NEWSLETTER APRIL 2007

ANNUAL MEETING

The annual meeting of the Newstead & District Historical Society was held in the courthouse on Monday evening. The election of office bearers was held and the office bearers for 2007 are as follows –

President Derek Reid 54762274

Vice President Brian Dieckmann 54752937

Secretary Dawn Angliss 54762006 adawn@gcom.net.au

Treasurer Janet Trudgeon 54762437

Committee Di Reid (research) 54762274 direid@gcom.net.au

John Neall 54762207

Cherie Lawton 54751566

Public Officer Derek Reid

Delegates to CHHA Adrian Haas and Gordon Dawe

Website http://home.vicnet.net.au/~newdhs/

Subscriptions are now due – single $20, family $35 plus $5 for postage if the newsletter is posted. Contact the secretary if you want it e-mailed. In the absence of advice, we will continue in the manner that you received it last year.

The guest speaker for the evening of our annual meeting was one of our members, Rosalie Jacobs and the subject of her talk was “Adelaide, Newstead and the Mackies”. As Rosalie is herself a descendent of the Mackie family, there was no-one better qualified to tell us more about the donor of our book collection, Miss Adelaide Mackie.

To begin with Rosalie read out the information she had provided to us when Miss Mackie died and this was an overall picture of Adelaide’s life. At this stage, Rosalie pointed out the family tree and the photos of Adelaide and members of the Mackie family that were on display. She then went on to speak of the number of Mackies who were living in Newstead in the early years of the twentieth century. After the death of his first wife, Elizabeth Kyd, James Mackie married Annie Keeling and Adelaide was the daughter of Fred Mackie, the third son of this second marriage. Adelaide’s mother was Florence Smith, daughter of Charles John Smith who had a store in Yapeen. Both of Adelaide’s grandfathers were involved in municipal affairs and their photos are on display on the courthouse walls.

Both Adelaide’s parents died when she was in her teens so Adelaide lived with her mother’s sister Olive and her husband Andrew Davidson in Melbourne. On her uncle’s death, Adelaide and Olive lived together in “Craigie Cottage” in Heathmont. Her working life was spent at Kraft and during this time and in her retirement she enjoyed travel. From her travel diaries it was possible to find when she made trips to the Newstead area to find out more of her forebears’ early life there. It was on one of these occasions that she met with the President and Secretary of the newly formed Newstead and District Historical Society and the welcome she received from Ross and Pauline Suter, must have planted the seed of where her collection of books would go when she had to go into Jasmine Lodge.

EXCURSION TO CRICKET WILLOW

Don’t forget that on Monday April 30^th, there is an excursion to Cricket Willow at Shepherds Flat near Daylesford. The cost will be $6, we will take our usual “cuppa” leaving promptly at 1.30 pm, carpooling from the courthouse.

MOUNT ALEXANDER MAIL MICROFILMS

The boxes of microfilms from the State Library have arrived with the batch from 1904 to 1960 purchased thanks to a grant from Local History Grants from Department of Communities. That means we now have the copies of Mount Alexander Mail from 1854 to 1960.

DISPLAY FOR MOUNT ALEXANDER SHIRE HERITAGE FESTIVAL

“Water and Newstead” is the title of the display that we will have at the courthouse when we open on Sunday May 13 from 2 – 4 pm. We will be having on show newspaper articles, photos and old documents about such things as flooding of the Loddon, building of the levee bank, the old reservoir in Pound Lane and effect of dredging on Newstead. As well there are lots of interesting walks, talks and displays across the shire and the information is included in the enclosed Shire brochure.

GOOD NEWS!

The builder of the toilet/storage facility is to start work on the project on Thursday 26^th April according to information from the shire. This project has been a long time in the planning process so we hope for a speedy finish.

Next meeting May 21^st at 1.30 pm.

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