A real diversity

In some respects it is easy to come to the conclusion that North Bendigo/Irishtown, was not only the poorest area of Bendigo in the 19th and early 20th century, but it was otherwise a microcosm of the diversity of our overall community.
I have used the North Sandhurst (North Bendigo) State School to reveal something of this interesting area, the people and some of their activities.
The law may have featured, too much perhaps for some readers, yet through the court system it is possible to learn much about the social living conditions of a particular time.
Through the work of the police we are left with snippets of information that otherwise would be totally ignored or lost.
In studying some of the enrolments at the North Bendigo State School, in sampling a few decades of the start of the 20th century, I have gained some insight into the types of employment that parents of the school’s pupils had.
Some of the information I have the privilege of seeing, I desire to share with you our readers.
During the period that will be the focus of this article we can learn much about the people of Bendigo.
It was normal for the father’s occupation to be recorded at the time that a child was enrolled at the school.
Rarely is it the mother who is recorded, this was because most women at that time were in the home as house managers. It was usually only the widows that would have been recorded as to being the responsible parent.
If one of the local Chinese had married a Caucasian, because of language difficulties, the woman was then regarded as the responsible parent.
You would have noticed, if you have been following the theme of the Irishtown articles, that there have been a number of German personalities that have come to play their role in the developing stories.
Some of these German families were practically unknown before I managed to unearth something of their lives and skills, yet others as will be seen became prominent on the Bendigo and wider scene.
George Jalland was one parent was living in 1901 in Valentine Street , moving to Atkins Street a few years later.
Mr Jalland was variously employed as a miner and later becoming a furniture dealer.
Some members of the Jalland family continued in the furniture business and in the 1950s, their Hargreaves Street shop was considered to be the leader in the introduction of avant garde and contemporary house furnishings to Bendigo.
Two of the Jalland children were enrolled at the school – Blanche in 1901 and Donald in 1903.
Thomas Parker who lived in Smith Street, was an employee of the Bendigo Gas Company, his daughter Lillian came to the North Bendigo School in 1904.
Blacksmith August Maes had two of the family’s children enrolled between 1903 and 1913.
The Maes children were George junior and Percy. Another branch of the same family the children Henry and Leonard Harold Maes, of Bakewell Street. Their father William was a
labourer.
Originally the Maes family name was spelt Moess, and if one visits the White Hills Cemetery the grave of the original immigrant can be found among the trees on the higher northern ground, marked with an impressive grave monument.
Henry Gottlieb Moess senior was born about 1823, he died in 1900.
Perhaps at another time,
I will explore the North
Bendigo connections of
other subsequent generations of the Maes family.
How did people in generations past prevent the type of vandalism which seems to be evident around our community today?
The problem of vandalism was largely prevented by workers living on site of public or private facilities, one example of this was Edwin Bright who was a gardener at Lake Weeroona in the early 1900s.
Bright lived on site, in a cottage provided by his employer the Bendigo City Council.
Two of the Bright family children, Edwin junior and Violet, were both on the roll at North Bendigo.

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