John Doveton and Margaret Doveton - Part 2

In our last post we looked at the life of Captain John Doveton and in this post we will see what we can find out about his wife, Margaret. She was born a Doveton and married a Doveton and I feel that this means that the suburb of Doveton was really named for her as well as her husband. As we found out in the last post, I knew Margaret's parents names from her marriage certificate, i.e Francis Crossman Doveton and Margaret Bostock. I also knew she was born in Tasmania. The Tasmanian Indexes to Births, Deaths and Marriage (BDM), on CD-Rom, are available to use at Narre Warre, Cranbourne and Pakenham Libraries. A quick search revealed her parents married in 1842, that Margaret was born in Hobart in 1844 and that her sister, Rachel Emily, was born Campbell Town in 1846. That was all I could find, so I ‘googled’ Francis Crossman Doveton and according to some information on the Ballarat & District Genealogical Society website http://www.ballaratgenealogy.org.au/ Francis Crossman Doveton was the first Gold Commissioner at Ballarat, but I will tell you more about that later.

Now I knew that the family had moved to Victoria I looked up the Victorian Indexes to the BDMs and found that the next two children, Annie (born 1848) and Francis (1850) were born at Port Fairy and the last child John (1852) was born near Warrnambool. Margaret Bostock, had been born in 1824 in Tasmania and died in Victoria in 1853. After her death, Francis Crossman Doveton married Mary Ann Snell in 1855 and had eight other children. So already we have found out some personal information about our Margaret, including the sad fact that her own mother died when she was nine.

Francis Crossman Doveton had come to Australia with the 51st Regiment of Foot (2nd Yorkshire, West Riding Regiment). The Regiment arrived in 1838 and served in Tasmania and Western Australia and then left for Bengal in 1846, but Doveton remained in Australia. This same information is mentioned in the report of his death in The Argus of July 15, 1905. As Francis Doveton Crossman had a Government position in Victoria, I checked the Victorian Government Gazette, where all official appointments are announced, and found his first appointment as Commissioner of Crown Lands (reproduced below).

Victorian Government Gazette, Wednesday, August 27, 1851, page 312.

The Victorian Government Gazettes have been digitised from 1836 to 1997 and can be searched on the State Library of Victoria website, www.slv.vic.gov
According to the Victorian Government Gazette other appointments followed, amongst which were - in 1852 he was appointed a Magistrate of the Colony of Victoria, in 1855 Chairman of the Local Court of the District of Hepburn and in 1858 he was appointed a Warden of the Gold Fields, then a Chinese Protector and in 1860 he was appointed as a Coroner, acting at Daylesford. From The Argus I found out that in 1866 he was declared Insolvent in the Supreme Court, due to ‘want of employment and having accepted accommodation bills for others’. His liabilities were £2,233 pounds and his assets £206.

The Argus, Monday, November 17, 1941, page 6. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article8217085

As we found out in the first post, we know when Margaret was married (1873) and we know that she purchased the property at Doveton in her own name in December 1894. We also know that by 1900 the property was leased and they were living in Oakleigh. According to the Australian Electoral Rolls on Ancestry database, in 1909 Margaret was still at Atherton Road in Oakleigh, but in 1914 she had moved to Malvern East. In 1924, she was at Everdon, Rose Street in Surrey Hills and was still there in 1937. In 1941 she was living in Mordialloc. I looked up The Argus newspaper on the National Library of Australia's Australian Newspapers website and came across the interesting article, reproduced above, from the November 17, 1941 edition. Some of the same information was recorded in her Obituary in The Argus of December 16, 1941. The Obituary is reproduced below. The Obituary mentions she was buried at the St Kilda Cemetery, not Oakleigh, where her husband was buried.

