INTERVIEW NO.19				DATE OF INTERVIEW: 21/11/91


MRS. MARJORY TURNER
61 JONES STREET
KINGSWOOD.

0.34	My name is Marjory Turner and I live at 61 Jones Street.  I was born on the 25th of the first 1929, and I was born in Penrith in Belmore Street, near the station.  I'm now married and I have been married for 43 years.  I'm Australian nationality.  I did have three children.  One has died.  I've lived in this area for a long time.

1.04	Well first of all I'll ask you a few background questions.  What kind of work did your father do?

	My father was a woodcutter.  His father had a sawmill near Kingswood station and they cut wood for fire wood, you know, and his mother had a coal and coke yard.  And they lived in Penrith from 1922.  Before that they lived in the vicinity - St. Marys and Orchard Hills.

	So you and your family have been here a long time.  And you were born here over in Belmore Road.

	Belmore Street, near Penrith Station, and I'm the eldest of seven.  My father's family had 14.

2.08	So when you were first old enough to remember, what were your impressions of the area then?

	Well it was a quite place and people were friendly.  We lived in a street where everybody knew each other and we didn't do lots of things.  Friday night shopping and carrying the shopping home was an excursion just around the street, and we had visits to the city on occasions with my mother when she wanted to go shopping, and they were a big excursion and very exciting, going on the train and them riding the trams in Sydney.

3.09	And what was your house like that you lived in as a child?  Was it a large house, or ...?

	Well, the one that I lived in first was just a weatherboard place, and I can just remember that it was built in sort of two section with the front rooms and then a little alleyway and then over it - covered in - and then you went into a kitchen in the back area.  And my father had lots of vegetable plots in the yard.

	So you didn't have to shop for vegies?

	No.	

3.54	And did your mother do the shopping at the local shops in Penrith?

	Yes. she did.

	Did she find that easier in those days, because they used to deliver a lot of things didn't they?

	Yes they did.  The grocer's shop would deliver your groceries if you just put your order in, and I found one of mine that I had after I was married the other day when I was going through some things, and it was seventeen shillings and something and he delivered those groceries to my house.  Yes.

	Really.  You've still got the old bill?

	The old docket, yes.

4.34	So as a child, when you lived in Belmore Street, was there much ... many other houses around?  Did you have neighbours?

	Well yes there was houses on two sides of the street there, right from the bottom end of the street to the top, and one of the houses up the top end had the nurse that was the old name they used to call for the nurse that came around when babies were born.

	Oh, yes.  Midwife.

	Midwife, yes.  Her name was Miss Jones and she attended all the ladies in our street and lots of the places arond when they were having their babies.  And six of my family were born at home before ...the last one was born in hospital.

5.34	So that was before the large hospital was built of course?  Long before.

	Yes.  Oh it was a long while before that, yes.

5.44	What were medical services like generally?

	Well, they were good and the hospital was a very nice place.  The first hospital we had, or that I remember, is now Governor Phillip Hospital and it had segregated places for infectious diseases, and I remember that our family had some infectious diseases and we had to go into hospital when we were very young.  Mother found out that my brother had diptheria, and the two brothers were in the same room, so they had to go to the infectious ward for diptheria.  And I had a needle so that I wouldn't get diptheria because I was the bigger sister, and the next week I got scarlet fever.  So I was in hospital too!

	Oh, dear.  All at the same time, the three of you.  And you got good treatment there?

	Yes.  I can remember, you know, my youngest brother who was very little was crying that I couldn't go into see him because I was in a different ward, and he was a baby and I understand that now.  But when I was a child I didn't think that it was very good, but I mean, when you get older you learn that things are like that.  You just cant' do what you want to.

7.20	And as a child did you go to school at Penrith primary?

	At Penrith, yes.  I went through from Kindergarten to High School in Penrith, and the Kindergarten's down in Henry Street, and then when you go to the big school well that was up on the highway.  The primary was on the ground floor and the upstairs was the high school.  And that was the only school between Katoomba and Parramatta ,and all the people from Doonside to Springwood came to that school.  So that same building, what's there today without any other ones around the yard, held all the children that went to primary and high school.

