Surprised to see a familiar name

from w
When browsing through the Saturday Age supplement with stories about arts/gardening/wine/literature, I was surprised by a graphic item with the maiden name of my grandmother - Frances Hillman - on a letter. Then I checked the by-line below and realized that the graphic artist is my cousin's daughter, Judy Green, who has produced super illustrations for the Age newspaper for the past twenty years or so. So the name is not coincidental. Judy must have some of her great-grand-mother's papers handed down from her grandmother Norma. A lovely surprise. I've added here a photo of Grandma when she was much older than a young umarried woman. I have one letter from her after she started teaching me to play the piano when I was seven years of age. She had been living with our family in Swan Hill for about six months and had moved back to Melbourne and somehow my mother had kept just one letter from her to me.

There was once a bundle of love letters from a 'hot-hearted Charlie' who was a Mate on one of the Loch Line sailing ships. I saw them at a cousin's house. Charles Lay did marry Frances though she was at first engaged to Charlie's brother! Unfortunately I think the letters were lost.

Some of Judy's graphics are on line and can be seen by going to the Age website and linking to the graphic artists.

The Women's Petition

from w
On Tuesday I'm going up to Melbourne for a women's gig for the anniversary of the women getting the vote. It's a function at the Federation Square and descendents of some of the women who signed this 30,000 plus petition in 1891 (yeah, it took 17 years to be read and put into action!) are having lunch. Frances May Hillman, y grandmother was a signatory as was her mother.

Frances was born in 1869 at Christchurch, Middlesex, England and her parents migrated to Melbourne. Her father was a gentleman's tailor in Melbourne and one of the founders of the breakaway Australian Church of Dr Charles Strong. They lived in Punt Road Richmond at the time. My grandmother was a piano teacher. She was not yet married when she signed the petition. She married Charles Edward Lay and their children were Jessie Isabel, born 1895, Charles Edward, born 1896, Norma Malvina born 1899, George Francis (my Dad) born 1901 and Harold Kingston born 1906. I knew her in the 40s and she was my first piano teacher when she lived with our family in Swan Hill during the 1940s. One photos of a Grandma, my Mum and a fat baby - well, that was me!


Frances was a quiet, gentle woman, who never ever smacked her children or grandchildren, and not a raging suffragette type at all. But she did sign it. Men at the time thought women too frail and silly to know anything about politics! Hmmm.