The Argus, Tuesday, December 16 1941, page 3. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article822687

We know that John and Margaret were cousins, but I wanted to know how they were related. There are numerous Doveton Family histories on the Internet and one site lists the children of John Frederick Doveton and Elizabeth Crossman. The children include a John Bazett Doveton (born 1807) and a Frederick Crossman Doveton (born 1817). But, ever suspicious of ‘unofficial information’ on the Internet I wanted to confirm this with other sources. Now, in the last post we know the Captain John Doveton’s father was John Bazette Doveton. We know that John Bazette Doveton was born around 1807 and from the Oxford University Alumni 1500-1886 database on Ancestry, we know that his father was John Frederick Doveton, so that fits. We also know, from the Victorian Indexes to the Births, Deaths and Marriages that Francis Crossman Doveton was 87 when he died in 1905, which makes him born around 1817 and that his parents are listed as Frederick Doveton and Elizabeth Crossman. Francis is also listed as a past pupil of the King’s School at Bruton (a facimile copy of the School Register 1826 to 1890 has been digitized by Google Books) and his father is listed as the Reverend John Frederick Doveton. This gives us a few other sources which confirm that John Bazett Doveton and Francis Crossman Doveton are brothers, being sons of John Francis Doveton, and therefore John and Margaret are first cousins.

Two more interesting facts about the Doveton family. They have a connection to Everdon Hall in Little Everdon. It is a Grade 2 Listed building built around 1820 for General Doveton and interestingly, Everdon was also the name Margaret Doveton gave to her house in Rose Street in Surrey Hills. Secondly, the article on the Ballarat & District Genealogical Society website on Francis Crossman Doveton (full details at the bottom) states that Elizabeth Crossman, John and Margaret’s grandmother, is said to be a direct descendant of King Edward 1 (1239-1307) and his wife Eleanor of Castille (1241-1290). They married in 1254 and had sixteen children, with only six living to adulthood. The Royal couple were on a trip to Lincoln when Eleanor fell ill and died. A memorial cross was erected at every place where the entourage stopped, when her body was being transported back to London. These crosses are known as the Eleanor Crosses. Eleanor was buried in Westminister Abbey. If your family has been in the United Kingdom for many generations it is apparently more common than you would expect to be related to a member of the Royal Family, albeit very distantly, as is the case with John and Margaret Doveton, so the Royal connection is quite plausible. Anyway, it is a very romantic story and I really like the Royal connection to Doveton.

The effigy of Eleanor of Castille (1241-1290) at Westminister Abbey. Eleanor is said to be an ancestor of both John Doveton and Margaret Doveton.

All the sources I have used to find out this information on John and Margaret Doveton are freely available, with the exception of the Death and Marriage Certificates which I purchased. You can access the United Kingdom Census collection, the Australian Electoral Rolls and the Oxford University Alumni on Ancestry database, available at all our Libraries. The Victorian Government Gazette is accessed through the State Library of Victoria website. The old newspapers, the Australian Newspapers Project, can be accessed on the National Library of Australia website. You can use the Internet at all our Libraries and it is free with fast down-load times. The Indexes to the Births, Deaths and Marriages, from all the States of Australia, are available at Narre Warren, Cranbourne and Pakenham Libraries, as are the old Shire of Berwick and Shire of Cranbourne Rate Records. This means, you could well find out some of the same sort of information on one of your Ancestors as I have discovered on the Dovetons. In finishing, I can safely conclude that Captain John Doveton and Margaret Elizabeth Doveton were first cousins, as their fathers were brothers, in which case Margaret should have as much status as the ‘namesake’ of the suburb of Doveton as her husband.

*Francis Doveton, First Gold Commissioner at Ballarat by Thelma Birrell. http://www.ballaratgenealogy.org.au/art/doveton.htm

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John Doveton and Margaret Doveton - Part 1

The suburb of Doveton was established in the mid 1950s by the Housing Commission to provide housing for the employees of the 'Big Three' Industrial companies, International Harvestor Company, H.J Heinz and General Motors Holden. The area was originally known as Grassmere or Eumemmerring, however in September 1954 the new suburb was named Doveton after Captain John Doveton. This is an interesting choice given that Captain and Mrs Doveton were only in the area for ten years and there are other families with a much longer or much earlier connection to the area. However it is a pleasant sounding name and is a variation of the name Dufton which means ‘Farmstead where doves are kept’.

Very little is known about the Dovetons, so I thought I would see what I could find out about them, using freely available resources and the best thing is, you can do the same sort of searches to find information on any of your own ancestors. You don't even need to have the Internet on at home, you can use the Internet, free, at any of our Libraries. The only money I spent was on obtaining a copy of John Doveton’s death certificate and a copy of their marriage certificate, but they gave me so much new information it was well worth the money, plus it gave me confirmed or official information.