8.17	And did you walk to school from home?

	Yes.  When I moved to Kingswood when I was nine, I walked to Penrith school for the rest of my school years.

	That's quite a long walk isn't it?

	Yes. it is.  But we didn't notice it in those days, though.  We enjoyed the school so we wanted to go to it, so we walked from there.  And my grandmother lived right opposite the school, so we had her there right over the road.  When we wanted to visit her we could on the way home from school.

	And did you go on to high school after primary?

	Yes.  I went to third year for my school certificate, or Intermediate it was then.  I sat for my Intermediate but I missed out by half a subject and the headmaster kindly wrote me a note to let me know what had happened.  But at that time we had a lot of illness in our family and I had a lot of pressure on me because I was the eldest, and I had a lot of things to do other than study for my exams.  And I wasn't always a good scholar. (Laughs)

9.40	So after school, did you get a job when you left school?

	Yes.  I went to work first in the Christmas just before I turned 15.  A friend got me a job at Parramatta  in a ... Selfridges? - like Woolworths it was.- and I went down there to work and I worked there for two years, and then I left there and came to St. Marys in a factory.  And then when I was 19 I was married.

10.16	So, when you were married, did you move straight away into another home?

	Yes.  I shared a house with my mother-in-law then.  I moved in with my husband's people.

	What year would that have been?

	1948.  And his mother was a widow and we moved in with her until we could afford to save up for our own house.  

10.48	And did you build your own house?

	Yes we did, and we had a block of land alongside his mother and we built that and it was a very small house to start off with,because that's all the money we had.  My husband was in a co-operative building society, so we borrowed money from that and we built a five-square house, and it had ...

	How many rooms is that?

	Well it had a bedroom and bathroom on one side and the living room in the middle and on the side it had a verandah that we could close in for a bedroom and a small kitchen.  So ...

	And the toilet was outside I suppose?

	Yes, the toilet was outside.  Then later on when the sewerage came, we added on the back another bedroom and a shower in the laundry and a toilet next door.

	When would that have been?  In the '60s?

	Yes.  Getting close to the '60s.  We just finished it nicely in about '69 when the Council decided that the are that we lived in was going to become a flat area.  So we had to look for another place to go and try and sell the house and to get enough money to build another house.

12.25	Why was that, because it was going to become too busy?

	Yes.  Everybody was selling for ... they wanted to build houses.  We lived in First Street, Kingswood, and now it's all flats except for a couple of people that have stayed on in their houses.

12.45	Was your house demolished?  

	Yes.

	Really, and you'd only just finished it!

	Yes,disappointing.

	How did you feel about that?

	Oh I was very disappointed to start off with, but then we bought this block of land and had this house built and moved up here.  So it was twice as far to go to the train and things, but anyway, we thought it'd be a little bit quieter up here.

13.15	So did you have children fairly soon after you were married?

	Yes.  My daughter was born in 1950 and my son was born in '55 and then I had another son born in l959.

	After four years.  And did you plan to have those children that many years apart?

	We planned the first one, to have it then.  We didn't plan ..

	The others?

	No.

	They happened?

	Yes. (Laughs).

13.57	What would you daily routine have been when the children were growing up?

	Well I was a housewife and I just done all the things.  We didn't have any transport to go to Penrith, only on the train, and I used to wheel the baby into Penrith in the pram and do my weekly shopping and bring it home on the pram with the baby in it.  Once a week that was done.

	You didn't have deliveries?

	Well, yes I did then, because that's when I found some of the things were delivered and I'd bring some home.  It was a bit awkward to get off the train because the pram was a big pram and so I learned to walk, and by that time my mother had left Kingswood and moved into Penrith, and I could walk past her house and then go down the street and then drop in coming back.  So I had a sort of a half-way spot to stop, and all my brothers and sisters were growing up then.  

