The Court Is Short!

Recent reports about the main swimming pool used for the Olympic Games in Paris possibly being two shallow brought back memories of some of the articles that my father wrote in The Argus newspaper. Dad was known as a stirrer and if he thought something was wrong he brought it to the attention of the public, usually in his Why Keep It Quiet? column.

Each year, in the 1950s, we used to spend the summer holidays on my grandparents' farm in Queensland. In January 1956 the Australian Tennis Championships were held in Brisbane so Dad covered the tournament for The Argus. This was the first time that the tournament had been held at these courts and it had not all been plain sailing. I remember Dad, when he returned to the farm, telling the family about a problem that he has discovered with one of the tennis courts.

When I heard about the swimming pool in Paris I decided to investigate the tennis court story so I did a search in Trove.

On Friday 27 January two semi-finals had been played on a court which was two feet too short at one end. The players had noticed the discrepancy but did not make an official complaint. However when some journalists, including my father heard of it they decided to investigate. They were assured by the tournament committee that the groundsman had verified that the court measurements were correct. When the journalists decided to double check for themselves an official tried to prevent them until the Q L T A vice-president said to let them check the measurements.

Measuring the northern end of the court with a foot ruler showed the length to be correct - 21 feet. However the southern end measured 18 feet, eleven inches.

No more matches were to be played on the court so the matter was closed. Dad did comment that the Q L T A had worked hard to make the tournament a success and it was unfortunate that this mistake had occurred.

Almost three weeks later Dad was reporting on another sporting venue problem. In Sydney one of the pools hosting events for Australian Swimming Championships had a hole in a lane wall. This had been known for some time and reported but nothing had been done to rectify the problem at the Enfield Pool. 

When the women's championship races had been held at the pool the women refused to race in lane five to avoid encountering the hole when they made the turn at the end of the lane. The 800 yard race and 1650 yard race, plus the diving were the men's events scheduled to be held at the pool. The local council had been informed of the problem but so far nothing had been done to repair the hole.

 And this was nine or ten months before the Melbourne Olympic Games!

At the beginning of his report on the defective swimming pool Dad had commented - It won't be long before Australian sporting organisations start paying me good money to stop at home.

 ... and now the court is short - The Argus 28 January 1956

Sherlock Strikes Again - The Argus 16 February 1956 

Olympic Games 1956 - more memorabilia

In preparation for another talk about the Olympic Games held in Melbourne in 1956 I now have some more memorabilia relating to the Melbourne Games and to my father.

Journalists reporting on the Melbourne Olympic Games were issued with a pass allowing them entrance to all venues during the period of the Games.

The Olympic Village Official Information Book provides basic information about the accommodation for those those staying at the Olympic Village in Heidelberg.

Click on image to enlarge

The information in this booklet provides examples of living in the 1950s with instructions for the use of bath heaters, gas coppers and other appliances. I also thought that it was interesting that steam irons and washing machines were only available in the Women's Quarters.

The Official Guide to the Olympic Games was published by the Organising Committee for the Melbourne Games. The guide contained a brief history of the Olympic Games, information about the Modern Games , venues, a programme of events, ticket prices, maps of venues plus information for tourists including information about transport, restaurants, sights to see, banking, postage etc.

The 1956 edition of The A T F S Olympic Handbook produced by the Association of Track and Field Statisticians was the third edition of this publication. It contains the official world track and field records for events from 1896 until 1952 as well as an all time world list for athletic events stating name,time, place and date event occurred. There is also  list if the world's best performances of all time.

The General Rules and Special Sports Regulations for the XVI Olympiad is a well used publication in my father's collection. It contains a detailed program for all events, maps (including gradients) for events held outside stadiums, general rules relating to the staging of the Games plus detailed regulations for individual sports.

The Melbourne Olympic Games were held from Thursday 22 November to Saturday 8 December. No events were held in Sundays. Programs were produced for each event for each day of competition. So far we have found programs for swimming, cycling and boxing among Dad's collection. I am still looking for the Dad's copy of the program for the Opening Ceremony.

In 1957 a booklet containing Australian Team Reports of the Olympic Games Melbourne 1956 was published. As well as lists of officials there was a general summary report followed by more detailed reports, often with photographs, for individual sports. There was a list of all the Olympic champions for the Games plus a list of Olympic placings by Australian representatives since the first Olympic Games in 1896.


These items, together with information on other posts on the Melbourne Olympic Games in this blog, help tell part of the story of an important sporting event in Melbourne's history.

Significance of Anzac Day for my family

During the Second World War my father served in the Australian Army with the 2/4th Battalion which left Sydney on 10 January 1940 for Palestine. The Battalion was also stationed in Egypt, Tobruk, Greece and Crete and Syria before returning to Australia early in 1942. The Battalion was then relocated to Papua New Guinea but Dad remained in Australia as he had been discharged due to illness making him unfit for military service.

Dad in Sydney with his mother, January 1940

An account of Dad's military service can be found in a series of blog posts in my Exploring Military History blog.

Anzac Day was always very important to Dad and each year he attended the Dawn Service at the Shrine of Remembrance  followed by the Anzac Day March later in the morning. The 2/4th Battalion was based in Sydney but a number of its members, like Dad, had relocated to Melbourne after the war. Anzac Day was their special time to get together and we all knew that we would not see Dad on that day.

However Anzac Day is also my mother's birthday.

