Memories of Iluka Road
My parents, Max Carment (1918-2007), a chartered accountant and his wife Diana (nee Sulman, 1927-2005), and I (born in 1949) moved to 26 Iluka Road, Clifton Gardens from Cremorne in 1951 as a bigger house was needed with my sister Ann (later Annie) about to be born. I cannot recall the exact purchase price but my father later told me that houses in Iluka Road were quite cheap in those days in comparison with many other parts of Sydney’s lower north shore. My brother Tom was born in 1954. My parents sold the house in 1973 after Annie and I left home. It was a most comfortable and large but far from luxurious brick bungalow on the side of a steep hill sloping towards Taylors Bay. It had 16 rooms of greatly varying sizes, terraced garden beds and sweeping harbour views. Until insect screens were installed a few years after we moved in mosquitoes and flies could be very annoying. My parents also had to have a garage built. Two more rooms, a front deck and a swimming pool were later added. Although designed by the prominent Sydney architect B. J. Waterhouse (1876-1965) in about 1939 and in pretty good condition, the house was recently, and inexplicably, demolished. Other Waterhouse designs include May Gibbs’ house, ‘Nutcote’.
Iluka Road was a wonderful place in which to grow up as there were other families living in the street with children of around the same ages as Annie, Tom and I and the nearby Ashton Park reserve provided a large playground for all kinds of adventurous activities. Popular recreations included bush walks, war games, street cricket, racing our scooters (our parents did not allow bikes because of all the hills), swimming at nearby Clifton Gardens, which we called ‘Cliffo’, and fishing. We also sailed a yacht that was anchored not far from the house in Taylors Bay.
When we moved to Iluka Road many of the blocks were covered with bush and unoccupied but that changed as more houses were built. Neighbours on the lower level of Iluka Road where we lived included the Theosophist community in the huge and imposing Manor, the Clarks, the Middletons, the well known bookmaker Bill Waterhouse and his family, the Monticones, the Coombs, the Stephensons, the Harringtons, the Rileys, Ollie Alldiss and his wife, the Stockwells, the Neaves, the society photographer Monte Luke and his wife, the Dobbies, the Kings, the Hamiltons, the Briggs family, the Bradley sisters, who became famous for their bush conservation work, and the Heaths. We were especially friendly with the Stockwells. Good friends on the upper level of Iluka Road were the Rickards.
For some years after we moved to Iluka Road, meat, fruit, vegetables, bread, milk and groceries were all delivered to our house. Initially the bread and milk deliveries were by horse and cart. Mosman Junction as we always called it (‘Village’ seems to be quite recent) was a much less impressive shopping centre in the 1950s and 1960s than it is today. I can remember no restaurants or bookshops and my mother, a superb cook, frequently complained about the poor quality of the meat sold at the local butcheries. The purchase of items such as good clothes and books required ferry trips into ‘town’.
Most residents of the street were from business and professional backgrounds. I don’t, however, recall anyone, with the possible exception of Bill Waterhouse, as being really wealthy. ‘Comfortably middle class’ probably best describes its social composition. In those days the richest people seemed to be concentrated in eastern suburbs like Bellevue Hill and Vaucluse.
Almost all the children attended private schools. I initially was at the Miss Godsons’ kindergarten in Kardinia Road before going on to Mosman Prep and Shore. Other popular schools included Sydney Grammar, Riverview, Queenwood, which my sister attended, and SCEGGS Redlands. Most people were Protestants but there were a few Catholics. As Presbyterians, my own family went to services from time to time at Scots Kirk in Mosman. I generally walked to and from Mosman Prep, often with a friend, but used buses when I was at Shore.
After 1972 I lived in Canberra, Perth, Rockhampton and Darwin and only moved back to live in Mosman (at my parents’ former house in Fairfax Road) last year. From time to time I re-visit Iluka Road as it holds special memories for me. It has, however, changed quite a lot as some of the most attractive older homes have been demolished and replaced with generally less interesting structures that occupy more of each block. One of the few houses in the street that appears in a 1919 aerial photograph was recently demolished and another in the same photograph is under threat. The ease with which demolitions are often approved has pushed up property values to extraordinarily high levels, meaning that only very wealthy people or those with huge mortages can now afford to move to the street. I am most fortunate to have lived there before this happened.
