The last two years of my schooling, 1948 and 1949, were done at Parade College in East Melbourne.  We had to wear caps when in school clothes and the badge is a photo of my original badge that I wore on my school cap.

Kath Harvey, a friend of Mum’s and her husband Tom Harvey came to visit us not long before Christmas of 1949. I was to turn fourteen on 9th December 1949,and we were talking about what I was going to do when I left school;

Tom Harvey was the caretaker of a building named Yule House at 307-309 Little Collins Street in the city and said a man in the building was looking for an apprentice jeweller. 

As you will read later, I had an association with Yule House
right up until 1986 which I will explain as I go along.

W Davis & Son.  In those days, you were able to leave school when you turned 14 years of age. Tom Harvey arranged a meeting and Mum and I went in and met Ted Davis the owner of a manufacturing jewellery business, who spoke to us for a while and then showed us the workshop and introduced us to the workmen. I started my working life as an apprentice with W Davis & Son at 8.00am on Tuesday 10th January 1950.

I had cut my arm about a week earlier and had the stitch out on the Monday hence the Tuesday start.I remember getting there about a quarter of an hour early and while waiting for the lift, the foreman, Mr Cherry, whose name was Allan but known as Mick arrived so I went up to the fourth floor with him. He opened up and then the workmen began arriving, Alex Milne, Len Mason, Geoff Davis, the son of the owner, and Gordon Froomes, who was a diamond setter employed by Catanach's.

Catanach’s rented the whole of the fourth floor and then sublet the front room to Ted Davis, the remainder of the floor was a storeroom and a smaller room where three watchmakers worked for Catanach's.

The business name W.Davis & Son was now owned by Ted Davis, son of the original owner who always came in around 9.00 am each morning.

The workshop faced north which was the best light to work in. It was the full width of the building with windows all across. In a jewellers workshop the first thing every morning was that the floor was swept and whatever was swept up was put into a bin. Used sandpaper and emery paper also went into the bin. When anything was washed, it drained into a barrel and went through a cotton wool filter to collect any filings. The liquid from the barrel was also emptied every morning and every year on the last day of work the bin with the floor sweep, sandpaper and the cotton wool would be sent to Glover & Goode for refining. In the early 1950’s 18ct gold was £17.10.0 an ounce and didn’t alter daily as it now does. By doing this procedure it would be worth about £1000 .00 to the business each year.

Christmas 1950 we had packed up the floor sweep into a large cardboard box and placed it in front of the lift ready for a carrier to pick it up and take it to be processed. Tom Harvey (the caretaker of the building) thought it was rubbish and moved it to the ground floor where it would have been collected by the Garbo's and taken to the tip. We noticed that it had been moved and retrieved it.

On my first day, I was shown how to roll metal to whatever size you wanted. There were two sets of mills, one for flat plate and the other had V shaped grooves in the rollers, which meant you got square wire. I was given a piece of silver wire and rolled it so as I could make a wedding ring. As you roll the metal it gets hard so every now and again you had to anneal (make it red hot to soften) it, otherwise it would crack. I still have that first wedding ring and it is on Betty’s finger.

Allan Cherry, known as Mick, was the man who taught me the trade. He was a good teacher and excellent tradesman and some of the work he did was the best I saw in the whole of my working life. He excelled in saw piercing (Filigree work) and once made a peacock brooch that had moveable parts set with coloured gemstones. The tail feathers could be spread out in all their glory. This piece was later stolen in a house break in and was found in a second hand shop in Albury. Mick had to attend the court case in Albury and identify the brooch as being the one he had made.

                                                        L-R  Ted Davis & Mick Cherry
                                                           My bench was on Mick's right

We worked from 8.00 am until noon with a ten-minute break for morning tea, we had half an hour for lunch then worked through until 4.30 pm. I used to go out about 11.30 am and get the lunch orders from mainly Coles.

Dad’s brother, Bill married into the Aylett family and Stella Aylett worked in the sandwich section of Coles where I went if sandwiches were wanted. Mick Cherry would have a bread roll and threepence worth of corned beef, Alex Milne had four Strasburg and sauce sandwiches (four pence each). Len Mason had a bread roll and two slices of Strasburg sausage. In the cold weather we had hot salmon or vegetable patties and roasted potatoes, two pence each, from “The Maypole”  Pies pasties and cold meats were purchased from Dyson’s delicatessen. Both of these shops were in Little Collins Street.

