1893 - where it all began

Today was an interesting day. Kate took me to the Footscray library to search through archives for clues about the house's history. We searched through old records using a microfilm scanner.

From our findings, it seems that the house was built in 1893 - just as a major depression hit (worse than the Great Depression)... yet the house was still constructed.

We recorded the names of all the residents of my house over the years. The last known resident, was a man named Thomas E. Bishop. I will have to search through cemetery records to see when he died (late 70s/ early 80s?)  We believe that perhaps, when he died, was when the house was left to crumble in disrepair.

What happended to you Thomas? What happened to your house, and why did it get in the state that it did? Though I am glad it did, or I could not have afforded it. :)

There is a reason Footscray was always a slummy area- not the up and coming hipster-moving-in area it is now. Kate showed me some excerpts from some local history books detailing how putrid the area was in Victorian times. Footscray was home to "noxious trades" - ie industries that processed the by-products of livestock slaughtering - the blood, bones, fat, hair, wool, hooves, and the offal. Household sewerage drained straight in the Maribyrnong river which often failed to flow due to being pushed back by the tides. Several books referred to the fact that the river was full of dead dogs, sheep, rats etc.

One man wrote of his train trip through the West and looking out the window at Footsray:

'There is not a tree or hedge to relieve the monotony of the scene. It is water, bog and mud on this side, and mud, bog and water on the other. Cows grazing in the adjoining meadows are knee deep in mud, men walking along undrained tracks are wading through mud, and every house that is not environed by mud, is surrounding by water."

Gee do you think he liked the area?

I then went and helped Kate and Nick for the day by sanding some of their guttering and edging, then painting it. It was a warm day, so sunscreen and icypoles were consumed. (That's ice lollies, for British readers!)