Mary Russell brought household items to Australia from England in 1934. Her mother, Elizabeth Russell used the writing desk that was originally given to her mother, Agnes Marian Byrne when she went to boarding school. Agnes used it all her life. Desk damaged by a visiting child who forced the desk closed/open at one point. Estimated that Agnes went to school about 1830'sA square wooden box with brass inlay decoration on lid and front around lock. Hinged lid opens to be a writing surface of velvet. At lock end, groove for pens and small well for ink bottle. Key (not to be used) is in the ink well. Base lined with green hessian glued on. Lid and base angled to give sloping writing surface. A total of 12 items including the box.domestic items, writing equipment, handcrafts, woodwork

White paper catalogue with brown printing for a sale on account of Parks Victoria, on 27th February 1997 at San Remo. For sale were marine & general service equipment, boat, crane, forklift, metal shop and woodworking machinery, pnu. & power tools, outboard motor, winches, trailers, hardwood & railway line, office furniture & equipment, nuts & bolts and hydraulic underwater tools. Announcement printed in the front of catalogue mentions that J. H. Curnow & Son Pty. Ltd. Are combining their name with the Dyett family and trading as Curnow Dyett, Real Estate Agents, Auctioneers and Qualified Valuers.business, auctioneers, curnow dyett, ian dyett collection - auction catalogue - parks victoria, leigh hart, ian dyett, curnow dyett, j h curnow & son pty ltd

Red covered catalogue for a Sale by Auction at Rocklands Reservoir near Balmoral, Vic. On the 9th to 13th November, 1953 (inclusive). For sale are Diesel Alternating Sets, Concrete Mixing and Aggregate Plant, Air Compressor Plants, Stone Crushing Plants, Locomotives, Woodworking Plant, Prefabricated Residences, Corr. Iron and Timber Buildings Stores and Extensive Equipment by order of The State Rivers & Water Supply Commission, Melbourne. Pasted in the front of catalogue is a slip to write name, address and phone number on and to give to clerk when making their first purchase. A typed note loose in the front of catalogue mentions that the time for removal of houses and buildings has been increased from four weeks to three months and goods would be at purchaser's own risk after time of sale. Descriptions of some of the items for sale. Catalogue has Ground Plans of the eight different residential houses. J. H. Curnow & Son Pty. Ltd. Were the auctioneers.business, auctioneers, j h curnow & son pty ltd, ian dyett collection - auction catalogue - rocklands reservoir, the state rivers & water supply commission, j h curnow & son pty ltd, balmoral combined women's associations, prahran telegraph printing co

Bertie Greenwood was born c. 1880/81 and died aged 82 in Hawthorn in 1963. His father and possibly his grandfather were also carpenters. Bertie’s work as a cabinetmaker required precise planing to give lovely edges and other elaborate decorations. The major item in the tool collection is Bertie’s wooden box, which houses 45 different moulding planes. Later in his life, he used these skills extensively when he worked as a patternmaker for a plastering company. Bertie worked through his seventies, retiring when he lost a finger. The tool collection was donated to the Kew Historical Society by Bertie’s granddaughter, Pamela Webster Bloom, a former resident of Kew.The blackened wood toolbox contains 45 wooden moulding planes, many made in England. In woodworking, a moulding plane is a specialised plane used for making the complex shapes found in wooden mouldings. Traditionally, moulding planes were blocks of wear resistant hardwood, often beech or maple, which were worked to the shape of the intended moulding. The blade, or iron was likewise formed to the intended moulding profile and secured in the body of the plane with a wooden wedge. A traditional cabinetmakers shop might have many, perhaps hundreds, of moulding planes for the full range of work to be performed.Toolbox engraved with the initials ‘BG’ on the lidmoulding plane, bertie greenwood, woodworking tools

William Jackson Thomas is credited with making the first ever telephone call in Victoria. Thomas was a customs inspector at the Geelong Customs House and a keen amateur scientist, astronomer and woodworker. He experimented with electricity and induction to develop his own telephone soon after its invention by Alexander Graham Bell. He built most of the experimental telephone equipment himself – right down to the screws. According to the Geelong Advertiser, on 27 December 1877, Thomas held a telephone conversation with friends in a summer house 40 metres away.This instrument is of great historic significance as the instrument which made Australia's first telephone call in 1877, between two houses in Geelong. Although predated by Alexander Graham Bell's invention, this instrument is an example of Australian innovation and design; characteristic of Australian communications history. The instrument has excellent provenance, carrying a descriptive plaque about the use of the item. As an early prototype of a telephone, it is an incredibly rare example of communications technology.Stained wooden rectangular box containing mechanism with circular turned section at one end being the receiver and transmitter. There are 3 metal screws at the rear and a leather strap running from one of these to the transmitter/receiver. A label is on the base.On label: "First telephone made in / Victoria 1878 / Used experimentally between / Geelong and Ballarat and Geelong Queenscliff. / Maker WJ Thomas Esq. / Late H.M. Customs Geelong / Certified by A.C. Thomas For the above W.J.T."telephone, inventions