Sepia Saturday 356 - Waterfront photos

The photo prompt for this weeks Sepia Saturday brought to mind a couple of photos taken by my paternal grandmother, Brenda FORSYTH, who was an avid photographer. All her photos were developed for slide format.

My Dad gave me her hundreds of slides.

Nana's hobby was gardening so most of them were of plants and gardens taken on bus trips with the local gardening club.

I found a few which were of people and recognisable landmarks.

Our favourite local pool was Shepparton's Raymond West swimming pool which sadly no longer exists. 

The photo below was taken on a quiet day at the pool.

It was usually crowded.

Shepparton's Raymond West swimming pool possibly late 1960s - early 1970s

Many other nostalgic photos of our pool have been shared on the Lost Shepparton Facebook page 

Another popular Summertime location was, and still is, the lake foreshore at Yarrawonga.

 That reminds me of the song by our iconic Australian country music singer, Slim Dusty, "I'm going back again to Yarrawonga"

The song was actually written during World War One for Ella Shields
Further information can be seen at The National Library of Australia Website

I'll linger longer at Yarrawonga

"I'll Linger Longer at Yarrawonga"

Read more SEPIA SATURDAY contributions HERE

52 Ancestors week 22 - School commencement

I first attended Gowrie Street Primary School, Shepparton in 1964.  

I'm in the front row, right hand side of the board, stretching my arms out.

The photo below is of Myrtleford State School grade 3 & 4 possibly about 1947.  

My mum, Joan Fleming, is far right in the back row and her sister Margaret is first left in the back row.

Below is a school photo for my maternal grandfather, Archie Fleming, who attended King Valley State School.  

He is far right in back row and would have been eleven years old in 1920.

My Dad started school in 1945 at Girgarre East Primary school in Northern Victoria and as the family moved around nearly every twelve months he attended many schools.

I don't have any school photos for him

The admission date for my paternal grandfather to the primary school at Belfast  Canterbury, New Zealand was the 25th of September 1911.   

His father also attended Belfast school, as did his siblings.  

Below are some school reunion photos.

Belfast school reunion - my great grandfather, James Christopher MUSSON is in the back row,  just to the right of the centre door.

my grandfather's eldest sister, Jessie MUSSON is in the back row, the second lady from right with the white hat.

I'm still searching for more school records for my other grandparents.

  52 Ancestors Challenge 
  by Amy Johnson Crow at "No Story Too Small"

52 Ancestors week 8 - Good deeds Joan OSTER.

My subject for "Good Deeds" is my late Mum

Joan OSTER, nee FLEMING. (1937 - 2012)

Mum was a volunteer in the kiosk at Goulburn Valley Health (formerly Goulburn Valley Base Hospital).  

In later years, along with my stepdad, she also volunteered for several years at the Revamp Opportunity shop in Shepparton which is run by The Bridge Youth Service organisation.

Miss you Mum xxx

Always Loved, Always Remembered.

52 Ancestors Challenge 
by Amy Johnson Crow at "No Story Too Small"

My 52 Ancestors challenge list

Sunday's Obituary - My own dearly loved Mum.

My Sunday's Obituary post today is for my own dearly loved Mum
who passed away last Monday the 23 of April.  She was laid
to rest with a beautiful graveside service on Friday the 27th of April at Pine Lodge Lawn
Cemetery, Northern Victoria.

Mum's eulogy

The third of Daisy and Archie Fleming’s four children, Amelia Joan was born at Wangaratta on 5th September, 1937; her siblings are Ken, Margaret and Elaine.

Joan was brought up in North East Victoria. The family moved around a lot for work.
Joan left Rochester High School at about fourteen years of age, and worked in grocery stores in Wangaratta and then Shepparton.

Through friends, Joan met Kerry Forsyth in 1957 and they married at the Church of England in Mooroopna in 1958.  Joan looked after the home and their two children - Kerryn who was born in 1958 and Ross who arrived two years later in 1960.
Once the children were attending school, Joan worked as a kindergarten assistant at St David’s Kindergarten in Shepparton.
Later on, Joan and Kerry were divorced.

While attending a country music club meeting in 1975, Joan met Bud Oster and they married on 1st December, 1981 at Mount Major.  They lived in Shepparton and Joan continued to work for the Yakka clothing company for a while, then later in food services at the Mooroopna Hospital, until it closed.

Bud and Joan bought the General Store at Dookie in 1990, where they worked for five years. After they sold the business they continued to live at Dookie for another five years. Bud went back to his previous occupation in automotive spare parts sales … and Joan retired.
When Bud had his annual holidays they used to enjoy exploring Australia.

