Notable People – Clarrie Drury OAM

I could milk a cow before I was six years old, also ride a horse before I started school.  I started school at 6½ and left at 13½.  School was a waste of time as far as I was concerned.  There were few motor cars then and I remember on two occasions before I left school having heard a motor car coming and the teacher let us run out of school to see them.  There were several bullock teams and about 5 horse teams continually passing the school.  Bullock teams hauling logs to a nearby mill and horse teams taking the sawn timber and sleepers to the wharf as there was no rail until 1913.  All gravel for he road was pick and shovel and carted with horses and dray.

Dairying was a big thing.  The cream was taken to Lansdowne wharf then per boat to the factory at Mitchells Island.  Each cream day there would be about 30 vehicles delivering cream to the boat, included would be 5 vans loaded with cream, the remainder would be spring carts bringing cream from 4-6 farms.  These carriers would take back the groceries and bread (3 pence per loaf) from our Co-op bakery in Lansdowne village.  The mail from the Lansdowne end was also taken by cream cart.

At Central Lansdowne there was a Post Office and for a time after the railway came in November 1913, the mail was delivered at about 7 pm.  A few of us boys would walk through the paddocks for the mail.  With dogs we would chase Kangaroo rats which were plentiful, also put o’possums up trees.

SCHOOL DAYS

I did not like school very much – had 4 teachers.  Andy McDonald rode a bike from Coopernook.  It was a terrible road in those days.  Then came a young chap, Sam Forster, he would give us Nature Study each Thursday afternoon.  He would take us to the bush over the road in Sheather’s paddock to study birds or the difference species of trees.  When I was 10 years old I knew all the different timbers in the forest.  Then came R L Barnes from Junee.  He was a splendid teacher and had a tennis court built in the school ground.  He was liked by all pupils and residents.

Next came WCM Elliott.  He had several favoured ones.  I was certainly not one of those!  I was blamed for many things of which I was not guilty.  He used to walk to the toilet each day after taking us in after lunch, about 80 yards from the school.  Once when there was long grass hanging over the track, David Minett tied it together.  Some of us watched a he came a ‘buster’.

When he came back he blamed me as the culprit and I had a big job talking myself out of it.  He never found the culprit.  He kept five of us in one day for half an hour.  When we went out we plotted to attack him the very next time he called one of us out for the cane.  We made our plans known to two boys (tittle tats) who went straight to him with our plans.  He came marching out displaying the cane and called us in and asked us if we said so, we boldly said ‘yes’.  He said ‘Do you mean it?’ We said ‘Yes, we do’.  His reply was ‘I advise you not to try it’.  None of us had any trouble after that.  I passed the Qualifying Certificate at 11½ years of age and did lessons from a book for two years.

I left school at 13½ and went to the bush with an axe on my shoulder.  My brother Andrew and I ringbarked 135 acres of forest in five weeks.  Most of it was fairly thickly timbered.  One paddock opened on to the road.  It was not fenced and was used by our family, also the two uncles.

We always had a good supply of horses at one time.  There were 26 and often bred three foals each year.  We used to get some stray horses off the road which we caught and rode.  At one time we had two draught mares die after foaling (septicaemia).  We reared the foals on the bucket, cow’s milk, a little warm water and sugar.  When they were about six weeks old we gave them cracked corn, chaff and bran as well.  I broke them in, also several other horses.  In my lifetime I have broken in 138 horses mostly draughts.  I charged £1 to the saddle only and 30 shillings for saddle and harness.  Any draughts I was able to use on the farm, so I did not charge for them.

When I was courting I used to ride 10 miles to Langley Vale twice a week – that was 40 miles a week – so combining business with pleasure.  I broke in a lot of horses in 3½ years.  If we wanted to go to Lansdowne to a concert or other function at night, sister, brother and I would go the 5½ miles on a bike.  One of us would ride so far, leave the bike, then walk or run and the next would ride and so on.  Doing the trip in relays we would do the trip in amazingly short time.

We boys would skin any calves and get nine pence for the hide.  Sometimes we would skin an old cow and get seven and sixpence for her hide.