Fortunately Mum accepted the situation. My mother's family lived in Queensland so her birthday was spent initially with my sister and me and later with our younger brother.

Mum, though, was not forgotten by Dad's mates, some of whom would each year ring her prior to her birthday to pass on birthday wishes and assure her that they would look after Dad!

Dad died in 1984 but the family always observes Anzac Day usually watching the main services on television. Two of my grandchildren are in guide and scout groups and this year they took part in the Anzac Day Parade to our local war memorial. Their mother, a guide leader, was involved in the Anzac Day March in the city.

The other family aspect of Anzac Day was, of course, not forgotten. My mother now lives in a nursing home so in the afternoon members of the Melbourne clan met there to help Mum celebrate her special day.

Mum's birthday 2019 - four generations

Therefore, for my family, Anzac Day is a day of commemoration and celebration.

The Stawell Gift

Living in a family where sport was an important part of our life, I always knew that the Stawell Gift was run each year at Easter.

Since 1878 (except for four years during the Second World War) an athletics carnival has been held in Stawell with the feature race being the Stawell Gift. Since 1898 the event has been held at Central Park.

Central Park, Stawell - Heritage Council Victoria

My father, Ken Moses, was a sports' journalist in the late 1940s and the 1950s and one of the areas of sport that he covered, initially for The Sun News Pictorial then from 1950 for The Argus, was athletics, including the Stawell Gift. This meant that each year he would disappear to Stawell, in western Victoria, for several days. After The Argus ceased publication in January 1956 Dad maintained his interest in the Stawell Gift and continued to visit Stawell for this athletics carnival from time to time.

Searching in Trove for "Ken Moses" AND "Stawell Gift" produced 97 articles that Dad wrote about the Stawell Gift from 1950 to 1955. Some of these references to the Stawell Gift appeared throughout the year in his 'Why Keep it Quiet? column while there are also articles covering the event each year.

In 1955 an article written by Dad was published in The Argus Weekender (9 April 1955) - 'Anything happens at Stawell' where he recounted some of the more sensational events that had occurred  throughout the history of the race. (article)

Using Google I located an article available via PressReader published in the Seymour Telegraph 5 December 2012 entitled 'Full of Life'. The article was an interview with an 86 year old Les Pianta who had been involved in athletics in the 1940s. In the article Les described how he became the Stawell Gift favourite in 1947. "I won alot of races around this area, I got a bit of a name for myself and somehow or other this Ken Moses (Sports Editor of Melbourne's The Sun) got to hear about it and that's how it started." Les did not make the finals. I am sure that Dad would have been amused by the promotion to sports' editor if he had seen this article.

Many years later I worked with a colleague who had been involved with professional athletics as a runner and a trainer and who for many years had attended the Stawell Gift. He spoke of some of the journalists who regularly covered the event and knew of my father. I gained the impression that the Stawell Gift was a special place to be each year.

One afternoon we called into Stawell when exploring part of western Victoria and made a visit to Central Park. I wanted to see the place that was so special to many followers of athletics including Dad. My father had been dead for many years but I was able to visit a place where he had enjoyed working.

In 2025 we once again stopped at the athletics ground in Stawell so that I could have another look at the place that meant so much to my father.

Athletics mosaic

Media / Press Room

Old Grandstand

A number of books have been written about the Stawell Gift:
Murray Macpherson, Twelve seconds to glory: the official history of the Stawell Gift (2014)
Gary Watt. The Stawell Gift almanac: history of the Stawell Gift (2008)
John Perry. The quick and the dead: Stawell and its race through time (2002)

Additional information:
Stall Gift history
Heritage Council Victoria - Central Park, Stawell

A selection of 1940s and 1950s Stawell Gift finals available online:
Stawell Gift final - 1946 - YouTube
Stawell Gift final - 1947 - YouTube
Stawell Gift final - 1951 - YouTube
Stawell Gift final - 1953 - YouTube 

Selection of other years:
Stawell Gift final - 1927 - YouTube 
Stawell Gift finals - 1971-1989 - YouTube

#52Ancestors - Week 24 - Fathers Day

The Fathers Day prompt for #52Ancestors provides the opportunity to think about our father or male ancestors who were fathers. For me it is an opportunity to reflect on my relationship with my father and what he did for me.

Ken Moses

Some of the best advice my father gave me was when reading a novel always pay the author the courtesy of reading the first forty pages. If the author has not hooked you by then, by all means look for another book to read.

It is strange the things that you remember years after the event. Dad died thirty-three years ago but I still remember and can visualise many things that he said and did.

For the first few years of my life I rarely saw my father. He was a journalist for daily newspapers - first the Sun News Pictorial and then the Argus. This meant that he worked in the afternoon and arrived home late at night. When we got up in the morning we had to be quiet as he was often asleep.

As a sports journalist Dad usually wrote about tennis, cycling, swimming and athletics. He often covered sporting events at weekends and sometimes was away from home for days or weeks. When I was eleven months old Dad left for London to cover the 1948 Olympic Games. As he had to travel by ship Dad was away from home for six months. Two years later he went to New Zealand to cover the Empire Games.

To say that Dad worked irregular hours would be an understatement. After the Argus folded in January 1957 Dad had a variety of jobs in advertising, public relations, television news and working for weekend newspapers.  It was not until a few years before he retired that he had a nine to five job. I accepted this lifestyle as normal. It was not until I was at secondary school that I realised that this was not the case and decided that when I married it would be to someone who worked, or mainly worked, 'normal hours'.

