Other

We were so lucky to grow up in a close-knit family. Mum was the ‘boss' with the right organizing skills to keep food on the table, maintain a close check on the finances, provide the boundaries of discipline and above all give us all the love we needed. On the other hand, Dad was the storyteller, the sports follower and the ‘go to' person who provided good humour.

In wintertime we spent a large proportion of the time in our tiny kitchen. Dad used to often ‘crow' about how he displayed so much foresight to design such a ‘large' kitchen. You can understand why we gravitated to the kitchen because that's where everything happened and above all it was toasty warm.

At the beginning of winter, Dad would organize for a large truck load of ‘mill end' wood, as it was called, to be delivered and this would be dropped off near the garage. Our concrete driveway used to be in terrible condition because of the weight of the truck which cracked most of the square slabs.

Mum began each day about 5:30am firstly lighting the wood fire and by the time we got up for school, the stove was already throwing out plenty of heat. Mum liked to have the radio on station 3DB and after breakfast of Vita Brits cereal and toast, I was out the door to ride my bike to the station and then catch the Box Hill train to school. Kevin generally followed me about 15 minutes later. In the afternoon, we would arrive home from school about 4:30pm and mum would have a hot cup of ‘Ovaltine' waiting for us and a homemade cake or a piece of toast. We then watched television or kicked the footy up the top of our yard before mum called out “teatime.”

For the evening meal we sat around the kitchen table with Dad at the end, Kevin and John to his left, Brian opposite Dad and then Michael and mum to Dad's right. There was no room for Brendon, so mum put him a tea chest in the lounge so he could safely watch television. He told me that's why he's still watching television over 50 years later in the same lounge room.

For the evening meal we never got tired of mum's homemade vegetable soup and the main meal was usually lamb chops, mashed potatoes and boiled vegies topped with homemade gravy. Sweets varied between banana custard, homemade ice cream, apple pie topped with pastry or stewed fruit from our small orchid.

(The kitchen table was also very small measuring 1.25m by 75m. Later in the evening mum read the paper and Dad did the crossword)

On the weekends we amused ourselves with all sorts of indoor activities since it was often too cold, windy and rainy outside. A favourite game was ‘Monopoly' which started with great enthusiasm and good humour, but as the hours progressed one of us became the ‘greedy capitalist' and the rest became paupers. Eventually, a ‘blew' erupted and sometimes the playing board was tipped over in frustration.

Another fun game we played came in a green flat tray box which was called ‘Test Match' and it was quite cleverly designed, essentially consisting of two semicircles with tabs attached which were rotated. The right side was for the bowler and the left side for the batsmen. A hidden box revealed the outcome: for example ‘Square cut 4 runs' or ‘OUT' bowled. There was another panel for the scoreboard showing the run total, together with the number of batsmen out.

One of mum's welcome purchases was an electric Vulcan Heater. It was quite a large rectangular metal box shape about 80cm * 50cm and the inside was a curved, aluminum, serrated grill which radiated such strong heat that our faces became quite flushed when we sat in front of it for any period of time.

Eventually, when it became time for bed, Kev, John and myself went just a few metres outside to the ‘sleepout'. This addition to our house was smaller than the kitchen. Kev had his bed on one side and John, and I had a 2-tiered bunk bed with me on the top and John down below. It was so cold out there but once we were under the blankets, felt the warm hot water bottle on our feet and often the relaxing sound of rain falling on the tin roof, you were lulled off to sleep.

We lived very modestly at Daisy St., so we were amazingly surprised that Mum and Dad bought the first black and white television in our neighbourhood to watch the 1956 Olympics. Our TV had the brand name ‘Ferris' and we watched it seemingly forever until the picture tube eventually gave out. It was such an extraordinary thing to watch TV in your own home and not have to go up to the Ringwood Town Hall to watch a movie.

It wasn't long before a heap of kids found out that the Kane's had a TV and they eagerly crowded into the dining room which we seldom used for its right purpose and was even smaller than our kitchen measuring only 9 square metres. Nevertheless, Jimmy Cruikshank, Randley Hall, the Rob's, Nelson's, Gray's and Ronnie Harrison who Dad named the ‘Yellow bird' piled into our place to watch the Olympics. Later, we had regular visits from these kids to watch lots of programs we always looked forward to with eager anticipation.

(Some of our neighbours who came to watch television with us: left to right Joan and Margaret Nelson, Kevin, Margaret and Peter Robb, Michael in front, to his right John and Brian)

Saturday was footy day and often we would catch the train down to Glenferrie to watch the VFL team Hawthorn play. It was such a small ground and one of the star players at that time was the full forward John Peck. It was no problem to get into the change rooms of the Hawthorn footy club rooms and see the players being rubbed down with ‘intoxicating'' liniment and see the boot studder hammer leather stops into the players boots. We generally parked ourselves behind the huge sign on the Southern outer part of the ground which read ‘SPECTATORS NOT ALLOWED ON PLAYING SURFACE.' We did this because the game was telecast and when we returned home, we were able to see ourselves on the television replay. When the game was over, we'd jump the fence and madly race across the muddy outfield to get autographs from our favourite players.

