Pickled Gizzards

I remember starting to print the letters of the alphabet at Mrs Kerr’s kindergarten on Trevallyn, Launceston. I was aged 4, and we were all using chalk on a slate. The following year, in Grade 1a at Trevallyn State Primary School, Launceston, we were then writing out our letters with pencil on paper with lines spaced to help us form the letters like p and h, g, k etc that had a small bit and a tall or long bit. And at the same time were were learning how to spell and read very simple words, too, like our own and family names, the words for colours, shapes and more, and reading simple sentences from books called ‘readers’. Goodness, when I think of all that, learning to read and write is an amazing process for a little human to go through – but we managed it to some level of efficiency, and here we are.

Most of us had a wooden pencil case in which we kept a spare pencil, maybe our own pencil sharpener, and a few coloured pencils, plus a rubber eraser for when mistakes really had to be rubbed out, but we were encouraged to be careful and and not have to rub out stuff, which became important as we moved up to the next stage.

Somewhere in Grade 4, (1956) we graduated to writing in pen and ink. So our pencil cases also needed a pen that would hold a nib to be dipped into a ceramic inkwell on our desk. (the pencil cases now held a spare nib or two as well) All the wooden school desks had a hole at the front right corner in which sat that ink well. There were no special desks for left handers, and those unfortunates were strongly pressured to become at least reasonable writing with their right hands. When the ink in the nib got low, we’d blot what we’d written holding blotting paper in our left hand while dipping the pen in our right hand into the inkwell and loading it up again. (and v.v. for the lefthanders…) So we developed a write, blot, dip, write, blot, dip routine. We often smudged what we’d written, but most of us became fairly good at avoiding that. Also by this time we had graduated from printing our letters to joining them in a flowing script style known as Cursive, which kids today find hard to decipher, having done much of their schoolwork on keyboards.

Every week the inkwells had to be filled, and we all had to be rostered for a turn at being ink monitor. Ink powder had to br measured into a large bottle or jug of water and the mixture poured into each inkwell. Being ink monitor was a vital job that we all loved doing, because for some reason it was the most prestigious of all the classroom duties we were rostered to do, like cleaning the blackboard every afternoon and making sure there was enough chalk on the ledge, emptying the classroom rubbish bins and more.

At this time the grownups who needed to write at work or compose and mail personal letters to family and friends had the option of a fountain pen, or a typewriter if they had one – as Mum often did.

But nothing stays the same for ever, and not only were we now writing rather than printing our letters and words, but dramatic change was about to revolutionise not only our written work, but the whole world’s hand writing, too.

At Christmas, 1956, I received what looked like a fountain pen, in the same nice presentation box that fountain pens came with in those days. Inside was what looked just like the pen in the photo above, with screw on cap and all, and it was even maroon red, too. But when I took the cap off, I found it was a newfangled ballpoint pen. This thing was called a ballpoint or simply ‘biro’, and it’s worthwhile taking time to read this article in the link that outlines who invented it and why it was such a perfect solution to the problems that everyone in addition to schoolkids, had with fountain pens. I had no idea for example, that until biros went into mass production, that very few people on the African continent had any means of writing anything, at all.

I recently met a woman whose grandson attended a grade school in Forida US. We got talking about all this, and she told me he’d been ordered not to even take his fountain pen to school, or use it in any homework either, because it ‘would ruin his handwriting’. We laughed when I told her that was exactly what my teachers told me about this new fangled ballpoint pen, the biro, that I and some other girls had received the previous Christmas and were forbidden to use in school !!

When we were young in the 50’s, virtually all our food was home cooked by Mum, or occasionally by Dad. The only fast foods available were the classic Australian meat pies available at every corner store and school tuckshop, fish and chips from fish shops everywhere, or hotdogs at the Launceston Show or other large crowd events including school fetes and the football. When we ate out, we went to the nearest or favourite Chinese cafe (and we were lucky if that was more than once or twice a year) or a hotel dining room, which was very unusual, and once a year we would have lunch in a Coles cafeteria. Most of what we ate was either at home, up at Gran’s on sundays, or at the homes of a handful of other little friends whose parents were also friends of Mum and Dad’s.

