A Winter Tragedy in Terowie

A Life of Quiet Strength 

In the cold midwinter of 1913, Kitty suffered a horrific accident that would change her life forever. With her father away at work and her mother ill with a severe cold, the young girl tried to light a fire to make her mother a cup of tea with disastrous results.

We are fortunate that the treatment of burns has come a long way since this poor child suffered.

Born on 29 December 1904 in Broken Hill, New South Wales, Catherine Mary Malycha, known as Kitty, was the second child of Mary Immaculate O’Dea and Valentine Malycha. Her family had moved north from Terowie, South Australia in the wake of legal and financial troubles involving Valentine’s father. Their stay in Broken Hill was brief and they returned to South Australia to be near their extended families. Like many settlers of the time, the Malychas hoped for a new beginning beyond Goyder’s Line. Yet the harsh conditions of life were dangerous.

The accident

TEROWIE. June 21. - A sad accident occurred today, when Mr Malycha's little girl,  Katherine, aged eight and a half years accidentally set fire to herself and was severely burned. The father's duties necessitate his absence from home, and the mother being unwell having a severe cold, the little girl got up, unknown to her mother, to get her a cup of tea, and it is surmised she put kerosene on the wood to make a quick fire. The mother, hearing screams, was quickly to the rescue, but was unable to put the fire out until it had severely burned the little girl. Medical aid was soon procured, and the little sufferer was conveyed by the doctor to Mrs. Robinson’s private hospital, where she is now lying in a critical condition. (1)

 Kitty’s story captured public attention. Living in a tent at Birthday Siding, East–West Railway, she wrote to The Worker, a labour newspaper, sharing a brief but moving account of her ordeal: (2)

The editor at the time, Mary Gilmore, a notable poet and advocate for the working class, ensured Kitty’s story was not forgotten.

Her letter sparked an outpouring of kindness. Letters of comfort and friendship poured in from across the country. In a subsequent issue, Kitty thanked the many strangers who had written letters of sympathy and friendship:

“I really cannot write to all, as they are too numerous.” (3)

Valentine, Kitty’s father, had been working on the railway line being established to connect eastern Australia with the west. Kitty wrote to the Daily Herald in 1918  describing life in this remote corner of South Australia. The camp was now about 105 miles (170 kms) from Port Augusta.

It is very dry, and the rabbits are very poor. They climb bushes and trees for feed. There is no grass about our camp, and none grew last year. Birthday Siding is five miles from the camp, and the J.R.V. dam is about the same. I catch a number of rabbits in steel traps daring the night time. I do a lot of knitting. (4.)

https://collections.slsa.sa.gov.au/resource/PRG+1780/3/14
Birthday Railway Siding: A small wooden shelter with water tank, and wagons on railway line.
This photo was taken well after construction of the railway was finished. Living conditions in tents in this harsh environment during construction was extremely difficult for families

Life in Spalding

After the completion of work and the dismantling of the camps, the family moved to Spalding, South Australia. Kitty never let her injuries define her. Though much of her life was lived quietly in the Mid North of South Australia, the newspapers offer glimpses into her later years. She lived in Spalding, where she contributed to community life through her participation in Catholic fundraising events, local dances, and the Country Women’s Association. A talented needlewoman, she won prizes for her hand-knitted garments at CWA shows, including a bed jacket in 1934 and a gentleman’s cardigan in 1935.

Her parents died within a year of each other, her mother Mary died in July 1935, aged just 55 and her father Valentine passed away in March 1936, aged 62. 

Her elder brother Stephen Francis (Frank) married in 1935, and her younger siblings Frances, Margaret Eileen, and Thomas (Tom) all married in the following years, all with connections to the local districts. 

Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Kitty remained a resident of Spalding, appearing on local electoral rolls. She was involved in efforts supporting Australia’s war effort, with her fancywork once again recognised at the 1942 CWA Exhibition, which raised over £61 for wartime causes. 

Kitty’s life centred around family. In later years, she is recorded holidaying with her sister Frances (now Mrs. G. Dowd) a niece and nephews at Fisherman’s Bay, a detail that gives us a glimpse into her role as a devoted aunt and family matriarch.(5)

Catherine Mary Malycha passed away in April 1974 in Spalding, the town where she had spent the majority of her adult life. She never married, but the love held for her and the strong family bond is reflected in the words on the tombstone in Spalding.

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Catherine Malycha's O'Dea ancestors

Gt. Gt. Grandparents Patrick and Mary O'Dea arrived in South Australia on the "Time and Truth" in 1854

Gt. Grandparents  -Thomas O'Dea 1831 -1914 and Bridget Hill 1838 -1902

Grandparents -   Margaret O'Dea 1858 -1938 married another Thomas O'Dea 1843 -1925

Parents  - Mary Immaculate O'Dea 1879 -1935 married Valentine Malycha 1873 -1936

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1. 1913 TEROWIE;, Daily Herald (Adelaide, SA : 1910 - 1924), 28 June, p. 8. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article124954060

2. 1916 ;CHILDREN'S LETTERS. The Australian Worker (Sydney, NSW : 1913 - 1950), 15 June, p. 11. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article145766198

