ReCollection – Rock ‘n’ roll, cars and happily ever after

Edited transcript of interview with Heather Cox.

When I started to go with John, I wasn’t quite seventeen. It was at the beginning of Rock’n’Roll and all those sorts of things, when the music was changing. My cousin Richard first started us going over to the Westbreen Hall. They’d started a dancing school and he’d say, “Come on down to the dancing school, there’s some boys come down from the bush, from Tocumwal.” And that’s when I went over and met Ian and then in turn John.

When I saw John, he had my cousin sitting on his knee and I thought, “That’s a bit… you know…” so I thought, “I’ll invite him over for dinner”. Mum thought he was pretty good but my dad didn’t like him at all, he thought, “You’re not going with him!” and when I asked him, “Why not?” he said, “I don’t like the way he’s dressing.” He had really thick, black hair, really flattened down with Brylcreem and long sideburns.

None of the boys had cars or anything then, they just couldn’t afford them. And if they did have cars they were really old, old cars that they had to patch up every time they went out on the road.  That old Vauxhall was a funny thing too. He came one night and said, “I bought another car today!”, really happy with what he’d bought. I was working in at Little Collins Street then in the little boutique that I used to work in and I said, “ Can I come for a drive?” and he said, “No, not really…” and I said “Oh yeah, I want to come for a drive!” I was all dolled up with the stockings with the seams in the back, the high-heeled shoes, the pointy toes and straight skirt and off we went, but it had no floor in it! (Laughs) It was pouring with rain and when I got home, my Dad got upset (at him) for going out in a car like that with (me) because I was covered in mud that had sprayed up off the tyres.

He was always running out of money. Always running out of money. He’d be going home on a Saturday night in one of these little cars and he’d only get so far then run out of petrol. My dad had the truck parked out the front of the house and he’d come back with a jerrycan, John, and a hose and ask if he could have some petrol out of his truck. My dad would have to get up out of bed and siphon the petrol out of the truck into a jerrycan and off they’d go. In the end, my dad bought him a jerrycan, filled it with fuel and left it in the garage and nobody was allowed to touch that. That was Coxey’s Saturday night fuel.

We still went to the dances every Saturday night and on Saturday night we’d make plans for Sunday. We’d either go to Bulla, swimming up there in the creek or go for a picnic somewhere. They were happy days. There was nobody that drank alcohol. There were no drugs that I knew of and it was all really good.

By this time, my dad was really starting to think that John was all right until he asked him if we could get engaged, then he didn’t like him again! He made us wait for several weeks, but when John asked him if we could get married we waited ages until my mum said, “Why can’t they get married?” and he said “She’s too young, she’s not getting married yet.” But we talked him around. (Laughs)

So I was nineteen in the January, we were married on the 5th of March, 1960.It was just a perfect day. They’d built a new church in Kent Road. John and I were the second people to be married there, which was pretty special in the new church. We had our reception at the Westbreen Hall. The week that we were getting married, the Vauxhall died. So we were going to Warrnambool for our honeymoon and Richard again came to the rescue. He had an old Chev and he said, “Take my car, don’t worry, don’t stay home, take my car!” So off we went and, on the way home, the gearbox played up so we parked it on the side of the road and we had to hitchhike back to Colac to get to ring somebody. A cattle truck pulled up and here we were in the truck with cattle all in the back.

We’ve been married 55 years that we’re both very proud of and I think the secret is just respect for one another and really our love one another.

About the ReCollection project.

As part of the 2017 Melbourne Fringe Festival, Memento Media partnered with Moreland City Council to present ReCollection at the Coburg Carnivale. ReCollection is about celebrating, sharing and capturing the memories of Moreland’s places, history and faces. The ReCollection exhibit showcased short documentaries and printed historical material which helped attendees take a trip down memory lane.

During the Carnivale, many locals generously shared their stories about life in Moreland in our specially built ReCollection Recorder.