Mum told us that when she married she barely knew how to boil an egg and so she enrolled in night classes at the Launceston Technical College to learn how to cook. In today’s world that probably sounds a bit exaggerated, but born in January 1923, she’d have left school at about 16 years of age, probably got her Leaving certificate, and she may have taken a secretarial course either at school or night school, because she was proficient with shorthand and typing. Family records are sketchy and can’t be verified these days as that whole generation has now gone, meaing I’m the matriarch!!!! , and I never thought to ask Mum much detail, as our family was totally focused on everyone needing to go to university and get a degree. She was the only adult in our family who never had that opportunity, as her father, Grandpa (Ted) Croan felt tertiary education was wasted on girls who’d only leave the workforce after a few years and start producing children. Looking back I can see she always felt the odd one out in the family she’d married into, and I’m sure in their own way her new family, the Padmans, made her feel inferior for that – it was a very sensitive point for her. But she was bright, and would certainly have been successful at university, as she was articulate and very well read.

She landed a job at the Commonwealth Bank’s head office in Sydney (which was fairly prestigious) but that bank was a government owned entity, and employees were engaged under The Public Service Act of 1902, which stipulated married women were legally barred from holding permanent positions within the Australian Public Service (APS). Women were required to resign upon marriage, and though they could continue working in that position, could only do so as temporary staff, which effectively stripped them of superannuation benefits and advancement opportunities. The act was eventually repealed, but not until 1966. So Mum resigned when she married and moved from Sydney, New South Wales to Launceston, Tasmania, and became a full time homemaker, at which she was very good, too. She learned how to really cook, and was an efficient money manager.

In the mid 50s Australian cuisine began to change from being almost entirely British to reflecting the growng influences of the large and rapid post-WWII immigration from Europe especially, and the availability of ingredients that come onto the market to cater for that demand. In the mid-60s Australians began travelling far more in Asia, and culinary influences from that part of the world came home with them, and then increased as Asia became a more important source of immigrants too. Today, Australia’s cuisine is a heady, delightful fusion of dishes from all around the world. Mum would have loved it, as she enjoyed making foreign recipes, and several of her friends spoke admiringly of how adventurous a cook she was.

The catering side of Mum’s home making activity included the daily meals for everyone of course, and we spent a lot of time in the kitchen helping. When quite young, from her we learned to cook simple things, and in secondary school the mandatory subject of Domestic Science included cooking and sewing classes.

On friday afternoons we’d come home from school to literally a heap of baked goodies that in theory would last the coming week. There was a small mountain of rock cakes, and cake racks featuring fresh date loaves and sponge cake halves for filling with jam and cream on saturday or sunday. From about April/Easter to perhaps the end of September, most weeks there’d also be a pot of soup cooking on the stove top, too. Once made that would continue and be added to for several days from saturday through mid week.

I still operate to this timetable, because home made beef and vegetable soup is a highly nutritous meal on its own with a cracker or two, or accompanied with other things like really fresh bread, any kind of sandwich (toasted or not) an omlette, or buttered toast with/without Vegemite and/or cheese. So here’s how Mum made her weekly pot of soup in cold weather.

Beef and Vegetable Soup From Scratch.

At the butcher’s or meat counter, I ask for some soup or beef bones – I get about 1-2 kg or a double handful. If you want chicken and veggie soup get several (3-4) chicken carcasses, and proceed the same way.

Place the bones into a very large pot, cover with water, and add a large or two small onions (coarsely chopped) a couple of cloves of garlic (pressed or chopped) a couple of bay leaves and some freshly ground pepper – I only add salt later, not at this stage. Bring to the boil and then gently simmer for several hours, topping up the water if necessary. The meat, gristle, skin and such on the bones should now be falling off easily.

Remove from the heat, and lift the bones out onto a plate. Pour the liquid into a large bowl through a strainer and leave to cool overnight, even put in the fridge. When cold there will be a layer of solidified fat, clean dripping or lard (which you can save for cooking, or discard) Using a spatula or slotted spoon, lift this layer of fat off the top leaving the clear liquid, which might be a little gelled now, depending on how much gristle and bone marrow were in the bones.