We had a small plot of ground to grow early cucumbers and tomatoes.  We could get three pence each for cucumbers and nine pence to one shilling per dozen for tomatoes.  They were sold at so much per dozen in those days.  We saved all we could so as to make a start in life.  Sometimes we would get a job milking for some one and receive two shillings a milking.  It all helped and by the time I was 17 I had £50, a horse, saddle, bridle and a sulky.  I left home at 17 years of age, we split posts at £1.2.6 per 100.  I then took a job burning off in August 1923.

It rained every night and I did not make much headway, so I went to work for Klumps at Langley Vale.  By mid September it was impossible to plough as we had so much drying winds.  I used to ride each day to Coopernook State Forest to a paddock of Klumps ringbarking.  I have never seen so many mosquitoes before or since.  I used to make a fire to boil the billy and then put green leaves to make smoke whilst I ate my lunch.

My brother Andrew and I leased a farm on the opposite side of the river from home [currently farmed by Andrew’s grandson Adrian].  By putting our savings together we were able to get a start.  We paid £28 for a new separator.  We bought cows for as little as £2 to £10, averaging about £6 or £7 per head.  By the end of 12 months we had 52 cows milking by hand and some calves we had reared.

Of course, we were batching and able to get equipment by degrees.  We did a lot of fencing and repairs to buildings, so getting the place in order as it had been allowed to run down.  We had a lot of fun in those days.

The property was both sides of the road with a lane running up the cow yard.  We usually left the gate open in the lane, stray horses would come in, we would shut them in and go riding on them at night.  In those days all stock were driven and not moved by truck as they are today.  Huge mobs would pass on the way from Long Flat through Comboyne to Wingham sales.  The drovers often camped at our place.  Syrian hawkers were also plentiful leading pack horses with their wares.  They also stayed and we played jokes on them.

On 6 October 1926 I married Nellie Sowter.  We bought a lot of new furniture and paid £101 for it.  Bread cost three pence a loaf, but steak was eight pence a pound, sausages three pence a pound, corned beef fourpence, or three pence in bulk – 25 lb lots.  We were paid 6½ pence per lb for butter during summer and up to 11½ pence in winter.  There was no stable price until about 1931 when the Paterson scheme came in and then the price was stable all year round, about 10 pence per pound.

In February 1927 we bought out Charles Klump at Langley Vale and leased the farm which was owned by Langleys.  We milked up to 32 cows by hand taking the cream to the wharf on the slide.

The Depression came in earnest, there was no dole, there were often 5 tramps on the roads in a day.  They would call in for food, never one was turned away, they were all going north, we never saw one smoke or ask for tobacco.

Times were very hard as the 1927 Depression really set in.  Basic wage was £4.10.0 per 44 hour week.  The key hands in the mill received £5 per week.  Undressed timber was 8/- per 100 super feet, best dressed flooring 15/- per 100 super.  We had big floods in 1928 and 1929 the “daddy” of them all.

We used to burn charcoal a lot, we would dig a pit 3 feet deep sloping sides about 30 feet long, fill it with poles which were plentiful as a big area of bush had been felled.  We would have to be careful how we filed it (an art in doing so) so as not to have it choke whilst burning, would fill about a foot above ground.  We would light both ends of the pit.  In about 2 hours it would be a mass of red coals.  It would then be covered with old corrugated iron, then covered with dirt until no smoke was coming out that would choke the fire.  In two days the coal would be ready to bag.  A pit that size would hold about 70 bags of coal.

We delivered it to the wharf and it would then be taken to the Butter Factory and used in generating power to run the Factory, as there was no electricity then.

The Taree Council also bought charcoal to run their power for the town.  They had a generating plant where the County Council office is now.  The Langley Vale Mill was in operation then in a big way with a tram line 7 miles long, running into the mountain daily for logs.  They had a steam engine in the bush driving a winch to haul logs along the tram line.  They would haul to the mill a string of trucks loaded with logs – each had a man on the back end managing a rope which worked the brakes – a nerve racking job.  I later purchased a spring cart and a good horse when the charcoal business cut out.

Each week I would buy hides down through Coopernook and up Moto to Kundle Kundle and back.  Next morning I would drive through Cross’ Creek, then put the hides on the train for Sydney  I skinned the calves and paid 15 pence each for them.  I could skin a calf in two minutes, would give 7/6 for a cow hide.  In the day and a half I would sometimes make 30/- ($3).  That was good money.  I also dealt in pigs.  Would buy a pen of pigs nearly read for market, top them up and perhaps, make £2 in a couple of weeks on the deal.

