01 Family Movie
"That's me on the left. My sister Ruth on the right, and my brother Alan is in the centre. My father had a 16mm Kodak movie camera and that was one of his great pleasures." - Bruce Petty
"Uncle John Gilham?, who was brother-in-law of mine, happened to borrow a movie camera - 16 mm movie camera - and I borrowed it and to take a picture of our children and I was that interested in the movies that I bought one for myself - a Kodak it was, and i took quite a lot of photos on 16mm film, and these photos - it's very interesting to have them now because they were of my Children - Bruce, Ruth and Alan, and Mary, who stayed with us - and we have those photos now" - Les Petty
"I can remember ascending us in the right order and little bits of choreography we'd have to do" - Male Speaker Unknown
"He was a very meticulous operator, you know. He did do things quite professionally when you think about it. - Ruth Petty
"It was a second hand camera but it was very satisfactory. It was a very simple one to use. No extras on it but it was satisfactory for what I wanted to film" - Les Petty
"I think those days there probably was an expectation of performance you know. The idea of letting things happen - cinema verite - was probably happening, but not where we were. We were expected to behave in some way in front of a camera, because this was for posterity - not just for a quick look. I may well be based on what the queen did or what the royal family did. We certainly walked around like a royal family for the camera and petted the dog. That's my only sort of measure of how we behaved.
Before movies dad was interested in still photography. It was plate photography then. Terrific quality - some of the work he did." - Bruce Petty
"One of the first sessions that was on the radio was a photographic program and they had a competition and I put in for this competition and I got second prize. The photo was that of a little bird that had come out of its nest, but it could stand up, and I had my earphones on the table and the bird appeared to be listening to the earphones. I called it "The Bedtime Story" - Les Petty
"Recording their various expeditions out the Dandenongs. Dad would assemble of course the whole - line them up - he'd want to be in it, so he'd get the old string remote control string trick operating wasn't as remote as it is now but it was pretty effective - if he could stop grinning that is." - Bruce Petty
"He used to go out with in fact the local minister. he used to set a camera up and wait for hours until his bird came back to her nest" - Alan Petty
"Day trips involved the camera. It would there. Snow was pretty rare around Melbourne, but when it happened that would be an obvious thing to et dad on the move." - Bruce Petty
"At times we went up to my Grandfather's little house at Olinda. They were great days then when we'd go to a shop and buy a pie or a pastie or something" - Ruth Petty
"Dad would focus on something - some tricky bit of movement - some animal - bit of behaviour that he found intriguing. The rest of us were highly embarrassed most of the time, but these were duly recorded. The zoo was a good one." - Bruce Petty
02 A Spring Carnival held at Doncaster school 17 Sept 1938
Mr Everard MLC declares the Carnival Open
The Maypole Dance by the scholars was the centre of attraction
"They had a fete at the school where they had a maypole dance, and i took photos of that." Les Petty
"It must have been absolutely intriguing to record these events there at that time in the 1920's and 30's to see things move on a screen. I quite envy that. This is a scooter race. Frank Burbury would usually win these. Great moments in our childhood" Speaker unknown
"It was Frank Burbury. He used to win all the scooter races. They lived on a few acres near the corner of Whitten's Lane and Doncaster Road. Same age as my late father, Peter Thiele." Christopher Wendy Thiele Facebook
03 Farming & Orchard
"Well, I'm 97 years old. I am the oldest member of the Petty family that is living just at present. I have been a fruit grower all my life. My parents were fruit growers.
Actually, our great great grandfather came out from England in 1855. He came out on his own for a start to travel around Australia just to see what the prospects were and he bought quite a big acreage of land in Doncaster. It's called Petty's Lane - the boundary of that land. When he saw the prospects of Australia, he sent back for his family and Tom, George and John, who were just boys were brought out by their mother.
Practically every generation of the Petty family went on the land at Doncaster.
I had my orchard on the boundary of Doncaster and Templestowe on the corner of High St and Manningham Rd. I had about 30 acres there.
We grew mostly peaches, apricots and lemons and pears" - Les Petty
"All the pears were put in a coolstore - a local cooperative coolstore and we would pack them during the winter" - Alan Petty
"We would get up early in the morning and pick until noon, and, the afternoon, we'd set too nd pack them into bushel cases and they were sent into the Victoria market.
