Minutes of Public Meeting 10 July 2005

Minutes of Public Meeting

Held on Sunday 11 September 2005

Venue: Linnwood, Byron Road, Guildford

Apologies: Vanessa McNeill, Christine McKenna, Audrey Murphy, Irie Olde, Raema Walker, Carol Duane, Brian Duane, Melissa Duane, Flo McMaster, Eileen Clarke, Jean Shaw

Confirmation of Minutes of Public Meeting held 10 July 2005 The Minutes of the Public Meeting held 10 July 2005, which were mailed or emailed to members, were accepted by the Meeting.

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to Linnwood and our third Annual General Meeting. It doesn't seem that long ago that we were here for our first public meeting and now here we are 3 years down the track - and what a lot we have achieved in that time.

I know the President is supposed to present an Annual Report at the AGM, but I think with the reports you receive each meeting, you pretty much know what's been going on over the past year, so I will just carry on as usual, and let you know what has been happening since the last meeting and what is coming up in the future.

Usually, I begin with a show and tell, but this month, I don't have too much to show, but quite a bit to 'tell', so please bear with me as we work through it all. Not too many donations since the last meeting, well not small ones that I can show you anyway.

At the July meeting I mentioned that we had been offered another fridge and some chairs. Well, with many thanks to Winston and Helen for being furniture removalists for a day, we now have another large fridge in the kitchen, courtesy of the InterContinental Hotels Group, and about 30 extra stackable chairs courtesy of the Prospect Heritage Trust. We thank these groups for their kind donations and also our 'removalists' who had a very busy day with a round trip from Guildford to St Leonards to Prospect and then back to Guildford - talk about taking the scenic route!

Helen has also kindly donated some lovely old postcards - all dated in the very early 1900's and absolutely beautiful - they certainly don't make them like this any more. I have put them into this photo album so that you can all have a look, together with some photos you might be interested in looking at. These include some photos from the McCredie family - some of which you may have already seen on display, but there are a few extra ones that you won't have seen, so have a good look through. We have already copied and enlarged these, ready to be displayed at a future Open Day. Also in the album are some photos brought to our last Linnwood Girls reunion and we very much appreciate being allowed to copy them. For privacy reasons these photos will not go on public display - only when we have future reunions, but I thought you might like a quick peak - there are a couple there that are especially interesting in that they show us how the grounds looked back then. Following those photos are those previously donated by Susan McCredie Miles, again showing the grounds of Linnwood - obviously back in the early years before the property was sold by the family. Following these are some 'happy snaps' of the August Open House, showing some of the exhibits, activities and performers. Last, but not least, I have put in some photos of the day we had a stall at 'The Oaks' at Plumpton, but I will go into more detail abut that later.

Other donations we have received include:-
* from Gwen Healy - on loan, a very precious christening gown and petticoat that has been in her family for many years. The gown was worn by her uncle in 1898 and her mother in 1900 and was made by hand by their mother. Also on loan are some school books used by Gwen's mother at Kincumber Public School in 1913 and 1914.
* with many thanks to Holroyd Council we also received a very large pine table, together with 10 or 12 matching chairs and these are all now in the newly opened and cleaned out room off the back verandah - an ideal room for meetings and workshops.
* from Mr. David Wardle we have a pair of Wache & James wire cutters with a date stamp of 1917 on them. David has also generously donated a Praktica camera - with lots of 'bits' to go with it - and a "Diacord" portrait camera. More additions to our growing collection of cameras!
* Maralyn Graham has kindly donated a very old wrought iron and timber ironing board and trivet.
* and Adriana de Haas has donated a Polaroid camera, complete with case.

Again, we thank those members and non-members who have been so kind as to donate items to us. Unfortunately, because we are a long way behind in our cataloguing, many of you who have donated items may be disappointed that we have not had your treasures on display as yet. We sincerely apologise for this, but please bear with us, we have limited time to do the cataloguing and the past few times we have been here, we have spent the time reorganising how everything can be stored, to make it quicker and easier to find each individual item. This has taken up valuable cataloguing time, but very necessary in the long run. Like anything, once you start this sort of thing, it always leads to other things needing to be done, and we had to do some major reshuffling and cleaning out of the rooms where we had the items stored, to hopefully make the system work a lot better. We are also restricted by the number of display cases we have, but hopefully we will better utilise these in the future so that we can rotate the displays more often. Also, it all comes down to how much time we have available - and like everyone, we're all busy!