Sunday was the day we loved the best. In the morning we did the right thing by going to Church, but our 2 nd religious activity started at midday – watching ‘World of Sport' on Channel 7. Mum always had the lamb roast cooking away in the oven during the morning which filled the kitchen with the promised aroma of a feast. The potatoes were crispy brown and the roast vegies decorated your plate in a splash of colour. The finishing touch was mum's home-made gravy made with the juice of the roast, flour and some boiled water.

‘World of Sport' was an institution on TV and it was compared by a popular host named Ron Casey. There were many sports covered including racing by Bill Collins and the Footy Panel with such members as Lou Richards, ‘Captain Blood' Dwyer, Bruce Andrew who oiled his hair parting it exactly half way across his head, ‘Chicken' Smallhorn and others who dissected the previous day's games. Merv Lincoln was the expert for Athletics and there were a variety of other sports and activities covered including the bicycle roller Derbys and the Tug of War which was usually won by the potato boys from Dunnstown near Ballarat. The anchor for the team was a ‘man mountain' whose muscles bulged around his tight fitting ‘Bonds' singlet.

All this entertainment happened in our kitchen for 2 hours while mum struggled to maneuver around us to prepare and serve our much-awaited dinner. Once the dishes were done, we then adjourned to the lounge to watch the VFA footy live. It was hugely popular with characters like Fred Cook who chalked up all sorts of records. Later, however, the VFL ‘muscled in' and began playing games on Saturday as well as Sunday which sucked the VFA competition dry never to recover the glory days.

Every now and again we would have special visitors come to our home on Sunday afternoon. There would have an open wood fire burning in the lounge and the highlight was mum's afternoon tea which included the lightest brown sponge cake filled with cream and coated with chocolate icing on top which just melted in your mouth. Mum's other specialties were light brown, fluffy light balls she called cream puffs and rolled brown cream lilies which were baked in the oven and served with a dollop of strawberry jelly inside.

(Mum, Dad with a Sister of St. Joseph of Mary MacKillop's order who taught them in Coleraine. Mum's typical afternoon tea and her famous chocolate sponge cake)

A favourite visitor was Clem Mahoney who was a school mate from Mum and Dad's hometown of Coleraine in Western Victoria. Clem was a single man and a Primary school teacher at Lilydale for many years. He followed the Richmond footy club and his students used to love teasing him on Monday if his team had lost on the weekend. Clem always bought chocolate for mum and packet of peanuts for each of us which we only received if we went to bed after the evening meal. This left mum, dad and Clem to chat in the lounge without prying ears.

We watched a lot of television when we were kids, but this was balanced with endless activity outside playing sport, going on very long bike rides and generally just mucking about with whatever took our fancy. It was a carefree childhood and when we decided to ‘take off' for the day, mum's only rule was to be back before dark.

1.	Gilligan's Island (1967)
2.	The Beverly Hillbillies (1968))
3.	Get Smart (1969)
4.	I Dream of Jeannie (1970)
5.	Hogan's Heroes(1971)
6.	The Benny Hill Show (1972)
7.	MacMillan & Wife (1973)
8.	The Rockford Files (1974)
9.	Fawlty Towers (1975)
10.	Dallas (1976)

TRIVIA:

• The longest kick of the football is Paul Vinar (Geelong). Record set of 80 yards 6 inches (73.1 metres set in 1968 – measured in the World of Sport TV program by Bruce Andrew)

• Dad's service number accessed through the National Archives of Australia https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/DetailsReports/ItemDetail.aspx

• Jack's service number accessed through the National Archives of Australia

https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ListingReports/ItemsListing.aspx

• John Kane Gallipoli service number accessed through the National Archives of Australia

https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/DetailsReports/ItemDetail.aspx?Barcode=7361822&isAv=N

The controls for our Ferris TV (the channel selector is missing)

• Classic TV Guide Melbourne (control + click to follow the link):

Sunday 4 November 1956 – MELBOURNE Official Opening HSV7
Monday 19 November 1956 – MELBOURNE Official Opening ABV2
Thursday 22 November 1956 – MELBOURNE Opening Ceremony Melbourne Olympic Games
Saturday 19 January 1957 – MELBOURNE Official Opening GTV9
Monday 6 May 1957 – MELBOURNE First In Melbourne Tonight
Saturday 7 December 1957 – MELBOURNE First TV Week listing
Wednesday 11 December 1957 – MELBOURNE
Tuesday 11 March 1958 – MELBOURNE

• The old kitchen table is just outside on the verandah.

(Brendon's transition from the Tea Chest to a lounge chair)

Mum's recipe book

FOOTNOTE:

I thought it's a little ironic that Dad has had the last laugh on the smallness of our living spaces at 5 Daisy St. Now that we've reached retirement and most people our age are downsizing, we're already there. The kitchen takes no time at all to warm up in winter by just turning on the $40 portable heater for about 10 minutes.

I've also paid for a small reverse cycle air-con to be installed in mum and dad's bedroom for Kate and I which will be much appreciated in the coming winter as it looks like we'll be here for a while because of the Coronvavirus. Also, on the odd hot days in summer it will be very handy to cool down our bedroom.