SNAP SHOT OF LIFE IN ROSANNA 1920s Yvonne Banfield
There were only about 20 houses spread around in acres and acres of open paddocks. The roads were unnamed and unmade, some were just dirt tracks. The main roads were just formed and covered with blue metal broken up with a big sledge-hammer by a little old man with a beard who wore bowyangs. His name was Paddy Cashin. There were no footpaths, just grassy tracks. Cows and horses just roamed at will, ours included, as we had several house cows.
Miss Bray was the post-mistress and all letters were collected from her back verandah, where she had a desk with pigeon holes and all letters were put in alphabetical order under their names marked on the holes.
Every evening the letters which had been posted through the day in a square red letter-box on the verandah were put into a canvas bag. The bag was closed and specially tied with a thick cord and then sealed with an enormous daub of red sealing wax which was melted onto the cord by a candle held over the wax. The wax was then squeezed with a special tool which left the initials P. M.G. on both sides of the wax. This was all done so the bag could not be tampered with. Then Miss Bray would walk to the Rosanna Station to meet the steam train and give the bag to the guard to be collected at Heidelberg station and taken to the Heidelberg Post Office to be opened under supervision and sorted out to be collected next day or for their respective postmen to deliver.
Our lighting was candles and kerosene lamps. We had an ice-chest, a wood stove, a wood copper for washing and open fireplaces in every room. We made our own butter and I had fowls and chickens everywhere so we had plenty of fresh eggs. Electricity was unheard of until 1923; the trains were steam engines and we had three up and three down per day. If we wanted the last train to stop at the station, we had to wave a kerosene lamp or we were left standing on the platform. The ticket had to be bought at the Guard’s room. It took the train one hour to get to Princes Bridge (previously adjacent to Flinders Street Station).
In the summertime it was lovely to see and smell the fruit wagons going into market from Hurstbridge and Diamond Creek at about 8.00 p.m. of an evening. All the local children, about six of us including myself, used to jump on the step at the back of the wagon and help ourselves to the fruit. Next morning, the wagons would pass our place to their way home. The driver would be sound asleep and the old horses would take them home safely.
From: Looking Back: Heidelberg and Rosanna in the 1920s to 1940s edited by Marion Lemin.
First published as : Snap shot of Rosanna 1920s by Ynonne Banfield. Photo Lemin family collection.