15.11	Did your mother help you look after the children if they were ill or if you were ill?

	At times, yes she did.  Yes she helped quite a lot.  And my mother-in-law then lived next door to me.  She was very helpful and helped look after the children.  If we wanted to go out she'd mind them so we were very fortunate to have her there.

15.37	And what about - sorry we got off that question - I've been asking you other questions.  About your daily routine - you went shopping?

	Yes.  Well just a little bit of gardening and the washing and ironing and those kinds of things.  I didn't belong to anything in those days, so it was just ... that all there were!

	You were kept busy looking after the children and cooking and that sort of thing?

	Yes.

	Did you cook your preserves and jams and that sort of thing?

	Well I didn't do a lot of that then.  I learned to do that a little bit later, 'cause I had to have lessons.

	Oh, did you?

	I wasn't a real special cook.   I was just a baker cook.

16.32	Was you mother a special cook, or ...?

	Yes she could turn her hand to a lot of things, and she was very helpful and good at handycraft and crocheting and sewing and those kinds of things.  And I went to sewing lessons before I was married for a little while of a night time to learn those, but then a lot of things I learned from my mother.

17.06	And what did the children do in their holidays for recreation?

	Well, we used to go in to the beach one day maybe, and that'd be exciting and we'd get over that for a week.  And perhaps ... there wasn't a lot to do in those days.  They played cricket because the park was right opposite us, and we visited other people that we knew and they played with their friends and that.  There was no really organised thing for them.

	They made their own fun did they?

	Yes.  As the boys grew up they played soccer because the soccer field was right across the road.  My daughter liked hockey and she used to play that at school, and as she grew older she got into a hockey club  to play hockey.

	Did they go to the cinema or theatre or concerts or anything like that?

	Not a lot, no.  We didn't go to the ... when we were first married my husband and I used to go to the cinema a lot in Penrith.  But after the children came, well we didn't go out so much because it's difficult and they like thier routine.  They get very cross if their out of it, so we didn't do that.  Unless mother-in-law - and there was some thing special on - she'd mind them.  Well when the children were growing they didn't go to the pictures a lot until they grew up to be teenagers and they wanted to go with their friends.

	Then they went to the pictures did they?

	Then they went to the pictures, yes.

19.10	And did they go dancing and that sort of thing?

	They didn't go dancing as much as we did when we were younger!  We did have a hall down there opposite us, but that got pulled down.  I don't know just when.  It must have been in the l960s that was pulled down.  They didn't go to many dances at all.

	It was more popular earlier on, and it's coming back again now!

	Yes, it is.

19.50	And what were the shops like in Kingswood?

	Well, there wasn't many shops.  There was just a local, you know, just a shop for everyday things that you might run out of, and the post office was on the corner.  There was no hotel in those days.  The hotel was built sometime later in the '50s I think.  There wasn't any other shops.  You had to Penrith for meat.  We did have a fruit and vegetable man that delivered to the house, so he came around once a week with the fruit and vegetables.  No... there was only the little corner store, sort of thing, there was two of them there.

20.46	And it wasn't very built up, so what was it like?  Was it bush all round?

	Oh, yes.  There was a lot of bush.  There was bush from Bringelly Road all the way up to where the hospital is now, except for about one house that's right alongside of the hospital in the front on the Western Highway there just before you get to the lights.  I remember that because when we used to go to the pictures and come home late of a Saturday night, I ran all that way home one night when I saw 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame"!  (Laughs).  Yes.  that was very thick bush all there.  And there wasn't a whole lot of built up area like there is along the highway or in any of the streets now.  You would find about five houses at the most in a big long street like Second Avenue or something like that.

21.54	So there was plenty of space around?
	
	Plenty of space and you could walk and they used to chase rabbits, and some of the boys had guns and those kinds of things in those days.  The farms were over the hill here, but all this area was, you know ... well we had a tannery on the corner down here which was a bit smelly each afternoon when work was finished.  But after that was closed, in the late '40s or '50s,  - yes it must have been late ''50s - well that was just land that you could run around on and have games - Cowboys and Indians and those kind of things.

