Ray Stone was born in 1927, growing up in Beechworth as the oldest of eight children, but spent much of his life travelling, which he recalls in this oral history. Although he started working at the Beechworth Tannery with his father, he joined the Navy before he was of age in 1944 to support the war effort, and upon returning to Beechworth gave up on the Tannery after half a day to continue working jobs across Victoria instead. He talks extensively about watching Beechworth's famous Wheelbarrow race, where Tony Evans bet Tom Parkinson that the latter would not be able to push the former in a wheelbarrow from the Beechworth Post Office to Mt Buffalo in eight days. Calling himself a "helper all [his] life", he discusses the way many towns he worked in would come together to support struggling families, especially widows. In comparison, he suggests that the Beechworth of 2000 is much less community-orientated. He also discusses the economic changes he's witnessed around Beechworth, from the difficulties during the Depression while he was a child, to business improvements at the Tannery and Brewery, to the tourism boom. This oral history recording was part of a project conducted by Jennifer Williams in the year 2000 to capture the everyday life and struggles in Beechworth during the twentieth century. This project involved recording seventy oral histories on cassette tapes of local Beechworth residents which were then published in a book titled: Listen to what they say: voices of twentieth century Beechworth. These cassette tapes were digitised in July 2021 with funds made available by the Friends of the Burke.Ray Stone's account of his life is historically and socially significant to the region of Beechworth for the way it describes changes in the town over the twentieth century. It covers themes including community relationships, business development, and cultural life. It makes this commentary in comparison to nearby regions such as the Snowy Mountains. This oral history account is socially and historically significant as it is a part of a broader collection of interviews conducted by Jennifer Williams which were published in the book 'Listen to what they say: voices of twentieth-century Beechworth.' While the township of Beechworth is known for its history as a gold rush town, these accounts provide a unique insight into the day-to-day life of the town's residents during the 20th century, many of which will have now been lost if they had not been preserved.This is a digital copy of a recording that was originally captured on a cassette tape. The cassette tape is black with a horizontal white strip and is currently stored in a clear flat plastic rectangular container. It holds up 40 minutes of recordings on each side.Mr Ray Stone /listen to what they say, beechworth, oral history, burke museum, stone, ray stone, tannery, tanneries, finch street, navy, the great depression, poverty, wheelbarrow race, cars, gift footrace, marriage, travel

Colour slide of children on a type of tractor train fun ride at Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of a tractor train a Legacy Christmas Party at Government House, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slide of three girls eating ice-cream at Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of three girls at a Legacy Christmas Party at Government House, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slides of children on a merry-go-round ride at Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slides x 2 of a merry-go-round at Government House, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party, carousel

Colour slide of children playing on a slide at Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of children playing on a slide at a Legacy Christmas Party at Government House, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slide of people at the Christmas party at Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of people near a tent at a Legacy Christmas party at Government House, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slide of children playing on a slide at Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of a boy playing on a slide at a Legacy Christmas Party at Government House, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Unknown year of origin training film from RAAF.black plastic box with yellow sticker on front with RAAF logo. Inside box is video tape, bearing the same title on the outside of the box.CLASSIFICATION: UNCLASSIFIED STOCK NO. 6910/66/105/3022 HQSC Film Library TITLE: The Care and Handling of video tape Accession No. VT0524 TIME: 10mins Copy No "A" REEL 1 of 1 Spine of box: Video Number 139

A recording of Shire of Diamond Valley Carols, December 1989. This performance is by the Diamond Valley Choral Society.3 audio cassettes in clear plastic cases, program and 2 draft programs.Handwritten on cassette: Tape 1: "DV Shire Carols 1989"; Tape 2: "Festival of carols"; Tape 3: "Dv Christmas carols 10.12.89, taped by Ray Briggs of Watsonia".diamond valley choral society, christmas music, diamond valley, carols

