ACT Heritage Library Manuscript Collection

HMSS 0326 Beulah McAppion Oral History Recording

Scope and Content Notes

Recordings of interview between historian Ann Mari Jordens and Beulah Rose McAppion, 20 February 2011, as part of ACT Heritage's Canberra Tracks Heritage Trails Project.

Beulah McAppion was born in 1927 in Queanbeyan, NSW, one of the four children of Arthur Henry Curran and Phylis Una (nee Southwell).  her paternal grandfather, Henry Roland Joseph (Harry) Curran, operated the Ginninderra blacksmith's shop and lived in an adjacent house with his wife Agnes (nee Gribble). 

During her childhood, Beulah saw her grandparents almost every day and has fond and vivid memories of them, their home and her grandfather's workshop.

Born in Australia of Irish ancestry in 1867, Harry died in 1955.  His blacksmith's shop was a focal point for the local community for whom he both built and repaired tools and machinery. he was recognised as a pioneer of the Canberra district by the Commonwealth Government by being invited to the celebration of the naming of Canberra, and in 1954 was invited to meet the Queen during her visit to Australia.

TIMED SUMMARY OF INTERVIEW

Keywords and topics 

00.00.1
Introduction, parents, siblings , Queanbeyan, Arthur schooling, first job. Henry Curran, Chappie, Babe, Phylis Una  Southwell, Phylis, St John's Churchyard, Aileen, Lance, CSIRO, Gininderra, Hall, Canberra High School, Belconnen Naval Station, YWCA, grandmother, Public Service, Department of Price Control. 

00.04.44
Paternal grandfather, his ancestry Henry Roland Joseph and siblings, Curran, Harry, Cork, Ireland, Lascar, Agnes Gribble John Curran, Henry Curran, Francis, Maude, Dora Creek, Margaret. 

00.08.53
How grandfather's learnt Grandfather, blacksmithing, describes shop. blacksmithing, blacksmith's workshop shop layout, Second World War, making equipment, making wheels, shoeing horses 

00.12.32
Her relationship with grandfather, Grandfather's character, his relations with other children, smells, hot, shoeing smells and temperature and sounds horses, Clydesdales, of blacksmith's shop. physical appearance, sounds. 

00.17.27
Customers, community meeting Customers, mailman, place, grandmother's activities, community meeting place, place, grandmother's activities, community meeting place, grandparent's house. hospitality, grandmother's activities, slaughtering, saltpetre, lye soap, pillows, eiderdowns, cooking, self sufficiency, spring water, milk, butter, laundry, toilet, Kalgoorlie safe. 

00.23.19
Customers, shoeing horses, Customers, shoeing sleeping at grandparents' house, horses, injuries, grandfather's appearance, grandfather's appearance, grandmother's medical skills, crystal wireless, grandparents' garden. grandmother's medical skills, father's accident, driving father, bailing hook, Lysol, treating thorns, poultice. 

00.29.41
Implements made by grandfather, Implements made, wheel machinery repaired, fuel used. making, Chevvy truck, chaff cutter, Bill Gribble, chaise longue, butter boxes, cretonne, grandmother's death, fuel for forge, coal, Queanbeyan railway station, burning wood for charcoal, auctions, table. 

00.34.34
Blacksmithing equipment used, Blacksmithing equipment, repairing crockery, acquiring raw repairing, poly cup, raw material, trading skins and wool, material, banking grandmother skinning rabbits, Queanbeyan, trading skins rabbit coats. and wool, tanneries, trapping rabbits, rabbit coats. 

00.38.36
Transporting raw materials, Transporting raw grandfather's musical skills, materials, grandfather's Agricultural show. musical skills, penny farthing bicycle, Agricultural show origins. and character, generosity, appearance and character, grandmother's birthplace, ledgers. Grandmother , grandfather's early employment, Gribbles, Lascar, pipe smoking. Shumacks, Gillespies, Tom Gribble, Wills Tobacco Factory, grandfather's early employment, pipe smoking, quid. 

00.45.15
Helping her grandmother, Grandmother's skills, grandmother's skills, grandfather's black puddings, feathers, ovens, grandparents' kitchen. draft stoppers, dressmaking, cooking for shearers, grandmother's brick oven, kitchen stove, grandparents' kitchen.

00.51.36
Grandmother's appearance, Grandmother's character, balls. appearance, character, debuts Albert Hall, Duke of Gloucester, Duntroon Cadets. 

00.53.46
Entertainment, hospitality, sporting Entertainment, cards, activities religion. suppers, hospitality, reading, dancing, exercises, Captain Hatfield, father's sporting activities, horse trainer, elocution, Albert Hall, eisteddfods, Hall concerts, religion, swimming forbidden, fishing. 

01.00. 56
Commonwealth government Pioneer's Night, naming recognition of grandfather. of Canberra 1918, Mr Daley, Minister for Interior, Action offices, meeting the Queen ( 1954), Ginninderra Village, Lascar. 

01.04.30 End of interview