Christmas plans- it’s all fun and games. The year Santa forgot our tent!

 

It was the day before Christmas and the Kerrs were at church. Mum was expecting a baby after New Year celebrations. All the Christmas gifts were prepared and hidden around the house to put out on Christmas Eve and Mum would make the final preps for  our Christmas lunch during the rest of the day.

But the plans changed. Mum came home from church and unbeknownst to us, she was in labour. It's all fun and games when you have a baby. The best laid plans can always be toppled by unexpected events such as a 27 hour labour on Christmas Eve. We lived in a newish neighbourhood where at least four of the neighbours were expecting babies and some others had already come along that year. None of them, least of all my sibling, came in the order they were expected.

Dad was the sort who left it all to Mum. The Christmas shopping, the Christmas wrapping, the Christmas food and Santa. Dad's only Christmas Santa duties were to pick up the Christmas toys from places like Farmers and DJs in the city.

As usual, his father and brother were expected for lunch on Christmas Day for family lunch. Later, on Christmas Eve, Mum was dropped off at Ryde Hospital to have her baby early. It was her third. My mum wasn't good with blood, so for her it was a scary thing. All the women had to go it alone, as you did in those days. The women in the street, who were also pregnant, hoped the same wouldn't happen to them.

All the fun and games of little  Christmas miracles. Probably Dad was given the instructions about how to lay out the presents for the six-year-old and the four-year-old. So much for all the best laid plans of celebrating Christmas around the tree in our new home, with our new kitchen, dining room, oven, etc.

Polly next door was briefed. She had had the phone installed at her house and would relay any tidings of comfort and joy that would come through at any time. She also promised to give Dad instructions about how to cook the chook and vegetables. Did Dad even know how to peel vegetables, stuff a chicken, carve one?

We went to bed as usual on Christmas Eve with Dad distracting us with a story that the red light on the Channel 7 transmission tower was Santa's sleigh on its way. We had no TV in those days and so no carols or Christmas TV watching for us.

The arrival of Santa approached and Dad dutifully laid out the presents under the tree. A doll house and a doll for Robyn and a cowboy set for Paul. We woke up without our mother and opened our Santa presents. Neighbours called across the road to check, all busy with their own Christmas and entertaining plans  but there was no news. 

Paul and the cowboy suit aged 4

Robyn and the dolls house aged 6

We dressed and went to church. It was a clear and humid day starting at 20 degrees. We went to Christmas church, as you do in any good Catholic household. Polly checked on the roast after church and Dad drove to the station to pick up his father. Still no news.

It had been 24 hours. Lunch was served and the wishbone was broken. Dessert was served. Christmas cake. We weren't a pudding and fruit type of family. Dessert was interrupted by Polly at the door. The hospital was on the phone. Good tidings at last. Mum had the baby after 27 hours.

The day which started with temps of about 21 degrees rose to about 23.3 by midday and probably hotter with all the baking happening in our house. The humidity grew to be fairly muggy as the day progressed.

In those days, new Mums rested up for about a week. You viewed babies through the glass in the nursery and in fact we weren't even allowed into the hospital. Lucky for Mum, her room was surrounded by a big veranda and no air conditioning meant windows you could even open and talk through.

That afternoon there lay Mum, after 27 hours labour, probably exhausted and definitely disappointed. She had expected she would be given a Christmas roast dinner but no, Christmas food had been provided the previous lunch and she had to endure steamed fish and white sauce. Not Mum's favourite type of meal. Mum was happy to see her littlies at last on Christmas day.

As we ran up and down the veranda, she was keen to hear what we thought about our carefully purchased Santa presents. Dad was pretty proud of his efforts at completing the Santa task until Mum asked him about how we liked the Indian tent. “What tent?” asked Dad, who had incidentally bought it home from Farmers in the city. Needless to say, he was told that he knew it was behind the door in his bedroom. When we arrived home, I still remember him with his charade of saying “Look what Santa left behind while we were out.”  We loved that tent anyway.

The tent and the neighbourhood kids

Oh... my sister born on Christmas day 1961 was actually called Helen Elizabeth (eventually)The nurses said we had to bring her back if she wasn’t named by Easter. We teased her endlessly. We still tell her she was adopted.