I did have help for a while but Alan was the main one who helped me on the orchard." - Les Petty
"I had no desire to do anything else really. I vaguely remember the draft horses, and I remember buying the tractor it was a Fordson, Cork model. One of the first in Doncaster." - Alan Petty
"I remember him being on a tractor before he was in school. The mind bogles." - Ruth Petty (Alan's sister. Later married Plumb)
"I suppose normal things that kids would do on the farm, yes. Most people either had a Petty plough or an improved version of a, which was called a ==(hilman?)==. Invented at a Box Hill Foundry by Daniel Harvey." - Alan Petty
On plough is seen "D.Harvey Ltd Box Hill"
"The tractor wasn't considered to be suitable. They thought it would hammer the ground down too much.
Dad was quite a pioneer really in getting one."
- Alan Petty
Thanks to Marion Richards for contact details for Ruth Petty. Thanks to Ruth Petty for permission to put online.
Comment Extracts:
- Petty Plough:
Petty Plough in Les Petty Film 03 Farming 9sec
Daniel Harvey, 'Petty' Disc Plough & Attachments, circa 1950
https://collections.museumvictoria.com.au/items/1531904
https://collections.museumvictoria.com.au/items/1531904
- There were many coolstores in the area at various times. There was the Doncaster one, west of Williamson's Rd, East Doncaster on the corner of Doncaster Rd and Devon Dve, and a few privately owned in later years. Craig Martin Facebook
- We had a cool store for many years in Ross Street. We moved into our home in October 1978 and cool store closed late 80's early 90s ...if memory serves me right. We moved out of our house in Ross Street, built in the 1960s, 4 years ago. It no longer stands. 3 townhouses occupy the land now. And Department of Housing occupy the cool store land...small little boxes/ houses stand on that land. Sandra Davies Facebook
- My family lives in Rose Street, Doncaster ... Mr & Mrs Petty had a cool store at the end of Rose Street and Carawatha Road and lived at the end of Rose Street ... we used to play on their trampoline at the back of their house ... Helen Pearson Facebook
3 Petty's Lane Doncaster appears at 53sec on 03 Farming Orchard GoogleMaps
- Fordson Tractors were made in Cork Ireland. “Ford of England restarted Fordson manufacture at Cork, which involved a lot of work given that the factory had been disassembled in 1923. Ford Ltd bought much of the tooling from Ford of the U.S. From 1930, Fordson tractors were again sold in the United States, via imports from Cork; the Dagenham plant opened in 1933 and took over production from the Cork plant, which was again closed. George and Eber Sherman became the leading importers of English-built Fordsons.” Rod Annear
- I'm sure the unknown female voice is Alan's sister Ruth Plumb nee Petty. Heather Rogerson
- I was an apprentice ladies hairdresser in Jackson Court between 68 and 71. Regular clients were Mrs. Petty and Mrs Tully. In the late seventies we bought a house in Seville, our neighbours were Alec and May Williamson. Williamsons Rd was named after Alecs' father. Marion Colman
- I played tennis at Templestowe tennis club with Alby Petty. I remember he was a lovely old gentleman. Also, my dad bought our orchard, cnr Porter St and the Warrandyte road in Templestowe from one of the Petty family. Patti McGregor
- The house from which the old man walks out from at the beginning of the Video was still there at No. 34 Wilsons Road, Doncaster on the same side of the road where I live, until it was knocked down and 6 double storey Town Houses were built there some years ago. An Old Lady lived in the house by herself until the house was sold. Depending when this Video was taken, the Lady may have been either the Old Man's daughter or perhaps his wife. Tom Di-Grazia
Wilson Rd No34 Doncaster Les Petty Films 03 10Sec
04 Holidays & Beach
"We used to look forward to our holiday. That was a highlight. My father would see that Mum had one good week holiday without even getting meals. So that would be a boarding house" - Ruth Petty
"Our very favourite place was Port Londsdale. It was nice an handy. It took us about half a day to get down there. we didn't travel very fast in those with our old cars." - Les Petty
"We would stop at Werribee for something to eat." - Bruce Petty
"There was a place called the Terminus. It was one of the last buildings on the road near the light house, and we used to stay at the Terminus." - Les Petty
The Terminus, Port Lonsdale c1920 (SLV)
"That wonderful week of sitting down and having a menu and someone looking after you." - Ruth Petty
"we got to know the people down there pretty well, and the children used to play on the beach, and we'd often go for a walk." - Les Petty
"This is May and it is freezing cold in Melbourne. May in Port Lonsdale another few degrees lower, but being on the beach, messing about, making things was part of the event, and it works the way it does today. It worked them, you know, making castles and imagining. It was so different from what we were used to. You know our sort of toys were fruit boxes and grass and rather heavy soil." - Bruce Petty
"It was mostly pretty cold. We'd go in the winter when there was not a lot doing at home in the orchard. But we sort of accepted it and went for walks." - Alan Petty
"There'd be something planned and we'd go to the lighthouse again and it would still be there, the way it was last time. It was really that we were all together. The know world was Doncaster, Sandringham and Port Lonsdale. The Heads were the start of something that you read about in the paper, I suppose, but it was a spectacular bit of geography. It was treacherous stuff anyway. There was always powerful waves and water, and coming from the orchard point of view, it was pretty dramatic. And I think dad was very intrigued with water and the power of water, partly because it was photographic. He was always in photographs - the photographic value of anything in the spectacle of a wave, and being able to capture it, and with movie cameras, trying to get the perfect aesthetic sort of power in the waves was, I think, one of his dreams." - Bruce Petty
05 Planes & Flying
Bruce Petty: Dad was always interested in technology of any kind. One of the huge areas of progress was, of course, flying, and on a visit to Essendon, you would see there the whole range of what was happening pretty much.