	So your children enjoyed running around in the natural area?

	Yes.  Just getting out and hiding in bushes and playing games like that.

22.57	And what about the churches in the area?  Did you find that they played much part in the social life of the community?

	Well, yes.  The church, the little church down on this corner to which I belong, it had a big part in the community during the War because there were soldiers that went off to the War and we used to have dances and make up parcels and send to the soldiers.  And so everybody knew everybody else and was friendly and helped each other and done knitting and all that kind of thing, and they were the social highlights of the town, you know, Kingswood.  Penrith was a bit bigger and they had more churches in there but all their little groups were very homey type of people and cared for each other.  

24.02	It sounds as though you knew most of the people who lived around the area too?

	Yes.  Well, that's right. When I used to take my daughter shopping down the street you could walk down the street and say hello to everybody because they'd lived here a long time and they knew you'd lived here a long time.  So everybody knew everybody.  And now we find that if we go down the street, well sometimes you never see a person you knew before, you know, from the olden days, as we call them now.

24.39	And how does that make you feel?

	Oh, well.  It's all changed.  You have to have change, but sometimes you miss the friends that you can sort of see and talk to.  But then, you're moving on aren't you, progressing in life.

25.00	What's the shopping area at Kingswood like now?

	Well, it has a bigger shopping area.  We even have a bank now.  One of the shops we had before was sort of the newsagent.   Well we've got newsagents, a bank and a butcher shop and then we have a cake shop and a Chinese shop and some other shops that keep changing all the time.

	It's still nothing like Penrith, though?

	No, it's still just a little sort of necessity shop that if you run out of things, or it's close handy if you just want to grab something.

	So you'd still have to go into Penrith would you for the main shopping?

	Yes, you would.

25.54	And how did you manage your finances when you were first married and during the '40s and '50s?

	Well we had to, you know, pay of our loan so we just had to have a budget and you put aside for all the things that you had to pay and then spent whatever you had left on your food.

26.23	And who managed the household money.

	I did.  I pay most of the things.  My husband pays for the car and he pays for - since we moved here - he pays for the house insurances, the inside and the house, the contents and the house.

	And did he give you his pay packet to manage?

	Yes.  And he'd have so much for his pocket money and then...

	He'd give the rest to you?

	Yes.  We'd manage.  We'd try and put aside for things and bank sometimes.  It was a struggle for a little while because we'd borrowed money to build the first house for twenty-two and two-third years and we'd just, like I said, had it paid off and got it nice to live in when the Council changed it to a flat area.  So ...

27.30	And what about employment?  Did you work after you were married?  

	I worked for a little while in a factory in St. Marys, night shift, so that my husband and his mother could put the kiddies to bed and then I'd come home then in the middle of the night.  When we short of money I done that for a little while.  And then occasionally I've had other cleaning jobs.  I helped out while they were young.  I'd clean up for somebody and I'd get a little bit of money then.  But other than that I've never had a career in employment, you know.

	You've been doing house work?

	Mostly housewife, yes.

	Which is hard work enough isn't it?

	Yes.

28.26	And what about clothes?  Did you make clothes for your children?

	Yes.  I made a lot of shirts and pyjamas and things that were easy and sometimes dresses for my daughter and I made dresses for myself and helped to make the money go round.  And my husband's been a truck driver most of his life.  When we first got married he was working in the stores in a factory in St. Marys and then he left there and he's been a truck driver all the rest of his time.  And he used to go interstate and be away for maybe a week driving interstate.  He done that for a while, and ...

29.20	How did you feel while he was away?

	Well it was all right because I had my mother-in-law next door, someone I knew, and the children an I managed quite well.  Well it's better for them to have a job that they like doing than to try and force them into something that ...

