Funding Cuts to State Records

Background (Preamble):

In late 2011, the State Records Authority of New South Wales announced the closure of the city reading room effective 30 June 2012. The History Council of NSW believes that the access to records is fundamental to the study of history.

State Records has been directed, along with other state government agencies, to make substantial savings to their budgets. Over the next four years State Records is expected to save a total of $1.8 million.

State Records is one of NSW’s key cultural institutions and an invaluable research facility for any historian’s investigations into aspects of the functioning of the state, from colonial and convict history, through all the permeations of the state’s role in people’s lives.
While the History Council acknowledges the challenges faced by State Government to be fiscally responsible, the budget cuts imposed on State Records NSW has a severe impact on the accessibility of records and services.

The cuts will downgrade the archives, undermining its position as a key cultural institution, limiting access for key user groups, and hampering the organisation’s role to inform and support state government, especially in its ongoing role in the state’s Digital Archives as well as guiding digitisation of records across NSW government.

A full Executive Summary of the issue can be found at
http://historycouncilnsw.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/HCNSW-Executive-Summary-State-Records-city-office-closure-March-2012.pdf

Petition:<a href="http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/stop-the-cuts-to-state-records-nsw-funding.html">Stop the cuts to State Records NSW funding Petition | GoPetition</a>

Publicans

Hodson Allen was  the licensee of the Welcome InnValley Heights from 1858 until 1860. The inn had also been known as the Valley Inn.

Women

Mary Ann & Susan Adams - Mary Ann married Thomas Nosworthy in 1879, and Susan married William Bates in 1888. The sisters were the daughters of William Aysh and Susan Adams, and were born c1857 and c1853 respectively & had several siblings.  They were William born c1849, Elizabeth born c1851 & John born c1855.

William & Sarah arrived in Australia aboard the Julindur 5.4.1849.  He was a carpenter by trade.

       

Mary Ann and Susan  owned land in the main street of Springwood, a portion of which was eventually sectioned off to build the School of Arts building. Shops owned by the two sisters on the adjoining property were burnt down before the School of Arts was erected in 1913.

       

A caveat was added to the title deeds that would enable Mary Ann, Susan and any relative or next of kin to have access to a large underground well that was located at the rear of the School of Arts property. The caveat remained legal until approximately 1936 by which time reticulated water was connected to the town. 

Mary Ann & Thomas had two children, Sydney and Lilly.

Women

Margaret Amelia Aberline was listed on the 1903 electoral roll as a general servant. It is thought she may have worked in one of the large houses in the area that were owned - at the time - by parliamentarians and wealthy businessmen. Alternatively, she may have worked in one of the many guesthouses in the area.

She is thought to have been born in Victoria c1868 to James and Jeanette Aberline. 

       

She was a woman of her time, making history by being among the first women to obtain the right to vote in NSW in 1903.  It would seem that she moved back to Victoria c1909 and died there in 1946.

Blaxland Park - Shelter Sheds

A recent conversation with, long-time resident of Blaxland, Davina Curnow, revealed information that it was her father - Adrian Melvin Donaldson - who built the little shelter sheds (that still exist) in the park at Blaxland located alongside the railway line.  It would seem that instead of war service Mr Donaldson carried out public works.  Over the years the little sheds have served a  multitude of locals, and visitors, when picnics were usual Sunday family outings.


The park, unfortunately, has reduced in size because of road widening, and the bridge that spans the railway alienated the triangular portion where Harold Campbell's World War One monument stands.
Pamela Smith     

Linden & Colonel Parrott

Col. Rowe (first Mayor of Manly) extreme left and
Parrott (father of Fighting Parrott's) seated third left

The history of Linden is often overlooked perhaps because of its ‘seeming isolation’ tucked away as it is between the townships of Springwood and Woodford.  However, a cursory look often turns up some interesting details.

In 1881, for example, T.S. Parrott sued Lieutenant Colonel Baynes in the Metropolitan District Court for the recovery of £40 being the sum owed to him for the supervision of work he carried out on a villa erected at Linden in the Blue Mountains.  Parrott won.<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]-->

But, who were these two gentlemen and how do they fit into the wider social history of New South Wales (NSW) and indeed the Blue Mountains?  Parrott, who is thought to have owned land at Faulconbridge also, was in fact English born civil engineer and soldier, Thomas Samuel Parrott (1842-1917) who, after working in Queensland and Victoria, took a post with the NSW Department of Lands survey branch, in the 1870s.  He enlisted in the NSW corps of volunteers around the same time and was commissioned lieutenant in 1874.<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]-->   

Interestingly, Parrott was just one of many who submitted a design for a bridge to join Dawes and Milsons Point at the site of the present Harbour Bridge.  Parrott’s plan for a two storey bridge was submitted as early as 1879 and would have seen railway traffic delegated to use the top level while horse and carriages, the bottom.  It is interesting to note that these early plans came to nought because the current Harbour Bridge was erected and opened in the 1930s.

