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William (Jim) Wyatt

MEMORIES OF WADDAMANA 1951/2

I arrived at the Guest house and became ill. The nurse came and then phoned up the Doctor. He diagnosed that I had Pleurisy and instructed the nurse over the phone to give me an injection each day until I recovered.

My wife and mother-in-law were so worried. We did not have the welcome that we expected from my wife's Aunt and Uncle ( Archibald and Madge Guy).

Aunty Madge would not come into the bedroom where I was recovering.

At last I was up and about. I felt well enough to help out with the running of the Guest House.

Uncle Arch had sometime before had a petrol pump installed near the Guest House. Whoever was available would go and serve either from the Hydro Electric Company or visitors to the area with petrol.

My wife Betty and her mother Lizzie worked for Uncle Arch and Aunty Madge. I decided to apply for a job at the Hydro Electric Company as a labourer.

My interview was with the Superintendent, Mr Kirbin .He gave me a job.

My wife and I became friendly with the milkman and his wife. There was a herd of cows at Waddamana so people could have fresh milk.

I had been a farm worker in the UK. So one day the milkman wanted to go to a football match. I took over for the day and milked all the cows by hand. Also Hay was grown especially for the cows.

One day Mr Kirbin asked me to dig his garden. I think he wanted to grow potatoes. His house was next door to the Guest House. After i had finished digging Mr and Mrs Kirbin came out to see what i had done. Mr Kirbin was a short man and his wife taller and bigger than her husband. Mr Kirbin was from Germany.

They were very pleased and Mr Kirbin said “The garden has never been dug so well before”.

Another occasion Mr Kirbin asked me to clear a patch of land near the Hydro. There was a lot of stones to remove. I took a small lorry down to pick up the stones. Unfortunately the ground was not level and I drove the lorry into a dip. Mr Kirbin was not very pleased he had to send men down to winch it out.

Usually I worked on or around the Hydro Electric building, helping as a labourer with the maintenance. We were sent up through the bush to the hilltops to check the pipes. They were made of wood and sometimes became frozen. We had to break the ice.

One day I was in the Hydro Electric building. All of a sudden there was a terrible noise and I was really frightened. The machinery had come out of synchronization. They had to close all the turbines down and restart.

Some of the men were unkind  and said that England had no bathrooms and only outside toilets. Which was true for some people.

One of the men was the site carpenter. He made amazing wooden furniture, which I admired very much.

Then myself and family decided to return to the UK at the end of 1952. It had taken six and a half weeks to get to Australia. Our return journey was only three weeks. The ship was full of produce and goods for Christmas.

The Guys