This tape is from the first telegram ever sent in Western Australia. This important event occurred on 21 June 1869. At this time the transmitted message was received on paper tape and later transcribed onto a telegram form for delivery. The original tape was presented to the Honourable Frederick Palgrave Barlee, Colonial Secretary of Western Australia, as a souvenir. "FPB" appears on an engraved shield on the lid. James Coats Fleming, the first telegraphist and later Superintendent of Telegraphs, sent the telegram. During 1875, Colonial Secretary Barlee transferred from Perth to Belize and then to Trinidad where he died in 1884. The fate of the case and spool, souvenir of that first telegram, was unknown. In July 1940, the WA Agent-General in London advised the Premier's Department in Western Australia that a Mrs EW Hillyer of Hertfordshire had the spool and case and was willing to sell it for ten guineas ($21). The Postmaster General's Department agree to the purchase and it duly arrived by registered mail. As a communications museum was planned in Melbourne, it was sent there to be included in the collection. Nothing more was heard until early 1980s when the relic arrived at the Post and Telecommunication museum in Perth. The case had been found in an old Melbourne strongroom where it had apparently been placed for safe-keeping and then forgotten. Initial attempts to decode the message on the tape were unsuccessful. Eventually, it was discovered that the Western Australian Telegraph Company, responsible for that first transmission, had devised its own code. A copy was obtained from the Battye Library and the message deciphered.This Morse tape is of historic significance as the first telegram ever sent in Western Australia. The occasion was momentous as the transition point between isolation and ease of connection for business and personal communications. The case is of aesthetic interest for the craftsmanship involved in the engraved text. Further, the tape has research potential owing to the unique information contained within this tape; that is, the code of the Western Australian Telegraph Company. This tape, may in turn be used to decode further messages sent by the Western Australian Telegraph Company. As the first telegraph message sent in Western Australia, this tape is rare. Despite a tumultuous journey from 1869 to the early 1980s, the tape's ceremonial wooden case provides provenance information which supports the tape's historic importance.Small wooden case (.1) holding a length of morse tape (.2) which was the first telegram ever sent in Western Australia . Wound onto a mother of pearl reel (.3). Accompanying signs and decoded message (.4,.5)..1 engraved on a metal shield shaped plaque on the lid: "WESTERN AUSTRALIAN / TELEGRAPHS / FPB" Inside: 'TRANSLATION OF REGISTER / TO THE CHAIRMAN OF FREMANTLE TOWN TRUST / His Excellency Colonel Bruce heartily congratulates the / inhabitants of Fremantle on this annihilation of distance / between the Port and the Capital, and he requests that this, / the first message, may be made publicly known. / GOVERNMENT HOUSE, / PERTH, June 21, 1869 / Transmitted 11 am / J.C.F."|.2: "Instrument Register / of the First / Telegraphic Message / in / Western Australia"|.3: "The first Telegraph Pole / in / WESTERN AUSTRALIA / was erected by / The Hon. Frederick P. Barlee / Colonial Secretary / on 19th Febr. 1869"telegram, commemorative item, morse inker, morse tape, morse code, code, postmaster-general's department

Colour slides of crowds of people on the Government House lawn. There are large Army style tents. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slides x 2 of people at Government House for a Legacy Christmas Party, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slides of crowds of people on the Government House lawn. There are large Army style tents. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of people, refreshments and umbrellas at Government House for a Legacy Christmas Party, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slide of people leaving Government House after the party had finished. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of people leaving Government House after a Legacy Christmas Party, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Mrs Sheila Parkinson was born in Wagga in 1916 and came to Beechworth as a young woman around 1938. Sheila trained as a psychiatric nurse at Mayday Hills hospital prior to the second World War. At that time, unmarried women were accommodated and received nursing training on-site. Shiela was obliged to cease professional training and employment when she married in 1941, which disrupted completion of her final nursing examinations. Following post-war changes to the law that allowed married women to work, Sheila returned to Mayday Hills. Sheila's husband, Don, returned to Beechworth after four years abroad as a serviceman in the Australian Air Force. Beechworth's institutions were a major source of local employment throughout the twentieth century. As well as providing limited employment opportunities to young women like Shiela, post-war European migrants from Bonegilla Migrant camp found at Mayday Hills, encouraging European migrant settlement in the district. Mayday Hills was renamed several times since its establishment in 1867. At the peak of operations, it comprised sixty-seven buildings housing over twelve hundred patients patients and five hundred staff. The hospital officially closed in 1998. Today, the decommissioned two-storey Italianate style main building stands on eleven hectares of botanical gardens under National Trust protection. The site remains a popular cultural heritage destination for visitors. This oral history recording was part of a project conducted by Jennifer Williams in the year 2000 to capture the everyday life and struggles in Beechworth during the twentieth century. This project involved recording seventy oral histories on cassette tapes of local Beechworth residents which were then published in a book titled: Listen to what they say: voices of twentieth century Beechworth. The cassette tapes were digitised in July 2021 with funds made available by the Friends of the Burke.Employed as a psychiatric nurse at one of Beechworth's large welfare institutions, Mayday Hills, Mrs Sheila Parkinson recalls the conditions faced by staff and patients at the hospital, which cared for chronically ill people from the Ovens region and patients from the Yarra Bend Asylum, Melbourne, which closed in 1925. When Sheila first began her nurse training, Mayday Hills suffered from a lack of resources and rudimentary facilities and patients frequently suffered from the cold due to poor heating and inadequate clothing and bedding. However, as the twentieth century progressed, Sheila recalls how conditions and treatments improved as a result of increased government funding of services and advances in psychiatry and pharmaceutical medicine. Mrs Sheila Parkinson's oral history recording is historically and socially significant for its witness to life in Beechworth in the pre- and post-WWII period. Sheila's story enriches our understanding of processes of modernisation with regard to psychiatric and welfare services, while the course of Sheila's professional training and employment brings attention to systemic and socio-economic barriers faced by women, as well as the valuable contribution women and migrants make in the delivery of care and ancillary services. This oral history account is socially and historically significant as it is a part of a broader collection of interviews conducted by Jennifer Williams which were published in the book 'Listen to what they say: voices of twentieth-century Beechworth.' While the township of Beechworth is known for its history as a gold rush town, these accounts provide a unique insight into the day-to-day life of the town's residents during the twentieth century, many of which would have been lost if they had not been preserved.This is a digital copy of a recording that was originally captured on a cassette tape. The cassette tape is black with a horizontal white strip and is currently stored in a clear flat plastic rectangular container. It holds up 40 minutes of recordings on each side.Mrs Sheila Parkinson /twentieth century beechworth, mayday hills, psychiatric care, benevolent asylums, nursing, wwii, psychiatric treatment, country women, psychiatric hostpital, beechworth's institutions, local employment, government institutions, listen to what they say, oral history, burke museum, sheila parkinson, beechworth lunatic asylum, beechworth mental hospital, beechworth hospital for the insane, the kerferd clinic, bonegilla migrant camp, working women, white australia policy