Whilst at Langley Vale I cut two toes off my right foot.  This gave me my first taste of hospital.  I learned to use crutches for a while.  Also had the first operation in the District for frontal sinus.

In late 1927 I bought my first car, a 1925 Chevrolet.  It had travelled 5,800 miles and cost me £105, Regd. No. 84132.  I drove it for 10 years.  The property joined the Coopernook State Forest and in winter we would run our dry cows in the forest, from where they would come in fat as there was splendid kangaroo grass and good water.

I would drive the baker’s cart on the third Thursday as that was bread carter’s holiday.  Pay was 12/6 for the day and bread sold for 3 pence per loaf.  Buns were 9 pence for 13 (baker’s dozen).  Our first son, Colin was born whilst we lived there 28.10.27.  Alan was born there 28.2.29.

We stayed at Langley Vale for 3½ years, then returned to Central Lansdowne 1 September 1930 when I leased part of the Crittenden Estate 235 acres.  100 acres of it was extra good, 135 acres was a forest paddock a quarter of a mile from the homestead.  We ran dry cows and heifers there.  We always kept a few working bullocks.  During the bad times I worked a team and hauled logs for the mill, didn’t make much money.  I worked up three horse teams and sold them.  I always kept a draught stallion.

We established a good Guernsey Stud in 1932 and bred some splendid specimens of the breed which I felt made farm life more interesting.  We used to show them at Wingham, Taree and Kempsey Shows for many years with a lot of success.  I sold bulls to many places including over 90 heifers to Victoria before dispersing the Stud in 1953.  Two rail trucks of cattle went to Victoria.

We grew a lot of corn at Lansdowne in 1939, 25 acres brought 500 shelled bags, most of it was sent by boat to Sydney.  We received 7/6 per bag and paid threepence for the bag.  Ground was all worked with horses and a single furrow plough.  We pulled corn by hand and husked by hand mostly at night by lantern light.  Wet days were spent husking or shelling corn.

Before the Peters Milk Factory started I had a lot of pigs, but with the advent of whole milk a lot of hard work on farms was done away with – no more separating and feeding pigs.  Linton was born on 8 February 1931, Joy 5 December 1934 and Judith 14 years later 26 August 1948.  We enjoyed our family very much.

Until our boys grew up we depended on hired boys as we usually milked 55-60 cows by hand, but had an engine to separate.  In 1937 we bought a milking machine for £10, a Greenslade, little used, but had been idle for 10 years.  It was a big job altering the bails and installing the machines.  We had problems for a few days then all went well and we were able to do away with hired labour.

The farm was poorly fenced so a lot of post splitting and fencing was necessary.  All new buildings had to be erected – dairy, bails and pig stys had to be built before we went into occupation.  I pulled down 13 buildings during the 23 years we were there.  One of them was a creamery where in the early days farmers once a day would bring their milk to be separated.  Crittendens would buy the cream and the separated milk was taken home for calves and pigs.  In 1945 we built a new house and pulled down the old one and sold it.  It was re-erected in Coopernook and is in good repair today.

In 1947 I purchased a block of land in River Street, Cundletown.  I sold half of it and built a house on the other part which I leased for a time and then sold at good profit.  In 1949 I purchased a farm at Upper Lansdowne from Gus Unger on a walk in – walk out basis for Alan.  Colin had gone into Bible College in 1947 then later into the ministry.  His first circuit was West Wollongong, then Coolamon, Mudgee, Five Dock, Croydon Park, Sylvania and now his last place Padstow.  We were 23 years on the Crittenden farm and then moved to Kolodong.  A completely new style of farming, only 83 acres and lucerne country, so of course, the art of hay making was completely new to me.

The farm, similar to the last, was in very poor and run down state when we purchased it.  Linton and I split 1400 posts and rails in Lansdowne Forest for fencing, also carted stream gravel from Lansdowne for cementing.  We built new bails, dairy yards, barn, feed stalls and hay shed and completely re-built the house and after the first year we felt we had a model farm and had lifted it from a 27 cow farm to 36.  After selling out most of the Lansdowne cows I kept some heifers and sold out most of the cows I had on Kolodong and soon had a good herd again.  It was an easy farm to manage.  I could work it easily myself, but my wife would often help in the yard if she was not busy or if I had to be away, she would do the milking.