In 1956 Dad flew in an aeroplane to America for work. In those days it was a special event to travel that distance in a plane and there were two stops en route. Dad was away from home for a month. By this time I was eight and old enough to know a little about the work that Dad did and no doubt told the other children in my class about my father flying to America. When Dad returned he brought my mother and my sister and me special gifts not then available in Australia -  short sleeved fluffy bri-nylon jumpers which were popular in America and about to become fashionable in Australia for us girls and  a copy of a 'My Fair Lady' LP for Mum - the play was big on Broadway at the time and would eventually come to Australia. We felt rather special with these gifts and showed them to our friends.

With Dad away from home so much our holidays were special times. Usually we travelled to Queensland to stay with my grandparents on their farm. It was a long drive taking several days. Sometimes we stayed at motels overnight but on one occasion Dad decided that we would camp. Mum and my sister slept in the back of the station wagon while Dad and I slept in the open. It was a new experience for me to sleep under the stars.

On these holidays we were able to spend time with Dad. Dad enjoyed being on the farm and helping my uncle and grandfather with the milking of the cows and other work required. I later learned that Dad had spent several years working on properties in New South Wales and Queensland before the Second World War. It was on these holidays that I really got to know my father. He had a sense of humour and was fun to be with.

We usually spent two weeks at the Sunshine Coast and each morning Dad and I would go for a swim at Alexander Headlands before breakfast. He tried to teach me body surfing with minimal success but I enjoyed these swimming sessions with Dad. Later the whole family would go to Mooloolaba  for a swim and in the afternoon my sister and I had swimming lessons at the Mooloola River.

Having a father working in media related areas had its bonuses. When he worked at Channel O (now Channel 10) Dad would sometimes take my sister and me to see the taping of teenage music shows. On one occasion he was given free tickets to a show at Festival Hall so Mum and I went to see Ray Charles perform. It was a great show and my first live concert.

Dad was responsible for me becoming a librarian. When I completed secondary school I was offered a place at Monash University but had turned it down as I was not ready to do further studies in English and history at that time. There was no such thing as a gap year in those days. Dad then discovered that RMIT had a librarianship course and, as I had spent most of my spare time at school helping in the school library, he rang Mum to tell me go into RMIT to enrol that afternoon and that we would discuss it in the evening. It was the right decision. When I finished the librarianship course I moved to Canberra to work where I began an Arts Degree part-time which I completed at Monash University when I returned to Melbourne.

Back in Melbourne, I worked at Monash University and on a Tuesday night we closed the library at 10 o'clock. This meant getting a late bus and then walking quite a distance home. However sometimes Dad and our dog met me at the bus stop and we would walk home together. These times were a good opportunity for a chat.

Health permitting, Dad always attended the Dawn Service and the Anzac Day March with his army mates. The only problem was that Anzac Day was also Mum's birthday. In the week before Anzac Day Mum would receive phone calls from some of Dad's army mates wishing her a happy birthday. This was just the way it was and we all accepted it. Dad, however, always made sure that we remembered his birthday. As soon as we put up a new calendar for the year Dad would make a circle around the date for 4 September and write 'This is Ken's birthday'. I still remember the significance of that date.

Dad's love of sport has been passed on to other family members. I am sure that he would be proud of the sporting achievements of his grandsons. I also hope that writing my blogs is partly carrying on the family tradition of writing started by grandfather and my father.

Later in his life Dad began investigating our family history. He did a great deal of research about a convict in Mum's family, Simeon Lord. Then he discovered that his great grandfather, Uriah Moses, was also a convict. Unfortunately Dad died before we discovered that there are eight convicts in his family. He would have been so proud.

Dad did not often buy us things. Mum usually purchased all the presents. However I have a leather keyring with a V on it that Dad purchased for me and this is a very special possession. When I look at it I always remember my father.

I have written many posts about Dad (Ken Moses), in this blog and there are also posts about Dad in my Exploring Military History blog.
 

The third Sunday in June is designated Fathers Day in many countries of the world including the United Kingdom and the United States of America. However in Australia, just to be different, we celebrate Fathers Day on the first Sunday in September, possibly because this time of the year is not so cluttered with events and provides commercial operators the opportunity to encourage purchase of products, this time for Dad.Fathers Day Australia:

Why we don't celebrate the day with the UK and the USA - news.com.au

#52Ancestors - Week - Week 23 - Going to the Chapel

St Philip's Church, Sydney - Sydney Architecture

When I saw this prompt in the #52 Ancestors I immediately thought of the church in Sydney where many of my ancestors would have worshiped in the early years of the colony and where some of my family, including my parents, were married.

Amongst the tall buildings of Sydney can be found St Philip's Anglican Church located at 3 York Street.

The first church service in the new colony at Sydney Cove was conducted by the Rev. Richard Johnson on Sunday 3 February 1788. Over the next five years Rev. Johnson held regular services, conducted marriages, baptised children and buried the dead. But he needed a church.

St Philip's, on the corner of Bligh and Hunter streets, was the first church built in Sydney. It was a wattle and daub chapel that existed from 1793 until it was destroyed by fire on 1 October 1798. The T shaped church building had a thatched roof and earthen floor. It could seat 500 people so it was quite large. During the week the building was used as a school run by the Rev. Richard Johnson and his wife Mary. Student attendance varied from 150 to 200 children.

The first service in the church was conducted by Rev. Johnson on 25 August 1793. 