There is a lot of Family History information on the Internet and some of the information I have come across on the Doveton Family I know is untrue, even from my own basic research on the family. I started my search by checking out the Indexes to the Victorian Birth, Death and Marriage (BDM) records. To obtain certificates you need the Registration numbers and the BDM Indexes give you these. You can access, for free, the Indexes to the BDM records at our Narre Warren, Pakenham and Cranbourne Libraries. For information about purchasing certificates follow this link to the Victorian Department of Justice http://online.justice.vic.gov.au

These are the signatures of John Doveton and Margaret Doveton from their Marriage Certificate. We don't have any photographs of them, so it is the only physical connection we have to them.

The marriage certificate told me that John Doveton married Margaret Elizabeth Doveton on October 8, 1873 at All Saints Church in St Kilda. The certificate also told me that his parents were John Bazett Doveton and Harriet Fenton and that her parents were Francis Crossman Doveton and Margaret Bostock. He was born in Saltford and his occupation was listed as Master Mariner. His father’s occupation was listed as “Clerk in Holy Orders”. Margaret was born in Tasmania and her father is listed as an “Officer in the Army”. On his death certificate I found out that John died, at the age of 61, on April 7, 1904 and that at the time he was living at Atherton Road in Oakleigh. He died of throat and liver cancer and was buried at the Oakleigh Cemetery. Once again it lists his parents and the name of his wife, and also the fact that they had no children. We also find out that he has been in Victoria for ‘25 years’. His age at death also gives us an approximate date of birth of 1843.

The Doveton marriage was announced in The Argus newspaper of Saturday, October 11, 1873, page 4. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article5873415

Now we can have some basic information, we can start working back and I looked at the Ancestry database, available free at all the Casey Cardinia Libraries, and searched for his father, John Bazett Doveton, in the United Kingdom Census Collection. It is a fairly unusual name and I found out that in 1851 the family was living at Burnett and his occupation was Rector of Burnett and that he was 44 and his wife Harriet was 32. There were five children, Catherine (aged 9), our John (aged 8), Bazett (aged 6) Caroline (aged 3) and Ella (aged 1). The household also had a Governess and four servants so it was a fairly comfortable household. John’s birthplace on the Census records is listed as Saltford, so that all ties in with the information on his Death and Marriage certificates. His age in 1851 is listed as 8 years old, which makes his year of birth 1843, which ties in with the date we worked out from his Death Certificate. In the 1861 Census, John Bazette Doveton was still the Rector of Burnett, but we find that there are two more children in the family, Mary Harriet aged 9 and Henry aged only 10 months.

This is from the Oxford University Alumni, 1500-1886, available on the Ancestry database

Ancestry also has an interesting database the Oxford University Alumini 1500-1886. We can find John’s father and grandfather listed as Alumni. John Bazett Doveton is the second son of John Frederick Doveton, of Blagden in Somerset, who obtained a Bachelor of Civil Law in 1804. John Bazett Doveton matriculated in 1825, aged 18, received his Bachelor of Arts in 1831 and his Masters of Arts in 1834. He is also listed as being the Rector of Burnett, Somerset – this ties in with the Census information, plus both the Census and the Alumni information both indicate that John Bazett Doveton was born around 1807. So you can see how we are building up a picture of John’s early life and solid upper middle class family back ground.

I thought I would see what I could find out about his life in Australia by searching the newspapers available through the National Library of Australia's Australian Newspapers Collection. The National Library of Australia (www.nla.gov.au) has digitised major Australian newspapers and they are a wealth of information. I found a notice of John's marriage to Margaret in The Argus of October 11, 1873 (reproduced above). There was a report in The Argus of September 22, 1876 about the new steamship Durham which had just arrived from London after 50 days of sailing. Mr John Doveton is listed as the Second Officer, but he did not sail again with the Durham when she left port, as he had ‘elected to remain in the Colony’. In 1879, John Doveton, as the Chief Officer of the Julia Percy, gave evidence at an Inquiry into a collision between the Julia Percy and the St Joseph. The Argus has various reports, in the Shipping Intelligence column, of Captain Doveton arriving and departing Melbourne as the Captain of the Julia Percy, then the Tamar and then the Southern Cross.

The Hobart Mercury, Monday, 8 May 1882, page 2. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article9009163

A report in the Hobart Mercury of May 8, 1882 (reproduced above) said Southern Cross, under Doveton, run ashore on the Vansittart Shoals between Babel Island and Cape Barren in Bass Strait. Captain Doveton was suspended from the Command, pending an enquiry. Another report in the May 23, 1882 said that Captain Doveton had resigned. After this, the only reports I could find about Captain Doveton involved him supervising work at the Wright, Orr & Co. floating Dry Dock and later at Dukes Graving Dock.

