23. Adult and Adolescent Children in the 1930s

Albert Banksia St

Albert and Grace, Bert's two older children, came to Australia in early adolescence. The first years were hard, as the family hung on through the worst of the Great Depression, adjusting to new climate, new ways - similar poverty in new surroundings.

The experience was very different for them than for Sylvia, who began school in Australia. Albert and Grace had left school behind and needed to find their way to financial and adult independence.

Albert found work at Bailey's tannery and quickly made friends. Albert and Grace joined the Methodist Youth group in Botany and made more friends. As they both got a little money in their pockets they wanted a life other outside the work routines - and expectations - of their parents.

Albert fishing

Albert at Cronulla

Albert

Albert and his friends went fishing - staying all weekend in makeshift huts near Cronulla. Albert eventually got a boat, and sold some of the fish he caught.
With his friend Tommy Meahan, Albert took up boxing and practised at home in Banksia St - buying boxing gloves to alleviate the fear and abhorrence that Bert and Nell expressed at the damage they did to each other.

Albert on left, with mates on Manly ferry

One of Albert's favourite pastimes was taking the ferry to Manly with his mates on Sunday - dressed to kill in their striped blazers - going back and forth on the same ticket, listening to the bands that played on the ferry, and flirting with girls.
It was not a life with which Bert had much empathy.

For a while Grace helped out and home, then went into service. She worked for a while at Coghlan's Nursery.

Grace

As things improved economically, she got a job at Johnson and Johnson. She rode her bike there - never mastering, according to her sister, the back-pedal brake, and stopping when she got to work by running into the wall.

Grace, 2nd from left

Grace liked to dress up and go out. She also loved the rare occasions when she could visit the country, or places of interest.

Albert and Beryl's wedding party. Grace in pink

In 1938 Albert married Beryl Thompson, one of Grace's friends from the Methodist Youth Fellowship.

Their daughter, and only child, Irene, was born in 1942.

Grace and Sid wedding

In 1940 Grace married Sidney Molloy, one of Albert's friends from Bailey's. Sid had by then joined up and was serving as a stoker on HMAS Australia.

Sid was a Mascot boy, and the couple settled  in Mascot.

21. Bonnie Doon Nursery

Nell and Bert in Bonnie Doon Nursery

Bert and Nell put all their energy into establishing a nursery. They raised seedlings to sell in Paddy's market each Friday, along with flowers and a few vegetables.. They did everything themselves - creating the products they could sell.

Bert in his shed with boxes of seedlings

Bert brought fruit boxes home from the market on Friday and turned them into seedling boxes.



The children were expected to help, particularly pricking out the seedlings, a task the older children hated, but Sylvia, the youngest, was happy to do.

The back of 98 Banksia St house with seedling beds

 It was relentless, demanding work.









Albert got a job at Bailey's Tannery, but was expected to help out after work and on weekends. He hated it and wanted to be out with his friends - and with girls.

Bert and his dahlia crop

Grace worked in the nursery and also "went into service" as a domestic help to a family at Brighton-le-sands.

Bert was known to friends and others outside the family, as 'Ted', from his second name, Edward. Nell, his mother, sister and brothers, always called him Bert, and he had no trouble moving between the two. It was as if he kept his life in two compartments. The names rarely crossed over.


                                                                             

Bert needed a truck to get his products to market. He enjoyed driving and tinkering with the truck as much as he enjoyed the cultivation of plants.
























He also loved and kept dogs, most bought in Paddy's Markets.

Albert and Grace with friend Tommy Meehan

 Albert and Grace joined the Methodist Church's Youth Group and made many friends. Albert went fishing and rabbiting with mates from work and also from the church group.

Albert fishing at Cronulla

Grace, Nell and Albert at Banksia St c. 1935

They were finding their feet in Australia and wanting their own lives and independence. They were also throwing off the constraints of the Great Depression.

20. Australia in 1930

The Orontes arrived in Fremantle on 25 November 1929 and in Sydney about ten days later. In the six weeks it took the Orontes to reach Sydney, the impact of the October Crash of the New York Stock Exchange was being felt in Australia in job losses. Unemployment had been just above 10% in October 1929. By mid-1930 it was 21% and Bert was amongst the unemployed.

Nell, Albert, Grace & Sylvia, Sutherland St.

Bert's sponsored job evaporated before the Orontes docked. Fred and Les, Bert's two single younger brothers, gave up their jobs in favour of Bert, but even that one, shared, job dried up as the country sank rapidly into Depression.

The family found accommodation in Mascot, first in Roby St, then  at 136 Sutherland St.

In 1930 there was no unemployment benefit scheme in Australia. In 1929 the Federal Government made £1 000 000 available to the States to use unemployed workers to undertake roadworks. In July 1930, the Federal Government, led by Scullen,  provided a further £1 000 000 to the States for Public Works, using the unemployed.

Fremlin St Flooding 1930. Sir Joseph Banks Hotel in background

In 1930 storms and high tides caused substantial flooding in houses along the shores of Botany Bay.

Flooding in Fremlin St Botany 1930

Sea wall construction Sir Joseph Banks Park.

The NSW  Government used part of its Federal Public Works money to build a retaining wall along the Botany Bay foreshore at Sir Joseph Banks park to prevent further flooding.

Banksmeadow retaining wall 1948

Bert got work under this scheme, labouring to build this retaining wall at Banksmeadow.

The wall is still there.

                                                                                         

View over Botany Bay from Tenterden Rd, 1938.

The family moved to Botany, first living in 2 Livingstone Avenue, then in Tenterden Rd. Sylvia attended Banksmeadow Primary School. Botany in 1930 had a lot of open space. It must have looked a little bit like the Isle of Sheppey where Nell spent her early childhood.

They lived frugally - eating their share of bread and dripping, while Nell saved for furniture.

In 1933, Bert and Nell moved to a rented house at 98 Banksia St Botany. 96 Banksia Street, a block with no house but a large shed, came with the rent. Here Bert set up Bonnie Doon Nursery and went into business.