Remove the meat left on the bones and chop if necessary. Also remove any gristle fat or skin still on these bits of meat. Add one or two soup cubes, another chopped onion, and a good quantity of various fresh vegetables – such as chopped celery, including those tops, chopped parsely, finely chopped cabage, several chopped leaves from a cauliflower, spring onion tops, diced carrots, finely chopped string/runner beans, a small grated turnip, some diced or grated pumpkin, some grated potato, and mushrooms. I’m fortunate to have a food processor, so this stage can be quick. I put this all back on the stove, and top up with lots of water and have it simmer and bubble to cook the vegetables.

‘Correct’ the seasonings to your preference now – and here’s where I add a little S&P if necessary, and it’s now ready to serve – bon appetit!

The other day I was talking to our youngest grandson Ronan, 23, in a conversation about changing printing technology, which touched on cameras, and we got to a point where I realised he barely knew what I meant by 35mm slides and getting film processed; which let me to mention slide nights. He commented that they sounded a wonderful alternative to board games and cards. (He clearly had no concept of the hours we sent listening to plays and serials on the radio either, but that’s for another day.)

While writing this post, I googled around to check a couple of things and I was astonished to find this page, https://uy.ebay.com/b/Collectible-Film-Slides/262415/bn_55190306 on which you can buy job lots of slides. (why? who knows …) There are many job lots offered – and it’s worth a read, as some of them are amusing, but the most impressive one so far is “1960s + World Travel ~ Photographer Estate 960 COLLECTIBLE TRANSPARENT SLIDE LOT ….. (sic) US $750.00 or Best Offer”

My father, Ronan’s grandfather, was a physics whizz and was always fascinated by new technological developments, that is by pieces of equipment and machines that do specific jobs. With the outbreak of WWII in the Pacific, he enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force, RAAF, to serve as a radio operator in Papua New Guinea, but was soon moved over to the team developing the new RADAR technology for use against the Japanese who were rapidly moving down through South East Asia towards Indonesia and ultimately Australia.

Postwar he was an early adopter of the new fangled 35mm camera with images recorded onto the Kodak colour film that when processed came back mounted in 35mm card frames – which were called slides. Of course these were small things, and required a viewer or a projector so that we could see them well. Dad bought a projector, a tripod, and slow release trigger to enable him to press the button and quickly get back into position in a group photo. His brother, Uncle John, did the same, and they joined the large number of snap happy Australians recording in Kodak colour their families, gatherings of all kinds including school sports days, conferences, travel activities and community events.

Dad’s brother, Uncle John, was an industrial chemist working for the paper and particle board manufacturing mills at Burnie on the NW coast of Tasmania. In the mid to late 50s, the company sent him on a 4 or 5 months-long tour around some of the world’s most important paper and manufactured wood producing companies in Scandinavia, north America and Japan and there may have been others. I’m sure he’d have photographed lots of fascinating industrial plant, machinery and key personnel wherever he went to include in his reports to the company.

But along the way he also had days off for sightseeing, and my first recollection of a slide night was actually a saturday afternoon, when Uncle John and his family brought some slides around to project onto a lounge room wall. I think the aunts and Gran came too. The couch and all the chairs were moved to the opposite wall. The blinds were drawn, and in the breaks for reloading the slide carousels there were cups of tea, scones and Mum’s cinnamon tea cake to enjoy. It was a fantastic afternoon. Uncle John was a good talker, and told us such interesting things about his work trip he’d so clearly enjoyed (and it was clearly a huge feather in his cap to be sent on it) Young and old, we all asked questions, so it was very educational to hear his impressions of these places which we might have already seen in books, but which he’d actually visited! He had pics of places like the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the Tower Bridge and Buckingham Palace in London, the view from the Empire State building in NY, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Grand Canyon and Disneyland and what he told us about these things enthralled us.

