New Residence - A Trip Down Memory Lane

Barry At New Residence

Just by way of a little side track, while we are killing time here at New Residence I thought I might just take the liberty of a trip down history lane.  The weather, has on the whole, just been mostly horrible, and whilst we are camped down here on the river flats at New Res, everytime it rains, is another few days that we are unable to get the bus out of here.  The flats are extremely sticky and become very boggy when wet and we stand no chance of getting out of here until it has stopped raining...so here is my little bit of history.

New Residence is a very small locality, 20 kms out of Loxton, in the lovely Riverland area of South Australia.

Way, way back in 1967, my parents decided to up root us once again from Shepparton in Victoria and move us to this wonderful little place.  We lived here for 3 wonderful years, until late in 1970, when we moved to the Hunter Valley of NSW - our base ever since - something like 13 schools in 13 years was my academic record lol.

Our time in New Res, as it is affectionately known, was just such a  memorable time  for me and has always stayed in a special place within my heart.  A wonderful community, and a time of great freedom - being able to roam the river banks and the block at will.  In between we worked for pocket money during the school holidays cutting apricots for drying - slave labour it was - 25 cents a tray -  today, where they still do it - which is few - they get $2.00).  The apricots we cut in half and the stone removed and placed on the trays.  Stacks of 25 were made and two side by side where placed inside a canvas tent, and inside a tunnel that went into the tent we burnt a tin of sulphur over night. Our little dog at the time - 'Timmy', was always there, when it was time to take the tent off the trays - his little body would shake in anticipation and excitement, knowing that when the tent was lifted, there would sometimes be hundreds of 'stunned mice' ready to run in a thousand different directions - The mice were high on sulphur..... From there the trays were placed by hand, out onto what we loosely called the 'green', where they were left to dry. 

Apricot Trays

The Drying Green

The frequent dust storms that would arrive on an almost daily basis, would see everyone arrive to help take the trays in to protect them from the dust - sometimes up to 600 - 1000  trays at a time.

The block catered for stone fruits, citrus (some of the best you would ever taste), and grapes.  We were never left to go hungry. Oh how good it was to just go and pick one of those huge washington navels off the trees and eat them where we stood, with the juice running down to our elbows.  We have been fortunate that Wayne has allowed us to help ourselves to what ever we want off the trees, and believe me - we certainly have lol.   When we weren't eating fruit, there was always the river, where the supply of yabbies was never ending, and certainly not the size of the ones we are catching now - these we like the size of small crayfish.  The only other thing we are catching is carp - giant size carp - the menace of the Murray River.  At least I have done my bit for the environment and have caught about 8 reasonable size carp and just helped to feed the water hens., and used the rest for yabbie bait.

 Just by way of another little side track here- my dear Father wants me to add a little bit here - so this is a quote from Leonard Keith Prowse.  I have done a wee bit of editing here.  lol

   "I think it was Ozzie Klau's father who was one of the people to have been
given a grant in the 1800's.
  There was originaly 335,000 acres in the property of which aproximatley 800 was in the horticulture side the rest was in wheat ,barley and sheep.The agreement I
had with the company was that I received a wage plus 10% of the profits and
of course there were never any profits as the agricultural side never made a
profit in the 35 years that I was aware of.and seeing as the apricossa
venture failed due Ozzie getting a bank draft for the farm it was not a goer
hence our move to Muswellbrook".

Some Leftovers - From Days Gone By

 

During our time here, it was through one of the worst droughts the area has ever seen.  Water was a luxury and the saline levels in the Murray was just starting to be realised as a major problem - even now walking around the camp, the sand and the dirt is severely impregnated with salt crystals, so still a major problem.  Most irrigated with overhead irrigation, but due to the salinty levels, many changed over to irrigating underneath to prevent burning of the trees.

Now my Dad has come in here and mentioned Apricosa - and you are probably wondering what is it.  An amazing idea that he had, when he saw his Boss, Mr Klau, making this sort of dried fruit, which was made of the apricots that were too soft to dry, and so he had this process whereby he cooked it all up and placed into the same trays that we dried the apricots with, but with some modifications. So the apricots where cooked and purred and poured into the trays which had plastic inserts.  It was placed out on the green, the same as with the dried apricots, and when dry, was then cut into one inch pieces and coated with caster sugar.  Oh it was so nice, and there has never been anything on the market like it.  But Dad being Dad, took it that couple of steps further and set it up so that it wasn't so labour intensive.

 

This was the big vat used for cooking the apricots and getting it ready to place into the trays.  Mother dearest seen here at here best - always by Dad's side - no matter what the venture was - but always the stirrer - lol.