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David Carment’s is delightful, as is David Hamilton.
I, of course, remember David’s brother Tom well, who was my age.
We lived in the Madame Kirsova house.
I went to Miss Heath, then Miss Godson’s, then Mosman Prep then Shore.
The “bush” was our playground.
I now live with my family on the southern corner of Burrawong and Thompson.
These recollections are interesting to me as I am researching the lives of conservationists Eileen and Joan Bradley, who developed Bush Regeneration in Ashton Park in the 1960s. I would be glad to read any stories anyone has about the Bradley sisters and their mother, ‘Dot’ .
I read the article on Iluka Road, and was disappointed to see that the writer did not include the Boothroyds who lived at "Pendragon", 44 Lower Iluka Road, the same part of Iluka Road that the writer lived on. There was overlap in the dates, in that in the 1954 Electoral Roll period, my grandmother May Boothroyd, my Uncle Arthur Boothroyd (artist, e.g. for the Women’s Weekly, but later solo), and my Uncle Jack Boothroyd were still living in that street when the writer lived there. Jack gave his address as 3 Iluka Road, but May and Arthur were at 44. (My Uncle Gordon was on the Electoral Roll as being at "Pendragon" with his mother and Arthur there for a while from when back from Britain in 1954.) "Pendragon" (the source of my father’s favourite nickname for my Grandmother) was, I believe, immediately next to the Misses Bradley, whom I met several times – or it might have been a couple of doors away. (Uncle Arthur was a friend of theirs and took me there.) A Bryden-Brown family also lived in the street (Mrs Bryden-Brown lectured in German at Sydney University late ‘50s and early ‘60s).
Till the time of her marriage to Rev. Roderic (JRLJ) Johnstone, then Curate at St. Clement’s Mosman, my mother Beryl lived there too; but that was long before the Carment family moved to the street. By 1954 another of my uncles, Sharland, was in Western NSW, managing a station.
I did not live in Iluka Road, but I stayed there at least once, and visited often. At nights we used to enjoy the city lights from my grandmother’s balcony which overlooked the bay. We heard the tooting of steamships as they signalled, watched small white-sailed yachts sailing, and sometimes small flying boats landed in that very bay. Many times we went down the steep bush path from the house to the beach and scrambled on the shell-encrusted rocks with their little pockets of sea-water, and we also walked along a bush track in the direction of Bradley’s Head. The steps and garden up to the street level from the house was very steep.
My Uncle Arthur, the artist, by the way, turned 100 years old on 1st October 2010, and died on 10 February this year. In addition to being an artist, at one stage he was Rector’s Warden at St. Clement’s Mosman. Another thing about him, he had a studio on Raglan St behind a house for a while, but later he built one at the street level of my grandmother’s house; may have converted the garage to it, or added it on beside the garage.
My sister Catherine Hewett is on the pastoral team of St. Clement’s Mosman still.
Regards,
Liz Christmas (nee Johnstone, daughter of Beryl Boothroyd, daughter of Kenneth and May Boothroyd)
Our family moved to 9 Iluka Rd, in 1965-1972 (8 years), after building a house in Sirius Cove with a dodgy builder (Dad had to sell to an architect, who fixed all the problems). I had just started high school at Willoughby Girls High with 29 girls from my primary school, Castlecove Public, so was allowed to commute to school via 3 buses everyday. My brother, Peter Cary, is a year younger than I. We loved the teenage life of Clifo with the bush and the water. We are a sailing family, so Dad, Paul, immediately moved our yacht ‘Clancary’ from Mosman Bay, onto a mooring in Taylor Bay with the dinghy chained to the rocks. We loved exploring the bush and swimming at Clifo and walking the dogs around the area. Peter was transported back to Castlecove for the last year of primary school each day, then went to Mosman High. I remember our neighbour in the Walter Burley Griffith designed house at 7 Iluka, Mrs Loaney, who liked to make us afternoon tea. Also the families mentioned by David Carment, as well as The Lils (5-6 kids, Roslyn my age), Valda and John Ulm and their 6 kids (only moved out in last couple of years), Vic Nicholson at 5, I think, who was in advertising and on The Inventors TV show. I travelled on the bus to school with Sun and Lyn Montecone. I remember the Stockwells coming to Mum/Olive’s and my assistance when our corgi was having her pups. When I turned 14, I started babysitting lots of the neighbours in Iluka, Kardinia and Morella Rds. My brother and I became friends with Prue and Brad Boxall from 2 Kardinia, and it is probably Ted their Dad who suggested that I go into advertising. In the late sixties there were only 7 or so yacht moorings allowed in the bay, so we got to know most of the other owners. Dad said it was ‘sad day’ when the Clifo pub was demolished in ’66 I think.