My great x4 grandparents, William Roberts and Kezia Brown were married by Rev Johnson in Sydney on 14 August 1793 so they were probably not married in the new church. Their daughter, Mary (my x3 great grandmother), was also baptised on that day.

A month after the fire destroying the church in 1798, planning commenced  for a new church on land known as Church Hill - now Lang Park. This time a stone church would be constructed and the foundation stone was laid by Governor King on 1 October 1800. The Parish of St Philip's was proclaimed in 1802.

St Philip's Church Sydney 1809 - Dictionary of Sydney

St Philip's Church School opened in 1812.

On 27 October 1814, my great x3 grandparents, Simeon Lord and Mary Hyde married at St Philip's Church.

Not everyone was impressed with the style of the church building so the foundation stone for the third St Philip's Church was laid by Rev. William Cowper on 1 May 1848. 

The third St Philip's church building was designed by Edmund Blacket in the English Gothic Perpendicular Style.The church was constructed in sandstone with a slate roof and cost sixteen thousand pounds to build. The money to build the church was raised by the congregation. The new church was consecrated on 27 March 1856 by Bishop Barker, the Archbishop of Sydney and Archdeacon Cowper. The new church was built across the road from the old church.

Location of present church (left) and old church (right)

St Philip's Church in 1890s or early 1900s - Sydney Architecture

Interior of St Philip's Church - Pocket Oz Sydney

The naming of the church was originally influenced by the name of the first Governor in the colony - Arthur Phillip. Later churches were dedicated to Saint Philip, the Apostle. 

Over the years St Philip's Church has played an important role in Sydney's history.

My family's connection with St Philip's Church continued into the twentieth century when my parents, Ken Moses and Rosemary Lord, were married in the church on 11 February 1946.

References:
New South Wales Office of Environment and Heritage - St Philip's Church of England
Sydney Architecture - Parish Church of St Philip
Registers of St. Philip's Church of England, Sydney, NSW, 1787-1937 - microfilm held at NLA (reel 1)
Anglican Church League - Richard Johnson First Chaplain to Australia
Church Hill - Pocket Oz Sydney

Family history in strange places

A friend from primary school days has sent me a photo that she took recently of wallpaper on the wall of the public toilets at Campari House in Hardware Lane, Melbourne. The wallpaper in the photo was a page from The Argus newspaper 24 November 1956 page 3 in the Olympic Games liftout. One assumes that the newspaper has been coated or it would have disappeared long ago. The article is about the mens' 100 metres where the first three place-getters were expected to be American athletes.

Why was this image sent to me? The journalist who wrote the article was Ken Moses - my father.

NB: Checking Trove, another article by my father, published in The Argus on 26 November 1956, reported that although American sprinters came first and second in the race, Australian runner Hec Hogan won the bronze medal.

Looking after special items in collections

For Christmas my family provided the money for me to order, from Archival Survival, some polypropylene boxes, polyethelyne bags, acid free card, photo hinges, tissue and labels to begin storing some of the special items in my family history collection.

The first project was to safely house copies of the Argus newspaper from the early to middle 1950s, some copies of the Australian Women's Weekly published around the time of the Melbourne Olympic Games in 1956 plus a few copies of the new Smith's Weekly which made a short reappearance in the 1968. My father was a sports journalist on The Argus until its closure in January 1957 so the newspapers, especially the articles in the years leading up to the staging of the Olympic Games in Melbourne, are an important part of his story.

I already had a few large polypropylene map bags that I had acquired for another project - not enough for individual newspapers - but I was able to store similar newspapers in bags. The newspapers in the bags are now stored in a large A2 polypropylene newspaper box.

I purchased one A2 box for the newspapers but also purchased five A4 boxes for other collection items. A label holder is attached to the outside of the box indicating the main contents of the box. In time a contents list of items in the box will also be prepared.

The first project with the smaller boxes was to safely store items relating to my father and World War II. One of the objects was a wallet that I used for one of the projects in Image, Place, Object, one of the subjects in the University of Tasmania Family History course. A copy of the piece that I wrote about the wallet can be found in my Exploring Military History blog. This post describes some of the other items now stored in this box.

The wallet, dog tags and negative wallet were wrapped in acid free tissue paper. Ephemera such as tickets were housed separately in small polyethelyne bags from another project as were telegrams and correspondence. Fragile items were supported by acid free card.

My father helped write the book, White Over Green, the history of the 2/4th Battalion. A collection of photographs was sourced for this project and Dad kept a few of them which have now been attached to acid free card with acid free photo corners. When information about the image is known I have added this in pencil. The sheets of photos are stored in polyethelyne sleeves and then placed in the box.

Project 2 will be to store other material relating to my father including his involvement on the Publicity Committee for the Melbourne Olympic Games and the the 1956 Olympic Games in general. The other three boxes will be used for storing material relating to other major family history projects I have recently researched. I will then need to order additional boxes and supplies from Archival Survival - maybe the family can fund this project for my birthday.

NB: If you have problems assembling the polypropylene boxes leave them in the sun for a short time, which makes them more pliable, and then assemble them. Apparently a hairdryer on low can also help, though I have not tried this.

Ken Moses' wallet

University of Tasmania course - Image, Place, Object

As part of the Place, Image, Object unit we were asked to write about an object important to our family. The object that I chose was a leather wallet that was one of the possessions of my father during the Second World War. This is a link to the post about the wallet in my Exploring Military History blog.