29.23	Is he still working now?

	He is today and tomorrow, and then he's retiring?

	Oh, really. 

	So ...

30.00	What about childbirth?  Did you have your children all at the local hospital?

	Yes the first hospital, like I said before, was Governor Phillip and I had my children over there and the other one was built later after they were born.

30.24	So what did you do for recreation?

	Well, we often played tennis.   When the children were small we'd play of a night time sometimes, and they'd go with us.  Perhaps my husband's truck we could go in that and we could go into Penrith and play tennis in a social club or something like that.  We quite enjoyed that and we met quite a few friends over the years playing tennis like that.  But other than that we didn't have very much else to do.

	You went into the city occasionally as you were saying.  Did you go on any picnics?

	Yes we used to go on a picnic sometimes sometimes to Bronte beach, and that was always exciting.  We'd maybe go once a year or twice a year.  We had a friend of my mother's who lived at the Spit in Balgowlah and we used to visit her too sometimes.  And that was exciting.  We'd go to her place and then all go to the beach that was below her house and that kind of thing.  So it was all different to being out here in this area.

31.53	And did you keep any animals? 

	Yes.  when the children were little we used to have sometimes a pet sheep and we had dogs at numerous stages.

	You didn't keep chooks?

	Yes.  I've had chooks over the years, and my husband's had pigeons all our married life.

	Oh really, you've still got them have you?


	Yes.  He's a pigeon flyer.  He has homing pigeons and that's his hobby.
END SIDE A

SIDE B
0.06	A lot of migrants came out here from Europe.  Did you have many of them move to live around here?  Did you notice them much?

	I didn't notice them in this particular area, although there were some that came to live here.  I did notice them when I went to work night shift because there were a lot of them there working in the factories to make their way in this country.  But there wasn't ... oh, we had ... yes a German lady that opened a shop on Bringelly Road and another lady from Germany that lived just down the road from us in First Street and they were very nice people, and  used to talk sometimes in their language so we could listen to them.  But there wasn't a great deal of people in Kingswood, you know, at that time.

	What about market gardens and that sort of thing?  Were there any around this area?

	Yes.  We had vineyards just over the hill where they grew grapes and market gardens we had down on the Western Highway where houses are now built.  Well, there was ... everybody seemed to have a little garden plot, you know, in the back yard in those days.  In fact the man and I are having competitions now to see who is growing the best tomatoes.

	The man next door?

	Yes.  He's in his seventies and he always has a nice garden and I've been having one too, the last three years.  And he's looking at my tomatoes and saying 'Your tomatoes are coming along very nicely!'  (Laughs)  Yes, there were lots of people that had gardens in those days.

2.23	And you grew your own vegetables too when the children were small?

	When I could, yes.  I used to have a little plot.  I like gardening.  I find it's very relaxing and gets you away from the boredom of four walls and all the mundane things that you repeat every day.  And if you can grow flowers and then vegetables and eat them, well it's really good.

2.55	And did you ever feel that you wished you'd gone out to work or were you happy doing what you were doing?

	Well I wanted to go.  Yes I would have liked to have gone out.  But I didn't want to leave the children all the time, so ... the children were, you know, the most important thing.  Once you get them off your hands, then I think ... but then I wasn't trained for anything except housework.  That was what I found that I could do this.

	And did your husband like the idea of you going out to work or would he prefer you to stay home?

	At first he said that I should be at home, but then when I did go out to work and things were tight and I went to work in the night time, well I done that for three years to help us get on our feet a bit and be able to pay our way.  'Cause wages were very small then, although prices weren't as dear as they are now.

	So he didn't mind that?

	No.

	It was a necessity I guess?

	Yes.

4.17	You didn't belong to any community organisations like the Inner Wheel or the Red Cross?

	No.  I didn't belong to those.  I belonged to the Church as I grew older and the children were growing up and after they'd sort of growing up I started belonging to things like Meals on Wheels.  I felt that I could help there, so I do Meals on Wheels once a month.