As in many Australian families of the day, Mum and Dad occasionally invited friends over for a slidenight to tell of their latest holidays or travels, and they went to other people’s homes – it was a fairly common thing in those days before TV arrived in Tassie in time for the Melbourne Olympic Games in 1956. I’ve only just seen it because my subscription to The Australian lapsed there for a while, but one of my fav. columnists, Bernard Salt, recently wrote on the demise of some important social rituals in Aus: “The slide night was a means to showcase not so much foreign places but to demonstrate a measure of worldliness, which was (and still is) a prized quality in an isolated colonial society. Sadly, the slide night is no more but we still need or want its purpose; today it’s fulfilled by Instagram. Insta delivers better images and has scope for quirky commentary but it can’t replicate the warmth, the humour, the familial sense of occasion that was the slide night.” Absolutely, Bernard!

Teachers found sets of slides were wonderful teaching aids, and I myself used to lug around sets related to some of the art quilt workshops I taught in the 90s and 00s. I haven’t taught in-person classes for years now, but I do speak to fibreart and art quilt groups by zoom and now show power point collections of images of my own or other artists’ work to illustrate what I’m saying.

Up until early this century, entry into the prestigious art quilt exhibitions required full and detail image slides of whatever works we were entering, so we needed several duplicates of each so they could go back and forth in the mail, and it was usual for an organising entity to keep the slides of all those accepted. What a relief it was when digital technology took over, as today we just email images; even my photographer just sends huge image tif files suitable for publication within hours of taking the pics, and no longer sends them to me on dvds. I make copies of those originals and resize down to much smaller jpgs and thumbnails for my blog.

This morning an interesting post from Inspire Daily facebook post this morning popped up in my FB feed – telling how in 1927 a physician noticed the large numbers of tired looking, listless children were appearing in schools, and found that many of them had eaten no breakfast before coming to school – times were tough – the Great Depression was underway. Their attendance and academic performance overall was poor, and the doctor realised they were suffering from malnutrition. Due to his campaigning, the Norwegian government introduced free nutritious breakfasts for all Norwegian school children in 1932.

These were simple and served cold, but they were nutritionally well balanced with nutrients to foster physical growth and improved health. Called Oslo breakfasts, they consisted of a wholmeal bread roll, some cheese, vegetables, a piece of fruit and some milk, plus a spoonful of cod liver oil. Results were quite startling, as children began to show signs of growing taller than their average cohort had previously shown, and as academic performance levels increased, illness and absenteeism decreased.. By the late 30s and 40s the hugely successful program had been adopted by a number of other countries incuding Australia.

The appearance of that post in my feed this morning was an interesting coincidence (or was AI listening to our phone conversation? ) because just yesterday Ro and I had been talking about the difference in life expectancy between that of our parents’ generation, born around 1920, who expected to live into their 60s; and our own, the post WWII Boomers, born beginning in the late late 40s, who expect to live into our 80s – which I will reach this year.

Our family lived in Launceston, just a few doors up the street from the entrance to the school we all attended, Broadland House School, BHS. Naturally we went home for lunch most days, but once a week we were allowed to take homemade sandwiches (always mashed egg and chives, still my fav.) a piece of cake and some fruit for lunch at school (in addition to our usual play lunch for morning recess) Other girls who lived further away of course had to take a lunch box, and a handful of girls even had lunch in the boarders’ dining room, at considerable cost no doubt. I’m the eldest in the family, and when I was 8 or 9, the school Parents and Friends, P&F, trialled a new system – which I think was one day a week. On that day we could order what was called an Oslo lunch!!! I’m not sure but it might have been ordered the day before – but anyway on the day, we went into the assembly hall and collected a brown paper bag containing a some wholemeal bread with cheese, perhaps tomato and lettuce, and I think an apple. I don’t remember a drink but it was possibly choc milk. No codliver oil, though. But Mum was pretty diligent with the codliver oil when we were very little – Ro says we only had that revolting Scotts Emulsion administered to help us get through the winter colds and flu season, but I’m not sure it wasn’t occasionally dished out through the whole year 🙁 but anyway it’s also now available orange flavoured.

The lunch-making BHS mums welcomed the popular Olso lunches innovation, and I think that gave the P&F the green light to go ahead with the tuckshop plan, which probably started the following year, as it was only a short time that Oslo lunches were distributed in the school assembly hall.