 

 

Dad out walking through some of the rows of Apricosa - ready to help make his millions he was lol - but it was a great idea and surprised that no one really took up with the idea - but then again - the stone fruit industry has died here - like so many other agricultural areas of Australia

Julie and Janette along with cousin Janet - helping themselves to what was probably lunch

Doing a Few Laps of The very Large Verandah We Had

Julie and Janette - my two youngest sisters at the back (Right)

Marilyn and I - ready for High School

Family Photo Taken at Our Farewell

 

 So there - now the trip down memory lane is complete with old photos and all.

Even though we have had a reasonable amount of rain since we have been here, we have been through a couple of dust storms - just seems incredible.  The surrounding country side is lush green and the crops look like they hold a lot of potential for the coming harvest season.

Dust Storm Over The Murray

The fields look just wonderful - being freshly plowed - they create such wonderful patterns in the right light.

Golden Fields

The Only Good Carp Is a Dead One

Barry with One of the smaller Carp I Caught

The Vines As They Are Now - Just Been Pruned

Some of the beautiful washington navel oranges on the trees.  As it has been a bumper season, the trees are abundant after a number of pretty bad years. but just when you think things are good, something else comes along to nip things in the bud - the market is saturated with these beautiful fruit and the growers and only getting about $100 per ton - whereas last year it was about double that.  The $100 barely covers the cost of picking and labouring and so most are letting them just fall to the ground to rot - Doing my bit here for the growers here - so when you read this, off you go and buy some Riverland oranges. OK!!

I knew that mother of mine was sitting thinking of our time here and so in a moment of madness we packaged up 8 (as many as would fit in a post box) and posted them to Wauchope- I know how much both parents enjoyed them, so I won't tell how much the postage cost lol - just pleased they enjoyed them.

Now you might ask, why is she waffling on about all this?  Well, it's like this - It's only when you get a bit older, that you start to wonder about some things, remember things from the past, and I came to wonder how New Residence ever come to get it's name.  You might say, well 'google it' - well sorry but no go - yes that's right - something Google doesn't know.

So if you want to find out something - you ask the locals .............

The story goes something like this:-

South Australia is one - if not the only state in Australia not to claim convict status, and was founded on German immigration.  The government of the time implemented a scheme, during the severe depression, to provide relief for those hit hardest, and to prevent people from deserting the state and going to areas further afield and going areas hit by the gold fever,  and the Village Settlement Scheme was implemented.  There was a certain amount of unrest at the time and the government hoped that with implementing this scheme, would help stem the unrest. 

 The scheme aimed to utilise the 'wastelands of the Murray River' for irrigation and to provide a feeling of self- sufficiency.  The idea of of irrigation along the Murray was first proposed by Edward John Eyre in 1842, while living on his property at Moorundie.

 On Frebruary 22nd, 1894, the first group of nearly 250 people, including 114 children arrived at Lyrup (just across the way from New Res) and started a communal village.  They cut timber, and made make shift homes or lived in tents.

At Pyap good sandy soil gave rise to a substantial village, including a store, bakehouse and school. Among some of the early pioneers were, Boyle T.H. Cox, postmaster, John W. Bankhead bootmaker, John Bowes harnassmaker, Frank Duke painter, Jason Holt blacksmith, Charles J. Lanthois, boxmaker and Ernest Robinson carpenter. However lack of later cooperation amongst settlers and the drought left only seventeen members by the end of 1899 and the Pyap settlement was dissolved in 1903, as was Holder. New Residence, downstream from Pyap, was settled in 1895 but abandoned within two years. 

In 1901, after much toil and struggle, it was decided that the scheme as it was - was not feasible and the decision was made to divide the areas into 'blocks' and those that chose to stay were given an allotment based on a ballot system.  the official release of the 'blocks' was held with the governor of the day present, and he was reported as saying, "this is your 'New Residences' - and so hence the name New Residence stuck.  this being the shortened version of the story.

Even so, the Village Settlement Scheme gave for some time hope and a living to some 1800 people and laid the basis for the region's very successful horticultural industry. 

The communal atmosphere of the time is one of the very many wonderful aspects of the area that has endured the era of time, and Loxton, especially has a wonderful sense of community spirit.

In the late 60's when we lived here, all that remained was the Lutheran Church and Manse, the old school, and tennis courts.

The Old Manse - Our Old House

The Old School

The Remains Of The Old Post Office (2009)

Our Orange Supply

Our Camp By The River

Well hope you have enjoyed this edition of our blog - Thanks to everyone who have left us comments and are enjoying following our journey.

See you on the next trip, which we hope will not be so long next time.

Next Time You Buy Almonds - Make Sure They Come From The Riverland - NOT Brazil

One of the many almond blocks that have sprung up around the Riverland.

We have done a few day trips around the area and hope to share them with you very soon.

The Limstone Cliffs Of The Murray