Today my husband and I and two grown children still live in Mosman (28 years in our Holt Ave house now), still sail and spend a lot of time walking the old 13 year old dog at Clifo, with the occasion swim. We have many friends living in Clifton Gardens, mainly from work days and children’s school friends, so spend quite a lot of time there and enjoy the coffee shop and Ripples restaurant. The children went to Mosman Public school, then Jen onto Queenwood Junior and senior schools and Chris ferried to The Scots College in Bellevue Hill. It is my favourite spot Monday to Friday in Sydney!
I am pleased that my memories have attracted so many interesting responses. As Anne Cook indicated, the Bradley sisters were remarkable women. I regret, Liz Christmas, that I do not recall the Boothroyds. I was, though, only four years old for most of 1954. I do remember the Bryden-Browns. One of them, whom I sometimes visit when I go to Canberra, married an eminent scientist and was very friendly with my mother. I am glad Toni Heath mentioned some of the families on upper Iluka Road that I did not. The Lils were particularly pleasant people.
Hello, can you remember the nicest man I ever knew, he was your postman, a dear man, Jack Gaynor, I worked at the post office with him a true gentleman, worked so hard for his family, so through these pages, I would like to say hello to Jacks family.
Terry Brown, now Horsham Sussex, England.
Terry,
If he is the person I think he is I remember him well and fondly.
David
Thanks David, regards Terry,
Here’s an article I wrote recently that you and your readers may enjoy David.
Growing up in Clifton Gardens in the 1960s was to be immersed in and enveloped by the natural world.
By day we would roam through the bush, collecting so many ticks on our backs that when we got home, Mum would put on a frypan to burst them when she plucked them from us with tweezers and metho. We’d scramble across the rocks like crabs, and our bare feet would leave blood prints all the way home when we slipped on oysters.
At dusk one hot day, running back from the beach, we crashed headlong into a llama escaped from the zoo, and set new land speed records in reversing and hightailing. At night I could hear Taronga’s lions roaring their discontent.
The baths at Cliffo were our backyard pool, where we’d swim until pruned, go fishing for stripeys, yellowtail and croakers, bomb the many jellyfish, and comb the beach for imagined treasures. And all the while we’d wonder at the holes in the chain-link shark net, and wonder what may lurk under the not-so-pristine waters.
The zoo was our theme park, which we’d enter once in a while through the front gates on a family excursion, or more often via a hole on the fence in clandestine raids to collect Fanta and Tarax bottles to claim the threepence rebate, which we’d spend on Sunny Boys and Smiths Chips.
The zoo and Cliffo were linked fantastically by a giant stingray that swam in circles in the old aquarium’s shark pool. From the viewing platform above, it was tradition to try to lob pennies and ha’pennies onto his broad back. Legend had it the massive black ray had been caught in our baths, but I don’t know if we ever quite believed it, despite all those holes in the chain-link net.
Yet 50 years later I discovered that this particular urban myth was actually flesh and blood – some 350kg of it.
During a stint on the Mosman Daily as acting editor, I received a letter from a reader complaining about the state of the shark net at Balmoral, and how common stingrays were in the baths. I recalled the story of the giant ray of yore in an editorial, and a letter arrived shortly after from Jean Taylor.