I used to catch the 4.50 pm train home from Flinders Street to West Footscray, which took about seventeen minutes.  I noticed after a while that everybody sat in the same seat, both going to work and going home. The man who always sat next to me going home was deaf and dumb but was a great communicator. He carried a notebook with him and used to write on it and then give it to me to read and then I wrote a reply. He worked for Tattersall’s in Tasmania and came to Melbourne when Tattersall’s moved to the mainland in the mid 1950’s.

The morning train was the same. Two of my cousins, Joan and Janice Epps worked in the flour mill right at South Kensington station and would be on the same train each morning and in the same seats. One morning they gave me a couple of watches to be repaired and after they got out at South Kensington a man came over to me and asked me if I repaired watches. I told him yes and the next morning he gave me four or five to be repaired. I got quotes to do the repairs and he agreed to have them repaired.

I wondered if he would pay me after they were repaired and Mum suggested that as he had trusted me with the watches I should trust him to pay. He must have been happy with what I’d had done for him and later gave me a mantle clock to repair. This was before my Catanach days and watch repairs were done by Dick Hortle and re threading was done by a firm called Miss Cherry who had about eight women working for her. Both of these workrooms were in York House, in Little Collins Street. York House no longer exists as it was in those days.

Les Jackman, an Englishman joined the firm in February 1950, Les had done his apprenticeship in London at Cartier's where his father also worked. He was an excellent craftsman and designer who worked on high-class jewellery. Les was very music minded and had taught himself to play the guitar and organ.

Christmas 1950 break up turned out to be very different.

Ted Davis played the flute and he asked Les to bring his guitar in so we could have a bit of music. We packed up at lunchtime and had food and drinks. Les was a real entertainer so I kept up his supply of beer and didn’t realise that Geoff Davis was filling him with whisky. When it was time to go home Les was very drunk and left his guitar there until after Christmas. 

Tom Harvey, the building caretaker, met him in the building some time later, took Les’s holiday pay from him for safety, and wrote a note on Les’s newspaper explaining where his pay was. We found out later that he had lost his paper and had no idea where his money was.

Les Jackman and his wife, Ada, lived at 12 Mary Street, Highett. It was a white weather board house that they had built for £1250 in 1950. Les asked me if I wanted to go there for a weekend. I rode my bike and caught a train at West Footscray. I had to change trains at Flinders Street, get on another which took me to Highett, and then I rode to Les and Ada’s home. We rode to Mordialloc and fished from the Mordialloc pier. Les had made two jigs, one for each of us, so that you could have two lines on at the one time. It was a nice day and we were pulling in garfish as fast as we could bait the lines. Little did I know that later on after being married, Betty and I would move to Cheltenham, which was the next train stop after Highett.

After a couple of years, Les decided to go out on his own and work from home. He had no trouble getting work and worked for most of the better jewellers in Melbourne.  Wrought iron work was popular and he made all of his own wrought iron work when he lived in Chadstone.  A while after his wife Ada died (1982), Les retired and went to live in Queensland where he eventually married again. I arranged to have two wedding rings made for him.

Les Jackman passed away in Mudgeeraba, Queensland on 21st September 2003 aged 83 years and was interred with his first wife, Ada at Springvale Cemetery on 25th September 2002.

December 1950 was my first Christmas as a jeweller. I asked Mick Cherry if I could make Mum an eternity ring. After finishing it, Ted Davis said there was nothing to pay, as it was experience for me. When Mum passed away, it was given to Betty. 

 Alex Milne (L) and Len Mason
As you can see in the photograph, it was a very untidy and antiquated workshop.

Len Mason was a grumpy man who kept to himself. He had no lower teeth and always had the tip of his tongue poking out so we used to call him “The blue tongued lizard” He made all of the Masonic jewels in 9ct gold  but by the time I left, to keep costs down they were made in silver and then gold plated.    W Davis & Son moved to the Beehive Building, at 98 Elizabeth Street in 1954 after I had left them to do my National Service. I don’t know if Len was fired or he might have left of his own accord. He ended up being a conductor on the trams. Len passed away in 1992 aged 83 years.