We now know something about John Doveton’s family life and his working life – and the next step is to find out about his connection to the area which eventually bore his name. The Library has the Shire of Cranbourne Rate Books from 1863 and the Shire of Berwick Rate Books from 1875 on CD-Rom. You can use these at Narre Warren, Cranbourne and Pakenham branches. The first listing for Captain Doveton was in the 1893-94 Shire of Berwick Rate books. He owned a house and 2½ acres at Lot 53 in Grassmere. The following year he had another 2½ acres at Lot 56, so five acres in all. From 1900 it was leased out and was sold on August 21 1903 to Robert Skinner. Even though Captain Doveton was listed as the ratepayer, according to a copy of the Title we have in the Archive, the property was actually purchased in Margaret's name. The house, which is now demolished was located around Gumbuya Close, off Doveton Avenue. In our Archive we also have a copy of an article from the South Bourke and Mornington Journal of April 10, 1896 which says that Captain Doveton had erected a 70 foot high flag pole in front of his ‘cosy residence’ where, on Sunday and high holidays, a 10 foot flag was flown.

This is from the Australian Electoral Rolls, 1903-1954, available on Ancestry database.

One other source of information we can use are the Australian Electoral Rolls on Ancestry database. The 1903 roll, for the Division of Kooyong, lists John and Margaret Doveton living at Ferntree Gully Road in Oakleigh and his occupation is listed as Poultry Farmer (see above). The death notice in The Argus on April 9, 1904 says that he died at “Burnett’, Atherton Road in Oakleigh, his property obviously being named after his childhood home. (see below)

The Argus, Saturday, April 9, 1904, page 9.
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article10313673

By using all these freely available sources we have built up a picture of Doveton’s life. In the next post we will look at Margaret Doveton's life and discover a connection to Royalty!

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Lang Lang Guardian

The Lang Lang & District Historical Society has reproduced the entire Lang Lang Guardian on DVD. The DVD covers the years February 1902 until December 1918. According to the local history, Protector's Plains : history of Lang Lang Primary School No.2899 & District, 1888-1988 the Guardian was shifted to Koo-Wee-Rup in 1918, and became the Koo-Wee-Rup Sun. The Guardian provides a wealth of information on early Lang Lang and surrounding towns such as Yannathan and Yallock. It was really a one-stop paper which could provide the local farmer and his family with all the information they needed. For a start, it had International News, for instance the edition of May 3, 1902 has a report on the health of Queen Wilhelmina of Holland and a report on the cost of the Auckland Town Hall.

Lang Lang Guardian, May 3 1902. Click on all the images to enlarge them.

Naturally, there is also plenty of local news and always of interest are the advertisements. There are many advertisements from Melbourne and Dandenong Companies offering their services to the locals as well as advertisements from local firms, such as Ernest Cougle's store, where all the necessaries of a household could be purchased. Ernest Cougle had taken over the store in 1907 from John Donaldson, who had purchased the store in 1903 from the original owners, the Priestley family. They had arrived in Lang Lang in 1898.

This advertisement for Ernest Cougle 's store was in October 11, 1911 edition.

Local News covered sporting groups, Churches, Community Groups such as the Red Cross. Farmers could get reports from the Dandenong Market, information on farming issues such as how to improve the dairy herd and Poultry Notes. During the First World War, there were articles on locals who had joined up, plus fund raising efforts. In the item below, it mentions the death of Private Frank Keighery. Edward Keighery, a boot maker, and his wife Annie, had arrived in Lang Lang in 1903 with their four children, Christopher (b.1889), Frank (b.1894) Sheila (b.1899), and Ned (b.1901). Frank had enlisted on March 20, 1915, and embarked aboard HMAT Euripides on May 10, 1915. He was killed in action on September 11, 1915 at Brown's Dip, near Lone Pine on the Gallipoli Peninsula.

This section of local news is taken from the Lang Lang Guardian of October 27, 1915.