Jean has lived in the same house overlooking Clifton Gardens for 53 years, and vividly recalled a bleak winter’s day sometime in the early 1960s when she went down to walk her dog along the wharf, and discovered the ray.
“It first seemed like a big, big patch of seaweed, then I saw the left edge of the ray feeling along the net and realised what it was,” she wrote.
Jean rang the zoo and a truck soon arrived carrying two dinghies, a large net and several men, who eventually succeeded in trapping the ray and whisking it away. They told her it was a “Captain Cook”, and that it measured 9ft wide by 11ft long.
Jean surmised the ray must have come along the bottom under the net and then “forgotten how to get out”. When she later saw it swimming its sad circles at Taronga, she told me: “I felt bad for dobbing it in.”
But was the zoo’s ray and Jean’s ray really the same animal?
Taronga’s archivist provided newspaper clippings from the 1950s concerning several stingrays being transferred from the graving dock at Garden Island to the zoo.
“I am instructed by the Trustees to convey to you their deep appreciation for your kindness in connection with the receipt at Taronga Zoo Aquarium on the first inst. of two Captain Cook Stingrays, from the Captain Cook Dock. We are very pleased to have these two specimens, which together with the Stingray also received from the Captain Cook dock in November 1952, make a very fine display in our Aquarium,” wrote zoo secretary Lieut-Commander A. H. Brew in December 1954.
Perhaps these rays were still alive in the early ’60s, although in 1952 zoo chairman Sir Edward Hallstrom told newspaper reporters of the new rays: “We do not expect them to live for very long, but when they die they will make a grand feed for the zoo’s polar bears.”
It is probably safe to assume that the zoo’s aquarium had a giant stingray-shaped hole in its exhibition when Jean Taylor made her telephone call.
This is at least partially corroborated by Taronga’s operations manager and former aquarium manager John West, who started at the zoo in the mid-’60s and well remembers the giant ray swimming alone in the shark pool.
“The ray was so big that when it died (in the middle to late 1960s), we needed a front-end loader to haul it out of the pool,” he said.
West estimated the size of the ray to be about 2.5m by 3.5m, or about 8ft by 11.5ft – almost identical to Jean’s 9ft x 11ft ray – and said a so-called “Captain Cook” ray was almost certainly Dasyatis brevicaudata, the smooth or short-tailed stingray common in Australian waters.
Wikipedia described this species as: “The largest stingray in the world, this heavy-bodied species grows upwards of 2.1m (6.9ft) across and 350kg (770lb) in weight”, although there have been reliable reports on bigger specimens. Mature females are about a third larger than mature males.”
From this it is safe to assume that Jean’s ray was a female – and she had a secret.
“The interesting thing about that ray was that it was the only specimen of its species in the aquarium, but when they did an autopsy on it, they found it had several stingray pups in its reproductive system,” West said.
“We concluded that this must have been a case of delayed implantation, where a ray can mate with a male but not get pregnant until several years later. We believed it may have been complications with the birth of the pups that killed the ray.”
So the stingray of myth is made real. Jean’s massive smooth female ray was caught and taken the short distance from Clifton Gardens to the zoo – John West has little doubt the “tough” animal would survive the trip. If there had been other specimens there at the time, the zoo’s medical team would not have been surprised by the pups found during its autopsy.
All we need now is a photo.
Jean recalls women arriving during the ray’s capture and taking snapshots of the procedure and wonders if they are in existence today. Taronga’s archivist and this company’s photo library have come up empty, but they will be in an old album or a camphorwood trunk somewhere in Sydney.
A picture would seal the transition from myth to reality, but for small boys who grew up in Clifton Gardens during the 1960s, there is now no doubt. Jean Taylor has reached 50 years into the past and made fact of childhood fantasy.