While we were here on one of our cataloguing days, it was a little disconcerting to see a fire brigade truck pull up at the front door, but we were reassured when they explained that it was just a visit by both the Guildford and Fairfield units to familiarise themselves with the site and the house. Justine from L.J. Hooker had organised this and there have also been some ongoing maintenance issues as well lately, organised and paid for by both the Heritage Office and FOL. A water leak on the front lawn has been investigated and hopefully repaired and the Friends also undertook to pay for some electrical, plumbing and locksmith work to be done in both the house itself and Digger's Den.

At the last meeting, I mentioned that we had been given about 40 pieces of Nell McCredie pottery on loan by a fellow FOL member and these are now on display, together with our own small collection, in one of the large display cases in the Drawing Room. They are lovely pieces, so please make a point of having a look at them all.

We have been quite busy the past couple of months with having promotional stalls at a few functions and I would like to thank Christine, Pam, John and Julie for manning a stall at the Riverside Theatre on the evening of 1st August, and Carol and Michael for being at the Holroyd Council Open Day on Saturday 6th August. On the same day, we were also invited to have a stall at 'The Oaks' at Plumpton, organised by the newly formed Friends of the Oaks group as part of the Back to Plumpton Day. Christine, John, Helen, Coral, Pat and I did the day in 'shifts' and it was very interesting seeing how another group such as ours does their fundraising. We had a joint stall there on the day, with both the Friends of Mays Hill Cemetery and the Holroyd Local History Research group sharing the space - talk about 'rent-a-crowd'! We would also like to thank Merrylands Library for allowing us to borrow their large, portable display board, which made the day a lot easier.

The Oaks, as you will see in the photos, is a lovely old 2-storey home, built in 1895 and now a private home owned by Dr Trevor Garland, the Honorary Consul of the Solomon Islands. Like Linnwood, the house needs a lot of work done to it, which is where the Friends come in, holding many functions to raise much needed money. The house is most impressive, but without sounding too biased, I believe Linnwood is much nicer - if only for the sheer size of the rooms inside. It would be impossible to do the kind of events we do in The Oaks, the room sizes are just so much smaller, and also, being a private residence, it actually has furniture in it! This of course prohibits indoor activities, although they do hold regular night ghost tours and have a large community Carols by Candlelight at Christmas in the grounds- which is something we could possibly consider doing - just look how much room we have out there!

You may remember we participated in a Neighbourhood Day at Young Park, Merrylands, in July - well we have now received this Certificate of Appreciation from Holroyd Council to add to our collection.

Helen represented FOL at a recent book launch. Joanna Penglase, one of the founding members of CLAN - the support group for 'homies' as they call themselves - has written a book titled "Orphans of the Living" and we purchased a copy to add to our library. With some of the magazines and journals we have received over the past, it might be an idea to set up a library box or cupboard, as I'm sure many of you would be interested in looking through some of these publications - even if only on our public meeting days.

Also, as a fundraiser, John organised a breakfast for members of the Subaru Forester Car Club, who all turned up bright and early one Saturday morning ready for a taste of our BBQ chef extraordinaire's wonderful cooked breakfasts, before heading off on a trip to the south coast.

Michael also recently represented FOL at a monthly meeting of Tourism West and we are hoping that networking through this group may increase Linnwood's profile in the Greater West.

Last Saturday, the usual 'rent-a-crowd' had a stall at the Mustang Parade & Spring Fair held at the Walpole Street Park and again, Coral, Michael, Helen, Pat and I were there to promote Linnwood and display some local history items. Thank you to those committee members for giving their time once again.

Our August Open House was a VERY successful day. We had a full house of exhibits and lots of activities happening both inside and out. We estimate that we had over 350 people through the door, which made it one of our best days. John will be able to tell you the financial details, but it was a great day and I'm sure everyone enjoyed all the Scottish performances as well as all the other activities. The Scottish Association has expressed an interest in returning next year, so we will be trying to work them into our Calendar of Events for 2006. It is a credit to our group that all exhibitors are more than happy to return for future Open House Days - so we must be doing something right! It also shows that these days are a great way for these special interest groups to promote their activities and that by the number of visitors that return to EVERY Open House Day, they are a great social event for our community. By varying our exhibitors and keeping our entry fee to an affordable amount, it is an inexpensive day out for not only our local community but for the many visitors who come from further afield, many of whom had never heard of Linnwood before and are overwhelmed by its beauty and atmosphere.