	And you do that now do you?

	And then the Church had a ladies group and we used to meet once a month, and then we'd have fetes and we'd work for the that.  And I also teach Sunday School.  I taught Sunday School before I was married and then I gave it up for a little while.  Then I went back to it in the l960s and I'm still teaching.

	Are you?

	I teach scripture at the school, and when the children were there I used to work in the canteen, so those few things kept me busy. 

	Oh yes.

	And now I'm working for the birthday of the school for a hundred years, and still doing my Meals on Wheels, and scripture and my Sunday School, so all in all I'm keeping very busy, yes.

	You're still very busy.

5.58	And when you were first married, when you first built your own house, did you have electrical appliances like refrigerators and things like that?

	We had a ... we didn't have a washing machine.  We had the very first washing machine given to me from my aunt, and it was one that had a round circle and a pump that went up and down and the clothes were pumped in that and then you had to wring them out and put them through the rinse.  We didn't have a refrigerator when we were first married.  We had an ice-chest.  And when I lived with my mother-in-law we had to boil our clothes out in the copper in the yard and then bring them inside to wash them in the tub.  And I grew up on just the well water, so I had to draw water out of the well when I was younger, before I was married, yes.  The house only had well water, with one tap in the whole of the house ...

	Cold water?

	Over the sink, yes.

7.17	How did you heat water for bathing?

	Well that was heated in the copper and you carried up three steps and into the bathroom and put it in the bath.  The drain was there to let it go, but there was no taps there to put it in.  And no hot water, because we lived in a very old house.  And then after I was married and mother moved into Penrith, when she moved into Penrith she went into a Commission House because they were just starting to be given to people that needed better accommodation, and she lived there until she died.

	So she had all the modern conveniences there?

	Yes, when she went in there she had all the modern conveniences, like electric copper and that type of thing.  Then later on she got a washing machine.

8.12	So thinking back on those times, like before the War, the late '40s and though the '50s, how did you feel when the place started to become more crowded and more people were building houses and cutting down the trees and all that sort of thing?

	I suppose I was a little bit ... oh, I couldn't say I was angry, but I was a little bit apprehensive of what would be coming next.  Because the world that you knew was changing and, you know, things were happening so fast after the War.  Everbody sort of ... and it seems to be getting faster every year!

	It hasn't stopped has it?

	No.

9.13	And do you think that things were better before the population grew out this way, or did you like it better then or do you - how do you feel about it?

	Well, I think sometimes that they're trying to crowd too many people into little spaces because they're making the blocks smaller all the time and putting them into high-rise and density housing or cluster housing and I think that they haven't really got time or space to move, so people get ... they get on a whirly or something, that everybody's so close that they feel closed in.  It's just a shame for our country that they don't have like the electricity and the water and things to give people more space.  The children growing up, they grow up better when they're around their own area and not when they're sort of give a couple of dollars and told to 'Go and entertain yourself for four hours and I'll see you when you get back!' sort of attitude now.  Whether that's the cause of all the problems with the drugs and that I don't know, but I think that it would be better.  When you can watch over your children and see where they are and I think parents are responsible for children.  I've always felt responsible and I mean that doesn't go away because they're grown up and married.  I still feel for them, not so responsible in giving them things, but responsible because their hurting or responsible because they can't advance or something.  But I still think we're cramming too much in together.

11.35	And do you get that feeling yourself that the place is closing in around you?

	Yes, well see they make houses now with only eight foot ceilings and it gives you a little bit of claustrophobia, where the house we had before was up a little bit off the ground and it was a nine foot ceiling.  Well, it didn't seem to be pressing down on you.  These houses, when you walk in, specially in the summer time, you know, you just can feel the heat coming down.  They build houses now so easy and get them up so quickly and then you've got to have all the different conveniences like air-conditioning and fans and all these kind of things you didn't have to have before.  But you didn't realise that it was hot before, because there seemed to be more air around.

	The houses were built for the conditions...?

