My Mum, Joan Dawson
Young Teacher Graham Street Port Melbourne 1939
My mum was just 18 when she began to teach this class at the Graham Street School.
She lived nearby at 174 Buckhurst Street. Her father was a carter and they lived in a double fronted timber home with stables at the back where they housed the two Clydesdale horses, one of which was called Lucy.
Teaching at Kilbride Convent 1956
My Mum married Maurice Enright at Sts Peter and Paul’s, South Melbourne in 1945. Maurie, as he was always known, was from Ballarat and was one of only 8 out of 200 who sat the PMG exam in 1937 to become a telegram boy. A big thing in those days after the depression. He was boarding at a lodging house in Nelson Road, South Melbourne and only 17 years old when he met my Mum at a Sts Peter and Paul’s parish picnic. They had 8 children.
Mum spoke of Kilbride and the nuns fondly. I do remember her going there as a small child but often we were with Dad over the road on the beach or sitting on the beach wall waiting for her. My little sister and I were lumped into this photo of Mum’s class taken with the Parish Priest and three of the nuns. From the stern looks on their faces and their body language, I don’t think the nuns were that pleased to have us there.
Mum was also an A grade basketball player as well as a tennis player.
Carmel Pascolo