Les Petty: I was always very interested in planes and we used to sometimes go out to Essendon and look about it and watch the planes land and take off. There was the Douglas Convair...
Bruce Petty: DC3's, De Havilland, Stinson plane. Flying was actually fascinating. It was sort of accessible then you could see how they worked. They were quite beautiful.
Les Petty: There was a moth plane which used to fly the Herald newspapers to Tasmania. They are started off from the Moorabbin airport. We has to drive down there occasionally and watch them load the papers on the plane and start off from there to Tasmania which is about 200 miles away.
De Havilland: de Havilland Australia DHA-3 Drover:
Douglas DC-3
Stinson Aircraft Company
Essendon Airport
Moorabbin Airport
Herald Newspaper
06 Growing Up
"This is dad and his brother Gordon at a young age. They were both clever. Dad was a good magician. Gordon was a good flute player. One of dad's great skills was woodwork and he made some beautiful furniture. Anything mechanical intrigued dad, I think. And that period, of course, huge advances in metals and movement and engines generally and big constructions - bridges, weirs - were built and they all seemed dramatic at the time - to us - not so - I guess. The progress being made in boats, trains, planes and, of course, the car. I thing you could actually own." Bruce Petty
"My first car I bought an old Chev. It was about a 1914 Chev. It was in pretty poor condition. It was a second hand one. I paid 47 pound for it and I stripped it down and I painted it and varnished it and I took the engine to pieces, did the engine up and I got a lot of satisfaction of this Chev it was called a "Superior" model. It was one before the "Capital" model. But I got a lot of pleasure out of that. After that, I bought a second hand Studebaker - a 27 or 8 model I should say. That was a "Tourer" of course. Before I got the car, I had a motorbike. That would be when I was about 19, I suppose. It was a Triumph. That was an English model bike - very rough to ride. But I got a lot of pleasure out of me bike" Les Petty
"I always loved football. I used to listen to football on Saturday afternoon, and, at quarter-time, I would go out and kick the ball in McGay's paddock. I'd kick the football, race in and listen to the next quarter, and then, at half time, go out and do some more particular solo imagined feats of magnificence for Collingwood basically. And I still like Collingwood to win." Bruce Petty
"Bruce and I were particularly close, because we were almost the same age. I can never remember life without him." Ruth Petty
"Ruth was always cheeky. I think she was quick and funny and a bit cheekier than me" Bruce Petty
"He used to tease me a lot - Sam. I mean, I think he was protective also and I remember Alan as being quite a bit younger." Ruth Petty
"Yes, I vaguely remember them having to wait around me a bit, pushing me around on a billy cart my father had made for me. They weren't that keen on pushing that around." Alan Petty
"I can remember a thing called a flivver - impossible bit of apparatus for kids. Alan could be persuaded to perform pretty well. Being the youngest, you know, we encouraged him as an entertainer. he seem disposed to jokes and anything a bit funny, he would get away with it where probably we wouldn't." Bruce Petty
"Ruth and Bruce were very musical. I wasn't at all really. I remember lying in bed, I suppose before I got up for school, and Ruth would be practicing piano, and, later on, I remember Bruce playing the clarinet - or trying to" Alan Petty
"And swimming eventually. We somehow learnt to swim. I don't know how." Bruce Petty
Flivver
Tricycle, ‘Flivver’, row cart, made by Cyclops, Australia, 1924-1929 . Made 1924-1929.
