Perhaps because I’m a writer, I’ve always had a passion for desks, especially roll top models, and those with secret compartments. Unfortunately I have never owned either type. My passion for history led to me discovering portable desks, also known as campaign desks. Some even had fittings
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So our resident Wongas are raising yet another set of twins. They were sitting on eggs all through the March ‘big wet’ here in the Blue Mountains. The chicks need constant care and it’s time for Mr Wonga to take over the afternoon shift. His partner has
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Edith and George Smith married in Queenstown around 1913. They later moved to the Hobart suburb of New Town, where they ran a general store on the corner of Carlton and Pedder Streets. The building pictured below is likely to have been the store. The business was
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In January 1926 there was a terrible incident at the Briseis tin mine, in the northern Tasmanian town of Derby. A dump of tailings collapsed, tearing away hydraulic water pipes. Four miners working in a ‘sump’ nearby were overwhelmed by water and soil. Two were trapped; John
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The words in the image below certainly apply to me. I have loved social history since I was very young, Family history is even closer to my heart, especially right now, in relation to my second cousin, Winnie. Visitors to this website will be aware that I
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I must thank fellow Blue Mountains resident Stephanie Moxham for alerting me to this story. Stephanie posted the following letter on a local history FB site. It had been published In The Katoomba Daily on Saturday, May 25 1935. To the Editor Sir, – Mr George B.
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LONDON – On August 19 1845 the Morning Post reported that the convict transport Mayda was lying at Woolwich, with 197 prisoners on board. They had been brought down the Thames from the Millbank Penitentiary and were to be taken to Norfolk Island, the harshest penal colony
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Tasmania, as with most of the world, was coping with severe economic depression during the nineteen thirties. The State Government initiated capital works programmes to employ those who were ‘on sustenance’ as it was called. It was considered beneficial to the physical and mental welfare of the
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Soldier Settlement was a federal, but state administered initiative which began during WWI. Land was purchased by government to provide small farms for returning servicemen, often on leasehold. One person who applied was my great-uncle Arthur Singleton, from Ulverstone. With the 12th Battalion he had taken part
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Our first troops left Australia in late October 1914 following the outbreak of World War I. They disembarked in Egypt at Alexandria, and were then moved to a vast encampment near Cairo, where they continued to train in the shadow of the great pyramids. Soon, it was
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