I have just found this blog and found it so interesting! I grew up at 25 Iluka Rd. My parents are John and Valda Ulm and they are still alive and living in Greenwich. My brothers are Charles and Scott and Ben and sister Killara. Our house was built in 1961 and my parents rented on Military Road while it was being built. I was born there (at home) almost across from Mosman High. As children we used to explore the bush and play cricket on the street outside our house. I was terrified of getting ‘six and out’ because it meant either scrambling down the pol to the bottom road or walking all the way around to get the ball. I went to Mrs Heath’s preschool and we seemed to know everyone in the street. Such happy, happy memories.
I grew up at 25 Iluka Rd. I have really enjoyed reading these memories. My parents built the house in 1961. While it was being built we rented a house on Military Road, which is where I was born (at home). My parents John and Valda Ulm are still alive and live in Greenwich. My brothers are Charles, Scott and Ben and my sister is Killara. I went to Mrs Heath’s preschool at the end of the road then Mosman Infants, Primary and High (with a few years in NZ in the 70s). We used to roam the bush looking for drop bears and swim at Clifton Gardens Beach. There was always a cricket match outside our house. I was terrified of ‘six and out’ as you would have to either scale the pole to the bottom road or walk all the way around to retrieve the ball. My parents used to have Boxing day parties. The milk was delivered and the fruit and veges from ???? the green grocer family on Military Rd. All the dogs would roam the street and had their own pecking order, as did the kids I think. Good days.
What an interesting page to find!
I was one of the few children who was approved to live in the Manor, mostly it was older people which is why it was commonly thought of and referred to as a nursing home. I lived there for a couple of my younger years (1979-81) and attended Mosman primary and then Queenwood, then again from 1985 for another few years, attending Mosman highshool, and as my parents remained living there it was a big part of my early adult years, until a few years ago. We would often get people ringing the front door bell, asking if they could look inside or location companies wanting to shoot commercials there. While I remember the Manor fondly as a great place to explore, getting lost in the ridiculous maze of rooms, it was also a pretty serious environment for kids, so I headed out into Iluka rd to play and spent much of my time residing at 40 Iluka rd with the wonderful King family and their 3 children, Dacre Jnr, Diana and Catherine who was my age. I wasn’t aware at the time that these early friendships would become lifelong.
Of course times change and it’s with some trepidation that I visit Iluka rd now, so many wonderful memories of kids being kids but so much has changed, except the Manor which doesn’t seem to ever change!
I have so enjoyed reading all the memories of Iluka Road as I too lived there as a kid. My father, Eustace Summers, was away during much of the War, leaving my mother, Joyce, to sell up the wonderful home we had on Port Philip Bay in Melbourne and move to Sydney in March, 1940 with her mother, my brother Bob (3 and a half) and me (13 months) in the Wolsley car my grandmother had bought in England in 1937. When my mother bought the land I don’t know but Tom Esplin was the architect of our house, no. 24, into which we moved in around 1943 I suppose. During the building process we lodged with a wonderful French family in Kardinia Road, the Lamberts – two spinster sisters (Blanche was one but I don’t remember the other’s name) and Raoul, their brother who used to smoke Gaulloise cigarettes. We remained friends with them till they died, years later.
During the war but after he had come home, Dad joined the NES (National Emergency Service) who had a concrete building on the top level of Iluka Road where he and other members of the NES went on a rota system every night. I remember Dad telling us that when the Japanese midget submarines entered Sydney Harbour and let off whatever it was they let off, he had been in bed reading, with all the blackout curtains and the blind securely pulled down when suddenly they all lifted up, completely silently, at right angles to the window and as silently went down again! He raced up to the NES station,the only person to do so and was met by Dr. Deck who lived at the bottom end of Kardinia Road, with: “Impressive, what, Summers?”! This became a family saying quite quickly! Until the day we sadly left Iluka Road (winter, 1953) the only way to get to the top level was by either of the two almost vertical ladders, one by the curve near our house and the other opposite Monte Luke’s house further down the road; you could of course go all the way to either end of Iluka Road but the two ladders were a marvellous short cut.
