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1905-Current
By Peter Goodchild
Joyce and Edmund Goodchild.
Edmund Peter Goodchild was born in Katanning on the 18th January, 1927. His parents were Edmund Frank Goodchild and Joyce Breray. They both emigrated from England, his mother from Yorkshire (unknown year) and his father was from Ipswich, Suffolk.
Edmund senior arrived on the “Runich” in 1905, and went to Katanning to join his brother who had arrived in 1904. They took up virgin land in Badgebup and proceeded to clear for agricultural purposes. All their produce had to be carted by horse and cart to Katanning, a round trip taking three days, back loading fertiliser or any other of their requirements. Edmund Snr. was the wagon driver.
Joyce Goodchild with baby Peter
This went on til 1912, when the railway line was installed to Nampup, now Nyabing. In 1916, Edmund Snr. enlisted to take part in the First World War. He was subsequently seriously wounded in France in 1917. After a long period in hospital he was discharged and sent home, totally and permanently incapacitated.
After returning to Badgebup, he and his brother purchased “Badgeminnup”, Nyabing. On July 27th in 1920, Edmund and Joyce were married in Claremont and took up residence on “Badgeminnup”. They produced eight children by 1930. They were Barbara Joyce on 26th January, 1922, Edmund Henry on 6th April, 1923 (died age 5 months), twins Bernard Frank and Stella Mary were born on 18th July, 1924, Ellen Bessie was born 6th October, 1925, followed by Edmund Peter on 18th January, 1927, Sheila Doreen on 22nd September, 1928 and Marguerite on 8th October, 1930.
For the first five years of their marriage, their only means of transport was by horse and buggy. Their first car was a Ford T, bought in March, 1924. Things were pretty hard, particularly for Joyce. No running water, septic sewerage, or any of the things we take for granted today. Washing was done by a copper to boil the clothes, and by a tub and washing board.
First tractor
Edmund Snr. purchased his first tractor, a British Wallis, in March, 1925 although Peter never remembers him working it that much, but he must have in the early parts as the number of worn grips laying around the farm. He still had a team of horses working as well as the tractor.
In the 1930’s the tractor remained in the shed and the horses became the main source of power – possibly the cost of fuel was the main reason for this (Depression era). Even in the 1940’s the tractor was seldom used. In 1939 Edmund Snr purchased a second hand two-ton Holt Caterpillar Tractor, and Bernard became the driver of this machine until March, 1944 when he went off to join the air force.
After that, Edmund Snr took over driving it until 1948. In 1945 he purchased a Fordson Major when the Holt went into semi-retirement except for new land and dam cleaning. It was also used under wet conditions when the Fordson kept getting bogged (1946-47 were really wet years, followed by bumper year in 1948).
In 1939 Peter became the full time Teamster and worked teams from anything from one to ten horses (ploughing and seeding) and for harvesting they only used six horses. Peter drove for ten years until his father and he fell out, and then Peter was kicked out.
Peter worked for his brother-in-law (Vic Kenwood in Datatine) for six months. He then went to work for Mr Merv Manuel for thirteen months before purchasing and moving to the property he now works and lives on. After a period of wet and dry years he was queried about the property name, and the joke stands, it was “Mud or Dust”!!
In 1949 Edmund Snr and Joyce moved to Albany and his brother Bernard took over Badgeminnup. He worked it until 1972. when he sold out to Noel Pollard. Noel later sold out to Gordon and Sheryl Browne who are still the owners today.
Peter got a bit ahead of himself at this point in his story. Going back to his childhood things were pretty hard for his father. He remembers his father selling big shorthorn cows for two pound ($4.00) a head to the butcher in Katanning (butchers in Nyabing were only there on and off). A lot of calves were destroyed at birth because they weren’t worth rearing. They needed a lot of milk for the family and also separated the milk and sold the cream to the butter factory in Katanning. The family reared some of the calves on skim milk. For the first few weeks they had fresh milk, and then gradually became all skim milk. Milking cows soon became the children’s job.
Peter’s brother, sisters and he all went to school in Nyabing using a horse and buggy to get there. Before leaving the children had cows to milk, milk to be separated and the calves fed. The school horse, as they called it, still had to be fed, watered and groomed. As Peter liked horses, this became his job. The other children left him to harness it to the buggy and take it up to the house so they could all get in after the milking. Peter and two of his sisters had cows to milk night and morning. The sisters had three each to milk and Peter only had to milk two, However, he also had the horse to look after,. He would also get a wheat bag of chaff to take on the buggy so the horse had something to eat while they were at school. The children had to leave home at 7.30 am, and didn’t usually get home until 5pm.
Hay cutting at Grove farm Badgebup
E F Goodchild binder & GS Goodchild with sheaf
Edmund Snr used to cut about 100 ton (90 tonne) of hay a year (in sheaves using a binder). Most of this was cut into chaff to feed the horses. How the children hated Saturday as this was chaff cutting day. A team of the boys and girls carrying sheaves to the chaff cutter, with their father feeding the sheaves into it. Unfortunately, Stella was an asthmatic, and dust always bought on an attack – she was excused from chaff cutting, much to everyone else’s disgust!
From there, an elevator would take the chaff up to the chaff house, where they would have to rake it around. New wheat bags were unstitched on the long side, and stitched end to end together forming the conveyor belt (new ones were used because they were stronger). Peter used to remember when Harry Cronin would come over and ask for a couple of tons of chaff, and so they would have to cut it on Sunday!! Harry used to have a bit of a dairy in Nyabing and this is where the rear of the store is today, and may include Tony and Chrissie Franchi’s house.
