Ellison Hawker

Ellison Hawker was a country boy who moved to the city to attend school.

In 1940 Mr. Hawker went to England to study anti submarine activities and join the Royal Navy.  He worked on various ships in the north and south Atlantic for 4 years during the Second World War.

My Hawker also worked out of West Africa for a couple of years then went back to England to join an escort aircraft carrier as a gunnery officer.

“I was very fortunate.  I was never in any life risking situations.  I did have a couple of nasty experiences.  When I came back off leave to London I went back to Australia House and on a couple of occasions I went there, I met my friends from Hobart, probably people I went to school with.  One was Alan Pearsall from Margate and when I came back again I’d found out they had been shot down and lost their lives.  Very often I found that.  Lots of my friends went and on the other hand I was fortunate I went through the whole lot and survived it”.

Mr. Hawker married in 1944 and in 1949 bought a cottage at Park Beach because his sons wanted to go swimming at the beach.

Mr. Hawker will be 93 in February and says he leads a very quiet life now.

Thank you Mr. Hawker for sharing a snippet of your life story.

Beryl Woods

Beryl was born in Tasmania in 1920, in 1943 married and in 1978 moved to a shack in Dodges Ferry.  This shack was the only house along the straight at Carlton Beach Road then.

Beryl’s earliest childhood memory is when she was 3 and sitting on her Father’s knee and he would say “tickle my feet and go to sleep” and indeed Beryl would fall asleep!  Her Father continued this until she was 5 and sadly when Beryl was 7 he died.

Beryl attended school at New Town.  Near the school was a hill where her friends would drag a sled to the top and ride down it.  Each Thursday night a group of the students would go dancing.  There was one boy named Archibald who had no idea how to dance.  Each week he would go along the row of girls and ask them to dance.  Beryl said to her friend “if he gets as far as me I will have to say yes as I feel sorry for him.”  Archibald got to Beryl and of course she said yes.  They were on the dance floor and everyone was laughing at Archibald and all his antics when all of a sudden he stopped still and crossed his legs. Beryl asked him “what are you doing”.  He said “I have to stop or I’m going to pee myself!”  Beryl walked off the dance floor laughing and her friends never let her forget this dance.

Two of her best friends from kindergarten she still sees now on a regular basis.

At school Beryl enjoyed writing.  The students were tested once a week and if they scored ten out of ten they didn’t have to do the test the following week.  Beryl liked school and had an abundance of friends.  One day in class Beryl and her friends decided to take turns in writing a poem about their teacher.  Unfortunately the teacher caught them passing the poem to one another, but luckily after reading it took it in good spirit.

Beryl’s first job was at Cadburys but she hated it.

Beryl has one child which was a miracle as she was told after having a caesarean that both her and her son only had 1 hour to live and to this day both are alive and well.  “Having my son was the happiest day of my life”.

In her spare time Beryl likes going out and meeting up with her friends.