	Yes.  Now they're built for cost and convenience.  The quicker we get 'em up and the cheaper we do 'em - the more people have them. But, I mean, they're the biggest thing you buy in the whole of your life aren't they?

12.56	That's right.  And do you think for young families growing up out here now that things have changed for the better, or the worse?

	Well I don't know.  I think the young people think they're better off, although they keep singing out that they want more creches and more minding facitlities for children.  Well, there again I think you've got to stay with the children until their certain ages.  I mean if they're seven or eight or nine, perhaps you could get a job then, but to leave little babies because they've been on maternity leave, they put the babies into creche when they're seven months old and off they go to work.  Well, children don't grow up into a family atmosphere.  You've only got weekends to do that and it's not really enough.  

	And families aren't as close as they used to be.  You used to spend a lot of time with your mother and grandmother, and do you find your children - do they live around you now?

	Well, my daughter lives at Campbelltown and my son lives here, but we're in contact all the time.  Yes.  Our gran used to come and visit us on a Sunday afternoon and visit us on a Sunday afternoon for afternoon tea, and that was a big highlight, because she drove a horse and sulky and we used to get to hold the horse and have it in our yard for an hour while she was there, and ... those are the things that you think about and remember as you get older.  Well, children that are in a school - more or less, or a creche - from when they're young, that's all they've got to think back on.  And I think sometimes they over burden children with too much these days.  They tell them everything from when they're little and I mean there's no surprises in life.  There's no mysteries in life then, because they're not learning something as they're going along.

	Yes.

	They want their children to know everything from when they can first talk so they tell them everything, so they tell them everything.  But as you progress you should learn, and that's what teaches you, I think, all the way along, but that's just my way.

15.40	Yes.  And what about your - how would you describe the way the place has changed to look at?

	To look at?  Oh, well, it's swallowing up all the open spaces, and it's just going to be like ... it looks like it's going to be like Redfern and Petersham as you ride through on the train, you know, just little houses and people go out to work and in the night time they come home and shut themselves in there, and that's all there is to life.

16.22	And that friendliness of the smaller village atmosphere has disappeared?

	Yes.  Yes.  Well, we're still friendly with lots of people.  I find friends, you know, and I keep in touch with them because if you don't keep in touch with them, well you lose them.  I contact people that I went to school with every now and then.  I met one today in the grocer's shop that I hadn't seen for about nine months, so we had a quick ten minute's conversation together, but we were pleased to see each other.

17.05	So what would you say are the main things that you think have changed in that time?

	Well I think people are so busy wanting to get ahead with earning money and paying their way and sometimes I think it's just ... a lot of people are just trying to keep up with the Jones's.  Because it doesn't make you any happier, I mean, you can be happy if you're not going to grumble about things.  And you've got to learn that early in life.  Well we're in the possie where we are and that's where we're going to be.  And you've got to learn to accept it.  If you fight against everything all the time, well you get to be a real grump.  

18.07	And what about your sense of security?

	Well you need that.

	Yes.  But do you feel as secure now, you know, walking around the streets, as you did when you were ... in the '40s?

	Oh, no.  People say 'Don't go to Sydney on the train, even in the daylight!'.  But that's been something that I grew up with, and I could, you know, go wherever I wanted to and people now want to go in their cars instead of on the trains because their worried about ... yes, and they don't feel safe on the train.   When I was first married we never locked our house when I lived with my mother-in-law and she'd go away for a fortnight and the house wouldn't be locked.  The door would be closed, but neighbours would watch the house.  And I'm in Neighbourhood Watch now too and well, these are the things you've got to be in.  You've got to be observant about what's going on around you all the time because you don't know who's coming and who's going.

	There are so many strangers, or people that you don't know?

	Yes.

19.32	Well I think that's just about covered everything, unless you can think of anything else you'd like to tell me.

	No. I can't.

	O.K.  Well thank you very much.  That's great.

	That's all right.
END OF  TAPE

12