Robyn and her Christmas doll with Helen and Paul

Happy Birthday Helen!

Accentuate the positive 2024. I Marie Kondo'd my writing pile.

 

My focus in 2024 was revisiting my British families after the WWI and finishing off a few loose ends. I researched the 1921 census (English)  extensively when I got the opportunity to research for free for four days straight in November. This was the most generous offer from Find My Past and I certainly made a pig of myself, screenshotting at least 50 family relatives and researching for other projects. The 1921Scottish Census was also systematically searched on Scotland’s People.

I finally managed to attend the Kingswood Archives Centre or the New South Wales State Archives. You sign up, order your documents in advance and “go for it” when you arrive. My husband and I did speed screenshotting of the multiple pages of about eight divorces, land titles and other random records. I was just being nosy but the domestic violence cases hit me where it hurts and were quite sad. I can't wait to go again because I've got a few more cases I'd like to snoop around.

A social media post I am most proud of.

A couple of blog posts have drawn people's attention. Tagging posts with things like Kerr family history, Murphy family history, etc. seems to be the way to go. One post led to a two and a half hour FaceTime with relatives in Ontario.  The blog about Elizabeth Kerr Revington Tinman has been of interest to people lately.

A history book I enjoyed was … A friend gave me the rough draft of a book she is having ghost written. Such a privilege. My third cousin is included in this book as well as lots of research we discovered in the Schweidnitz POW project we worked on during COVID. She is writing her grandfather and parent’s story and my involvement is via the research we did on the POW escape by 24 men via a tunnel which came up in a pigsty.

My most valuable subscription is Ancestry.

Still, but … During the year, if you look around, you can get quite good specials. I've taken up subs in a couple of places such as Newspapers.com. I'm the master of the speed search when I can get short subs such as Irish Roots. With a handy list compiled on the Plan section of my Family Tree Maker, I just go for it.

I'm still making Scotland's People rich because of the instant gratification of the low cost certificates. Besides the 1921 Census,  a few police and prison records made for good reading. Secrets my relatives wouldn't be proud of, I would guess.

I paid for an app called Whisper Memos. I think its origins maybe  a bit shady (something to do with dating?) but it's the best $60 I've spent in a long time. I dictate my drafts and it transcribes my work in 15 minute blocks and emails it to me. It's extremely accurate and it saved me hours of typing which is not one of my strong points.

It is great that more records are coming available. Photographs of Grace Gadsby and Betty Whitcomb when they briefly signed up for the cause in World War II and their records add insight into where they lived, their occupations, etcetera.

Grace Day Gadsby

Betty Whitcombe

The genealogist of the future will despair at the ever decreasing death notices and non-existent birth and marriage notices.

I finally settled the probate for my aunt's will. It was deemed intestate and 25 certificates and multiple identifying documents and JPs later I was allowed to distribute.

In 1925 I plan to rewrite the stories of various family lines after the war. As the census information has become available, it's a period of mass movement overseas after the upheaval of the war. I believe there was a recession in the early 20s as well as the aftermath of the Spanish flu has turned up a couple of deaths.

A useful website I found While trying to piece together the life of my husband's great grandmother I had been networking with a lady in the UK. She had been using a site called Genealogy Specialists. I stumbled upon her discussion thread  she had started. It was full of people's generous suggestions and research. I came away with pages and pages of information/ assumptions/ suggestions. I could see what had been covered, uncovered, discarded and discovered in the forum discussion. A bunch of obsessive amateur genealogists helped a heap. Genealogy specialists, tracing our past, discovering our genes.
https://genealogy-specialists.com

I've written a lot but I hate the tidying up process. I got a few posts published and some are still a work in progress. Some were part of my writing group tasks. After reading our piece to the group, mine always seems to be a little bit long. There is amazement at times at my interesting family and what they got up to. Most were reflective posts but the writer's story in the format of a gossip column was challenging and fun as it was to write in the form of a list. Ancestor Trivial Pursuit, Who's Got a Ghost, Royalty, etc. was another favourite story. I might have been down on my blog count this year but I got distracted by wanting to follow up on a few families that needed recording and re-recording.

But the collaboration has been up. It's not so lonely and I find the results are greater than the sum of the parts. Collaboration brings local knowledge and perspectives, expanded research and a bigger brains trust. I'm up  129,057 hits on my Robyn and the Genies blog and 13,214on my Schweidnitz POW Camp blog.