If we had a large amount of gold or silver to be rolled, we were able to use electric rollers at a firm in Little Lonsdale Street I used to walk through Myer from Bourke to Lonsdale Street. One time they had a magician demonstrating card tricks and when I stopped to watch, he asked me if I could play poker. I said yes and with another person, he shuffled the cards and dealt three hands, one for him and another two for the two of us. We threw out our discards and he said he would stay as he didn’t want to change his hand. We both had full hands and he had a royal routine.

In 1952 work commenced on the construction of the Degraves Street subway which meant I could use it to gain easy access to work as there were arcades all of the way to Little Collins and further along the way to Lonsdale Street. One morning in the early 50’s after leaving Flinders Street station I noticed a bit of commotion when I got to Collins Street. A bull had escaped from the Richmond Abattoirs and ended up near the Centreway in Collins Street. I don’t know how long it had been there but there was a large crowd and the police were worried about what move it would make next. They eventually shot it with revolvers and as each bullet hit, it would shake its head until it got too much for the bull and it dropped dead.

In 1951, I was almost sixteen and was asked by Dorothy Gorman, the lady who used to prepare debutantes for the annual Old Paradians Ball, if I would like to be a partner for one of the girls. I said yes and had to go to Parade College in East Melbourne to practice every Sunday night for about ten weeks. I had to use public transport, as I was too young to drive. The ball would be held in the Royal Ballroom, part of the Exhibition Building and next to the Melbourne Aquarium, which was burnt down in January 1953. I did this four years running. 

Barbara Beck,The first girlI partnered,
was taken to the Royal Ballroom
and picked up afterwards by her father.

The next year, 1952 I partnered Marice Hallet whose

family were monumental masons in Richmond.

She also was taken to the ball and Mum shouted me a taxi to take her home.

The ball finished at 2 am so we took a taxi to her home and at about

2.30 am, Dad picked me up on the corner of Punt Road and

Brunton Avenue, Richmond, outside the football ground.

I had to be at work at 8.00am next morning, I was really tired and fell

asleep at the bench, and Mick let me sleep for about an hour.

The next year, 1953 was Jillian a girl from Thornbury, I can’t remember her

last  name though.  I also don’t remember how she got to and from the ball. 

The fourth time, 1955 I managed to talk my brother Alan and a friend, Brian Leonard,

into partnering a girl each. I did my Nasho in 1954 and had asked Dorothy Gorman

if I could choose the girl I was to partner and she agreed. 

 I chose Geraldine Diamond to be my partner.

Geraldine Diamond lived in Elsternwick and by this time, I had my own car, a 1950

model Ford Prefect (which I had purchased from my father), so she would make

her way to rehearsal with her sister Pat, and I would drive them home.
The ball was held at the Royal Ballroom, and usually about twelve hundred people attended.

Sadly Geraldine Cross (nee Diamond) passed away in Warragul on 18th June 2021

with a private funeral service held in Narre Warren on 25th June 2021

When I was aged seventeen, I was given the job of making the Mount Gambier Mayoral Chain. It was to be made in 9ct gold with a centrepiece of silver and enamel. The gold was purchased from Glover & Goode in Little Collins Street. It was delivered to us in a long length and I took it to a firm in Little Bourke Street who stamped out individual links. My boss, Ted Davis, was a bit of a joker and told me to be careful as there were a lot of Chinese in that area so I rolled it around my waist and under my jumper when delivering it. Les Anderson did the enamel work.

Betty and I drove over to West Australia in 2003 to visit Brett our youngest son. We drove inland to Adelaide and then across the Nullabor. On the way home, we drove around the coast from Adelaide and when driving through Mt. Gambier I said to Betty that it would be nice to see the now fifty-year-old Mayoral Chain. After getting home, I wrote to the council and explained who I was and would we be able to see it. They wrote back with “just let us know when you will be here”.  

In 2003 my wife, Betty and my brother Alan and his wife Lynnette, went to 
Mount Gambier for a few days and I was reunited with the chain. 

The Mayor’s Secretary had arranged for the local newspaper to be there. I was photographed 

at the Mt. Gambier Town Hall and the photo was published with a short article.