29 August 2022

Celebrate Family History

 


A fourth blog post for the month of August 2022 as I participate in Alex's challenge to celebrate National Family History Month held annually in Australia in the month of August.

Week 4 - Celebrate - tell us what you've achieved this month. What talk did you attend during #NationalFamilyHistoryMonth that you thought was brilliant or tell us about the discoveries you made? 

Celebrate - to do something special, to commemorate an event or occasion

I celebrate the fact that my ancestors made their long arduous journeys to this land and commemorate those occasions where I find evidence of  their lives here. I participate in the enjoyable pursuit of family history to enrich my own life and record stories of our forbears for my children's children.

It is fitting then to reflect on some family history events during the past month. So in no particular order a few things I have done this month :-
  • Watched the inspiring  Opening ceremony talk given by Larissa Behrendt
  • Attended the webinar Using State Records Online - South Australia
  • Thoroughly enjoyed the Society of Australian Genealogist's inspiring session Do SOMETHING with your family history!
  • Written 2 family history stories An August Gentleman and From Shank's Pony to Airy Heights
  • Shared some tips for scanning and labelling photos
  • Presented a Zoom session for my local genealogy group on Free Texts: Internet Archive and JSTOR for family history
  • Presented a session for our volunteers on Finding and Saving photos from our Cooroy Rag photo collection
  • Attended an excellent session presented by Shauna Hicks in our local Noosaville library entitled Why can't I find it?
  • Designed a business card for our local group and updated our new brochure with a QR code 
  • Worked on rescanning old photos in our family collections
There is always more to do, that's the joy of family history. We look for it, learn about it and learn from it. 

Celebrate family history!




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

14 August 2022

From Shanks's Pony to Airy Heights

Some Vehicles of Yesteryear

he has ridden in a bullock dray, spring cart, the old Mass shandrydan, and the motor car; and daily witnessed the flight of men through the air as birds on the wing” (1)
Written in 1933 the passage above reflected the changes in modes of travel during the preceding 90 years of David O'Leary's life.

No doubt many of us through the years asked the question of our parents - "How will I get there?" to which their answer may have been "by Shanks's pony" implying that we had two good legs to walk the distance. We are lucky to have seen the developments in modes of travel that provide us with many easy options for reaching desired destinations.

In my Father's times

Looking through our family photos reveals the changes in modes of travel since my father was a boy. When he died in 1992 he had certainly seen and experienced many changes. He courted my mother travelling from Alma into Hamley Bridge via horse sulky. He was the proud owner of an early buckboard followed by a Buick and several generations of Holden cars. Farm vehicles changed from horses and carts to trucks, utes, tractors and motorised implements. 
Below are some photos of the vehicles my father travelled in or worked with throughout his lifetime from 1908 - 1992. 

Travelling to Church on Sundays
"The old Mass shandrydan"
Later in his life my father, pictured here as a boy in about 1918, adapted wagon wheels for use as children's play equipment.

Travelling to School


Edward John Horgan is listed on the Alma South school register as having attended there for 8 years from the beginning of 1914 until the end of 1921. The ride to school was about three miles.

Moving around the farm

Andrew Horgan with sons Eddie and Joe atop a cart used to move the hay stooks from paddock to  haystack, about 1937 on the Alma farm.

Owning a motorised vehicle

When my parents moved to Snowtown after the birth of their first child, a vehicle of their own was needed. Here is Dad looking very proud of his buckboard.


After the death of his uncles, Jack and Tom Horgan, the young family now with two children, moved back to the Horgan family farm at Linwood.

Here are some of his vehicles with my father pictured in each one.

Notice this cart now has tyres rather than wagon wheels.

My mother wrote on the back "First load of bales and Eddie, Linwood"

Taking goods to market on trucks

Eddie Horgan c 1954
Above: The Oldsmobile truck is loaded with bales of wool ready for the long slow drive to Adelaide. The trip down, unloading the bales and the trip back home took all day. 