During the summer months, rain water became scarce. However, there was a soak about ¾ mile south of the house on Badgeminnup. Peter and his brother had to take the school horse and a 100 gallon (380 litre) tank on skids to cart the water. They had two-gallon (7.5 litre) buckets; one would stand in the soak and hand the bucket up to the other to tip into the tank. When you took the full one, you were handed the empty one to be filled. 50 bucket full’s to fill the tank. When they got home they had to bucket it out into a 200 gallon (750 litre) tank. To get the two cart loads, it took them all morning.
Funny things happen
Bogged!! (c1954)
Peter remembers a few things, funny things, that have happened over the years depending on your point of view. He remembers once they were getting ready to cut chaff and there were a lot of mice in the hay. Peter’s father always wore long john underpants, and apparently a mouse ran up his leg in between the inner and outer pants. When he sat down to have a cup of tea, he squashed the mouse – the look on his face was worth seeing!
Another time, he was stamping down wool in the wool press. He used to smoke a pipe and, when it went out, he would put it in his pants pocket. But apparently this time it wasn’t out!! No one ever knew he could move so quick as when he came shooting out of that press with smoke billowing out of his crutch with his pants on fire! It’s always funny when you are not the victim.
Peter Goodchild, age 16, in 1943 with horses Rex, Blossom, Gypsy, Nugget and Mac.
When Peter first started driving a team of horses, he had a six-horse team and a five-furrow Mould Board Plough. He was able to do about 5 acres (about two ha) a day. He had a 200 acre (about 80 ha) paddock to fallow. The first harvesting he did was with five horses on a six foot (1.8 m) Sunshine Harvester and ten acres (4 ha) a day was a fairly good day. How things have changed from about about 80 years ago!!
Peter learnt to ride a horse bareback taking the horse to water. Later he taught himself to ride with a saddle. When he was about ten years old, Mr Albert Hobart gave him a pony that his son Stan used to ride to school at Kwobrup. But when the Kwobrup School closed they went to Badgebup on a truck driven by Mr Ollie Woods (I think this truck was the first school bus in the district!) The pony’s name was “Tiny” and Peter won a few first prizes with her at the Nyabing Show.
Back when they were going to school, their father used to employ two teamsters working two eight-horse teams. He was also breeding a few horses so usually had about 30 horses on the farm. Hence the large amount of hay on the farm.
A new family
Peter Goodchild married Marjorie Whowell on 10 March 1951 at St Marys, West Perth.
In 1951 on the 10th March Peter married Marjorie Whowell (Pingrup) in West Perth. Between them they raised five children. The couple were married for 58 ½ years when, unfortunately, Marjorie passed away on 28th September 2009. The first years of their marriage for Marj were very similar to Peter’s mum’s; no mod-cons, used wash tubs, copper, scrubbing boards etc. No refrigeration, electric lights, septic sewerage or anything taken for granted today.
Peter and Marjorie had five children, Cheryl Evelynon 9th April, 1952, Kerry Lynette on 1st July, 1953, Peter Wayne on 16th January, 1956, David Robin on 10th July, 1958 and Nigel Stuart 19th September, 1962.
Marjorie & Kerry with Peter’s mother and father, Joyce & Edmund
They all went to primary school in Nyabing. They caught the school bus from the front gate and the Bus driver was Charlie Wallace at that time. The girls didn’t go away to school. They did correspondence through the primary school to get their leaving certificate. The boys went to Katanning Senior High School to complete their schooling. Peter and David boarded privately in town and Nigel went to the Hostel.
From there they branched out. Cheryl went nursing at Princess Margaret Hospital prior to her marriage to Jack Cheetham (now divorced). She now has two children, Andrew and Anita. Kerry worked in the Nyabing Post Office and then went to Jerramungup Post Office for 12 months prior to transferring to the Albany post Office. Kerry married John Strickland and they had three kids, Daniel, Rachel and Jacinta.
Peter went to University and became a Valuer. He is now in the Melbourne Office and still doing this line of work. He has five children, unavailable, Ashley, Kayla, and twins Teal and Prue to his second marriage. David left school and trained as a boilermaker, then started going steady with Stella Cole. He was asked to help her father in the ceiling and cornice industry on weekends, only to find that he earned more money on the weekend than boiler making during the week! He Married Stella and they have Jade, Aiden and Troy.
Peter Goodchild’s first motor bike
Peter’s first motor car
Nigel left school and came back onto the farm to help Peter. He got some work seeding with Tom Bailey (previously the farm was owned by Ernie Batt and it is now where Charlie Borlini lives, and Jeff Hobley bought the rest of the farm).
He came home and asked to borrow the handpiece for Crosby’s shed, and came home after doing 80 sheep on the first day. He ended up doing 150 sheep a day with a wide tooth comb/handpiece. He shore for a couple of years and then went panel beating. He also welded at Pederick’s in Wagin, then apprenticed with an air conditioner mechanic. He finished his apprenticeship in Perth and is now located in Wagin with his own business. He married Gaye Gannaway (no local link to the Gannaway’s in Nyabing) and they had James and Sarah.
This is a brief history as Peter remembers it. He has seen many changes throughout the years, but it is always for the better. He now watches Browne’s go round the next door paddock on Badgeminnup with 36 and 42 foot machinery and thinks back to what he started with!
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