Finally there were articles of interest to women. The Guardian had Health information, a weekly serial and Fashion notes, so even though you lived in the country, there was no need to be unfashionable. This article, below, from 1907 caught my attention. This elegant Ladies Fichu Bodice could be made from Butterick Pattern 9618, which came in six sizes. The pattern could be purchased for 10 shillings from M.Thorp & Co in Collins Street.

Lang Lang Guardian, May 8, 1907. A Fichu is a woman's shawl, or piece of lace, worn around the neck or shoulders.

You can purchase a copy of this DVD from the Lang Lang &District Historical Society, P.O Box 8, Lang Lang, 3984 for $30.00 plus postage. They also have an interesting website at http://www.langlang.net/historical.html

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Lord and Lady Casey and Edrington

We have spoken about Ancestry database in this blog before. One of my favourite databases in Ancestry is the Australian Electoral Rolls. Their coverage has now been extended, more years have been added and the coverage goes up to 1980. What sort of information can you get from the Rolls? They are useful to help track down ancestors if they have moved around a bit. Perhaps Great Uncle Bill may have left Victoria and moved to Western Australia after the Second World War, you may be able to trace his movements in the Electoral Rolls, and you could also find out if he has married by finding his wife listed at the same address.

Lord and Lady Casey on the front cover of the Bulletin magazine, November 2, 1968. 

Two of our more famous Casey Cardinia residents are Lord and Lady Casey of Edrington Berwick. Obviously much of their life is already on the public record, but we will see what we can discover about the Caseys in the Electoral Rolls and by using another of my favourite resources, the Australian Dictionary of Biography. Lord Casey, who was Governor General of Australia from September 1965 until April 1969,  was born just plain Richard Casey in 1890 (he wasn’t made a Life Peer, Baron Casey of Berwick and Westminister, until 1960) so we wouldn’t expect him on the Electoral Roll until around 1911 when he was 21. He was, however, then in England at Cambridge University and then spent 1914 until 1919 in the A.I.F. Casey was overseas again from 1924 until 1931 as Australia’s Liaison Officer for Prime Minister, Stanley Bruce. He married Ethel Marion Sumner Ryan (known as Maie) in London in 1926. In 1931 the Electoral Rolls list them at 91 Collins Street and his occupation is listed as an Engineer. At the end of 1931 he was elected as the Member of the House of Representatives for the seat of Corio and the Electoral roll in 1935 shows them at the Military Quarters in Duntroon in the A.C.T. His occupation is listed as M.H.R. Casey resigned from Parliament in 1940 and had a number of overseas postings and arrived back in Australia in 1946. We can then find them in the 1949 and 1954 Rolls at Edrington in Berwick, where his occupation is listed as a Politician, for he was now the member for La Trobe. Lady Casey’s occupation is listed in the Electoral Rolls as “home Duties” which seems a rather banal description for a woman who was an accomplished author, artist and historian, however this is just a reflection of the times.

Edrington in 1978.

If you don’t know Edrington, it is now the Community Centre for a Retirement Village, and it was built in 1906-07 by the West Australian pastoralist Samuel Peter McKay. Captain Robert Gardiner was the first European occupier of the land where Edrington is located and called the property Melville Park. It was sold to James Gibb and then to Samuel McKay. Edrington was designed by Rodney Alsop and is listed on the Victorian Heritage Register, where it is described as a two-storey red brick example of the English vernacular style with some reference to the Queen Anne style. It has also been described as being in the Arts and Crafts Style. Lady Casey and her brother, Colonel Rupert Ryan, inherited the property in 1934 from their aunt, Winifred Chirnside, who was the widow of Andrew Chirnside. The Chirnsides had purchased the property in 1912 and renamed it Edrington, after a family property in Scotland. Andrew and Winifred Chirnside died within three months of each other in 1934.

The Edrington garden in 1978. Lady Casey (centre) is pictured with two companions.

The house is surrounded by a Heritage Garden, part of which is shown above. Many of the trees were planted by James Gibb and during the early occupation of the Chirnsides. There is also a brick cottage on the site thought to have been built during the time of Captain Robert Gardiner.

Lady Casey outside the 1860s Cottage. T he photograph was taken in 1978.

Ancestry database is available, free, at all Casey Cardinia Libraries. The three black and white photographs are from a collection of Edrington photographs held in our Archive. The colour photograph is from the Bulletin magazine, dated November 2, 1968.

