The REID Family

(George ) Harcourt and Vera Andree Reid.
Lynchs Creek, Princes Highway.

Vera and (George) Harcourt Reid. JN.

Jenny Nelson recalls "On th 26th of September 1946 we arrived at Longvale, Lynchs Creek six miles from Moruya and one mile from the old Princes Highway, which in those days was a gravel road. [At that point, the Old Highway was over a kilometre inland from today's highway]. Our father had purchased the 640 acre property from Jack Lynch of Moruya who had run cattle on it. The only accommodation there was a bark hut with a small annex and an adjoined kitchen. The floor in the main room was timber, but the annex and kitchen had sand covered dirt. Two army surplus tents were erected for use as children's bedrooms, they sufficed until an extension was built onto the hut.

Moving from Badja on the Braidwood to Cooma Road near Tuross Falls, the children were Jack, Dorothy, Bruce, Athol, Eric, Thelma, and Jenny, they were aged between four and seventeen.

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At Badja, Harcourt had been one of the first five trappers with the Dingo Destruction Board.

Jack moved before the rest of us with a horse and sulky, and he and a Mr Hooper built the annex and kitchen onto the hut. Mum, Dorothy, Thelma, Eric and I came in a carrier's truck with the furniture, Dad, Bruce and Athol rode down on horseback.

Our connection to Mossy Point and Broulee was through the supply to the small populations of both communities of fresh fruit and vegetables in season, milk, cream, and butter, as well as pork products, poultry and eggs. We also had goats to keep the blackberries in check.

Names of residents who called at our place that come to mind were Clark, Grey, White, McFarlane, Radclyffe, Mullins, Smith, Dawn, Train, Yates and Baggatt.

Our father leased The Oaks at Mossy Point from Dr Annetts who lived in Sydney from around 1953 to 1958, and brothers Bruce, Athol and Eric milked cows there and delivered milk to Mossy Point in a five gallon (22 litre) can on horseback and later in a horse drawn cream and red painted milk cart.

As well as selling produce locally, bags of beans were sent to Sydney.

Reid children Dorothy, Athol, Eric, Jenny, and Thelma, flanked by family friends and house guests MIriam and Mrs Constance, outside the bark hut before the extensions. JN.

Meanwhile, at Lynchs Creek Dad and eldest brother Jack milked by hand. We had a separator to produce cream, and a churn to make butter, all hand operated of course.

In later years Ed Clark built us a dairy at Lynchs Creek, we put in Lister diesel operated milking machines and Athol and Bruce and their cows moved back from The Oaks. We started delivering milk and cream to Broulee and milk to the Moruya Cheese factory. By this time a utility had been purchased.

One interesting memory is that of the hawker George Trad and his horse and van.  He travelled through from Bega after the highway was changed and bisected our property. His visit always coincided with his need to have his horse shod, and of course Dad always did this for him.

We always say that our mother was the first person to supply take-away food. Mr McFarlane who lived in Wagga but had a holiday home at Mossy Point was having his daughter Lyris Turner and her family for Christmas. He asked Mum if she would cook a Christmas dinner for him as he didn't have very good facilities. Those of you who know us will know that we didn't have very good facilities either. However Mum cooked on the Beaconlight fuel stove and with huge cast iron pots on the open fire and provided roast turkey and pork (raised on the farm), baked vegetables, gravy, Christmas pudding, custard and of course cream. All of this she packed in various containers, and them put them in cardboard boxes insulated with layers of newspaper. And Mr McFarlane transported the meal home. But I have no idea how much she charged. Of course we also were provided with the same delicious meal.

George Trad's horse-drawn van, it had been Bega's first ambulance. It's now on display at the Bega Museum.

Vera Reid carrying water to the house before the windmill was set up. She didn't like her photo being taken if she was not prepared for it, so she put her apron over her face. JN.

A new house was built around 1959/60. Electricity was not connected to the property until the early 1990s, Mum lived there until mid 1990s. The only mod cons that we initially had at the farm were a Charles Hope Cold Flame kerosene fridge, purchased in 1949, and a windmill that pumped water to a high tank that then gravity fed to a tap outside the kitchen door. Until then, we carried all our water from the creek, that meant carrying it uphill. Dad had a wooden box dug into the sand in the creek bed, with a hessian covering to keep out the frogs etc, and this was our drinking water. We had a pan toilet.



Mum also did the washing at the creek in a big metal tub (which we also used for bathing). The copper was set into the steeply sloping creek bank, the clothes line was located nearby and everything was wrung by hand, not even a wringer. Don't we females have it easy now!

Our father hated the ocean and its smell. All the time he lived at Lynchs Creek he never went to the beach. Until my brothers got a car and learned to drive in about 1958, Mum always took us (in the horse and cart) there was a track from the farm down through the bush that came out on the Broulee side of The Creek. I'm sure she didn't take us in the summer time, because looking at photos we were dressed in winter clothing.

 Harcourt died in 1971, Vera in 1997.

Jenny Nelson, nee Reid, who was born on 31 August 1942, and died on 23 September 2017.  One of the three founders of this web page.
We miss her.