As usual, my range of Facebook groups has expanded. I'm trying to get more information on the musical artists in the family. While there's been a lot of interest in the later comedians and singers, etc. who successfully moved to TV and theatre, not much has been written or recorded for the musical artists of the 20s and 30s, etc. So I'm following the Music Hall Facebook groups and if all else fails, I'll have to write an update on those I can find in my family. Trouble is, very few had children, so there's not a lot of family information out there.

I've listened to weekly writing podcasts. One explores writing processes and the other is dabbling in copywriting and AI. This year I joined a U3A writing group. They concentrated on smaller and perhaps more reflective types of writing and I'm adding a few of them to my blog.

I had some fun with... AI. I've been trying to find out more about AI. I had a play with Meta and after feeding it a few storylines from some recent research. I quickly had three chapters of a fictitious and scandalous neighbourhood chronical. I argued with it and it didn't even apologise when I told it had got the facts wrong. It had mixed the story up so beware. It just continued on and added more paragraphs.

Another story agreed with my husband that a place we had visited was unsettling and proceeded to write about it. I'm trying to find out more about AI's uses. I can see it helps with inspiration, summarising a few key points, etc. It completely made up information about my music hall family.

A Genie surprise I received. This year my son-in-law did his DNA and got all interested in building a tree and researching the matches of cousins and second cousins he didn't even know about. He was surprised to have a small amount of black African and Jewish DNA. There was lots of discussion in my daughter's in-law family. The interest in Nan's funny little hobby is building.

Similarly, a niece did her DNA after being gifted it for her birthday. She discovered my tree and was impressed by what she's found out so far. Needless to say, I've encouraged the rest of the family to test to help me with the roadblocks.

A new genealogy history book I’m enjoying.

My kids gave me this book for my birthday. It is far from complete, but babysitting afternoons take on a new interest when they ask questions, like “phrases that were popular when I was a teenager”, “Big world events I remember from the time I was growing up”, “Memories of my mother”, “memories of my father”, “How I spent holidays” etc….. If only they could spell.

An interesting newspaper article I found.

As close as I can get to being a fly on the wall. I found a newspaper article which included music hall relatives. It was about a celebration day that had been held in Portsmouth 19^th July 1919. I discovered that about six months after the Armistice, the English government set down a bank holiday on to celebrate the ending of the war and the signing of the Treaty of Versailles. I was unable to find out more about the other towns and their activities that day, but it was great to see the way the town of Portsmouth rolled out the red carpet for returned soldiers and their families.

Sharing with my genie mates. I shared a lot of 1921 census findings with my genie mates. Suddenly everyone was doing a mad look up for the Find My Past free weekend. A blog post taught me something this year. I've been reminded that my blog posts are searchable. Families, people have responded to my Rowbotham and Stewart and Murphy posts.

A new found family member shared … not really. Occasionally things are reciprocated, but I guess that I mostly get there before them because I'm so thoroughly obsessed.

Another positive. I printed via Pixie Books my series of blogs on the Schweidnitz POW Camp site blog. It was quick turnaround and a great record. Maybe next year it's volume three or maybe even four of my Robyn and the Genies blog. The quality of these books make it such an asset and the customer service and turnaround are superb. It is great value for money.

MeRrY ChRriStMaS

We went to Church on Sundays.......

 

I was born and raised a Catholic and Sunday Mass was a constant in my life. My nanny gave me the church offering of a gold half sovereign on the day I was born in lieu of putting it in the plate. My dad and uncle had been altar boys and my nanny worked for the nuns while possibly working for free. Our Catholicism flows down through the Irish sides of my paternal family.

My mum, a Catholic convert was not as versed in all the ritual but was a fierce believer. There was no thought of doing anything that would displease the parish priest, Father Nolan.

We had moved from their childhood parishes in Neutral Bay and Woollahra. When we first moved to the northern suburbs our parish was Our Lady Help of Christians Epping. A new parish of St Gerard Majella, Carlingford was formed when I was about eight. My father was like a pillar of the church. He and his mates renovated the old World War II radio communications building to become our first church in the new suburb. They built the school classrooms, room by room as the years progressed. The project gave great satisfaction and achievement to the parishioners. Every weekend they removed the weeds and lantana and used all their trade skills to make this old and neglected building into the parish church.