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The 1934 Flood

It is 75 years since the worst flood on record hit the Koo-Wee-Rup Swamp on December 1, 1934. The original Drainage works on the Swamp were completed in 1897 but later floods in 1901, 1911, 1923 and 1924 saw extra drainage work undertaken including the widening of the Main Drain and additional side drains. None of these works protected the Swamp against the big flood of 1934. 

Cora Lynn in an early flood, perhaps in the 1910s. The building on the right is the E.S.& A bank and the building in the middle is Murdoch's General Store.

Image: Rouse Family collection

There had been above average rainfall in the October and November and more heavy rain fell across the State on December 1. This rainfall caused a flood of over 100,000 megalitres or 40,000 cusecs (cubic feet per second) across the Swamp and this was only an estimate because all the gauges were washed away. The entire Swamp was inundated; water was over six feet deep (1.8metres) in parts of the Koo-Wee-Rup township. At Cora Lynn, three feet of water (about a metre) went through my grandparent’s house in Murray Road. The family, including the four children aged 11, 5, 3 and nearly 1, had to retreat to the roof. This flood also affected other parts of the State, for instance, it was reported in The Argus that there was four feet (120 cm) of water over parts of the Princes Highway between Dandenong and Berwick. Over a thousand people were left homeless as a result. The Koo-Wee-Rup locals were just recovering from this flood when another flood of about 24 000 cusecs hit in April 1935.

Rossiter Road in Koo-Wee-Rup in the 1934 flood. The photograph was taken just near the Railway line, the building on the right is St George's Anglican Church.

Image: Koo Wee Rup Swamp Historical Society

As a result of the 1934 flood, the State Rivers and Water Supply Commission (SRWSC) worked on new drainage plans for the Swamp and these plans became known as the Lupson Report after the complier, E.J Lupson, an Engineer. A Royal Commission was also established in 1936. Its role was to investigate the operation of the SRWSC. The Royal Commission report was critical of the SRWSC’s operation in the Koo-Wee-Rup Flood Protection District in a number of areas. It ordered that new plans for drainage improvements needed to be established and presented to an independent authority. Mr E. G Richie was appointed as the independent authority. The Richie Report essentially considered that the Lupson Report was “sound and well considered” and should be implemented. Work had just begun on these recommendations when the 1937 flood hit the area. The 1937 flood hit Koo-Wee-Rup on October 18^th and water was 60cm (2ft) deep in Rossiter Road and Station Street. The flood peaked at 20,000 cusecs (50,000 megalitres) about half the 1934 flood volume.

Station Street, Koo-Wee-Rup, during the 1934 flood.

Image: Koo Wee Rup Swamp Historical Society

The main recommendation of the Lupson / Ritchie report was the construction of the Yallock outfall drain from Cora Lynn, cutting across to Bayles and then essentially following the line of the existing Yallock Creek to Western Port Bay. The aim was to take any flood water directly to the sea so the Main Drain could cope with the remaining water. The Yallock outfall drain was started in 1939 but the works were put on hold during the Second World War and not completed until 1956-57. The Yallock outfall drain had been originally designed using the existing farm land as a spillway i.e the Main Drain would overflow onto existing farmland and then find its own way to the Yallock outfall drain. Local farmers were unhappy at this, as the total designated spillway area was 275 acres (110 hectares). They suggested a spillway or ford be constructed at Cora Lynn so the flood water would divert to the outfall drain over the spillway. The spillway was finally constructed in 1962, though ironically its opening was delayed by yet another flood, as we can see in the photograph below.

This photograph was taken by my Uncle, Jim Rouse, in October 1962, before the official opening of the Cora Lynn spillway. The building, with the brown coloured roof, is the Cora Lynn Hall. The other buildings you can see in the background are the same as the ones on the other Cora Lynn photograph at the top of this post - the E.S.& A Bank and the general store, then Dillon's store. The road at the top left is the newly constructed spillway and you can see where flood waters have broken through the Main Drain bank and are spilling across it.

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A little of Emerald Lake - by Graeme Legge

With the advent of a local swimming pool in the 1930s, residents had ready access to the refreshing coolness of water in the summer heat as well as having a facility in which to swim. And even many who couldn’t swim were not too self-conscious to simply walk into the water and splash around. In all honesty, in the days of rainwater tanks and when water-levels ran low, some were seen at the Lake cooling and refreshing themselves with the benefit of a block of soap! So it was that the younger generation of the time were often the first in families to be able to swim.