Colour slide of girls enjoying rocking playground equipment at Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of two girls in a rocking seesaw at a Legacy Christmas Party at Government House, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slide of a legatee speaking to the crowd at the Christmas party at Government House. It could be the President. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of the Governor of Victoria attending the Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slides of a legatee speaking from the steps of Government House at a Legacy Christmas party, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

The Uebergang family lived at Tooram Park, Allansford from 1912 to 1992. The bed jacket is part of a collection of items relating to rural life in the mid 20th century.White cotton bed jacket with scalloped satin stitch edging and cut work with butterfly motif lace insertions. Front closing with press studs and a tie. Cap sleeves with a V-shaped slit and butterfly motifs either side.201 (on tape at the side)costume accessories, female costume, uebergang, allansford, women's bed wear

Colour slide of mothers and children on the steps of Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of mothers and children coming down the steps of Government House for a Legacy Christmas Party, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Colour slide of mothers and children on the steps of Government House. Melbourne Legacy held an annual Christmas Party for Junior Legatees and Widows at Government House for many years. The year is unknown but likely to be during the 1950s. A group of slides in glass mounts with green tape are probably from a couple of consecutive years. They will be catalogued separately. Was with many other slides taken in the 1950s and 1960s. The slides have been photographed to make digital images and moved to archive quality sleeves. In many cases the original images were not well focussed and the digital image is the best available.A record of a Legacy Christmas party held at Government House.Colour slide of mothers and children coming down the steps of Government House for a Legacy Christmas Party, in a glass mount with green tape.christmas party, government house party

Keith William Peatling 3794413. National Service, Royal Aust Armoured Corp Trooper. Vietnam B Sqd 3 Car Regt 10/12/69 - 11/12/69. Detachment 1st Forward Delivery Troop - 12/12/69 - 15/12/69. B Sqd 3 car Regt 16/12/69 - 4/6/70. Came from Huntly/Bagshot area. 1. Beige wool knitted underwear, short sleeve top - makers label, beige with black writing. 2. Beige wool knitted underwear shorts, name on cotton tape in black ink, 3 cream plastic round buttons on fly front, makers name stamped in blue ink. Cotton tape around waist, cotton lining on waist band. 1. On white label, black writing "BRUCE PIE INDUSTRIES, QUEENSLAND 1952 Size 36" 2. "3794413 PEATLING" WRITTEN IN BLACK INK ON COTTON TAPE ATTACHED TO WAIST. STAMPED IN BLUE WRITING: 'HOLEPROOF VICTORIA 1966 32underwear, wool uniform, military issue