Until recently Joan loved working as a volunteer at the Revamp Op Shop in Fryers Street, Shepparton.

In her younger years Joan played tennis, and later she took up bowls, playing first for East Shepparton and then Dookie.
She loved gardening, roses being one of her favourite flowers, and she also grew vegetables.  She enjoyed crosswords, word puzzles, scrabble, card games such as euchre, five hundred and canasta … and Joan was also an avid reader of crime stories.
She enjoyed most genres of music, but particularly loved country music, and some of her favourite singers were Rod Stewart, Roy Orbison, Jimmy Barnes, Neil Diamond … and the list goes on.

In the last five years or so, Joan has contended with ill-health, and so she and Bud moved to Rodney Park eight months ago.  Joan suffered pneumonia and some heart failure last Christmas and she was admitted to GV Base Hospital for a time, before returning home.
On Wednesday 18th April Joan was re-admitted to GV Base after a cardiac arrest.  Joan died there on Monday 23rd April 2012 with family by her side.

A very caring, sometimes stubborn, always generous person, with a good sense of humour, Joan was very protective of her family and was a loving wife, mother, grand-mother and great-grand-mother.

Horsing around with her much loved son.

Joan leaves Bud, her husband of thirty-one years; she leaves her two children - Kerryn and Ross; she leaves her six grand-children - Andrew, Lisa, Samantha, Kathryn, Prudence, and Simeon;

She leaves two great-grand-children - Khaylen and Nevaeh and would have dearly loved to have met her treasured, soon-to-be-born, great grandchild.

Joan is survived by her three siblings - Ken, Margaret and Elaine.

My beloved mum is now reunited with her own beloved mum.  We love you Mum and Nanna.

WHAT STARTED MY GENEALOGY JOURNEY?

When I was younger my maternal grandmother would often speak of different family members and their connections.  I just wish I'd taken more notice!

My paternal grandparents were a completely different kettle of fish.  They said very little or nothing and that piqued my curiosity no end!

I can remember at probably about 9 or 10 years of age, I was looking through my grandmother's photo album (or one of them) and I saw a photo of a grave.  I asked her whose it was and she said it was her first husband.

There was a photo of a little boy always on the sideboard.  One day I realised the photo of the little boy looked a bit different to the photo of my Dad.
I asked Nana who he was.  She replied, "That was my first little boy who died."

She didn't encourage further questions so I left it there and being only young I had no clue as to the trials she had been through.

I'd had a happy, uneventful childhood.  Until I was 12 and my brother 10 years old we lived in a neighbourhood in Shepparton, Northern Victoria, with lots of other kids our own age.  We all called each other's parents "Aunty and Uncle".  It was like one big family.  I had wonderful, loving parents and grandparents.  I was very lucky.
When I was 13 Dad bought a farm and if felt like all my Christmases had come at once.  We travelled into Shepparton to school on the bus.  I went to Shepparton High School and my brother went to North Shepparton Technical College.  We had great neighbours and we had motorbikes and horses and dogs and a channel at the back of the house for a huge swimming pool.

In 1975 my parents separated and after that, I didn't see as much of my grandparents anymore so the opportunity to ask more family history questions never really arose.

In 1976 my grandfather developed bowel cancer.  I was going to New Zealand with a friend and as I did know that my grandfather came from there originally I thought I'd ask where.  His reply was "I came from Rangiora, but I was blamed for something I didn't do, so I left".*
I was a bit gobsmacked but because he was ill I didn't push it any further as I could see it troubled him.

When I got to Christchurch I had a look in the phone book and there were a couple of  Forsyth's listed but I was busy having a good time so I never followed up on them.

Our son was born in 1980 and that same year a large family reunion was held at Euroa for my maternal grandmother's Morgan ancestors who had arrived in Australia from England in 1842.  I didn't get to the reunion unfortunately but there was a book printed and it held so much wonderful information and so many photos that it made me even more determined to find out the story of my mystery grandfather.

I did know he had never returned to New Zealand and that he had no further contact with his family there.
I just wanted to know why.
Papa never spoke much of his family and we only ever had snippets like -

• He used to bicycle around the South Island with his brother. (now that's a  long ride!)
• He was one of 9 children.
• There was a Scottish General in the family (I have not to this day found him!)
• There was an astronomer in the family (yes he was a brother in law)
• He had come to Australia in the early 1930s taking horses to the Melbourne Show.

