Alan Stewart

Story

Alan was born on 7th May 1912. He was the second youngest of eight children to William and Elizabeth Stewart who lived in St. Helens Gardens, North Kensington, London. Alan was only four when his father died of a work-related accident at age 48. Some of Alan’s early childhood memories were of night raids during the First World War. His eldest sister played the piano while his mother & the rest of the children sang hymns over the noise of the anti-aircraft guns & falling bombs.

Soon after the war they were forced to sell their house in London & moved to the country. By this time Alan’s eldest sisters & brother were working, & the younger children were sent to boarding school. His mother purchased a house & took in lodgers, one family being an Australian doctor & his wife. They talked about Australia as a “land of opportunity” for young people. Some time later his mother decided to migrate to Australia, leaving the three eldest children, who were permanently employed, behind. Alan was 11 years old.

Two of the older boys worked their passage to Australia as ship stewards. Alan’s mother & the three younger children travelled on the T.S.S. Larges Bay, & landed in Sydney in December 1923. They rented a cottage in North Bondi & the youngest children attended school. Their mother secured a job as seamstress in one of the leading department stores in the city. Alan spent after-school hours playing in the Bondi sandhills behind their school. He left school at the age of 13 with just his Intermediate Certificate.

The family moved to Dubbo, with Alan & his brothers working on wheat and sheep farms for very low wages. However they all found better jobs, but in other towns. Their Mother realised the hopelessness of trying to keep her family of boys together, & decided to return to England with her youngest daughter.

In I927 Alan decided to take up an apprenticeship in bricklaying, as Australia was going through a boom period. Unfortunately this was all to come to a sudden halt within two years with the beginning of the Great Depression.

Alan & his brother Don had heard about the Government starting up a tobacco industry in Mareeba, North Queensland. The finance to get started was 300 pounds & the land was simply balloted for. It didn’t take the Stewart brothers long to decide this was what they wanted to do. With no money for transport they decided to ‘hitch-hike’ to Queensland. However folk were very hesitant to offer a couple of ‘swaggies’ a ride. By the time they reached Tamworth they had worn out their boots. A couple of ‘hobos’ took pity on them, & told them about ‘jumpinq the rattler’ (travelling or goods trains without paying) and this became their mode of transport all the way to Mareeba.

Alan and Don found work on tobacco farms to gain knowledge in tobacco growing. Finally in September 1932 they selected land near Dimbulah. They named their farm “Glen Aldon”. They worked extremely hard clearing thick stringybark scrub then planting tobacco. They faced many setbacks of pests and ‘blue mould’ which resulted in low prices for their tobacco. Inexperience was their downfall. They were forced to give up their dream & look for more reliable work.

In 1935 Alan resumed his bricklaying trade and worked on the Tully School and the Ingham Hospital. Later he moved to Canberra where the new National Capital was in the making. That was a turning point in Alan’s wandering life. He found lodgings in a private boarding house owned by Mr & Mrs S.O. Taylor of Kingston & their three daughters, Iris, Mena & Norma. Alan went to work for a contractor building houses in Ainslie & Turner. In time Alan struck up a courtship with Mena & in May 1941 they were married in the Methodist Wesley Church Forrest.

The 2nd World War broke out & Alan was drafted into the medical unit of the 18th Field Ambulance in May 1941. Due to a knee injury he was sent to the Rocky Creek 2/2nd Australian General Hospital, near Mareeba for surgery on his knee, & remained with them as a ward master on clerical duties. He returned to his bricklaying trade after the War, & built his family home at 30 Stuart St, Griffith in 1946. Alan and Mena raised 4 children, Grahame, Carolyn, Bruce and Elizabeth.

By 1962 Alan gave up bricklaying & worked with Charles Rogers & Sons at Civic in the Garden Dept. Well known in Canberra’s gardening community, he remained with Rogers for l0 years before retiring in 1973 to Yamba in Northern NSW. Later they retired to Buderim, Qld. They kept fit with square dancing, lawn bowls & tending their lovely hibiscus garden.

Alan passed away one month bfore his 85th birthday, on 2nd April 1997. He is survived by Mena and his four children, Grahame, Caroline (Cardenti), Bruce & Liz, seven grandchildren and six great grandchildren.

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