A later photo with sheep on board
Eddie Horgan c1959
photo taken from paddock across
the road from the newly built farmhouse

My parents depended on the income from the wool, sheep and grain as well as selling the cream from the cows and eggs from the fowls. It was a hard, busy life with seven children to be fed, dressed and educated. I do not have a photo of Dad with bags of wheat on the back of a truck, but that too was a common sight at the end of harvest in late December or early January.

Dad with his Buick or is it a Chevrolet, the car we had before a range of Holdens

In later years my parents travelled for pleasure by train, boat and aeroplane. One of my favourite travel stories was of their visit to St Peter's in Rome in 1979. My father a very devout Catholic always removed his hat at the back of whichever church they entered and placed it on a nearby table or chair to be retrieved at the end of Mass. This was always fine in the small country churches where nobody would take a farmer's hat. Yes, he removed his hat on entering St Peter's and must have deposited it carefully somewhere at the rear of the cathedral. He was surprised when his hat was no longer there on exiting.

Creative use of old vehicle parts

Here's some old wagon wheels Dad adapted to make a see-saw for his children.
My six siblings bumping up and down or perhaps posing for the photo

The stones at either side of the wheels were placed to prevent it from rolling away. I wonder if any of my siblings remember any "accidents" on this seesaw.

Another use of a wagon wheel, what we knew as our hurdy-gurdy.
My siblings and self, the youngest, on the old wagon wheel

The iron frame surrounding the wooden wheel was hot on sunny days and one quickly learned to lift one's feet and hang on carefully to a wooden spoke before being spun around. Behind us is the maroon coloured fence with gates on three sides in the backyard of the old house. It kept us safe from the dangers of the farmyard and the nearby creek.

My father's creative talent of putting old parts to new uses was handed down to his son and grandson who continue to work on the farm each day.

1. 1933 'A NONAGENARIAN COLONIST.', Bunyip (Gawler, SA : 1863 - 1954), 29 September, p. 7. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article9664921
This post first appeared on earlieryears.blogspot.com by CRGalvin

8 August 2022

An August Gentleman - a Great-Grand Uncle


August - National Family History Month

August - Someone or something that is august is dignified and impressive

David O'Leary was a well liked and valued member of his community; more than 150 people attended a farewell evening for him in Tarlee in May 1896.

Early years

David was born in Thebarton, South Australia in 1843 to Andrew O'Leary and Catherine Burke. By 1849 his parents and their young family had moved to Para Plains, near Salisbury where they farmed for many years. Those were the days of horse drawn ploughs and there are several reports of David competing in ploughing competitions as a young boy with his father's horse and then as a 16 year old with his own horse.

At age 29 in 1872, David acquired two blocks of land just south of Tarlee less than 2 miles from where his elder sister Hanora had been living since her 1863 marriage to John Horgan.
Blocks of land in the Hundred of Light, near Tarlee, SA



David and Mary Johanna Bannon married in November of  1874. Mary Johanna had been teaching in newly established Catholic schools prior to their marriage. Two children, Andrew and Ann Catherine were born to them in the next years. 
Now well established in the district, David became a founding member of the local Agricultural Show Society in 1877.

Tragedy strikes

On returning from a shopping trip to Stockport in 1878, a tragic accident  took his wife a mere three and a half years after their marriage. The horse trap she was driving mounted an obstacle as she tried to turn a corner. She was thrown out. It appears that the panicked horse may have caused her deadly injuries. David was left with the two toddlers to care for. One imagines his sister Hanora Horgan who was nearby would have helped with the little ones even though she had a young family too. Perhaps Mary Ann his younger sister who was about 24 years old came to help. Mary Ann married just a year later in 1879 so David must have found other support. There is no evidence to suggest that he remarried.

When his sister Hanora's husband John Horgan died after a short illness just a few years later in 1883; David was one of the executors of his will. 

In 1893 David became a founding member of the Tarlee Literary and Music Society.

In 1895 an advertisement in the Adelaide Observer appeared offering his Tarlee farm for sale. David's parents had died and perhaps he wished to be nearer to his other siblings near Salisbury now that his children were young adults with their own lives to lead.