I decided to write to a Forsyth family in Rangiora to see if they knew anything about my grandfather but I didn't get a reply.

In 1999 we got the internet and after I'd learned a bit about how to use a computer from the kids I set about posting queries on every genealogy board and site I could find online and searching for any information at all on any James Forsyth (of which there were many!).
Dad had told me that when Papa died his solicitor sent to New Zealand for his birth certificate but there wasn't one to be found.  Nana listed his parents unknown at his death, so I purchased their marriage certificate to see if he had named his parents on that occasion.

They were married in the Presbyterian Manse in Port Melbourne on the 24th of September 1937 and Papa had given his parents names as James Forsyth and Margaret Musson.

So I posted and posted and waited and searched.

The following is one of the posts I put on genealogy.com

I even had a researcher in New Zealand looking around but she couldn't find him either.  We realised later that she did actually find the right family but because of lack of information, we hadn't made the connection.

Then the following post finally appeared 6 months later in reply to my original.

Earlier I mentioned my nana's photo albums.  After she died Dad gave them to me and there were a few old photos in there of people no-one knew.  Written on the backs of the photos were single words - Hip - Fat - Mac, Leslie and Carey.  Obviously names and nicknames but whose?

Many emails, MSN messenger conversations and phone calls followed.  I told Anne-maree all I knew and she found there were Musson's still listed in the Rangiora phone directory.  She tried one phone number and ended up speaking with my grandfather's sister in law, Mary Musson.  She had never met him but knew the family story.  She said he had been named as responsible for a local girls pregnancy.  He said he wasn't and took off .... or was he sent away by his father?
His family searched and searched for years for him but because he changed his surname to his mother's maiden name and he wasn't found.

My paternal grandfather, who I knew as James Musson Forsyth.  He was born James Richard Musson in 1906  Belfast, Canterbury, New Zealand to James Christopher Musson and Margaret Ann Hay Forsyth.

My grandparents Jim and Brenda Forsyth, taken in 1958.

When I spoke to Mary Musson she enlightened me as to the names on photos in nana's album.  Hip and Fat and Mac were his brother's nicknames.  Leslie and Carey were his sister, Esther's, children. Mary was absolutely thrilled to finally have the mystery solved.  After that, I got several phone calls from New Zealand from Papa's nieces who were as excited as I was.  I even got a phone call from a niece who was living in the town of Deniliquin which is only an hour from Shepparton! 

Sadly I never got to meet Mary as she died a couple of weeks later.  I did go to New Zealand later that year and met all my long-lost cousins.  So many unanswered questions still and we will probably never know those answers. I don't know if my grandfather was sent away to Australia, he was very stubborn or very hurt or all of those but I do know his brothers and sisters loved him enough to keep searching. 

If only he had known that. 

Apparently, when he first came to Australia he was working for a Mr N Vanotti of Park Parade, Ballarat East. 

Nola Bennett nee Musson is the daughter of Eric Mark (Mac) Musson, Pa's brother.  She had a letter that was written to their father from Mr Vanotti. 

It reads as follows: 

Dear Sir, Mr. J. C. Musson just a line to let you know how the boy is getting on over here so I thought I would drop you a line for him to let you know he is getting on over here.  Well Sir he is getting a bit homesick and he may be over at Xmas or in March as he may travel a 3 year Stallion this season as he is looking after him now. He has had a good run for work over here this last two years he is working on a farm at  the present time.  The boy and myself is going to the Melbourne Royal Show next month.  I am taking two horses their.  I do no know weather we can win or not as I know it is a lot of work getting them ready.  Well Boss we had a very cold wet winter over here this year and it has been very hard on stock at Ballarat and I have been hand feeding 18 horses this winter and I got a three year old colt from over their not far from where you are .  The boy knows the place but I can not think of the name he is one of the horses I am taking to the show he is very nice well this is all this time write to the above address.

I am yours
Etc N Vanotti

Below is a wedding photo I was given by Fred Breach, son of Edward Leslie Breach and Esther Helen Musson.

This photo was taken at Esther Helen Musson's wedding to Edward Leslie Breach.  My grandfather was groomsman (back left).  Esther was his sister, closest in age.
Sadly her family says she always pined for Jim.  

I was given a lot of old black and white photos but many people in them are unknown.  Hopefully, with this blog I can post the photos and perhaps one day some of the people may be identified.

** "I came from Rangiora, but I was blamed for something I didn't do, so I left" **
** (Update to this story added June 2017 - "Our Amazing new family DNA discovery"