 

Converting an old WW2  building into a church

Building the school class by class

Several working bees were held to build facilities, school rooms etc. The ladies supplied the cakes and sandwiches. From the outset it was a very social church full of young families moving to a new suburb. With all the building came social events to raise funds. The altar ladies gathered up flowers, ivy and decorations to adorn the event ball tables.

The name of the parish, St Gerard Magella, was suggested by the mothers of the parish. He was patron saint of mothers and family life, something we all felt at peace with and it certainly encapsulated the spirit of our Parish.

The male parishioners formed the St Vincent of Paul Society and my mum was in the Altar Society which cleaned and decorated the church with flowers each week or on special religious occasions.

We were always late for church on Sundays. I remember my First Communion day. Late as usual and wearing my pure white dress and veil, Dad took a corner too fast and too sharply to see a plate of savouries for the communion breakfast slide off the tray and all over my dress.

Each Sunday we donned our Sunday best and the ladies and girls  wore hats and mantillas. Some days we would pick up a poor family to transport to church. All of us Kerrs crammed into our little car plus the mother and her two children. We would be running late as usual and when we arrived Dad would turn into “usher mode” because the church wardens used to walk the aisle and find spare spaces for the late comers. Churches were always filled in those days. Often these spaces were in the front row. He'd indicate with a pointed hand and then the spaces with his two fingers. So embarrassing for us and the other family we brought to church.

Dad and his mates always had plenty of customers purchasing Catholic weeklies, cards and calendars at the piety shop.

Later the modern church was built. It had a huge space out the front and I'm sure Father Nolan went home for breakfast and lunch while waiting for the stragglers to stop chatting and the children to be gathered up and taken home.

Sometimes if it was a good day those who were left would opt to go on a picnic at Windsor, Ebenezer or Mount Wilson. The mums had to always plan for this by having barbecue meat and baked cakes in anticipation.

Needless to say it was not in and out in an hour even though Dad tried to shave off a few minutes at the beginning. Nine o’clock Mass became at least eleven o’clock home. Long enough to leave the Sunday roast cooking at home for our return.

Sometimes it was a Sunday night meet up for early tea at Manly Beach or a trip to Mona Vale for a swim. The families were good friends and being Catholic there was an ever-increasing number of children. The families formed good lifelong friendships with the mums supporting the school at the Mother's Club and the men up at monthly golf, weekly St Vincent de Paul meetings and squash nights.

At our particular Mass a bus load of children from the North Rocks School for the Deaf came along to church . A few of the girls took a liking to my brother and heads were turned and their fingers wiggled with sign language. They giggled away  and we had no clue what they were saying amongst themselves.

The children of the parish went off to various local Catholic High Schools. Later our parents started youth groups at Church and we had rock masses. A few of my friends and I married the boys we met at the newly formed youth club. My husband and I married in the church and brought our growing family back to visit from time to time when visiting on weekends.

Our wedding at the new church with some  members of the youth group

Taking the idea of family picnic days a step further, the Carlingford crowd began holidays together and eventually began camping on several weekends a year. One of the parishioners had the idea of buying a dilapidated old home on the water at Empire Bay. Enough room for all the families and their caravans. We just met up at a different church at Ettalong on those weekends and conveniently the priest was a local boy from our area.

Sadly, I buried my parents and some of their good friends from that church.

I still feel the loss of that special community which cannot be replicated in the same way at my local church in Dapto although it is very vibrant in its own way. One day a friend from Dapto church told me that someone at the St Luke's Nursing Home had asked after me. He was my dad's old friend Gordon- a man with much shared history with us. He had recently located down here to be with his children. I raced over to visit him and reminisced over the old days.

I took along a  book about the history of our old Catholic parish and we talked about what a great community it was. He was too polite to mention all the time we turned up late. In fact, he had been a part of writing that book. For my part I was glad to be able to welcome a dear old friend to our Parish and introduce him to my local priest who performed masses at the nursing home once per month. I felt like we'd come full circle.

St Gerard Majella Congregation March 1966 (Looks good on a full screen- tap to expand)