 Syd and Mary at their wedding [Full picture] |
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Atkinson family tree
Sydney Atkinson and Mary Masterson
Notes by Daphne Lowth [Book: Where the people live]
A brief history
He arrived in Fremantle by ship and took the train from Perth to Northampton. The rail line was not completed to Ajana at this stage, but Syd was sure he would find Ajana if he followed that line. In the town of Northampton, he bought a water bag and food for his three day walk of thirty three miles. Each night he placed the water bag a few yards away pointing in a northern direction so as he knew in which way to start in the morning. Somehow he found his brothers.
Syd worked on the farm with Allan and Nellie Rochester before joining the army in 1915. On his return he stayed with them until he married Mary Masterson on 9 October 1920 and built his own house.
After a few years he decide to build another house at the Ajana township. He purchased one ha (2.5 acres) of Crown land on the boundary of his brother Len's farm. Syd had collected fuel cans which held four gallons of petrol and kerosene. He cut open these empty cans, flattened them out and soldered them into sheets. When Syd and Mary finally built their home, it had strong jarrah frames, corrugated iron roof and the exterior walls were clad with the home made sheets of tin. The interior walls were lined with hessian and floors made from the wooden packing cases that the fuel came in.
He also built chook houses using bush timber and those soldered sheets of tin. They had a good size poultry farm and sent eggs to market. As there was only one train a week, the eggs had to be treated with a preservative named Keep Egg. This was rubbed over the eggs before packinto into egg crates.
Syd had set up a fuel agency and sold fuel to the farmers in the district. They kept a herd of goats so they had plenty of milk, cream and butter. Also grew plenty of vegetables and made their own bread. Syd built a workshop at the back of his garage where he made furniture and toys for all the children in the district.
As he was such a handy man the Education Department asked him to teach the school boys some carpentry. So every Tuesday, Syd would arrive in his old T-model Ford car and set up a workshop on the school porch. The Ajana people were grateful for all he taught them.
Syd worked on many projects in the district, such as building the dam for the railway, stock yards, and his own telegraph line from the post office to his house almost a mile away. He built a foot bridge over Croton creek so as people could walk from the tennis courts to the shops when the creek was in flood. Another big project was the house he built for Mr and Mrs Viv Mitchell. This house is still occupied.
Farmers carted grain to Ajana siding to be sent by train to market. For a period of about three years, Syd held a job where he weighed and recorded each bag of grain, lifted the bags onto his back and walked up a plank to stack them in a rail truck. Of course all farmers helped him, as they do.
Syd and Mary were sadly missed when they left Ajana and went to Perth to live in 1940. Syd helped build the South Fremantle power house and travelled each working day from Leederville to Fremantle by train. He put his age back a few years so as to join the army for the Second World War. He served this time in Darwin and the Midland army workshops.
Sydney Atkinson died on 9 August 1955.
Mary was registered with St Johns Ambulance Association in Victoria. In Western Australia she worked at the Base Hospital Fremantle in the Voluntary Aid Division every second weekend during the years of the First World War. At Ajana she was the only first aid person we had, and was often called upon to help the sick and injured.
Mary died on 7 October 1976.