Port Pirie Grain Silos

January 15, 2016January 15, 2016kira0030

This photograph, taken from the top of the bulk-loading gantry of the wharf, shows the last-minute preparations that are being made prior to the commencement of the “big pour” on Monday.

This week I’ve been trying to find out the history of the Port Pirie, South Australia grain silos. I found the above newspaper cutting in with my Dad’s photos and it was Mum who identified where it was and what was happening. Dad was a builders’ labourer, a brickie and also did concreting and other building work and he was part of building these silos. From what I have been able to gather the main part of the work took place between 1957 and 1962. I haven’t been able to find much online about it at all. At first I thought this was rather unusual however then I thought it may be too recent to be considered “history” or it simply hasn’t been added to any South Australian industrial heritage websites yet.

“Country silos spread outwards along the railways from Ardrossan; the first local silo in the State was built at Paskeville and opened in January 1956. Bute followed a few months later. They took two forms: horizontal silos were built at Balaklava, Snowtown, Blyth, Hoyleton and Brinkworth, and vertical concrete elevators at Nantawarra, Redhill and Gulnare; the tall white cylinders were towering landmarks that could be seen from every farm in the Hundred and beyond. This first generation of silos all fed the Ardrossan terminal. With the construction of bulk handling terminals at Wallaroo in 1956 and Port Pirie in 1957, the way was open for silos throughout the region.”1

“Port Pirie1” by Fairv8 – Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Commons – https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Port_Pirie1.JPG#/media/File:Port_Pirie1.JPG

The town’s lead smelter certainly takes the spotlight as it is the world’s largest. It also produces refined silver, zinc, copper and gold.2

Friday Faces – We Finally Have A Name For A Face

January 7, 2016January 15, 2016kira0030

My parents have jokingly argued about whose ancestor this was for years as the photo got mixed in with both of their photo collections and neither could remember whose it was. My Mum gave me the photo yesterday and I have been able to identify it! This is Eleanor Wigley nee Greenway, my Mum’s paternal 2x great grandmother.

Eleanor Wigley nee Greenway b 1831, d 1917

Nothing was written on the back of the photograph however the cardboard frame of the photo lists John Lay & Son, Eaglehawk, as the photographer. I found out that John only operated the business under the name John Lay & Son between 1904 and 1906 so this narrowed down the possibilities of who it could be greatly. I thought the woman appeared to be in her 80s in the photo. In my family tree database I searched for everyone who had lived in and around Bendigo and narrowed it down to all the ladies and those born over 100 years ago. Eleanor was the only one who fit the time frames. She was between 73 and 75 in the above photo.

On checking a family photo we received, relatively recently, of the Wigleys I found that it is indeed Eleanor.

Charles and Eleanor Wigley seated in the centre with some of their children and grandchildren.

Google Search By Image

January 1, 2016kira0030

I’ve been scanning and sorting more of my Dad’s photos and I wanted to see if there were any photos of a taxi similar to his online.

This is where Google’s search by image function comes in handy.

Go to images.google.com and click on the camera icon in the search box

Click on ‘upload an image’

Click on ‘choose file’

Click on the picture you want to upload and click on the ‘open’ button, in some programs it might be the ‘okay’ button

Wait while the picture uploads

Now Google will compare your picture with all the pictures it can find on the world wide web and will show some similar ones

You can also enter a word in the search box, I used Holden and it narrowed down the search and gave two websites about Holdens as well.

I think this was the closest match. You can also use this function to see if there are any copies of a photograph online.

Deutsche Weihnachtslieder, German Christmas Carols

December 19, 2015kira0030

I’ve written here before about my love for Christmas Carols. I remember my Mum would often play her Vienna Boys Choir Christmas Carols record at Christmas. I’ve been reminiscing with some Youtube videos today.

Did you listen to Christmas music from your ancestor’s native land growing up? Do you still listen to it now?

Google Indoor Maps-King Charles’ House

December 15, 2015kira0030

I obviously missed the announcement from Google that they were now providing indoor maps as I got such a pleasant surprise when I was searching for the birth place of a client’s ancestor. I had the house name, King Charles’ House, New Street, Worcester, Worcestershire from an obituary and from census records so I looked it up to get a photo of what it looks like now and I was able to zoom right in and then there was an arrow to click pointing in the open front door!!

This is what the outside looks like

The sign says, From this house King Charles II escaped his enemies after the Battle of Worcester September 3 1651.

The entrance

It is now a pub

It was so exciting exploring a centuries old building in England from my house in South Australia.

Incredible wood carvings on the fireplace. On Google you can zoom right in and see the detail of the carvings. I wonder if this was done by someone in the Nichols family or their employees.

This was the home of Edwin Nichols, he was born here and ran a furniture manufacturing and antiques business here which was passed down to him from his father and he passed it on to his own son Edwin Jnr. Finding out how they came to own the house is another fun challenge!

It is well worth having subscriptions to both Ancestry.com.au and Findmypast.com.au. As I said above I used an obituary and census records to find the house. Find My Past makes the British Newspaper Archive available to its subscribers which is where I found the obituary.

I hadn’t been able to find Edwin in the 1841 census on Ancestry (you can’t search by address on Ancestry) so I checked on Find My Past and only searched for Nichols, New Street, Worcester where I found a John Nichols listed. The image on Find My Past was very faded and pretty much illegible so I went back to Ancestry and searched for John Nichols and there was Edwin as well however he was recorded on the original census form as Edward. I know it is the right person because of the address, his age, and his occupation of Cabinet Maker. All this information also fits with future censuses as he remained at this address until his retirement in 1885.

The Time Travellers’ Picnic

December 13, 2015kira0030

I went to the Time Travellers’ Picnic again today, last year I went as a hippy. This year I chose Doctor Who and based my costume on Tom Baker’s Doctor who I watched growing up.