In the article below we are given some indication of the respect he had earned in the intervening years through his community involvement.

Social to Mr D. O'Leary

A farewell social and presentation was tendered Mr David O'Leary by his numerous friends at Tarlee and the surrounding district on Wednesday evening April 22.

Mr O'Leary who is leaving for Salisbury, has resided in the district for nearly thirty years, and the committees of the various local institutions to which he belonged decided to co-operate for the purpose of recognising in a practical manner his numerous good qualities, and the active interest he had always taken in the welfare of the neighbourhood.

About 150 ladies and gentlemen assembled in the Institute Hall to do honor to the departing guest, the chariman of the Agricultural society (Mr F. Gray) presiding.

The presentation took the form of a handsomely designed gold locket, bearing the following description:- "Presented to David O'Leary on his departure from Tarlee, April 22, 1896," and a purse of sovereigns.
Mr Jas. Edwards (president of the Institute) was called upon to make the presentation, and in his remarks made complimentary reference to Mr O'Leary's straightforward disposition.
the other speakers were the president of the Catholic Picnic Committee (Mr P. Hogan) and president of the Literary Society (Mr Jno. McInerney) who spoke on behalf of their respective bodies, and Messrs Jas. Doyle and D.G. Stribling.
Mr O'Leary feelingly replied.

The article continues with descriptions of the musical and spoken recitations performed by various members of the community, concluding with: The dance that followed terminated a most enjoyable evening.

1896 'Country News.', Southern Cross (Adelaide, SA : 1889 - 1954),
 1 May, p. 4. , viewed 29 Jul 2022,
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article166349321

Throughout David's following years in Salisbury he appears in many charitable donation lists in the newspapers supporting many worthwhile causes. But where was he living at this stage? A land sale in 1915 reveals that he had been farming north east of Salisbury for nearly 18 years.


David appears in the news again in 1926 at a farewell for the parish priest in Salisbury.

The presentation took the form of a well-filled wallet of notes, and was
made on behalf of the congregation by Mr. David O'Leary, the oldest member
of the parish, who was present at the laying of the foundation stone of St
Augustine's Church nearly 70 years ago.
He is the eldest son of the late Mr. Andrew O'Leary sen., who arrived in
the State in 1840, and with his bullocks, carted the first stones- for the erection
of the church.

On David's 88th birthday in 1931 an extensive article about his family in the Out among the People page of the Advertiser and Register includes the following tribute:

He is one of the few remaining links which connect us with the infant days of our state, and one who has won troops of friends by the integrity of his life and kindly charitable disposition.

The articles published on his 90th birthday in 1933 wax lyrical about his character, his family and the changes David would have seen throughout his lifetime.

David died in 1937 and a lengthy obituary was published in the Southern Cross newspaper followed up by a similar article in the Advertiser.

Indeed I regard David, brother of my great grandmother Hanora Horgan, as worthy of the title "An August Gentleman."

Postscript: Blocks 38 and 45 are now owned and farmed by Hanora Horgan's gt-gt-grandson.


1926 'COUNTRY NEWS.', Bunyip (Gawler, SA : 1863 - 1954), 12 February, p. 3. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article96639182

1931 'Out among the People', Advertiser and Register (Adelaide, SA : 1931), 10 September, p. 10. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article35683570

1933 'A NONAGENARIAN COLONIST.', Bunyip (Gawler, SA : 1863 - 1954), 29 September, p. 7. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article96649217

1933 'MR. DAVID O'LEARY', Southern Cross (Adelaide, SA : 1889 - 1954), 22 September, p. 17. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article167698004

1937 'OBITUARY', Southern Cross (Adelaide, SA : 1889 - 1954), 15 October, p. 10. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article167703748

1937 'Out among the People', The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1931 - 1954), 13 October, p. 25. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article36377955

1938 'TARLEE.', Kapunda Herald (SA : 1878 - 1951), 16 September, p. 3. , viewed 08 Aug 2022, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article108405173


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



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