There were always masses of kids in Iluka Road but I was the only girl so when we played cricket in the road outside our house – this being the only flat bit between the two slopes – I was not only the wicket keeper but the wicket, also. On pain of death I let a ball go down the long drain just on the curve, as I had to then go to where the ball may (if I were lucky) reappear, at the bottom of our land before the bush track between us and the Government Reserve and Taylors Bay. There were three boys who lived with their family at The Manor – the Hynes (or Hines, I don’t remember): Freddy, Arthur and a bit later on, Johnny. Bob and I always envied them tremendously as they queued up for their meals at the little hatch between their communal dining room and the kitchen and occasionally we were allowed to eat with them but as they were Theosophists they were also vegetarian so as I remember it now, the meals were fairly colourless! When my mother made a Pavlova, beating the six egg whites with a hand-held egg beater, she insisted we give the scrapings to Freddy and Arthur who always miraculously appeared at just the right moment! We were always invited to the Manor’s Christmas party, held for all the kids in the area in the large, central entrance hall with the most enormous Christmas Tree dominating the place and our presents put under it; however, we had to recite something/do a dance/sing something before we were allowed to claim our present. I remember when I was 8 I recited ‘Blow, blow, thy winter wind’ etc (all of it) which reduced the adults to audible laughter, much to my embarrassment and bewilderment. They did, however, also applaud; I didn’t understand either reaction, at the time!
The Carments moved into no. 26, next to us before David was born (on my mother’s birthday, I remember, which pleased her no end). We all enjoyed the Carments being next door as we (Bobby and I) had been scared of the wife of the family who was there before them – the Mackinnons – and felt sorry for the daughter-in-law who had to live there with them for years till she and her husband could afford to move out, or perhaps it was when the place was sold to the Carments and they all went.
Bobby and I both went to the Godsons’ wonderful little school in Kardinia Road until we had to leave to go to Mosman Public. Bob went to North Sydney Technical School which now no longer exists, and I went on to Wenona, which I just loved. During the winter term Mr Carment used to give me a lift to school in his Jowett Javelin car which I thought was just the greatest vehicle in existence! He did this because I had to get to school early for ball game practise and the tram took too long. Normally, though I would walk down to the ladder by the Luke’s house to get to the top level, walk along to the end of the road and go up the millions of steps to the bottom of Burrawong Avenue and then along the bush track to the tram terminus opposite the Zoo.
I remember being able to hear the lions roaring, too, from home and feeling nicely secure in my own bed. I seem to remember there being a Season Ticket system at some stage to get into the Zoo and if my mother were not going to be at home for us when we returned from school, we would go to the Zoo and have a lovely time getting to know every nook and cranny and of course, the animals. I particularly loved the penguins – which are still my favourite creatures!
Of course, when we lived in Iluka Road there was a lot of bush around – the block between us and the Montecones having a stand of bamboo at the edge of their land. This creaked alarmingly to a small child when the wind blew, and scared me for years. They also had a wonderful fish pond where, having sought permission I would gather frog spawn very frequently to bring home to hatch into bull frogs which of course made a frightful din. Watching the tadpoles appear from the spawn, then lose their legs to become frogs always appealed to me but my mother didn’t think it nearly as interesting! The Montecones also had a huge mulberry tree from which they would allow me to collect leaves to feed the silkworms I always seemed to have every year.
My parents knew most of the people in Iluka Road, both levels (but there were fewer houses on the top level in those days) and were particularly friendly with the Lukes, whose son Peter raced in the first Sydney-Hobart race on his yacht “Wayfarer”, and several succeeding races but I don’t think he managed to complete a race but did become the ‘mother’ ship. He used to live on board “Wayfarer” at Mosman Bay quay for years, I think. Monte used to hire a small-ish ferry and invite his friends on board to follow the yachts out to the Heads. We were invited several times and I remember being rather worried when everyone rushed one side or the other to watch something spectacular, all at the same time, making the ferry list alarmingly. I can certainly remember the Boothroyds, the Bradleys and the Heaths, whose daughter Elizabeth was much the same age as my brother. There was Mr. Felata (or something) who lived next door to the Lukes and had a Stutz Bearcat car which Bob and I just loved – particularly riding on the footplate! Someone mentioned Helene Kersova: she was married to the Danish Consul and lived on The Manor side of the Montecones – ?no.18? – and their home had a sprung floor in the vast drawing room, on which was spread a polar bear skin rug! Their son, Ole Fischer, was my great friend till they were moved to Paris when I was 8. During the period between breaking up for the long summer holidays and Christmas Bob used to help the postman (Mr Glock) which I think they both thoroughly enjoyed. It was during this period he met the Bradleys on his own, as it were and It wasn’t till years later that we learned they had introduced him to sherry at this stage of his life! I also remember our milk arriving with the horse-drawn float, and helping the milko every summer holidays with his deliveries around Clifo. You could buy your milk in ‘bulk’ then, rather than having to have it in bottles – we always had ours in an ex-Naval billy on the side of which my father had gently punched marks at the six-pint and eight-pint level.