Parrott served in the Sudan in 1885 and in 1886, at the behest of the NSW Colonial Secretary, visited Europe and North America to report on their coastal and harbour defences.  He served in South Africa in 1900, as a special service officer, and formed a regiment of mounted civil engineers known as the Australian Pioneers (Flying Sappers).<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]-->  Parrot retired in 1902 and migrated to South Africa where he served as a transport officer during World War 1.<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]-->

John Hammond and Arthur Kersey Parrott, sons of the above, owned land at Woodford.

Information suggests that a Colonel Baynes acquired Portion 14 at Linden in 1879, and - as the newspaper report above confirmed - commenced building a cottage there in 1881. The name of the cottage was ‘Verulam’ and church services were conducted in the abode in 1887.  Baynes was in fact Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Beindge Baynes who, together with William Henderson, Richard Beindge Baynes and William Pritchard, became ‘Trustees of Linden Park’ in October 1887.<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]-->  

Baynes was mentioned in The Australian Town and Country Journal in 1889.  The journal carried details of the placement of a foundation stone, by Baynes, for the new parsonage at Wentworth Falls, on behalf of Mrs. Henry Bell.  It would seem that the building fund had been considerably boosted with the assistance of donations from his relative, Mrs. Henry Bell, and Miss Edith Walker.<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]-->

Baynes died in 1889 and the property was bequeathed to his sons Richard and Frederick.  Nothing is known about Frederick but Richard married Annie A Bell in 1888. Richard served as an alderman on Mulgoa and Nepean Councils until he retired in 1925.<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[7]<!--[endif]-->  The couple had four sons; Richard Henry Beindge, Frederick Charles Beindge, George Nepean Beindge and Reginald Frank Beindge Baynes.  Richard, Frederick and George all perished as a direct result of the First World War, while Reginald, who flew a Maurice Farman Biplane, was the only one to survive.  That small hamlet encountered some interesting characters.  

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<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[1]<!--[endif]--> Sydney Morning Herald, 13.9.1881, p. 7.

<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[2]<!--[endif]--> C. Neumann, ‘Parrott, Thomas Samuel (1842-1917),’ Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. 11, 1988.

<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[3]<!--[endif]--> Ibid.

<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[4]<!--[endif]--> Ibid.

<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[5]<!--[endif]--> Sydney Morning Herald, 22.10.1887, p. 13.

<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[6]<!--[endif]--> Australian Town and Country Journal, 16.11.1889, p. 14.

<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[7]<!--[endif]--> Penrith City Council website.

Family History - Alfred Farrell Bath Stewards

Alfred Farrell, though not a Springwood or Blue Mountains resident, married into the Greentree family who settled in the Hawkesbury district of New South Wales.  He was the paternal grandfather of Shirley Evans...this is her story.  

An example of steamers like "Cintra"

I never knew my paternal grandfather, Alfred Farrell.  He died in 1925, not long after my parents were married.  Despite his Irish surname he was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1866, parents Thomas and Sarah nee Hinchcliffe.  Thomas was a journeyman iron moulder but Alfred did not follow in his father’s footsteps.

My mother, who was a devout Catholic, remembered him as an extremely bigoted anti Catholic.  When she married my Anglican father in a Catholic Church, Alfred waited outside on the Church steps to congratulate the happy couple after the ceremony.  Of course he did not hate my mother – she was universally loved – he just hated her religion.  Ironically, three of his six sons married Catholics.

My father told me that Alfred had been a ship’s steward prior to his marriage but he had pursued a life on shore as a family man.  We believe he probably met my grandmother, Daisy Greentree, while organising his ship’s laundry.  Daisy was working in a steam laundry, contributing to the family’s upkeep.  The Greentree family had been living very comfortably on a prosperous farm at Freeman’s Reach until father, Robert, died prematurely at the age of 51.  His widow, Hannah nee Bushell, burdened by a large family, lost the farm and moved to Sydney.

Pamela Smith, my friend and colleague, was an early subscriber to Ancestry.com and volunteered to do some research for me.  She found Alfred’s name on ships’ crew lists.  Sure enough he had been a steward – a Bath Steward!  He made a number of trips on the “Cintra”, a cargo steamer, plying the Australian coast and carrying passengers as well as cargo.

I had no idea what a Bath Steward was so I hastened to consult Google.  I found Emily Post’s 1970 edition of “Etiquette” quoted as follows:

“Steamer Tips

If you like your bath at a certain hour you would do well to ask your bath steward for it as soon as you go on board (unless you have a private bath of your own), since the last persons to speak get the inconvenient hours – naturally.  To many the daily salt bath is the most delightful feature of the trip.  The water is always wonderfully clear and the towels are heated.”

Later, under tips, she recommended five shillings for the bath steward.  It is not clear if this tip covered the whole trip or just one bath.

I also found a section on tipping in the United States “Rotarian”, June 1940:

“Passengers occupying rooms without a bath, consequently requiring the services of the bath steward to prepare a bathroom and arrange bath hours, should tip this steward from $1.50 to $2.00 for the voyage”

Also from Google I found that there were 6 Bath Stewards aboard the “Titanic”, two of whom survived the disaster.  There were also on board a number of Turkish Bath attendants.

Alfred seemed to adjust to a life on land, working first as a trolleyman carting timber and then as a mill foreman, and raising six boys in Leichhardt.

Shirley Evans