Kolodong was a lovely place in which to live.  Linton bought an old truck and took over a delivery business, stream gravel for cementing or road surfacing.  Joy trained at MRD Hospital, later married Peter Tutty and went to Wagga.  Linton soon purchased more trucks and built up the business and went into “ready mix concrete” in Taree, Forster and Gloucester.  The Kolodong farm was quite a change, no wages to pay no rent and a semi-retired sort of life.

I purchased a run down farm at Mitchells Island – 150 acres and improved it by putting in several dams, also fencing it into three paddocks.  After six years, I sold it for a big profit and bought 223 acres at Kundibakh.  Again I had to do a lot of fencing and dam building, also ¾ mile of road.  After having it for 8 years, I sold it and purchased 50 acres at Kolodong to where I removed a cottage which is leased to very good people, who care for it as though it is their own.

In 1964, my wife had to go to Sydney and have her breast removed because of cancer.  In 1967 we sold the farm there and moved to Albert Lane in Taree.  I purchased a farm at Taree Estate for Alan in 1958 and sold Upper Lansdowne.  We lived in Albert Lane and in 1973 my wife had a return of cancer in the lymph gland.  She gradually deteriorated and wasted away.  After five months in hospital she passed away on 14 November 1975.  I spent five lonely years and in November 1980 I married Lillian Murray, a widow of 25 years and came to her home in Bahtoo Parade.

For most of my life I have been active in Public Life.  In 1966 I was elected to the Management Committee of the Manning Valley Senior Citizen’s Home and became Chairman in 1975, a position I still hold in 1988.  In 1986 I was awarded The Achievement Award Plaque by the Taree City Council and in 1987 honoured by the Queen with the Order of Australia Medal.  Lillian, Colin, Trix and I attended an Investiture at Government House, an event always to be remembered.

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During his long life, Clarrie had an outstanding record in community affairs, rural activities, local government and most recently, his work for the aged of the Manning Community.

His involvement in community work dates back to 1927 and the list is a long one:

• He organised, through the Department of Lands, the appointment of trustees for all denominations in Lansdowne Cemetery.
• He was chairman of two lodges, held the position of District Master of the Hastings District Loyal Orange Lodge at the age of 25.
• He was a member of the Upper Lansdowne Hall Committee; also he was foundation secretary of the Lansdowne Junior Farmers and later president for five years.
• He was secretary of Lansdowne Primary Producers Union and Manning District President for two years.
• He was president of Lansdowne Patriotic and War Fund, vice-president of Lansdowne and District War Agricultural Committee and a member of the Voluntary Defence Corp.
• He was a committeeman for 36 years and president for four of the Manning River Agricultural and Horticultural Society (Taree Show).  He was a member of the Upper Manning Show committee.
• He was a committee member for 20 years of the Guernsey Herd Society.
• He was federal councillor for the Guernsey Herd Society for several years and was on the panel of Royal Show judges.  He had judged in three Royal shows and most country shows in NSW.
• He served on Manning Shire Council for 12 years, including two years as shire president.  He was chairman of the Works Staff and General Purposes Committee and a delegate to shire conferences for six years.
• He was deputy chairman for six years of the Manning-Forster branch of the Tourist Committee.
• He was foundation president of the Milk Producers Association for Taree district and spent several years on the United Pure Bred Cattle Breeders Society.
• He was a member and trustee of the Manning Valley Historical Society.
• He served as committeeman of the Manning Valley Senior Citizens homes for 26 years and was chairman for 15 years.  In May 1989, the C C Drury villa complex was opened at the Bushland Retirement Village.
• He was a steward and trustee of Central Lansdowne Methodist Church and secretary of the Leaders Meeting.  He was a steward at Taree, secretary of the trust when it became the Uniting Church, he was chairman of the property committee.
• He was awarded the Order of Australia Medal (OAM) for services to the community and to local government on Australia Day 1987.
• A year earlier he received an Achievement Award as part of the Greater Taree City Australia Day honours and in May he was presented with the Premier’s Award in recognition of outstanding service to the community of NSW.

Clarry died on 16 June 1990 just a couple of weeks short of his 85th birthday.

Contributed by family of Clarrie Drury.