This is a child’s ride-on toy called a Flivver and was made in Australia by Cyclops between 1924 and 1929. The term ‘flivver’ originated as American slang for a cheap car or aeroplane. It also refers to a railway hand car or trolley car. By the 1920s flivver was the common name, at least in Australia, for a three-wheeled children’s trolley car propelled by pushing the handle bars back and forth, and steered by feet resting on front wheel foot pegs. This means of propulsion was very similar to that used on the four wheeled trolley cars also used by children at the time. The flivver was essentially a three wheeled version of the trolley car.
Toy manufacturing in Australia was slow to start but by 1914 there were a small number of toy manufacturers, including Cyclops, which was begun by Heine Brothers a pressed metal company. The origins of the firm began in 1911 when 5 year-old Ernest Heine saw an American tricycle and would not leave his father, John, alone until he had imported one for him. It featured solid iron wheels, no tyres, turned wooden handle bars and a leather seat. Seeing the marketing potential of the bicycle, John Heine began manufacturing flat-framed tricycles for children in a small factory in Hay Street, Leichhardt, an inner Sydney suburb, in 1913 with a staff of four. By 1915 the name of “Cyclops”, the one-eyed giant whom Ulysses met on his travels in Greek mythology, was registered as the new name of the company. In the same year they produced the Kangaroo Cycle skate, one of their earliest scooters, which featured two large steel-spoked wheels 9.5 in (24 cm) in diameter.
By 1924 Cyclops claimed their “Original Flivver No.1” was the most popular toy made in Australia. The term “flivver” originated as American slang for a cheap car or aeroplane. It also referred to a railway hand car or trolley car but by the 1920s flivver was the common name, at least in Australia, for a three-wheeled toy. It came in either wire wheels with steel tyres or disc wheels with solid rubber tyres. By 1926 Cyclops merchandise had spread Australia-wide.
Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences
1914 Chev Superior
Studebaker Tourer 1927-8
Possibly.....
Studebaker-Commander-1928
07 School
"Primary School was a mile and a bit away in the middle of Doncaster. A whole set of us walked, Irene Williamson from down the road and then we got bikes and we rode bikes.
I can remember the day Verny? Clay told us there were men under the Koonung Creek bridge with springs on their boots, and the story around the school was that they would leap out and get you. We were miles away from that, but you had the feeling that miles were not a problem for a bloke with springs on his boots."
- Alan Petty
08 Marraige - next for FB
Les Petty: My Wife, Milly ?, came from Sandringham from a family of five girls and one boy. That used to come to church and I met her when she visited Doncaster. I became interested in her and it was not long before I was visiting down there. On 22 October 1927 - that was when we were married.
Bruce Petty: it's pretty hard to get my mother onto film. She found it all pretty embarrassing having to perform. It's a pity because she was full of humour and fun in a spontaneous way.
Ruth Petty: Somehow my mother had a enough Time to plant a lot of flowers - annuals you know that she had a great big bed of Zinnias.
Alan Petty: She was a great family person. She was always helping people and keeping us all cheerful.
Ruth Petty: The church was our central focus. A lot of things revolved around the church, and I will always remember it was just the normal thing to attend church on Sunday morning at 11am and go back for Sunday school in the afternoon at 3pm.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinnia
09 Travel
We didn't venture too far off the approved trail though. Queensland. I shot some of this film I vaguely remember. It makes you appreciate how good dad was with cameras. It's very hard to make a trip interesting. No matter doing what in front of you. It's a very subtle thing - length of shot, movement. Interesting.
10 Adult Children
Ruth Petty: In Doncaster, I would've been the first generation to really branch out as a woman and work.
Bruce Petty: Alan stayed in the orchard with his father for a while and worked on the orchard and then move to Riverina. He has now got grown-up children and grandchildren.
Les Petty: Bruce went to England and it was from over in England, he started off as a cartoonist. It was rather unusual. He went off because there was more prospects for him than it was in Australia.
Life's much faster today. Nowadays people seem like they want to have more excitement. I don't think they have a better time than we had.
Ruth Petty: I just wonder how they fitted everything in. It was very hard in the orchard. Everyone worked hard in those days.
Bruce Petty: It's very interesting and I don't know how typical our family is. I suspect it's quite typical of lots of families. But there is. Dad and mom both worked extremely hard, and carefully and were both considerate and loving to us.
Alan Petty: Times have changed tremendously. But it's nothing out of the ordinary. I can remember grandfather saying to my father that he wouldn't have as good a time as he had.
Bruce Petty: The Films. It almost touches a cosmetic look at the family. The rest of it's going to be in our private recollections I guess.
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