Unfortunately, we are still having problems with our door entry. We have been using the hand-stamp lately to distinguish those visitors who have paid and then are free to move in and out of the house at will for the day, but we are still having problems with FOL members and exhibitors and their family or friends who feel that they are exempt from paying the door entry. We have covered this issue before, but can we make it clear again, that we would appreciate ALL members and exhibitors paying the door entry. We feel that as we do not charge a stall fee, $2 is not too much to ask from exhibitors, and as our own membership fee is very, very reasonable compared to some other groups, the door entry is not too much to ask - besides which, every person who pays the door entry automatically receives a ticket in the lucky door prize, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank both the Art & Craft Society and the Porcelain Artists for donating these prizes - their generosity is very much appreciated. We have also had to make the decision now that where previously we allowed all exhibitors to have free tea and coffee in the kitchen if they made it themselves, we now ask for a donation to be made in the 'honesty' jar which will be on the table - again, a few who have taken advantage of our generosity have spoiled it for the rest and we now need to be able to cover the cost of replacing our supplies.

Our October and December Open House Days are looking really good, again with many varied activities and exhibitions. You should be receiving an updated Calendar of Events for these days and will hopefully mark them as 'musts' on your calendars. October will be another Children's Day with activities for the littlies, the Travelling Nomad will be back together with the Marines and our Duellists, who were very popular last year. We were also told that the ladies from Careflight are working on trying to have one of the helicopters here as well, but no promises!

We were also very pleased that Mr Laurie Ferguson, Federal Member for Reid, has accepted our invitation to continue as Patron of the Friends of Linnwood. We were very pleased to see him at our August Open House, together with quite a few of our local councillors, and it was very good timing that both Mr Ferguson and the Mayor of Holroyd, Clr John Brodie, were here just at the time when we surprised Mr Bruce McCredie with a birthday cake - capped off by being serenaded by the Australian. Gaelic Singers with a wonderful rendition of "Happy Birthday". A great moment for all.

Future events at Linnwood also include having a family picnic day in the grounds as an official Children's Week event, hosted by Holroyd Council, on Sunday 30th October. FOL have been asked to provide a sausage sizzle on the day, with the final details to be still worked out.

The Australian Miniature Enthusiasts Association will be holding a 2-day workshop here next weekend and we have also been approached by the Tapestry Guild of NSW about having a 3-day exhibition here in October 2006. This is quite a big event, only held every 2 years, and would be quite a feather in our cap if held at Linnwood.

Planning is already underway for CityFest 2006 and we would like to continue having our Rhymes, Rhythms, Writings & Refreshments as part of the Festival - it really is a most enjoyable evening, sitting outside listening to a potpourri of poems, stories and music. We hope that this will keep growing into a bigger and better annual event as part of the CityFest celebrations. Last year, we had the Pleasant Past Times craft and hobby expo on the same day, but in 2006 the date actually clashes with the Lace Guild meeting here during the day, so we will possibly look at holding the craft and hobby day in a different month. It was such a successful day this year and if there is enough interest, we will endeavour to have it again, if our prime mover and organiser, Carol Duane feels up to the task!

While we haven't had as many tour groups through this year, we have had quite a few other different activities which seem to have been just as, if not more successful, than the group tours, but we have had a few enquiries regarding tours and will continue to open for them, when and if required, so if you know any community groups who haven't been through yet, let them know we're here!

The George McCredie Memorial Church on Guildford Road is celebrating its centenary on the weekend of 24th & 25th September, and I would like to take this opportunity to invite all FOL members to come along and help celebrate this milestone in the community. Festivities will begin on Saturday afternoon at 2pm with the church being open for inspection, an historical display in the large hall, with afternoon tea available, and an official ceremony at 3pm. There will be a Youth Celebration Concert from 7pm-10pm that night and on Sunday 25th there will be a special church service at 10am with participation by all congregations who use the church buildings, followed by an informal lunch. So, please feel free to come along and help celebrate this important community occasion.