Olympic Games Melbourne, 1956 - memories

This afternoon, as part of History Week,  I spoke at Ivanhoe Library about the Melbourne Olympic Games in 1956, particularly the involvement of my father, Ken Moses, who was a sports journalist on The Argus at the time.

Opening Ceremony ticket

During and after the talk a number of those present shared their memories and experiences of the Olympic Games. Some members of the audience brought along their mementoes of the 1956 Olympics - books plus a ticket to see events on the 23 November. This ticket cost 11/- compared to the £1 / 1/- for the Opening Ceremony ticket shown above.

I had brought one of my father's scrap books plus copies of The Argus published during the games, a copy of the Australian Women's Weekly from December 1956, a selection of programs prepared for individual events for each day of competition and the Official report of the Organising Committee for the Games of the XVI Olympiad Melbourne 1956.

I have a partial collection of copies of The Argus published during the Melbourne Olympic Games but one gentleman brought in a full set of this newspaper published during the games period that his mother had kept.

As the Olympic Village was constructed in neighbouring Heidelberg a number of audience members had memories of growing up near the village.

Raymond Morris Collection, National Museum of Australia

Comments were made about the Olympic Rings which were displayed near the entrance to the village. Apparently these rings are now back on display in the area.

Raymond Morris Collection, National Museum of Australia

One gentleman remembered watching the construction of the village and he used to play on the foundations of the buildings - once the builders went home -  during the early stages of construction. There were also memories of wandering through the village after school - security wasn't a major concern - and waving to and / or chatting to athletes. I was also told that a number of athletes stayed with families in private houses and that the families drove those athletes to the venues to participate in their events.

Winner's medal

One of the ladies in the audience told me that her mother was a seamstress who made the cushions used for the medal presentations at the Olympic Games in 1956.

The Olympic Torch Relay is an important event in the build up to an Olympic Games and I met one gentleman who told me that he had been one of the torch bearers in the 1956 Torch Relay.

This was a great session to share experiences and memories of events that occurred 60 years ago as we remembered the 1956 Olympic Games - an important event in the history of Melbourne.

Other posts on this topic:
Olympic Games Melbourne, 1956 - Media
Olympic Games Melbourne, 1956 - Challenges for host city
Sepia Saturday 316 - Movie cameras
Olympic Games Melbourne 1956 - view post

Olympic Games, Melbourne 1956 - Media

The organisers of the 1956 Olympic Games faced a number of challenges not faced by the organisers of  previous games. Suitable facilities for the general press needed to be organised however the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne was the first to be extensively covered by film, along with some limited television coverage. This created new logistical problems for the organisers.

Press facilities at the MCG

Press covering events needed space for their typewriters or room to take notes using pen and paper. Telephones were provided and some journalists used tape recorders. Reports on the Olympic Games were also presented on radio. The press stand at the MCG was the largest used for the games but temporary press stands also had to be provided at other venues.

Television
Television was launched in Australia just before the Olympic Games. A subcommittee was therefore established to oversee conditions for providing television coverage.
Local television stations in Melbourne could televise events at venues where seating was sold out such as events at the main stadium. Each evening a 16mm film was sent to television stations in Sydney.
Each night was despatched each night to various overseas destinations. Six half hour television programs were made for American syndicated television. Arrangements with airlines were made for quick transportation of film.
A major discussion point was the charges asked for by the Olympic Committee to televise Olympic Games events.

National Museum Australia has this page on TV and the Melbourne Olympics

Film
As described in a previous post restrictions were placed on the use of movie cameras by non-accredited persons as the Australian Olympic Committee had commissioned a French company to make an official film of the Olympic Games. However the restrictions were relaxed as a number of films of the Olympic Games taken by individuals exist. Three of these home movies taken by Bruce Beresford, Mile Leyland and Sir Robert Menzies can be viewed online via the National Film and Sound Archive website.

Camerman from French film company on right

The official film was released in May 1957. The Australian Women's Weekly attended the launch and reported on the event in the 20 May 1957 issue. Members of the Australian Olympic Team attended the premier.

The staging of the Olympic Games in Melbourne was also seen as an opportunity to promote Melbourne, Victoria and Australia to the rest of the world.

The black and white images in this post are from the the Official report of the Organising Committee for the Games of the XVI Olympiad Melbourne 1956. This publication is available online.

Olympic Games Melbourne, 1956 - challenges for host city

Hosting an Olympic Games is a major undertaking and many challenges can arise. In the lead up to most Olympic Games we learn of problems in meeting deadlines, financial issues, construction concerns and sometimes threats to move the games to another location. The recent Olympic Games in Rio de Janerio is a prime example and reports have already begun circulating about the problems in staging the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2020. The lead up to the Melbourne Olympic Games also experienced many problems.

Argus 11 April 1896

The above statement was the first suggestion that the Olympic Games might one day be held in Melbourne. In 1906 Richard Coombes also informed Baron de Coubertin that Australia should host the Olympic Games.

The Victorian Olympic Council (VOC) was formed on 21 June 1946 and an item on the agenda was Discussion of Olympic Games for Australia. The  Australian Olympic Federation (AOF) endorsed the bid. At the 1948 Olympic Games in London Australian delegates promoted Melbourne as a venue. The vote on the city to host the 1956 Olympic Games was held in Rome in April 1949. There were six contenders - four cities in the USA, Buenos Aires and Melbourne. Melbourne won by one vote.