Emerald Lake Park, looking back from the Lake towards Main Road.

Swimming lessons for local school children were conducted before World War 2 in the 1930s. Miss May Aisbett was one teacher who conducted these lessons. Then there was Arthur Bolton, propagator at Nobelius Nursery who also gave lessons. Swimming lessons became part of the School curriculum in the late 1940s.Head Teacher, Phil Skelton of Emerald Township State School (now Emerald Primary School) taught swimming to the older pupils in the Lake. At afternoon recess (‘play time’) on Friday afternoons, those going swimming would leave the School, run down the road and along the tracks to the Lake and quickly change into their bathers and be ready for Mr Skelton’s arrival by car. The Children’s Pool was used for instruction in leg-kicking and arm-stroke practice. Upon swimming one length of the Children’s Pool a swimmer qualified for the ‘Herald Certificate’; two lengths earned the ‘Junior Certificate’.

Diving instruction saw children lined up, standing on one of a stone wall at the end of the Children’s Pool. In turn, each stood at the end of the wall, feet together, arms raised above the head followed by the instruction ‘Go in head first’. For any who seemed likely to jump instead, Mr Skelton was not beyond thrusting out his arm in front of the would-be diver’s ankles thus ensuring that ‘head first’ it was.

Children were dismissed from swimming lessons at the Lake to make their own ways home from the Lake. This was often an adventure in itself – passing fruit trees with delicious (but ‘green’) apples to feast upon and playing games. It was usually a leisurely trip home walking up the hill from the Lake. Later, with ‘safety’ in mind, School children were ‘bussed’ to the Lake and return for one shilling a week. Ray Lockyer, Jack Eudey and Hilda Van Den Dungen were among the volunteer, trained instructors who led the program.

The Lake and Kiosk in the 1940s.

An anchored ‘raft’ floated in the centre of the Lake as a safety measure upon which tired swimmers could rest. The distance across the Lake was underestimated by some swimmers, so the raft provided relief. But it was also a great source of play as a floating platform. The raft was made of eight ‘forty-four gallon’ drums with sturdy timber decking. A number of lifebuoys were also strategically located around the Lake ready for immediate assistance.

The Lake Kiosk. The first kiosk was built in the 1940s and the popularity of the Lake is evidenced by the number of cars and tourist buses in the car park.

There came a time when Emerald Life Saving Club was formed and went into action when swimmers ‘got into trouble’. In February, 1960 the Club Rooms were officially opened and a grand occasion it was. Sir John Latham, escorted by the bagpipes of the Victorian Police Pipe Band to the grounds of the Club House. Sir John said in his gracious remarks that ‘Emerald is no less a jewel than the stone after which it was named, and that the Lake is its highest facet.’ Residents continue to cherish the Lake and its beautiful surroundings with all its walks, parklands and playgrounds far beyond the swimming season.

Cr Graeme Legge is a Cardinia Shire Councillor, local historian and an Emerald identity. This article was first published in Signpost, the Community newsletter.
The photographs are from Emerald In Focus : a photographic history published by the Nobelius Heritage Park and Emerald Museum, in 2006. It is a great book with over 300 photographs on all aspects of the history of Emerald. It is available for loan from Casey Cardinia Library Corporation or you can purchase a copy from the Emerald Museum. The Museum can be contacted on 03 5968 2152 or P.O Box 578, Emerald, 3782. The Museum and Heritage Park occupies part of the Gembrook Nurseries, operated by Carl Axel Nobelius and his sons from 1886.

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The Encyclopedia of Melbourne

The Encyclopedia of Melbourne was published in 2005 by Cambridge University Press, and there is now an on-line version. The on-line version has all the original articles plus additional text and 'see also' links.
The Encyclopedia covers not just the inner city, but outer areas as well, so includes a short history of most towns in Casey and Cardinia. The Encyclopedia also looks at Melbourne landmarks, for instance, St Paul's Cathedral, the Australia Hotel, Georges and the Athenaeum ; concepts such as the Environment, Horse racing, Lanes & Alleys and Nature Strips ; Sport, Associations, Immigrant Groups, Religion, Banking, Politics and anything else which has contributed to the history of culture of greater Melbourne.

The on-line version of the Encyclopedia is called
eMelbourne : the City past and present and can be found at
http://www.emelbourne.net.au/

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