I was a child of both home schooling and our local public school, before being sent to boarding school. Mum taught myself and my siblings around the dining room table as by that time the schoolhouse on our property had been converted into extra accommodation for jackeroos. The last time the building had been used [...]
The 1960s. Life in the bush is filled with busy work days, long hours spent out in the sun working with livestock, planting or harvesting crops, or in the paddock mending or constructing fences, sheds and yards, delving bore drains, fixing windmills or digging new dams so vital water flows. The weekends however are bliss. [...]
Yesterday morning the Murki Homestead burnt to the ground. Four generations of Alexanders lived there, from my great-grandfather’s time through to my generation; 1893-2016. It was here that the early beginnings of our business were established, and over the years the house grew to accommodate successive families. Beneath its roof men and women discussed the [...]
Over the last few days I’ve been compiling some of my family history to be included in a book on pioneers in the greater Moree district. Anyone who has done a speck of research into their ancestors knows what a time-consuming job it is. Tracing your family history is very much like falling down Alice [...]
When I was little, my older brother, John and I had a treehouse opposite the jackeroo’s quarters on the property. Actually, treehouse is probably too flash a name for what was basically four long timber boards nailed into the higher branches of a bottle tree. From our point of view, what that tree lacked in [...]
Have you ever noticed that at family gatherings the stories that are shared quite often relate to a moment in a family’s history. We exchange memories of precious times and loved ones, delighting in snippets from the past, a form of reminiscence that can bring great joy and humour, but also reflective sadness. Recently I [...]
