Friday, June 13, 2014

TELLING IT ON TUESDAY (Part 22a) on SATURDAY

As mentioned last week I was unable to get to some photos I wanted to show but now I've managed to finally reach them so this is a photo shoot to share with you and also enable me to have a peek back into the late 1960s and relive some very happy times. Quite a lot happens over the next few years so I need to sit back and get events into chronological order if I can.

You may remember that toward the end of 1966 Phil and I had moved into a house in Claremont.  These photos were taken in 1967 and 1968.  The first is the house itself at 358 Stirling Highway, followed by one of Phil in 1967 sitting on the front step with Charlie Brown and then a fuzzy one of yours truly relaxing in the back garden in 1968:




In February, 1967 I began working at Thomas and Co in Cottesloe and this photo was taken in the back garden behind the office.  Oh, look some colour photography at last!  Actually the Export Manager, Len Daymond, had just bought a Polaroid camera and wanted to try it out and I was the guinea pig.

After my divorce proceedings in June, 1967, Phil and I became officially engaged and then on 16th September we were married in Trinity Congregational church in St George's Terrace in the city.  (Unfortunately brother Len took some photos but for some reason they didn't come out.  I was surprised and rather disappointed as he was a commercial photographer.  Strangely enough it happened again at the dedication of the seat to my mum in Kings Park.  He said the photo shop had lost the photos).  Once again we had to rely on our old black and white cameras but at least we do have a record of our wedding.  I was 35 and Phil was 37.  This is a photo of us arriving by taxi at the church:


and the bridal group outside the church door.  Back row:  Eddie Simcock, Phil me and Betty Simcock and front row Steven and Karen.  (Steven was nearly 10 and Karen was 12).


This one shows Phil and me with (L-R) my niece Wendy, my mum and (far right) my sister-in-law Jean (Wendy's mum):


The wedding party once again, this time at the small reception held after the wedding cememony, and Phil and me cutting the cake:



We spent a lovely couple of hours with family and friends and then it was time to say farewell to everyone, go and change and leave on our honeymoon.   First photo is of Phil and me outside the hall and then of us getting into the faithful Ford Anglia.  (You can tell by the way Phil is standing to attention that he was in the army for a couple of years.  He did two years National Service with the British Army with most of his time spent in Germany).



Looking back on these photos I am still amazed at just how young Phil looked.  When these photos were taken he was nearly 38 and yet he looks about 25.  There is a story that is often told about one morning when Phil was dropping Karen off at Iona College and her friends asked her if he was her brother.  When she told them no, it was her step-father they thought she was having them on.  I often wondered if he was perhaps taken for my son.  Oh dear, what a dreadful thought.

P.S.  For all those that I know are dying to know (not) what I was wearing....it was a pale blue suit with navy and white shoes, a navy bag and white hat.  Karen was wearing a yellow dress with a lace yoke and sleeves I made for her, and Betty's suit was aqua with white accessories.   A gentleman Betty and I worked with, Bruce Cantwell, grew the most beautiful orchids and the day before the wedding he presented me with 2 slipper orchids done up with fern for Betty and I to wear on our suits (I think back then we actually called them costumes).  He also gave me a spray of cymbidium orchids for Karen to carry.  I have always remembered Bruce's kindness in doing that.

On our honeymoon, Phil and I drove around our south-west in a week (we had to be back in Claremont for Steven's birthday on 24th September so couldn't stay away any longer).  I have black and white photos which of course don't do justice to the scenery but perhaps next week I may bore you with some of them.  That will give me a little longer to get my head around all that lay ahead.

This is Steven cutting his birthday cake with friends Stephen and Janet Simcock (children of Betty and Eddie), Karen and the lad at the back was a school friend of Karen.


Didn't youngsters dress nicely back in the "good old days"?  (That was another yellow dress I had made Karen.

14 comments:

  1. What a wonderful adventure, and so happily photographed. I'm reminded of an English Ford --a Ford Prefect, which provided writer Douglas Adams a name for his most enigmatic fictional character in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy-- owned by one of my friends long ago. Loved that car. There weren't many of them here in California. I eagerly await further installments in your chronicle. It is excellent!

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    1. Geo thanks so much for your very flattering comments. I just try to tell it as it is or at least as I remember it.
      My first father-in-law owned a little Ford Prefect. Their only problem was cornering as they had quite a high centre of gravity so you had to be careful on the winding roads.

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  2. Like Geo. I am loving this. Gorgeous photos - and so much happiness captured. Beautiful start to a wonderful marriage.

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    1. Thanks also for your comments EC. I have been enjoying going back over the years and trying to remember. There are events even now I am remember but have omitted them for no reason other than they didn't come to mind when writing the memoirs.

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  3. A fresh start captured in film. You were quite the seamstress.

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    1. Was a good and happy start too. Delores, I really loved to sew from about the age of 4. My sorrow now is that I can no longer use scissors to cut anything not a tiny needle if any hand sewing required. I can still at least hem sheets if need be or take up trouser legs (if Phil first cuts off the surplus). Ah the fun of aging.

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  4. Hari Om
    The happiness oozes off the screen! YAM xx

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    1. That's good as that is what I hoped I'd portray. xx

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  5. Lovely, lovely memories. Thank you. I adore Karen's yellow frock!

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    1. Yes, they are wonderful memories on which to reminisce.

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  6. I'm wondering was yellow Karens favourite colour?

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  7. Very nice wedding photos, you're right Phil does look quite young.
    I remember suits being called costumes in the 50s and 60s. I remember dad making an appointment with a dressmaker for me and my sister to get measured for clothes but wen I realised she would be making each of us a costume, I never went back as I was only 12 or 13 and didn't want to wear what I called old lady clothes.

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  8. I don't remember yellow as being a favourite colour but I have always like it as a colour. The dress at Mum's wedding was a lemony yellow and I felt so grown up and beautiful wearing it. I think it is still hanging in the spare wardrobe, although I have had a couple of purges lately so maybe it went to Good Sammys. Mum made the most beautiful clothes for me to wear, I always felt very special in my one-off outfits. shame I never inherited the patience to sew.

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