Sepia Saturday: Monumental steps

This post is in response to the Sepia Saturday's theme photo. I couldn't find any wheelbarrow photos so I've elected to look at the steps leading up to the fountain.

It must have been about 1962 when the Phelan family had a holiday in Canberra, Australia's capital. There was a lot to see. From the snapshots I can see that they visited the War Memorial, the old Parliament House and the Australian-American Memorial.

Family on the steps of the War Memorial, Canberra

War Memorial as it is today. It was opened in 1941 and houses a significant museum.

Family at King George V Memorial near the old Parliament House, Canberra

King George V Memorial as it appears today. It was commissioned in 1936 and constructed
 in the workshop but the war intervened and it was not unveiled until 1953.

The Australian-American Memorial, Canberra

The Australian-American Memorial, Canberra

The Australian-American Memorial on the
60th anniversary of the opening by Queen Elizabeth 2 in 1954.
It was built to commemorate the role of the US in the Pacific region in World War 2.
It is topped by an American Eagle 11 metres high.

Canberra today is a very beautiful city with the national war memorial, art galleries, parliament, botanical gardens, a large lake and other special sites. It's a planned city, built from scratch, but that's a whole other story.

I suggest you see what other bloggers have contributed over at Sepia Saturday's webpage.

Mt Macedon

We recently visited the Macedon area in Victoria. Neither of us had been there since we were children in the 1950s so it was time - such a beautiful spot and only and hour or so from home. The first European to climb the 1000 metre mountain near Macedon was Major Thomas Mitchell in 1836. He named it Mt Macedon after Phillip II of ancient Macedonia.

Some of my family visited the area c1947. It looks like they're in a garden which isn't surprising because Macedon is famous for its beautiful private gardens. Dorothy and Allen Wyllie are my paternal grandparents.

Family picnic, Macedon c1947: (l-r) ?, May Rose and her sister  Dorothy Wyllie,
Dorothy's daughters Barbara and Dorothy, and her husband Allen Wyllie.

Some of my husband's family visited the area before the war, shortly after a large cross was erected on top of Mt Macedon. On a clear day you can seen Melbourne and Port Phillip Bay to the south.

This large cross is one of the most significant war memorials in Victoria. It was built in 1935 as a memorial to soldiers who served in the 1914-1918 war by a wealthy resident, William Cameron, whose son had died in the war. It's 21 metres high, is faced with terracotta tiles and embellished with a large bronze sword. The cross was restored in 1995 because it had been damaged by storms and a devastating bushfire in 1983 known as Ash Wednesday.

Phil at the Memorial Cross, Mt Macedon.

Phil's uncle, Gibson Phelan, with friends and family
at the Memorial Cross, Mt Macedon in the 1930s.

Memorial Cross and gardens c 1935 [Museum Victoria MM045589]

Memorial Cross and gardens after the bushfire in 1983 [Sydney Oats, Flickr]

Memorial Cross, 2014

We discovered a lovely cafe at the top of the mountain, delightful gardens and natural bush as well as walking trails and a memorial to a plane that crashed into the mountain in 1948. (It was a DC3 ANA flight, he Captain and his First Officer were killed, the hostess and 19 passengers survived.)

Sepia Saturday: The case of the disappearing statue

A 1914 photograph of the Thomas Jefferson statue in Columbia is the theme for Sepia Saturday this week. So my contribution to the theme are these two photos taken in Huonville, Tasmania by family members from Victoria who holidayed on the island of Tasmania off the south coast of the Australian mainland in 1938. They shipped their car over and drove themselves around. I think their car is shown in the second sepia image below.

There are two photos of this bridge and it's a mystery how the first one was taken. The Huon River is fairly wide and I have snipped the Google Maps image from about half way across the bridge so I can't imagine what vantage point was used unless it was taken from the second storey of the old 'Franklin Tavern' that was and is on the south side of the river. I wonder if the family stayed there overnight. [You can click on any images to view larger.] The first bridge across the Huon was built in 1876 and was replaced by a new bridge in 1926. I don't know when the present bridge was built.

Huonville, Tasmania 1938

Image from Google Maps 2014
The red hotel on the corner still exists and externally appears to have changed little.
The red arrow indicates the position of the statue in the photos below and above.

Huonville is about 40 km south of Hobart and used to be a big apple orchard area. (Tasmania is known as the Apple Isle but it is an industry in decline.) There are still apples there but now tourism is important because it's a very beautiful part of the island. Well, actually, all of Tasmania is beautiful.

OK, I'm getting to the theme. This photo is taken from the north side of the bridge and you can see the statue to the right of the car (which I think is Grandpa Phelan's). It's a statue of a soldier holding a gun and is a memorial to the soldiers from the district who served in the Great War of 1914-1918.

Huonville, Tasmania 1938

Google Maps 2014. Arrow indicates the approximate position of the original statue.

But the statue is not there now. Where has it gone? In several newspaper items the memorial is called a cenotaph, and it appears to have still been there in the 1950s. Maybe it was moved or removed when the present bridge was constructed.

Mercury 26 Apr 1938

Mercury 17 Apr 1951

I suggest you wander over to the Sepia Saturday website to see some more sepia photos of statues around the world.

Sepia Saturday: Peace

There used to be a town called Mologa. It developed to serve the land selectors that started arriving in the 1870s. Now the shops, churches, school and post office have almost gone. But the War Memorial remains and it records the names of sons of those selectors who served in two world wars.

The two photos below have been taken from almost the same position and you can see in the first some of the buildings that used to be there in the 1920s. Great-uncle Ray Leed was killed in France and Great-uncle George Leed served in France. Both are named on the memorial. In fact for such a small community there are a lot of names on the memorial and this is repeated all over Australia.

Mologa war memorial (Alford family album)

War Memorial, Mologa (2013) Photo: Tim Fitzgerald
http://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/conflict/ww1/display/32659-mologa-war-memorial

Most towns and cities in Australia erected memorials after the first world war and they still hold an important place in our culture. They are the focus point for the ceremonies that are held each year to celebrate the volunteers who left to serve overseas. And the communities also planted memorial avenues of trees, installed memorial boards in halls, clubs and workplaces and built memorial halls, bridges and so on. The war had a huge impact on the peace time that followed.

Not far away from Mologa is the town of Mitiamo. At the time of the first world war it was bigger and busier than it is now but it hasn't disappeared like Mologa has, and the community at Mitiamo also installed a memorial. I remember reading somewhere that this memorial is unusual in that it has a female sculpted figure - presumably she represents something or other and is not just there to look pretty. She seems to be holding a basket of fruit or vegetables.

Grandpa Roy Phelan (at right in the photo below) served in France in WW1 and his name is on the memorial. And so are the names of his two sons, Neil and Keith, who served in WW2.

Mitiamo war memorial (Phelan family album)

Mitiamo war memorial (Phelan family album)

The photo above is interesting because it records the German machine gun that was also installed at the memorial. It is no longer there and I believe it was stolen.

Mitiamo memorial as it looks now.
More information here: http://en.tracesofwar.com/article/8643/War-Memorial-Mitiamo.htm
and here: http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~ausvsac/Mitiamo_War.htm

The theme for this week's Sepia Saturday was peace, as in a campaign for peace, but I don't have any campaigners in my photo collection. So I went for the 'peace after war' idea.  I suggest you march on over to see what other Sepians have to say about peace.