As the city of Launceston is my home town in the state of Tasmania, I keep an eye on a Facebook page devoted to the history of Launceston and Northern Tasmania Recently someone posted 1969 photos of several streets and intersections in the central city area. I haven’t been to Launceston recently, but know shopping centres out in the suburbs have grown in importance and taken a lot of that bustle from the CBD over time. It was started by supermarkets and other important food shops, then shops other than supermarkets gradually moved into the biggest centres, eventually having several locations out of the city and, then branch offices of banks and even some government departments followed, and so on. In cities everywhere in the world this process has changed CBDs, including in our current city of Montevideo Uruguay, where it has been just as marked. On my first visit in 1989, the footpaths were crowded from 10am when the shops opened, to around 10 at night, but today there’s a mere fraction of the people in any street downtown.

People’s behaviour has changed, too. If she were still alive, my mother would probably regretfully comment on the clear drop in standards that people show when they go shopping today – she never left home to shop down town without being in one of about 2 of 3 suitable outfits complete with stockings (which had seams in those days ) hat and gloves. (perhaps with an audible sniff) When we were children, every home had bottled milk delivered every morning, usually from around 4 or 5 am to about 8am. The baker, green grocer and butcher would all deliver a couple of times weekly (many people had a standing order, and paid the bill at the shop monthly) Some green grocers and bakeries would also have mobile delivery vans that would visit areas at certain known regular times, so that when people expected them, they’d come outside and buy at their front gate. There were many more local post offices everywhere back then, so people walked to collect parcels sent to them, and letters were delivered to homes twice a day, between 8.30 – 11.30, and about 1 and 4, and once on saturdays. But for furniture, clothes, shoes, books, linen and bedding, fabrics, knitting wool and all kinds of other things, you had to ‘go to town’, literally. And one day a week, thursday afternoons, Mum would go to town. This meant leaving a baby sitter, Mrs Jessop, in charge of us, changing her clothes to a good outfit, selecting hat, gloves and handbag to complement that. She had the car that afternoon, to do who knows what around the town, and always brought home packets of multicoloured Fruity Chews which she’d give to us if Mrs Jessop confirmed we’d been good girls that afternoon – oh yes, we knew how to respond to that promise of a treat!

“Going to town” required being properly dressed. As someone on that FB paged commented, going to town was pretty up there with going to church, or going to Grandma’s for sunday lunch (both mandatory weekly fixtures in our young lives)

Now, another angle on this aspect of my upbringing comes from the visit by two friends a few days ago. One of them grew up in this very well heeled Montevideo suburb, Carrasco. She and her husband currently live in the central area of the city which is all undergoing some degree of gentrification. They’re renovating their 3 story building into a comfortable 2 story city home above a ground floor with a commercial space and two small apartments. They stopped at our nearest local supermarket for something to bring for lunch, and she commented that shopping there was so different to shopping in her downtown local supermarket.

It wasn’t just the obvious one of the different balance in the range of goods stocked. She commented on how people dressed – and I certainly do a visual check/slight upgrade, possibly even change a shirt, before I go shopping around here, because I have certain clothes I only wear at home doing chores and stitching. And I know that everyone else in the store will be well dressed and well turned out. Even if they’re shopping on the way home from the nearby sports club or gym, they somehow manage to look well turned out!

But my friend also said that even conversations between shoppers were very different, too, and this I must follow up that some time. Local shoppers of course know other local shoppers, but here they do tend to just stop where they are and chat on, seemingly oblivious to how they’re blocking other people until someone asks one of them to move – whereas where our friend shops, people tend to be much more aware of other shoppers and usually just step aside without being asked… interesting! But that’s for another day.

I often write about something from our Kalgoorlie-Boulder Western Australia days – because 13 of my 78 years (a bit over 1/6th of my life) was spent there, many wonderful memories remain, and so many things from those days( 1969-75 and 1981-87) continue to influence my life today. It’s probably a bit late now 🙂 but I’ve always said to Mike ‘If we need to go back to Kal, just say so and I’ll start packing straight away’.

