Three years old, what do I remember? Absolutely nothing!
The next photograph in my Crichton d’Ora album, taken when I was 3 yrs 2 mths
old.
By now my younger sister, Karin, was 17 mths old so I have lots
of photographs of the two of us. This next one is probably the first of many I
have that were taken at the Auckland Zoological Gardens. Because we lived only
a 5 min walk away most of our relatives & friends came to visit us first
then we would all walk to the Zoo.
With Mum (left) & her friend, this was before the end of
the war, is that an Army uniform, possibly the WAACs.
In those days the main entrance to the Zoo was the top entrance
in Old Mill Rd and just inside the gate is where the photographer would pounce
and line everyone up sitting on the stone wall. In this old map of the Zoo,
c1950, it shows the Old Mill Rd entrance on the right and it was those first few
caged areas as you walked down the hill towards the main part of the Zoo that
the Lions, Leopards or similar species were housed. Although the maps don’t say
the Lions were there I’m about 99% sure that I remember seeing them there at
some stage during those early years. I remember thinking I wouldn’t like to have
lived in one of the houses that backed onto those caged areas!! Or maybe I’m
just remembering a very fanciful imagination.
(One
memory I do have, although it would have been a few years after this, is that we
used to hear the Lions etc roaring for their dinner every day and one day one of
them managed to escape the Zoo and all hell was let loose! We were all warned
over the radio to stay inside our homes until it was caught, eventually it was
cornered in the garden of a house in Old Mill Road and shot with a tranquiliser
gun (I think).)
The old Zoo entrance as it is today, well 2012, from
Google Maps!
Not quite as I remembered it but near enough! A shame they had
to kill it though, grenades & sten guns are a bit over the top!
Well, I’ve digressed slightly from 1944 but if I don’t mention
things as I remember them I might not remember them again!
At home in 42 Wellpark Ave, the buildings in the back are no
longer there, there’s either a new house or an extension to the old one on this
spot now. Some photos aren’t scanning very well but what can you expect when
they’re as old as Methuselah?
Taken at Browns Bay where Mum’s parents lived, that’s grandpa
Courtney Parks & Dad standing.
Me with a Kangaroo of all things! Little did I know that I had
an Aussie grandfather, oh the ignominy of it, but that’s a story for another
time. I think I was a bit younger than three in this photo.
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Food rationing started in NZ in 1942
and by Oct 1943 we were up to the third issue of rationing books, they were
printed in three different colours, to signify the three different age groups
they were for: children six mths to 5 years, children 5 to 10, and everyone
else. In this photo two women are examing their new ration book, it also shows
the clothes fashions of the day.
Which brings me to another memory, again I
would have been older than three as I had gone to the shops by myself to get a
half loaf of bread for our next door neighbour Aunty Caddy, there was no sliced
or wrapped bread in those days and not many choices of what sort of bread, white
or brown and I don’t think it was even wholemeal, probably white was coloured
with treacle or similar. On my way home I gradually ate most of the soft stuff
so there was just the hard outside crust left and my excuse was that I hadn’t
noticed I’d dropped it and when I went back to get it the birds had eaten it
all! Oh dear, the things we remember!
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Events of 1943:-
New Zealand troops
take part in the invasion of Italy.
Eleanor Roosevelt arrives in New Zealand
for a visit.
NZ general election, Peter Fraser was still our Prime Minister.
The top song was Paper Doll by the Mills Brothers and the top Broadway
musical Oklahoma.
The Academy Award winning movie was MGM's Mrs Miniver
starring Greer Garson.
The Jitterbug was the dance of the 1940s.
George
Harrison and Mick Jagger were born.
The Glenn Miller Orchestra provided the
most popular music.
Stockings were very scarce so woman would colour their
legs with gravy browning and draw a straight line down the back to make it look
like a seam, that was before seamless stockings became available. I remember
wearing seamed stockings (when I was older) and what a pain they were to keep
the seam straight!
A woman's clothes essentials were a turban, the tied
headscarf, a basic sensible military style suit and the sturdy wedge
shoe.