 The Organizing Committee for the Melbourne Olympic Games was established in November 1949. Eleven subcommittees were also established to assist in the organisation of the Olympic Games. These subcommittees were Technical, Finance and General Purposes, Construction, Housing and Catering, Press and Publicity, Film and Television, Communications, Transport, Reception, Medical and Fine Arts.

Venues
A variety of venues were required in order to host the Olympic Games. These included a main stadium, smaller stadiums / ovals, a pool, velodrome, boxing stadium, venues for fencing, shooting events, modern pentathlon, cycling, basketball plus water sports such as rowing, canoeing and yachting. Due to Australia's strict quarantine laws, equestrian events were held in Helsinki instead of in Melbourne - an issue not mentioned in Melbourne's submission to host the Olympic Games.

Indecision would be a key word to describe the initial planning for the venues for the various sports. There were also prolonged discussions as to the extent the Federal or State Governments would assist in funding the Olympic Games.

Seven sites were discussed as possibilities for the main stadium - the Showgrounds, Carlton Cricket Ground, Olympic Park, Albert Park, St Kilda Cricket Ground, University of Melbourne Sports Oval as well as the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). It was not until February 1953 that the MCG was confirmed as the main stadium. Part of the problem had been the reluctance of the Melbourne Cricket Club to make the ground available as it would disrupt the normal use of the ground.

Alterations needed to be made. The surface of the MCG had to be regraded and a new stand was built after an old stand was demolished following the Royal Visit in 1954. The upgrades would mean that the MCG would be able to accommodate more than 100,000 people. As well as a venue for cricket the MCG was used for Australian Rules Football so it was not until after the 1955 VFL Grand Final that the turf on the ground could be removed and stored, the ground regraded and drainage pipes installed in time for the staging of the 1956 VFL Grand Final. The running track was then laid. During 1955 work banns delayed work at the MCG between August and October.

The second major venue was the Olympic Park Complex. This was to include the building of an Olympic Pool, the Olympic Park stadium, a second oval plus a veledrome. Olympic Park was situated close to the MCG.

Choosing the location for rowing and canoeing also took considerable time. Sites considered included Lake Bullen Merri, Hopkins River, Barwon River, Lake Learmonth and Lake Wendouree. Ballarat Shire did not want Lake Wendouree to be used and it was not until June 1955 that they finally agreed to the use of the lake for Olympic rowing and canoeing events.

Another challenge was to find suitable accommodation for the athletes and officials attending the Olympic Games. Once again a number of locations were considered including Prahran, University of Melbourne, Albert Park Barracks, Carlton and Heildelberg. The decision to build the village at Heidelberg was finally made in September 1953.

While Melbourne decided on the location of new venues and required alterations for existing structures, some members of the International Olympic Committee, particularly Mr Avery Brundage, began suggesting that the Olympic Games should be relocated to another city, probably one of the cities in the USA who had also applied to host the 1956 Olympic Games. It was eventually decided that the 1956 Olympic Games would remain in Melbourne.

Argus 4 February 1953

Boycotts
 Ninety-one countries were invited to attend the Olympic Games in Melbourne. Seventeen countries declined or withdrew for a variety of reasons. The Olympic Games had always been held in the Northern Hemisphere and some countries decided it was too far to travel so declined the invitation or, if they accepted the invitation, only sent small teams.

A month or two before the Olympic Games were due to begin seven countries boycotted the Melbourne Olympics due to political events. Egypt, Lebanon and Iraq boycotted the games due to the Suez crisis in October 1956. The Hungarian Uprising on 4 November 1956 caused Spain, The Netherlands and Switzerland to boycott the games though Hungary still sent a team. The People's Republic of China announced that they were boycotting the games in November 1956 because Taiwan (Republic of China) had accepted an invitation to attend. These boycotts created additional challenges for those trying to organise events and accommodation, especially as they occurred so close to the commencement of the Olympic Games.

The final number of countries attending was sixty-seven.

Australian Women's Weekly 5 December 1956

Despite all these challenges the 1956 Olympic Games were held in Melbourne from 22 November to 8 December and they were declared a great success.

The following article looks at the venues used for the Melbourne Olympics and what happened to them after the games - Mixed Fortunes of Melbourne's 1956 Olympic Venues.

The book, Australia and the Olympic Games, by Harry Gordon (1994) contains chapters on the Melbourne Olympics including "A grenade called Brundage" (chapter 14) and "When the magic came to Melbourne" (chapter 15)

Official report of the Organizing Committee for the Games of the XVI Olympiard Melbourne 1956 is available online.

Search Trove for articles published in The Argus and The Age about the preparations for the Melbourne Olympics as well as the staging of the games in Melbourne from 22 November to 8 December 1956.

Sepia Saturday 316 - Movie cameras

The Sepia Saturday Post 316 shows a cameraman on Bondi Beach in 1951 shooting film. This brought back memories of my father, Ken Moses, and his adventure with his 8mm movie camera which he brought back to Australia in 1956 after a trip to the USA.

Ken Moses at Olympic Park 7 Nov 1956

This photograph appeared in The Argus on 8 November 1956 (thank you Trove) and shows Dad, with camera over his shoulder, having a discussion with an official at Olympic Park, Melbourne. This was three weeks before the Olympic Games and Dad, as a sports' journalist for The Argus, had gone to Olympic Park to cover a training session. He took his new toy with him and was told people carrying movie cameras attempting to enter Olympic premises would not be admitted unless thay carried a pass permitting them to enter with a camera. The Olympic Committee had hired a firm to make an official (16mm) film of the Olympic Games and other cameras were not allowed.