It was an appalling wrench to my mother and us children when my father decided to sell no. 24 (which he and my mother had called “Melaleuca” and which name Dad had beaten out in copper, art deco style, and nailed to the side of the garage – he was a wonderfully creative handyman) and move us to an orange orchard-cum chook farm at Niagara Park, just north of Gosford. After the house had been on the market for 18 months or so, with the asking price being reduced ridiculously low, we managed to sell it to a family called the Stephensons who had four daughters.
Having so much bush around us was a bit of a fire hazard so my father felt it his civic duty to burn it off one year, the bit between no. 26 and the Lukes, at the bottom of the slope … Unfortunately the wind changed and the fire brigade had to be called, to put it out. Of course we all went to help beat it out, my father hearing one of the firemen say that he’d like to meet the b……d who had started this fire. I think Dad melted away – it had been done with the best of intent, after all!
Our lives there in that wonderful little pocket of Iluka Road and Clifton Gardens generally was the stuff of which dreams are made – carefree, happy, always summer (except when it rained for weeks on end during which we couldn’t go out to play in the playground at school so were allowed to read comics [supplied by the teachers] in our classrooms while eating our sandwiches), with, during the summer holidays, hours spent pretty well every day, swimming at the baths at Chowder Bay, getting burnt to a crisp and lying on the planking when we weren’t swimming or larking around just so that we could be the brownest kid at school,once we had to go back. No talk in those days of skin cancer!
I think that’s more than enough of/from me but the memories are so vivid and plentiful. Thank you, David Carment, for your memories and for sharing them.
Mary Allardyce (nee Summers) , now living in France, 29th October, 2017
Thanks for the wonderful contribution Mary. I was born in 1949 so you may be thinking of my sister Ann, who was born on 10 September 1951 not long after we moved to Iluka Road. I remember you and your family and have a photograph that, I think, includes us both. I would be happy to email you a scanned copy. My father quite often told the story of the fire. The Jowett Javelin was very sporty but also most unreliable. Your old house is one of the few of those on lower Iluka Road during the 1950s that had not been demolished.
Oh, the memories just come flooding back after reading about Iluka Rd.
I was born in Mosman in 1943. I lived in Silex Rd. my grandparents lived at number 11 Iluka. Some of the names you mentioned rang bells
My grandmothers name was Ruby Dalton. Grandads name was Albert. Sadly he died before I was born however I do know he was at home when the Japanese midget sub was depth charged in Taylor Bay. He jumped so high in fright he nearly went through the ceiling.
Some of the names of other Ilukians I can remember are Dr. Macbeth who was Nana’s next door neighbour at number13 and Jorian Blanche at number15 who was a few years older than me. He was a Shore boy. Don Smith lived at number 1. I went to Mosman Primary with Don who was a little ahead of me. He was an excellent sportsman and later went to Nth Sydney High then to Ag School. Never saw him after that as he went on the land. Another lad I knew lived around the corner in Kardinia Rd. Mick Shultz. His father was the chief engineer at the Macquarie Broacasting Network and I believe there could be a connection with The Manor at number 2 Iluka where 2GB began.
