had long since passed away and I was wondering if they still existed. Luckily, Michael Tierney came to the rescue. He was in possession of a wonderful collection from Athol. As well as the scorebooks there was a large scrapbook of articles about Paul Quinn, who must challenge Michael Cronin as the best Rugby League player Gerringong has ever produced.  Michael kindly donated these scorebooks as well as the other priceless artefacts and they are now the most prized possession of the Gerringong Cricket Club. At this moment I want to digress a while to set the scene for the tale.Firstly, 100 years ago, give or take 50 years, sporting clubs from Sydney would venture out into the country to play matches in various sports against country towns or Groups. They may have been playing a challenge match for a competition, playing promotional games to foster the particular sport or just having a relaxing weekend away bonding with their teammates. For example, in 1934 South Sydney Rugby League team played a match against Group 7 in Kiama. Incidentally Group 7 contained a Gerringong boy whose name was Eric Langton, a wonderful rugby league player, who was an excellent cricketer as well. Secondly, the Sydney area around Redfern Oval is very built up these days. However, in the 1890s this was not the case. A large open space existed in the form of Albert Park. In the late 1800s there was the premier sporting ground that went by the name of Albert Oval. Many great games of cricket were played there up to the 1870s. A very powerful cricket club, Albert Club, was based at that oval. The ground was closed in 1880 but the Redfern Albert CC played their games at what is now known as Redfern Oval. The old Albert Ground is now a public housing tower building behind the oval. Maybe the open parkland that used to exist there is where they got the rabbits from for the ‘rabbitohs ‘ to sell.Back to the tale. There is not a lot of information on the match unfortunately, other than the priceless scorebook. However, it is assumed that the Redfern Albert Club decided to take a trip down the coast to Kiama. I am imagining the team trooping out to Central Station to catch a steam train for a picturesque trip down the coast. After establishing themselves in one of the local hotels the team challenged Gerringong CC to a match. And therefore, on 7th November 1895 Redfern Albert CC played Gerringong CC at what is now known as Micheal Cronin Oval. Gerringong batted first and scored a very respectable 229. P. Deitz top scored with 57. Other significant scorers were R. Bell with 49 and J.M. Miller 48. Redfern Albert responded with 148. N. Camps was the best bowler for Gerringong with 4 for 34. No doubt the game was played in great spirit and Redfern Albert returned by train to Sydney after a very relaxing weekend. Maybe they had a celebration with the Gerringong club in the School of Arts hall (which is now the museum).Redfern Albert was not the only Sydney team to make the trip. The scorebook has scores from matches against MacDonaldtown and Strathfield Cricket Clubs.One interesting point is that the Gerringong team has a ‘J. Dixon’ mentioned. This is Joe Dixon, who, I hazard to guess, was the first Wodi Wodi sportsperson to play cricket, or indeed for any sporting team, in the Gerringong district.  He was fondly remembered by my father who met him as a little boy living in Gerroa, when Joe was a much older man. Athol also spoke very highly of him when asked to recall great Gerringong identities in the first newsletter of the newly formed Gerringong and District Historical society in 1982.Joe came to the attention of the Gerringong Cricket Club for his skilled performances while playing for the Crooked River/Wodi Wodi Cricket Club. This club was formed from Dharawal men and boys living in what is now called Gerroa by Mickey Weston, a tribal elder and, presumably, cricket fanatic. The team toured the South Coast for a time. But that’s another story.As I said, there is little or no information about the game or the trip undertaken by the Redfern Albert club in 1895. If it was not for Athol’s love of collecting artefacts the game and the players would be lost in the mists of time. These scorebooks show the love affair that the Gerringong District has with cricket for many, many years.Author: Mark Emery

All Kiama locals and visitors know the central park on the northside of Terralong Street between Collins and Shoalhaven Street in Kiama as Hindmarsh Park, but how well-known is the history of Hindmarsh Park? In 1967, Kiama Council renamed ‘part of Central Park’ to Hindmarsh Park to honour community services by Michael Nesbit Hindmarsh, Nesbit Evans Hindmarsh and Alfred Neil Hindmarsh, in addition to the role of Michael Hindmarsh and his siblings in the very early days of the settlement of Kiama, where Hindmarsh’s Store on Black Beach was one of the first structures and Micheal’s brother George was the first Postmaster.On Saturday 20 November 2010, a new plaque commemorating the ‘Founding Orphans’ was unveiled in Hindmarsh Park, Kiama, explaining the provenance of the name.It celebrates the central role that the Hindmarsh family played in establishing Kiama, as well as the strong civic role that family had made in all facets of Kiama over the next four generations.The Hindmarsh family got their land grant at Gerringong in 1822, and built Alne Bank in 1855 which has been lived in by ten generations of Hindmarshes to this day. The founding orphans of the plaque cover the history of Michael Hindmarsh who arrived in 1822, age 22. Michael Hindmarsh had 14 children and the extended family played many roles in Kiama’s life. Their fourth child was Kiama Mayor eight times. One of the first structures in Kiama was the Hindmarsh general store, which was supplied by boats landing on Black Beach before Kiama Harbour was built. Micheal’s sister, Hannah ran a school. In addition, later generations served on Kiama council, and played a variety of community roles. Nesbit Hindmarsh had the Kiama Motors, and lived in ‘Rosebank’ a Hardy Wilson-designed home sadly knocked down.Later his older brother George and his sister Hannah also emigrated to Kiama and Gerringong. George was Kiama’s first postmaster and Hannah established the first private school for girls called Rosebank School on her brother’s George’s property Rosebank in Collins Street. Rosebank House was demolished in 1982 for a block of units and a Jewel supermarket, and was the impetus for starting the Kiama and District Historical Society’s important role in preserving important heritage sites in Kiama and Jamberoo. As Kiama Library records, the central park was the main water supply during early settlement with a creek paralleling Terralong Street to enter the sea at Black Beach near School Flat. It is now underground and piped. The park was much lower than the current level of Terralong Street and was described in the Kiama Independent of the day as a ‘steep hollow.’In 1898, a petition was made to the Minister of Lands to turn the water reserve into a park. Water carters had previously taken and sold the water through the steep streets of Kiama. The water reserve was described in the Kiama Independent as ‘often unsanitary.’The well-known Norfolk Pines were planted in 1897 and the saplings can be seen in protective boxes in photos of the time during the two Great Fires of 1899 that completely destroyed the main shopping district of Kiama between Collins Street and Shoalhaven Street.From 1899 to 1906, the park was filled with rubbish (quite possibly from the recent fires across the road) and quarry spoil. In 1906, two tennis courts (now demolished) were built at the back of Central Park and the tennis club house (now demolished) was built in the park. The Memorial Arch was placed in 1925. The unstable nature of the fill below it was a factor in the arch needing stabilising work as it developed a lean over time. Both courts and clubhouse were demolished in 1988 and the Tennis Club moved to the Noorinan Street complex. The Kiama Rocket in Hindmarsh Park is a fond memory of many Kiama locals and visitors in the 70s, 80s and 90s and as a climbing structure in the shape of a rocket with a slide for children was both quite popular and quite unsafe. The year of the Kiama Rocket’s removal is uncertain in local history so any local with further details is welcome to contact The Bugle and add further detail.The most recent change to Hindmarsh Park was the demolition of the old Ambulance Residence fronting Shoalhaven Street which started on 20 July 2023 and was replaced by turf. On December 14, 2023  the giant blocks of basalt in Irvine street were relocated to this spot to create Kiama’s own Henge Stones.