Needless to say this incident became the feature of an article written by my father and published in The Argus. A footnote stated that: "The secretary of the Australian Olympic Federation, Mr. Edgar Tanner, in a recent letter to the president of the Federation of Amateur Cine Societies, said every facility would be given to amateur movie fans to take films in training."

My father did contine to take his camera with him and filmed a number of the events that he covered during the Olympic Games.

Dad also used the camera to take a film of a holiday on my grandparents' farm in Queensland. I can remember him filming us swimming in the creek and also of my younger sister plucking a chook. My mother recalled a section of the film showing my sister on a horse while she was mouthing the words, "let me off". Film nights when Dad showed his movies on the projector were part of family entertainment.

Good family memories however the family film has disappeared. Dad lent it to someone who was out from England to show him what the Australian bush was like. The film has not been seen since. I guess that this story illustrates how important it is for us to keep copies / back up our files.

Postscript: I have just visited my sister who says that there are cans of film in a cupboard and she is sure that one of them contains the Olympic Games film. If so, we will have a DVD made from it. She confirms that the family holiday film has definitely gone.

52 Ancestors #52 Kenneth Campbell Moses

Ken aged 5 - Future journalist

Kenneth Campbell Moses was born in Sydney, New South Wales on 4 September 1918. He was the younger son of Henry John (Reginald) Moses (1889-1936) and Agnes Campbell Thom (1891-1974).

The family lived at a number of locations including Turramuarra, Milsons Point and Killara before moving to 69 Wood Street, Manly, in 1933. Ken attended Chatswood Intermediate High School. The move to Manly no doubt suited the teenager who joined the Manly Lifesaving Club. As well as swimming and surfing he also played rugby and supported the Manly Rugby League club. Ken's interest in sport is shown in the following paragraph in the Referee 18 January 1934.

KEN MOSES 'The Little Boy from Manly,' aged 15, 5ft 10 in in height, and 12st 5lb in weight, has been vacillating in his choice of golf or swimming as a sport on which to give his serious attention. Maybe, swimming will win, for he won the 220 yards swimming handicap at the Manly carnival on Saturday, beating a big field of youngsters who never saw his heels for spray. A disinterested outsider, however, might suggest that in view of his bulk wrestling would be more in his line.

Ken left school when he was 16 and initially worked as a junior at an advertising agency, O'Brien Publicity Company, earning 15/- a week. However Ken wanted to go bush and twelve months after leaving school he was on the train for the two day trip to Morven in south west Queensland to work on a property owned by  R J (Dick) Boyer. Dick Boyer and Ken's father had been friends from their time together at the University of Sydney. A paragraph in the Australian Women's Weekly 30 November 1935 page 4 confirmed that Ken was working on a property in western Queensland at that time.  He was employed as a jackaroo on Durella and worked there for about three years. Before he left Sydney his father arranged for Ken to meet a literary acquaintance - Banjo Patterson - so he could receive advice about what it was really like living in the bush.

What happened after Ken left Durella is a little confusing. I have a photograph, dated 1938, of Ken at the Manly Life Saving Club Ball held in the Hotel Manly Ballroom. A note on the back of the photograph states that he 'had travelled from Thurloo Downs, 220 miles west of Bourke, leaving Thursday morning, arriving Sydney Saturday morning having travelled 720 miles for Ball Saturday night, left for Forbes 240 miles following night for Uah shearing.' Unfortunately I do not know when in 1938 the Ball was held however I have been able to locate the two properties mentioned via a Google search. An article about Ken in the Chadstone Progress (28 October 1981)  states that when war broke out 'he was working on 1.25 million acres 200 miles west of Bourke'. This was probably Thurloo Downs. We also know that sometime between leaving Durella and enlisting in the Army  Ken worked as a wool scouer at the Bourke Wool Scour.

Once again it is through sport that we can confirm that he was in the Bourke region for a time. Ken was a member of the Bourke Amateur Swimming Club and the Western Herald 24 November 1939 reported that he would be a member of a relay team at the next carnival. He must have been in the Bourke area prior to March as the Western Herald 10 March 1939 reported that Ken was participating in aquatic events in Bourke.

At the Carnival last Sunday Mr. Bill Cowderoy introduced "Mergathroyd Physizalwhacker" who won all the diving events at "the Olympic Games in 1066." This distinguished person (Ken Moses) amused the vast audience with a series of fancy diving never before seen in Bourke — or any where. His turn met with great applause, and his fancy dress was "something out of the box". Congratulations Ken!

I suspect that much of the employment on stations was seasonal and that men went from one property to another as required, hence the reference to leaving 'for Forbes 240 miles following night for Uah shearing.'

Ken with his mother

 Shortly after war broke our in September 1939 Ken, now 21, applied to enlist in the Air Force but as there was a long waiting list he joined the Army instead. He was 21 when he and a mate travelled to Sydney to enlist in the Army. His Attestation Form and Service and Casualty Form show that Ken passed the medical examination for the Army at Victoria Barracks on 2 January 1940 and from 3 January he was stationed at the Army Camp at Ingleburn as part of the 2/4th Battalion. The following day, in full uniform, the soldiers marched through the streets of Sydney. There was little time to say goodbye to family and friends for on 10 January, only a week after joining the Army, members of the 2/4th Battalion were aboard the Strathnaver on their way to Palestine where they arrived on 13 February 1940.

