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Thursday 27 May 2021

Mrs Rule's Lending Library, Essendon



This book turned up recently in the Book Nook, Christ Church Op Shop, North Essendon (corner Marco Polo St), from a former lending library, recalling for us the days of circulating libraries dotted about the suburbs. 

Mrs Rule ran a confectioner's shop (cakes, or possibly a milk bar) with the library as a sideline.  Mrs Rule died in 1950 and the business was thereafter run by her son, Frank Rule.  The business in the 1960s has been recalled as a milk bar, fancy goods and stationery shop.  Does anyone remember it when it also had a lending library? 

You can learn a bit more about Mrs Rule's Lending Library by clicking on the link.

Thursday 13 May 2021

The Missing

See this tribute to the workers of the Red Cross Wounded and Missing Enquiry Bureau and the post-war work of the Australian Graves Detachment and Graves Services men who retrieved the remains of the fallen to bring together into a Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery.  The Missing.

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

This media item is licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). You may share (i.e. copy, distribute, transmit) this item provided that you attribute the content source and copyright holder; do not use the content for commercial purposes; and do not rework (i.e. alter, transform, build upon) the material.


© Copyright of Wind & Sky Productions
© Digital reproduction copyright of Wind & Sky Productions
Director: Jary Nemo. Writers/Producers: Lucinda Horrocks and Jary Nemo.

Documentary film, The Missing, 2019, 11:21 minutes, director Jary Nemo, writer/producers Lucinda Horrocks and Jary Nemo, Australia, Wind & Sky Productions. 

Sunday 9 May 2021

William F Salmon and the Evolution of a Park

 

City of Essendon memorial walks and children's playgrounds. H. Y Frew, compiler. 1919.  State Library of Victoria Collection. Accession no: H2013.297/1-24

On 1 September 1918, mere weeks before the Armistice, William Frederick Salmon's only son, Percy Salmon, fell at the Front.  Two months later, Salmon offered to the Essendon Council 8 acres of parkland, planted and nurtured by himself over a period of years, as a memorial to "Essendon's brave soldiers".  The reserve became known as Salmon Reserve.  The Council took over the maintenance of the reserve, though it was a further 14 years before the land was transferred to the Mayor and Councillors of Essendon.  And when the land was transferred, it was four acres, not eight.   

Marilyn Kenny in her usual inimitable style, has had a detailed look at why the transfer took so long, and why the size of the land had shrunk to four acres.  

William Salmon came very close to succumbing to the last major pandemic in Australia - the influenza epidemic - and caused a local sensation by remarrying from what was tantamount to his deathbed.  He married Annie Laing Reid Sutherland, the sister of his doctor, Bertram Sutherland, with Salmon's three daughters and husbands strongly disapproving of this deathbed marriage.  They refused to attend the wedding. If you want to know the outcome of this strange affair, you can find more details on the Time Travellers website.