GILL (nee McINTYRE) Violet Gill Remembers

Vi McIntyre came to Rowville in 1918 at the age of nine. Her father Don was a market gardener who had grown sick and tired of being flooded out on a property beside the Main Drain, Carrum. One day at the Victorian Market, Alfred Taylor senior of Rowville told Don that Jack Gearon's farm in Wellington Road was available for leasing. Don talked the matter over with his brother Norm, also a market gardener, and together they decided to make the move.

Don and Norm McIntyre had married sisters, Alice and May Phillips, so the two families were always very close. Don and Alice had five children of whom Vi was the eldest; then came Keith, Ronald, William and Joyce. Norm and May had three children, Alec, Ivy and Jean.

At Rowville they lived on either side of Gearon Avenue: Don on 40 acres to the east and Norm on a similar acreage on the western side. They grew tomatoes, sprouts and white turnips (which were a cheap and easy crop). They depended on rainfall for the crops; the dams were not used for irrigation. Vi and the other children helped their fathers wash the white turnips in the dam before they were taken to market.

At Mulgrave State School

The children went to school at Mulgrave State School just beyond Dandenong Creek on Wellington Road. They rode their ponies or Vi drove the jinker with the other children packed in around her. On the way home from school they would often call in at their neighbour's home where Mrs Sophie Gill and her daughters Molly, Nellie and Vera would always have some treats ready for them. The Gill women were very good cooks.

Vi recalls a swagman who regularly called to sample the Gill cooking. He was a lovely old man with a big bushy beard and they called him 'Old Father Time'. He was always clean; once he was seen having a wash in a puddle.

As kids Vi recalled they helped their mothers in the home and their fathers in the paddocks. However, there was plenty of time for play. Don and Norm had been orphans and were raised by a 'dreadful' stepmother. As a result of that experience Don said that he would never treat his children badly - and he didn't. He was a very kind father. The eight children played hopscotch, rounders and football together. The boys had ferrets and they and the girls would go off catching rabbits and eeling in Heany Park Lake. One day Vi was racing the jinker full of children too fast up Taylors Lane when little 'Nippy' the pony stumbled and "over went the jinker". One of the wheels ran over her brother Keith's arm but fortunately the wheel was rubber-tyred so he wasn't hurt too badly.

Grandad (Don's father) lived with the family. He was an old Scot who loved listening to his records of Scottish songs and bagpipe tunes.

One of their closest neighbours was Granny Taylor. She was a lovely lady and a very hard worker. She used to kill the calves. Vi's Uncle Norm once said to her "I don't know how you do that Mrs Taylor." Her reply was, "Well you b- well have to do it. Somebody's got to do it."

Vi Starts Work

Vi left school at the age of 13 to work at home and to help her father in the gardens. When she was 18 she and her cousin Ivy were employed by the Watson family who live at 'The Leasowes', a property in Lysterfield Road (now known as Auxilium College). The Watsons were quite well-to-do people; Mr Watson was a part-owner of Young and Jackson's Hotel. Vi worked as the cook while Ivy looked after the children and waited on the table at meals at which times she wore a black dress, white apron and a white cap. Ivy and Vi lived in at 'The Leasowes'. Normally Vi was expected to cook plain meals - roasts and casseroles - but when there were guests she cooked extra "doo-dahs".

Vi worked for the Watsons for two years but had to return home when her mother developed diabetes. Before her illness Alice McIntyre drove the jinker to Dandenong to do the shopping. She had a beautiful dapple grey horse called Beauty. Vi recalled, "Beauty used to go and Mum would let her." Dad grumbled, "You'll come home with that pony with no tail on it. Gee, you make it go!"

When Vi took over the driving to Dandenong she found the winding S-bend in Stud Road near the corner of Police Road hard to negotiate. Of course, there is no bend in the road there now. A bigger worry than the winding hill was the presence of Gypsies who camped occasionally in Police Road.

About this time the Gearons returned to their farm. Uncle Norm went to another farm in Ferntree Gully while Don and Alice moved to a farm beside Dandenong Creek south of Wellington Road for a few years before going into Dandenong. "Dad would go to Bunyip and Koo Wee Rup to buy carrots. He'd bring them home, we'd wash them and he'd then sell them at Victoria Market."

Vi Marries Leo Gill

Before leaving Rowville Vi had started going out with the boy next door, Leo Gill. They were engaged for three years before marrying in St James Church of England, Dandenong on 10th November 1934.

They lived in a number of houses in the Lysterfield area near the quarry where Leo worked in the first years of their marriage. Their first child Gwenda was born in 1936. Later, Ehrenfried Exner asked Leo to market garden a property north of Wellington Road (where the Silkwood Rise Estate now is). Mr Exner moved a house from Lysterfield onto the block for them and in 1945 their second child Don was born while they were on this property.

Leo played football with Scoresby and continued on with the club for many years as a trainer when his playing days came to an end.

In the mid 1960s some of the young Rowville footballers including Leo's son Don, Lyall Seebeck and John Raymond decided to establish the Rowville Football Club on the site of the present recreation reserve. With an old tractor they grubbed out the tussocks and formed the oval. They cut saplings on Doolan's property for goal posts and bought two sheds that had been used in the Police Paddocks at the Jamboree and reassembled them as change rooms.

After Mr Exner's death Leo and Vi moved to a one acre block on the corner of Le John Street and Wellington Road before finally settling in Dandenong.

After a lifetime of hard work farming and working as a quarryman, Leo spent his final working days as a groundsman at Churchill Park Golf Club.

In recent years Leo and Vi moved to Bendigo to be close to their children and grandchildren. Leo died in Bendigo in 1993 only a few days short of his 87th birthday.

At the age of 85 Vi is still bright, active and in good health with many happy memories of her years spent in Rowville and Lysterfield.

Interviewed by Bryan Power

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