Mike’s first employer there was the Great Boulder Mine, and in a time of acute housing shortage in the boom, two demountables, both sent up from Perth and placed on the mine’s leases, were our first two homes there after our wedding in Launceston, Tasmania in 1969. (in those days no one shacked up together before marrying, as that was the kiss of social death) We headed west from Tasmania to the amazing world of a mining district in the full swing of an exploration boom, for nickel, which began in the mid 60s and then with mining underway the exploration phase faded by the mid-70s, and we moved on up to the NT and Mt. Isa, about which I’ve already written a bit and will write more in time. Both our kids were born in Kalgoorlie, and we made some wonderful lifelong friends there, many of whom also moved on as mining people do early in their careers, but a few others are still there, as these days the city has matured and there are better options for those who decide to remain in retirement. When we were there it was very common for people to retire to Esperance or the Perth metro area.

To go to Kal in the nickel boom was a huge and pretty exciting culture shock to me. Apart from the locals, who were a particular breed – everyone else came from “somewhere else”, and had no ties in the town. So when we began producing children there were no nearby grandparents, for example – and there were effects about which I will write elsewhere. There was still no TV yet, and so people took part in a very busy cultural, social, church and community life, a lot of which revolved round the hotels, with darts, pool and billiards teams! The famous Hay Street brothels were openly tolerated as a social service in a community with big numbers of single men from ‘somewhere else’ working in the area, perhas our of town during the week but they came to town on the weekends only, and like ourselves, none had family ties. The brothels were of course also patronised by some of the locals, and were safely located just a block down the street from the main police station. The minute one of the madams reported a disturbance, she could count on instant police action to settle it and remove trouble makers.

There were many active sporting and social clubs including tennis, football, cricket, squash, horse and dog racing, swimming, athletics, golf, netball, cricket, rifle and pistol shooting clubs, and bowls – though I don’t recall any mention of my grandmother’s sport, croquet. Many social activities revolved around churches, too, and choirs and amateur theatricals thrived – as did almost every recreational or hobby activity you can think of! Newcomers and locals alike became creatively entrepreneurial, bobbing and weaving, some making their fortunes, others not so much.

In every boom, in the long run most money is made providing services to those who come seeking the big discovery. Quite a few people made and some lost huge amounts of money on the stock exchange. During the heady nickel boom, all around Australia people focused on daily movements on the stock exchange and participated in trading on their own accunt of through share clubs. One company, among many, that rose to glory in the boom (and most then crashed) was Poseidon, a company built around a fabulous discovery of nickel which was in huge demand at the time. One of my father’s friends bought some Poseidon shares at about $15 and promised to take his whole family on a trip to Europe if they hit $300; we all held our breaths as they moved up and up, climbing over $280, and then began to fall, fast – he managed to sell at something like $35/share, a fabulous enough profit over his initial investment, but so disappointing for the family! And he was one of the lucky ones! Others we knew who did well included a couple of state school teacher friends who started a successful truck hauling business, a coin operated laundry and a cafe in the main street; a nother local fruit juice vendor did really well and became something of a real estate mogul; a furniture salesman successfully branched into real estate; a market gardening family installed a large store/shed and stepped up from horse and cart vending to major local and regional suppliers of fruit and veg; a pharmacist bought a run down old business, revamped it and following that success branched into several other businesses; formerly employed on the mines, some industrial chemists set up analytical labs to contract mineral assaying for prospectors and small companies; small business owners became big businesses as the suppliers of equipment and consumables for the exploration industry; electrical appliance sellers made fortunes as the demand for fridges, fans, portable air coolers and other domestic appliances soared; automotive electricians and camping goods suppliers made fortunes equipping vehicles with 2-way radios and other gear for remote area travel; someone bought a small cafe that used to sell spaghetti bolognaise by the pot full at the door (bring your own pot) and expanded into a large modern motel with a high quality restaurant – both always pretty full. An associate of Mike’s who ran a drilling company always bought a parcel of shares in every company that contracted his services for diamond drilling – that last, most expensive but final exploration step that no one takes without having good results on previous programs. He made a good pile down the years. It was amazing to see the rise and fall of a boom – but I’ll go into the fall on another post.