We have recently received some information from Bushells regarding a promotion for community groups to be able to win cash - for drinking tea! From August, all Bushells and Lan-Choo packs will have Community Cash Tokens on them - like this one. The idea is to collect as many as possible in order to earn a Community Cash Grant for our group. It will run for 12 months - with the top collector group receiving $25,000! There are also quarterly cash prizes with the chance of winning up to $5,000. We have registered for this promotion and so would like to ask you to go out and drink lots of Bushells or Lan-Choo tea! We will have a special box here for you to deposit your tokens in - so if you are a tea drinker - keep drinking! And remember to bring your tokens in and see if we can be one of the winners!

We have had quite a successful year with our fundraising, even with all the expenses we have had, and now we would like to ask you, our members, what you would like to see us spend some of the money on. You have all been an integral part of raising this money and we would like some feedback on what you would like it spent on - keeping in mind that we will be restricted in many ways as to what we can actually do, but I'm sure there are many smaller things we could do that will help with the TLC Linnwood is in need of. We will circulate a 'Wish List' for you to write your suggestions on, or if you can't think of anything today, we will have it at our Open House days for members to add their 'wishes' to. We have already added some of the things we would like, if you agree, give them a tick or just add your own ideas to the list and we will see what is possible.

Last but not least, today is our AGM, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the current committee for all their hard work in the past year. Our Executive Committee consisting of John, our Treasurer, who keeps our finances in order, and Helen our Secretary - without whom I don't know how we would keep going - she's so organised! Michael, who is always there to lend a hand, Pam with her green thumb and tireless energy, Christine and Carol with their creative ideas and Pat and Coral, without whom you wouldn't get a cuppa or lunch on Open House Days - and for all the other 101 jobs they all just get in and do because they know it needs to be done. A "Thank you" doesn't seem enough, but please join with me in thanking them for the great effort they have put in over the past year, and I sincerely hope that they all consider standing again for the next year, they've done such a great job!

Many thanks must also go to our own Linnwood Diggers for their enthusiasm and many hours of hard work that they have put in over the past 12 months, with special thanks to Sue, Del and Flo for the funds that they have raised throughout the year, expressly for the gardens.

Thank you also to all those members who have volunteered their time throughout the year, - to our handymen, Stan Thomas and Don Messer for all the jobs they have done for us - building a chair mover and access ramps and attaching castors to our display boards, to name just a few of the jobs these men have done for us, which all go to making life a little easier when we have to move things around.

I would also like to express our appreciation to Holroyd Council for their continued support in keeping the grounds in immaculate condition. We know we can count on them to have the lawns looking great prior to each of our Open House Days, and we receive many comments regarding the condition of the grounds on each of these days. Our thanks to Council also for continuing to support us with the copying and mailing out of our minutes and event flyers to members. This is a tremendous help to us and we appreciate their continued support.

I would also like to add a special thank you to my husband Peter and my children Ian and Megan, for their continued support - without that, it would have been very difficult to put in the amount of time I have over the past few years, in what seems to be my second home!

Now, I know most people like to become invisible when it come to AGM's, in case they get asked to take on a position, but the committee positions are open to all financial members, and if you would like to consider becoming a committee member, please do so, it's not that bad really!

Well, I think that's all for now - thank goodness, I hear you say, but in closing, I would like to thank you, the members, for your continued support, we couldn't do what we do without you, knowing that you support what we are all trying to achieve, protecting and preserving this beautiful old house, and helping to make it the community asset we know it can and should be.

John McKenna reported on the two months July and August 2005, and advised that the bank balance at 31 August 2005 stood at $17,555.18. Major expenditure in July included $500 to the Gardening Committee and $434.39 for plumbing repairs.

John advised that the August Open House was one of the most successful yet, with an income of approximately $3,000. This included $410 in new memberships and renewals, door entry of $629, $381 tea and coffee, and $627 on the BBQ - a fantastic effort. Major expenditure in August was $396 for electrical works.

John McKenna advised that the Committee was considering not holding the Public Meeting in January as the date was too close to the New Year and people would still be away (plus the Committee needs a holiday too!). Agreed that the January 2006 Public Meeting would not be held. Therefore, the first Public Meeting of the Friends of Linnwood for 2006 would be held on Sunday 12 March.