Most of the adventures described by former residents of the area I can relate to. Living in the Clifo district was Heaven. One practice enjoyed by mischievous boys was along the tracks leading to Chowder Bay. In the early 50’s there were still a few squatters living in shacks on the harbour foreshore. One of these was Ernie and his wife who had been there since the depression years. Many of us used to take delight bouncing rocks on his tin roof from the cliff above. I think I will stop here in case I incriminate myself. How long do the statute of limitations go for ?
I am so glad someone remembers my Uncle, Dr Macbeth! He lived at number 13 with his parents & sister Helen, my Mum.His Dad built their house & as he was an engineer he added several ingenious items….we had a speaking tube from the second floor to the breakfast room, a water-operated lift(sadly non-functioning by the time we arrived there), a secret cupboard & secret drawers in the base of the linen press. Helen went to England in 1956 to be married & our whole family came back to live at number 13 in 1968 when I was 10. I too loved living there & was lucky enough to have several children to play with especially the Lil family…though all those steps up to their house made for tired legs! I remember an escaped red panda from the zoo getting as far as a tree near the Ulm house & the peacocks at the zoo had competition in their screeches from the peacocks which lived at a house which was about 3rd from the dead end on the top level….it also had a letterbox which was a copy of the real house. Thank you for this very interesting site.
Today is 4 February 2020! and I have just read about Iluka Road.!! For almost a year about 1945-1946, I lived in a home next to Helen Kirsova and played with her son Ole. My Mom had gone to Brisbane to work for the US Army and farmed me out to her sister, Winifred Foristal. I loved my “bush” and took a path down to a small beach.
I, too, would come back covered with ticks and had to lie on the kitchen table while my aunt and uncle picked them off. I moved to USA in 1946 when my Mom married an American GI she met in Brisbane.
My goodness, the memories. I moved to 36 Iluka Road (aged 2) with my parents John, Norma and Bill Dobbie in 1962. They purchased 36 Iluka, the former residence of Monte Luke. I knew most of the families -the Kings, Hamiltons, Briggs, Bradley sisters, Heaths, Stockwells. My mother was friendly with Diana Carment (i think they had known one another from school). I remember when the Carment’s put their pool in because I was allowed to swim there so long as I knocked on the front door to let Mrs Carment know I was using the pool. The only downside was the occasional funnel web spider that lay dormant in a corner of the pool). I knew every inch of the bush. There were fewer kids in Iluka when I grew up but some of the kids I was at school with lived in Kardinia Road and of course Peta Coomes in Iluka. We roamed the bush, hit the tennis ball against the wall between upper and lower streets swam at Clifton and sailed. My parents had a boat in Taylors Bay. I remember the Ulms and Kylie of course. Really lovely free place to grow up. I remember navigating down the enormous garden path after school past the water dragons sunning themselves on the path. Lots and Lots of wildlife in Clifton.I was sorry to leave in 1979 and the house that Monte Luke built (which was so spacious and large) replaced some years later by something not nearly so pretty. Thank you, David, for bringing back these memories
Thanks Amanda. I remember you and your family well. My mother and your mother were at school together. My recollections include sailing on your yacht and playing chess with Bill. Bill took my sister to his school ball. It was her very first ‘date’. You are right about the house. It was beautiful.
Sept 19, 2021
I lived on Iluka Street in the 1940s and came to USA when my Australian mother married my stepfather, Harry P. Sieg. Does anyone know if Ole Fischer, Helene Kirsova’s son is still alive? His father was Danish. He and I played together at Kirsova’s home.
Just a few notes on the very interesting account of Iluka Road. In the early 30's my brother Dion attended a kindergarten run by the people at the Manor. I remember going to a Christmas party there. One of the more colourful personalities in the area was Madam Kirsova who was a ballet dancer who left one of the companys that came to Sydney in the 1940's.
Morella Road was a bit more cosmopolitan than Iluka which was something of a back water. Names from the thirties and forties included the Parers, Lyons, Hemingways, Keeches, Wynns, Doblyns, Snellings, Neilsons - all with families of children. We (Hamiltons) lived two up from the Clifton Gardens Hotel, demolished in the 60's. Agreed a wonderful place to grow up!
October '08
— David Hamilton · 19 October 2008, 01:57 · #