In 1947 when I was ten years old and living with my family on a farm at Wagerup in the South West, my mother became very ill and was hospitalised and/or confined to bed at home. My parents couldn’t afford to pay for help, so I was kept home from school to care for my mother and two younger siblings. I also had two brothers who were attending school and my father had to go out to work each day.
While I was at home I did Correspondence Lessons as well as the housework, and cared for a family of seven and my mother when she was home. My mother was too unwell to supervise me and I was very busy with cooking, housework, and caring for the littlies, who were four and two years old. There was no electricity and everything had to be done by hand, even the washing.
The lessons came by post, which my father picked up at the Wagerup Post Office and I remember this as being like something quite magical – both exciting and frightening. Exciting because new work had arrived but frightening in case I couldn’t do the work. The standard set by the Correspondence School teachers was very high but they were also very encouraging and helpful in their written comments. People still compliment me on my handwriting. We learned to do this by using Copy Books and I realised very quickly that if my work standard wasn’t high enough then I would have to re-do the lesson.
I returned to the Waroona Primary School after a year at home, however, I experienced Correspondence Lessons again later when I entered the high school years. In those days there was no high school at Waroona, so we continued to attend primary school and our teacher supervised the subjects we did via correspondence.
After I left school I was employed as a Governess at Wongawol Station about 220km northeast of Wiluna. This was about 1952-53. I had two pupils and I supervised their lessons that came on the mail truck once a fortnight (if the weather was good). It wasn’t so wonderful if we had heavy rains and the vehicles were unable to use the dirt roads. Quite often there would be children visiting from other stations (sometimes with their governess) and this would be a fun time. As well as sharing lessons we were able to play team sports, and go on picnics to various places of interest nearby. This also helped the children learn social skills, as living in remote places sometimes causes problems in this area.
I think the Correspondence School and the R.F.D.S are the most wonderful institutions for people living in the outback. Both these services were and are run by devoted, caring and empathetic people who appear to love the work they do in helping others.
