This was outside his offices from about 1948 until he retired in 1969. We have it in our memorabilia shelf in the hallway. He came to Oamaru in 1921 aged 32 having served overseas in WW1. His practice was amalgamated with the husband of a cousin of my mothers. For some reason in 1968, they fell out ( a secret never ever revealed to this day) and the two families did not speak to each other for years. The building that these drab and dark offices were in was demolished later and a new building erected. There was brown linoleum all through the offices, a reception window that had a slider on it and a deep concreted safe that we thought was magical. At one stage we had to go and clean the offices in the weekend - a job we didn't enjoy but happily played at being a receptionist and slamming the window shut on a prospective client also played by one of us!
Three good things:
1. My father did a lot of tree planting and some of the trees still remain.
2. Bookclub this afternoon - egg sandwiches and cake for afternoon tea! I put up with the book palaver just for this!
3. Some people in the town have got on the band wagon to stop a shop selling 'legal highs"! Someone was witness to a sale to a young person handing over heaps of money. He photographed the shop and put it over the Oamaru net!
Such a fun piece of history. (Family stories are always so interesting, eh ; )
I so love your story of playing receptionist. Our kids used to do that at their dad's office.
Thank you for sharing a part of your family history with us both in words & photo of I am sure a much treasured sign -The image nicely captures & presented Maggie mae !
i'm so glad you kept it, it's a part of him that you can actually see and touch. i wish the young people of today has the same kind of appreciation that we learned. very nice, maggiemae.
This is a nice reminder. I want to finish a scrapbook project I started like this. I called it self storage with these kinds of stories about the treasures I have around my shelves.
@maggiemae I started it several years ago and then got sidetracked making a Christmas scrapbook in quadruple for me and mom and both sons. Then I was temporarily burnt out on scrap booking.
First well done on the detective person...no one wants those sort of places in town!!
Your sign brings back my own memories of my dads office. I used to go there after school as it was is the same square as my junior, I even remember walking out of school at dinnertime & walking up the busy street to dads office when I was 5....I was soon marched back! The school would be in big lumber now if that happened!!! Lovely you have still got this sign & were able to rescue it.
This sign is beautiful in itself, and the family history is so interesting. Planting trees is a wonderful thing to do for the planet and its inhabitants.
I so love your story of playing receptionist. Our kids used to do that at their dad's office.
I hope you enjoyed book club.
Your sign brings back my own memories of my dads office. I used to go there after school as it was is the same square as my junior, I even remember walking out of school at dinnertime & walking up the busy street to dads office when I was 5....I was soon marched back! The school would be in big lumber now if that happened!!! Lovely you have still got this sign & were able to rescue it.