John McKenna advised the Meeting that the Friends of Linnwood are very active in promoting Linnwood at local events, e.g. Holroyd City Council activities, and we are continually borrowing portable display boards from Holroyd Library. The cost of a large portable display board is approximately $2,000. Agreed that this matter be raised again at the next Public Meeting to be held on Sunday 13 November.

John McKenna advised that the Friends of Linnwood have some funds that could be put to good use, and asked members to think about what these funds could be put towards. Dorothy Warwick produced a "Wish List" form and asked members for some feedback over the next few weeks.

The Meeting was advised of the above event, on Sunday 18 September, and encouraged members to visit the old church and graveyard at Prospect for what will be a very interesting day.

John McKenna welcomed today's Guest Speaker, Doug Minty, Publicity Officer from the National Association of Watch & Clock Collectors (NAWCC).

Doug told the meeting that he has an interesting affinity with Linnwood - he lived here in 1945. Apparently five families were allowed to live on the property rent-free while their own homes were being built.

The NAWCC is similar to Linnwood in that they want to preserve our history. Whereas the Friends of Linnwood's plans are on a large scale, the NAWCC "looks after little things we can put in our pockets and take home to restore".

The headquarters of NAWCC is based in Columbia, Pennsylvania (Lancaster County), about 1½ hours drive west of Washington (in Amish country), and has one of the biggest watch and clock museums, with clocks from all round the world.

Doug gave a couple of amusing tales about people's concepts of Daylight Saving when it was first introduced, i.e. an American tourist asking what time a flight left Sydney, and finding that it arrived in Brisbane about 5 minutes later - couldn't understand that! Also the myth about fading the curtains. Daylight Saving does not alter the world - only our clocks.

The psychology of time is interesting - how many people set their alarm but always wake up before it's due to go off? How many people actually set their watches a couple of minutes early? Many years ago Doug worked on a time clock in the main street of Armidale - one of the work crew changed the clock to read 12.00 noon even though the actual time was 7 minutes earlier - everyone in the street corrected their watches!

At the last Olympics, athletes could lose an event by only 2/100ths of a second - in the future races will be won or lost by only 1/1,000th of a second. We are really allowing time to control our lives.

It is believed the oldest clock in the world is dated around 1286 and is in Salisbury Cathedral in England - there is no dial but in the 13th Century someone would ring a bell to call the faithful to worship.

Doug asked the question - would you let your car go 10 years without a service? So why would you leave your watch or clock that long before you had it serviced - we have a concept that while ever it is still going, it's OK. Our watches and clocks need to be given a good clean on a regular basis.

Apparently Australia was the last country in the world to accept the standardisation of time, and Governor Macquarie was the first official in New South Wales to tidy up the colony and make sure times were set for various functions, i.e. church services.

The oldest clock in existence in Australia arrived in 1794 - it disappeared for about 100 years until the NAWCC located it in the East Maitland court house. Apparently it had been sold to the court by "a person of ill repute".

Doug then showed the meeting some beautiful antique clocks, as well as some quaint and unusual pieces, and spoke about each one.

Did you know that Henry Ford, Carl Benz, Mel Blanc (voice of Bugs Bunny) and the gentleman who invented the sewing machine, were also clock makers - they were in fact precision engineers.

There is no clock in the world that keeps perfect time - and Greenwich Mean Time no longer exists. We now have UTC, or United Time Correction. There are 125 atomic clocks spread through the world and even these do not keep perfect time. However they are so almost perfect that they can measure the speed of the rotation of the world.

The quartz clock that is on your kitchen wall is not actually a clock - it is a "time piece".

Wrist watches eventuated from the fact that police didn't want to take their fob watch out of their pockets so they attached it to a band and put it round their wrists.

Watches are becoming so advanced these days that soon they will incorporate a mobile phone, CTV, Pentium computer, language translation and a calculator. Try and set all of that to Daylight Saving time!

Try and remember not to allow time to control your life, however in this very busy world the only way to save time - is to collect clocks!!

You can find out more about the National Association of Watch & Clock Collectors, First Australian Chapter No.72, at www.aussieclocks.com Also on their site are some photos of the NAWCC team when they displayed their beautiful clocks at Linnwood last December.

The next meeting of the Friends of Linnwood will be held on Sunday 13 November 2005, at 2.00pm. Our guest speaker will be Tiffany Duane who will continue with her "Women in Policing" topic which was so enthusiastically received by members at the July meeting.