The next nine months were spent training. The 2/4th was an Infantry Battalion but the soldiers also had training with an anti-aircraft regiment. On 9 November 1940 members of the 2/4th Battalion were transferred to Egypt and were initially stationed at a camp near Alexandria before moving to Mersa Matuh. In January 1941 they fought against the Italian soldiers at Bardia before moving on to Tobruk and later to Benghazi arriving as the Italian soldiers surrendered the city.

Ken did not go to Greece on 1 April 1941 with the rest of the 2/4th Battalion as he was in hospital with bronchitis. However later that month when the decision was made to evacuate the troops from Greece, Ken was aboard the Costa Rica, one of the evacuation ships. Loaded with troops, the Costa Rica was one of four Allied ships that were bombed and sank during the evacuation. The men from the Costa Rica managed to board other ships and were taken to Crete. When the Germans began bombing Crete the soldiers were evacuated from the island aboard a number of ships. Ken was aboard the Dido which although bombed by the Germans managed to reach port safely. The 2/4th Battalion then returned to camps in Palestine and Syria where they experienced a white Christmas.

In Palestine on 12 January 1942 members of the 2/4th Battalion embarked on the ship, Rajula, to return to Australia arriving in Adelaide on 27 March. After a period of leave the members of the battalion were sent to Darwin and from there to New Guinea, however the war was over for Ken as his health had deteriorated - he now had chronic asthma - and on 22 June he received a medical certificate stating that he was unfit for service in the army and was officially discharged on 16 September 1942.

Back in Australia, Ken returned to Bourke for a time before working as an overseer on another property in the Morven area, Victoria Downs. It was there that he met his future wife. However working in the outback affected his health and the decision was made (reluctantly) to return to Sydney and have a career change.

In 1944, Ken was offered a position as a trainee journalist on the Daily Telegraph. His first by-line was covering a story in the Blue Mountains where, as the picture on the left shows, his bush experience was an advantage. In 1945 he then spent a year in Canberra working at Parliament House in the Press Gallery. In 1946 he moved to Melbourne to work on the Sun News Pictorial as a sports writer. In 1948 he went to London to cover the Olympic Games and in 1950 he was in Auckland covering the Empire (now Commonwealth) Games.

Ken joined the staff of The Argus newspaper in May 1950 and was a sports writer and columnist on the paper until its closure in January 1957. Although he was interested in all sport, Ken wrote primarily about athletics, swimming, cycling and tennis. He also wrote a column, Why Keep it Quiet, in which he was renowned for expressing his opinion about the management of sport. Many of his articles were picked up by Australian Associated Press. In 1956 Ken was a member of the Press and Publicity Sub-committee for the organision of the Olympic Games in Melbourne.

When The Argus closed life changed again with Ken working in a variety of jobs, all related to journalism. These included twelve months at The Sporting Globe, Victorian manager of Rodney H Evans Advertising Agency, public relations manager for AMF ten pin bowling (when 10 pin bowling was introduced into Victoria), deputy news editor of Channel O -now Channel 10 - (when Channel O first opened) and editor of the short lived revival of Smith's Weekly. When Sunday newspapers began in Melbourne Ken worked on the Weekender and then the Sunday Observer. He also worked as a free-lance journalist for a time, worked on the journal of the Institution of Engineers Australia then finally worked at the Department of Trade. Ken was an active member of the Victorian branch of the Australian Journalist Association and was on the committee for a number of years. He also helped write books including White over Green which is the history of the 2/4th Battalion and My World on Wheels, the autobiography of Russell Mockeridge. Ken was assisting Max Rowley write the book, The Rowleys: golden years of cycling, when he died. When the book was published in 1990 it was dedicated to Bert and Eileen Rowley, Keith Rowley and Ken Moses.

At St Phillip's Church in Sydney on 11 February 1946, Ken married Rosemary Ann Lord. After a two week holiday on Phillip Island, staying at the Phillip Island Hotel at Cowes, they then moved to Melbourne to live. They had two daughters and one son. Initially they lived in rented accommodation until purchasing, with the aid of War Service Home Loan, a newly built house in East Bentleigh. The family moved to East Bentleigh in May 1955. With family in Queensland and New South Wales, the summer holidays were spent visiting those states.

Ken loved Australia, especially its history. He loved to travel and saw much of the country when working or on holiday. Many of the pieces that he wrote for the weekend newspapers featured places he had visited in Australia. In later years he also spent time working on the family tree. He was so pleased when he discovered that the convict, Uriah Moses, was his great grandfather. After Ken died we discovered another seven convicts on his family tree. He would have been so pleased with this discovery, especially as one of the convicts, William Roberts, was a First Fleet convict.

When visiting family in Queensland, Ken became ill and died in Brisbane on 16 September 1984.

Being a New South Welshman through and through, Ken always said that he felt much better once he had crossed the Murray River and was back in New South Wales. However when he was in hospital in Brisbane all he wanted was to return home to Melbourne. The funeral service was held in Brisbane and being far from home most of Ken's many friends were unable to attend. However, as he was an ex-serviceman, the RSL arranged for members of a local RSL to attend the funeral and the Last Post was played. This was greatly appreciated by Ken's family. Ken's ashes were returned home and interred at the Springvale Cemetery in Victoria.

Ken Moses was my father.