NOTE! ALL PHOTOS ENLARGE WHEN CLICKED.
Do you recognise this young "office girl"? If not, read on...all will be divulged!
I had an email from her a fortnight ago in which she said that it was totally by chance that she came across the Arnold's web-site. Here is what she wrote:-
Hope I have the right email address for the right Bruce Kennewell who worked at Arnold Engineering & Lifts!
When I noticed that one of my neighbour's sons worked for Kleemann Lifts, I mentioned that I had worked for Arnold Elevators. He then asked if I had known John Inglis & went on to say that he had seen John talk at the L.E.S.of Aust. So he then emailed me your blog. What a small world!!
Here are a lot of clues:
- Her first name is Christine (Chris).
- She was 15 yrs old when she started work at Arnolds in February of 1965.
- She filled the roles of mail-girl, switchboard operator and did some typing.
- She then became assistant Paymaster (to George Blanning).
- She then became Paymaster and her job required her to do all those little brown pay envelopes & actually had to walk up to the bank in Regent St & collect the cash.
- Chris's last position was as Jim Tankard's Secretary, doing Accounts, Data Processing etc. and she also had to walk up to NCR in Harris St. with the Data Processing Tapes so that they could process them on their big computers then print all our reports for us.
- She left Arnolds in 1972 to have her first child.
I was in the office photo. [Here is a link to that page].
The girl that you had noted as Norma was actually Paula Wright [nee Tulk...I have corrected the information on that page].
When I saw the photo of George Blanning, it brought back memories of him calling everyone "SON" regardless of gender or age - he was a lovely man.
I still keep in contact with another ex-employee of Arnolds, Gail Burtenshaw, who was the typist in the office. She worked there for about 12 months and also left in 1972 to have her first child as well.
Chris sent me two photos in a second email....one of which is shown at the top and which was taken a couple of years ago.
This second shot (below) is a real gem because it includes a couple of the Arnold's "girls" who are not shown anywhere else. It was a night out at a restaurant but Chris can't recall the location or what it was in aid of.
Putting faces to names, from left to right, they are Jan O'Flanagan (worked in the D/O as a tracer), Peggy some-one-or-other (her surname escapes me), Renee Little, then the lady at the end of the table is unknown and also the lady with the glasses is unknown, then comes Shirley Jansen (later remarried and became Shirley Ellis), Paula Wright (nee Tulk....she married whilst at Arnold's) and finally Chris.
Thank you very, very much for contacting me, Chris, and for the photos. The memories keep rolling along.
UPDATE.
It was brought to my attention that I did not include Chris's surname - an omission for which I apologise.
Back in the day, when she was a single girl, her surname was Brown and when she married she became Mrs. Whitney...........and still is. Chris and her husband have lived in the same house in Sydney for the past 50 years.
