Continuation of the Lionel Edgar Laws family story as told by Frank Goodall Laws to his children Helen, David & Alan
In those days
wages and conditions are nothing like they are today. How my parents fed clothed and kept us I will
never know. We were always well fed and
clothed. My eldest sister Lill was a
stalwart. She stayed home and helped
keep things moving. She made most of our
clothes and cooked and helped my mum.
Our family could never repay Aunty Lill for what she did for us in those
days. At Warwick my mother bought a
Wertheim washing machine, wooden manually operated. She also bought a piano (a Hapsberg) and both were bought
on terms. This piano was a really good
one. Aunty Thelma has it now. It has
been renovated and modernised in appearance.
For years my mother did her washing by boiling up 2 kerosene tins on an
open fire and lifted all the water she used. No set in tubs in those days only round
galvanised tubs. My father’s work took
him away from home most of his time. He
told me that in 1916 he decided to have some home life. He applied for and was successful in
obtaining the job of Shire Engineer at Allora. On 16 June 1916 we shifted from
Warwick to Allora. All our family went
except Uncle Lionel who took over the contracting work, which previously he and
my father carried out, Victor who left school in 1915 and had many jobs. He was working at Flitcrofts coachworks as a
striker for a blacksmith when we shifted to Allora. Richard was overseas at the war.
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| Allora Shire Council with Lionel Edgar Laws 3rd from the right in the back row & Jacob Holmes 2nd from the left in the front row. |
Lil and Jess
learnt music at the Warwick St Mary’s Convent.
Jess also learnt painting there and at the Warwick Technical. Lil stayed home and helped my mother. Jess worked at Poulsen & White
Photographers where she did retouching of plates.
My fathers
appointment as Shire Engineer carried a salary of 265 Pound per annum and he
had to provide his own conveyance, a horse and sulky for which he received no
allowance. His salary did increase
sometime after to 350 Pounds per annum and he still had to find his own
transport, however some relief came a few years later when the Queensland Main
Roads Department came into being.
In the
beginning of Main Roads work, it was supervised by the Shire Council. The first Main Roads construction on the
Darling Downs was in the Allora Shire about 3 miles from Allora- Banndons on
the Warwick road and on Collins Hill on the Toowoomba Rd. The allowance my
father should have received was 2 ½% of total cost but the Shire Clerk claimed he
should get half of this and my father had to agree. He kept his job as Shire Engineer until May
1925. I will tell you more of this
later.
Referring back
to our arrival in Allora, We first took a rented house in Geck St at 15/- per
week. (This is the street Mum and I set up our first house later in 1929). Lily stayed home and helped Mum. Jessie got a
job in the Shire Office as assistant to the Shire Clerk not immediately but
some little time after our arrival.
Frank, Fred, Colin and Jack all went to school at the Allora State
School. Owing to the War the cost of
living was increasing. Many manufactured
goods were in short supply. Local stores
holding stock kept putting up prices on stock held. This was common all over Australia and a word
called profiteering was coined for this practice.
Some eight or
nine months later we shifted into a bigger and better house with more land in
Jubb St (near Grandfather Stay’s saleyards). Uncle Lionel and Victor did not
move to Allora but stayed in Warwick. At
this time Allora had no electricity supply no water supply and no refrigeration.
Lighting was kerosene lamps and later petrol lamps. Some houses (only a small number) had a
lighting system installed. These were
Gloria Wizarde Quirks systems. They were actually petrol operated. A container holding 4 gallons of petrol was
installed and through air pressure pumped into the tank by hand pump to about
50 lbs pressure. The petrol was forced through a hollow brass wire to lights permanently installed in homes and shops etc. Each light had its own generator and a small
brass tube which when heated generated gas from the petrol and this was forced
into a mantle which gave the light. An example mabe be seen at http://tgmarsh.faculty.noctrl.edu/hollowwire.html
We had two petrol lights at that time, one as standing table lamp and the other a
Hurricane lamp type and also kerosene lamps
and candles. Earlier in Warwick we only
had kerosene lamps and candles although Warwick had town gas for street light
and some houses and shops had it at this time.
Electricity was produced in Warwick for supply to consumers soon after
we left there in 1916.
I first met
Mum when I went to Allora School we were almost 13 years of age. In December both Mum and I sat for the High
School Entrance Exam at Warwick. We both passed. Mum also sat for State
scholarship and passed. I did not sit
for this. In January 1917 Mum went to
Ipswich Grammar School as a Boarder.
*1 When Marjorie was away at Ipswich Grammar School
Frank was friendly with Eva Jensen sister of his friend Peter Jensen.
I went to the
Warwick State High School. I travelled
by train each day. Riding 4 miles on a
bicycle to catch the train at 9am and the same on return in the evening at 6 pm
and then ride 4 miles home. I went for
two terms. I left to start work at Allora in Barnes & Co. a grocery and hardware store.
The vacancy was caused by a young man about 19 who had enlisted. I stayed in this job for nearly 9 years.
We were living
in Allora when news came through that my brother Richard had been killed in action. This was a great blow to my Mum
and Dad and also to all the family. It
was the first break in the family. My mother never recovered from this loss.
Both Fred and Colin went to the High School for about a year. Fred left to take a job as a compositor at
the Allora Guardian Newspaper to learn printing but later switched to plumbing
when he was apprenticed. Colin took a
job with the same firm as I worked. Jack
came on later and joined the Post Office as a telegraph messenger switchboard
operator.
In 1919 Aunty
Lil who was keen to be a nurse went to Brisbane and trained to be a nurse at
Pyrmont Hospital later to become St Martin’s when the new War Memorial Hospital
was built on the site of Old Pyrmont.
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| 2 sisters outside the hospital |
When we came to Allora my sisters became
friends of the Holmes sisters Bess, Linda and Norma-daughters of Jacob Holmes. Through them Uncle Lionel met Aunty Bess and
Uncle Vic met Aunty Norma. Uncle Lionel
and Aunty Bess were married on October 22nd 1919 and lived at Warwick where
Uncle Lionel was still contracting building roads and bridges in the district. Uncle Lionel was the first of
our family to marry.
Some four years
later, Victor married Norma at the Church of England Glengallen Church on 6
June 1923.
Your Mum, Marjorie Stay, spent four years at the Ipswich Grammar School. She returned home at the end of the School year. She passed her Senior and was keen to go to University but her parents said they could not afford it and she was forced to finish school. She obtained a job in the office of the Allora Butter Factory as Assistant to the Manager and after a while just about ran the office. She kept this job until she left to get married. She and I became friendly a year or two after she came home from Grammar. She was a very good tennis player and had a good singing voice. She was keen on her Presbyterian church and belonged to the Choir and Guild and was organist for some time.
Your Mum, Marjorie Stay, spent four years at the Ipswich Grammar School. She returned home at the end of the School year. She passed her Senior and was keen to go to University but her parents said they could not afford it and she was forced to finish school. She obtained a job in the office of the Allora Butter Factory as Assistant to the Manager and after a while just about ran the office. She kept this job until she left to get married. She and I became friendly a year or two after she came home from Grammar. She was a very good tennis player and had a good singing voice. She was keen on her Presbyterian church and belonged to the Choir and Guild and was organist for some time.
* 1 Comment added by his daughter Helen.