3. 1916 CHILDREN'S LETTERS., The Australian Worker (Sydney, NSW : 1913 - 1950), 3 August, p. 11 .http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article145766624

4 1918 THE LETTER BOX. Daily Herald (Adelaide, SA : 1910 - 1924), 16 April, p. 8.http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article124540003

5. 1953 SPALDING. Northern Argus (Clare, SA : 1869 - 1954), 28 January, p. 8. , http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article100589391

This post first appeared on earlieryears.blogspot.com by CRGalvin

Duty, Land and Legacy

The Sale of the Snowtown Farm

In the spring of 1942, a public notice appeared in the Chronicle newspaper announcing the sale of a 466 acre farm near Snowtown. At first glance, it looked like a routine land auction, one of many conducted by the South Australian Farmers’ Co-operative Union during those years. But behind the advertisement lay a story of family and duty.

The property was located in the Hundred of Cameron, Bumbunga, just southeast of Snowtown, a region known for its robust cereal crops and mixed farming. The land was good, and so were the improvements: a solid six-roomed homestead, a chaff shed, machinery shed, pigsties, stables, cow yard, and a fowl house, the land all neatly divided into six paddocks. 

The farm, a tidy and productive holding, had only recently been acquired in 1940 by Edward John Horgan. But barely two years later, he was forced to put it up for sale, not by drought or debt, but by the weight of family obligation and personal loss.

In quick succession, Eddie’s two uncles, Tom and Jack Horgan, passed away. They had managed the family farm at Linwood in South Australia’s mid-north for many years, but had leased it to their neighbours the Arnold brothers when they moved to Riverton with their sister Kate. Their deaths left the Linwood property in the hands of their ageing brother, Andrew, Eddie’s father. Suddenly, the task of keeping the old family property going fell to Eddie, his brother Joe and his father.

The decision to leave Snowtown was not made lightly. Eddie and Hannah had only recently put down roots there, investing in land and building a life. That life was tough and pennies were few. Hannah recalled walking one and a half miles to a neighbour's farm to borrow a match. A letter to her mother sat on the mantelpiece for several weeks before she could afford the stamp to post it.

Now with two toddlers in tow and another on the way they prepared to make their way south.  By August of 1942, Hannah was in Riverton Hospital where the birth of a still born babe would have added additional stress and concerns. (1)

The 1942 auction was held at the Snowtown Market on Tuesday, 13th October. The land was offered in two parcels, 190 and 216 acres, but could be sold as a whole. Cash terms applied, a standard arrangement during wartime, when credit was tight and inflation loomed. The auctioneers, operating out of both Adelaide and Snowtown, handled the sale on behalf of E.J. Horgan, who had no choice but to walk away from one farm to tend another one steeped in family legacy. The final sale and settlement of the land transfer did not occur until March 1946 when the title was transferred to a Glen William Davidson. (2)

This advertisement in the newspaper fails to reveal the whole story but highlights the way lives were reshaped by family responsibilities and the obligations of inheritance. It’s a story repeated in towns and farms across Australia, where loyalty to land and kin often meant changing direction when least expected.

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1. 1942 'Family Notices', The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1931 - 1954), 26 August, p. 10. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article48880231

2. Certificate of Title, SAILIS, Vol 1712, folio 124

This post first appeared on earlieryears.blogspot.com by CRGalvin

Arranging a Family Photobook

For the Grandchildren

Now in the second half of the year thoughts turn to approaching birthdays and that inevitable end of the year Christmas celebration. What presents will I find? What can I hope will endure and not be lost in later years?

With this in mind I am preparing a photobook based on my husband's line to give to our children for them to share with their children. I want to use a variety of photos I have going back as far as their three times gt. grandparents. 

The only photo I have of  John Patrick Galvin, their 2 x gt grandfather is this rather grainy photo from a newspaper. It is dated October 1927 when he was 59 years old. I don't think this photo would have much appeal to four young boys.

John Patrick Galvin (1)

In order to clean it up I gave an extensive prompt to ChatGPT.  This prompt appeared in a Facebook group but the original author of it was unknown. 

Restore this vintage newspaper photo by removing visible halftone dots, scratches, and discoloration. Enhance facial features and fine details while preserving the original style and texture. Improve clarity, contrast, and definition without over-sharpening. If black and white, keep tonal balance natural; if faded color, revive tones subtly. Maintain authenticity while making the image clean and presentable. It shouldn't look like a digital rendition, but like a touched-up vintage photo.

I then uploaded the photo.

The first iteration was good but not suitable, the face is too wide

AI cleaned image by ChatGPT

I then added "His face should be slightly longer and thinner"

AI cleaned image by ChatGPT

This is a better rendition, better than I would be able to do in photo restoration software but not a true photo of J P Galvin.

I will add the newspaper version to the photobook and next to it the AI rendition labelling it carefully so that future generations know that this is not actually a picture of him but it is how he might have looked in 1927. 

What a pity the original photo did not survive as John Patrick Galvin himself was a photographer. I wonder what he would think of this?

1. 1927 'H.A.C.B.S.', Southern Cross (Adelaide, SA : 1889 - 1954), 14 October, p. 11. ,  http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article167804044

This post first appeared on earlieryears.blogspot.com by CRGalvin