The Brown’s Story – Part 1 - Henrietta and Horace Brown (Nan and Jimpa)

A Few Words from Rob Landsberry

Joan O’Brien was Irene and Bill’s seventh child. My Mum, Gwen, was Aunty Joan’s sister, and having written much of Mum’s story, I can confidently say that it’s impossible to tell someone’s story without including the many others who lived inside their orbit.

A story about Aunty Joan would be incomplete without the inclusion of her husband, Uncle Keith (click here for that story). And the story of their lives together must include Uncle Keith’s parents, Henrietta and Horace Brown, as they played such an important part in the Browns’ lives across many years, as you’ll see in the recollections of their grandchildren below.

It’s not that Aunty Joan’s own parents, Irene and Bill, weren’t important. But the recollections in this story are those of Aunty Joan and Uncle Keith’s four children, and Irene (Nana) died early in 1959, when the couple had just two of those children, and they were only 2 and 3 years old.

Bill O’Brien (Pa) is mentioned a few times, as he lived until 1974, but by then the Browns had moved to Armidale and Pa, who remained in Sydney, had such a large family that visits to any of them were often few and far between.

So the four Brown children had far more to do with their Nan on Uncle Keith’s side, and even more so with Uncle Keith’s Dad who lived until 1994, when even Aunty Joan and Uncle Keith’s youngest child, Vanessa, was 25.

This story is drawn almost exclusively from a family history written by Aunty Joan and Uncle Keith‘s children - Karen, Ian, Darryl and Vanessa - with some additional material, photos and editing from me, all of which was approved by the Brown siblings.

I’d like to thank the four of them for creating this tribute to their paternal grandparents, and for making sure their story lives on.

If you’ve ended up here by mistake and you actually wanted to read the story of the Brown’s parents (Joan and Keith), you should click here.

Introduction from the Brown Siblings

Henrietta and Horace Brown were Dad’s parents. It may seem a little odd to include them in what’s essentially a website dedicated to the O’Brien Clan, but they played a big part in the lives of we Brown children. We knew them as Nan and Jimpa.

Henrietta Hogan (aka Nan)

Henrietta Emily Hogan was born 11 December 1901, died 17 August 1974, and was buried at Rookwood Cemetery, Lawn Grave 4, Grave 923.

We haven’t done much historic research here, so this is mainly hearsay from Nan and others, but the story goes that Nan’s father, Thomas Hogan, owned ‘much of Burwood’, a suburb in the inner west of Sydney.

We’re not sure what Thomas did for a living – a farmer of some type, a budding developer, owner of a sawmill (or something to do with timber), or a ‘contractor’, as Dad’s notes described him. We don’t know the extent of his assets and therefore the extent of the family’s losses.

After a small amount of research on Ancestry.com, we do know that Thomas, our great grandfather on Dad’s side, was living at 57 Conder Street in Burwood when he died on 22 March 1943, aged 76. At the time Henrietta, who was one of seven children, was 41 years old, and one of her brothers had already died.

Death Certificate - Thomas Hogan

Death Notice - Thomas Hogan

The death notice for Thomas Hogan reads:

HOGAN - The Funeral of the late Thomas Hogan will leave his late residence, 57 Conder Street, Burwood, this (Tuesday) afternoon at 2:30 for Catholic Cemetery, Rookwood.

Nan said that her father “drank and gambled away” the family assets, leaving nothing for his children. This shaped Nan’s approach to alcohol, which was to a large degree passed on to her children.

Her view about Thomas’ financial difficulties is confirmed in the New South Wales Gazette of 2 February 1894, which sees Thomas declaring bankruptcy, although this was when he was 27 years old, and seven years before Henrietta was born. We have no background as to Thomas’ financial rise and fall: the Garnishee Order was (presumably) to take money from his pay to repay debts to creditors. Garnishee Orders typically last several years or until the relevant debts are repaid and leave little spare funds for more than a subsistence lifestyle. How he managed to save from the residual is unknown. Similarly we don’t know if he might have received or earned some type of land grant in what is now Burwood. So we just have this hearsay from Nan, and have to assume (hope) she’s a reliable, direct source.

There’s also this earlier report from the NSW Police Gazette of 1885, which states that:

A warrant has been issued by the Parramatta Bench for the arrest of Thomas Hogan, charged with disobeying a summons for stealing a quantity of dead wood, the property of John Wetherill. Hogan is about 18 years of age, 5 feet 7 or 8 inches high, fair complexion, slight build.

Family photos often show Nan with a ‘stoic and serious’ face – none of the tooth-flashing selfies of today for her!

Darryl was closer to Nan and Jimpa than the rest of the Brown children, firstly because the couple stepped in to look after the toddler when Mum broke her arm in a fall on a neighbour’s path, an accident which went on to cause quite serious complications. They also stepped up to the plate later, when Joan returned to part-time work at the North Strathfield fruit market.

To Darryl, she was a softer, and more caring person than the photos might suggest. He spent a great deal of time with Nan, learning to do housework at her side.

Karen recalls an occasion at Dorothy’s house, when a three-year-old Darryl, without any prompting, picked up his jumper and, with a skill that would put Marie Kondo to shame, neatly folded it in readiness for being returned to its assigned location.

Later, when sharing a bedroom with Ian, Darryl was frequently heard remonstrating of a Saturday morning, “Ian! Will you please go and clean up your side of the room!” In the interests of full disclosure, Ian is no slouch in the area of household duties himself. 😉

Karen remembers enjoying the occasional and rare sick day when Nan would come around, help set up a bed on the ‘night and day’ in front of the television and wait on her hand and foot.

Horace Brown (aka Horry or Jimpa)

Horace Travis Brown was born 10 October 1898 in Parramatta, NSW and died 23 September 1994 in Concord. Horace is also buried at Rookwood Cemetery, Lawn Grave 4, Grave 923.

Sophia Agnes Travis (1872 – 1952) was Jimpa’s mother’s maiden name and when Horace was born, ‘Travis’ was given to him as his middle name. The tradition continued with Dad and his son Darryl taking on the middle name ‘Travis’, and with Jimpa’s great grandson (the son of Darryl’s daughter Laura) named Travis Charles.

The sobriquet ‘Jimpa’ came from Karen, the oldest grandchild, who couldn’t say ‘Grandpa’. Jimpa was the closest she could get, and it stuck. All the relatives on both sides of the family, knew him simply as Jimpa.

Jimpa - Front and Centre

JImpa - Right

Nan and Jimpa - Together

Nan and Jimpa were married at St Joseph’s Enfield, on 3 June 1923. They had three children – Dad, Olive (known as Obbie), and Dorothy.

Dad, Obbie and Dorothy threw them a big Golden Anniversary party in 1972, as documented in the local paper below.

Nan and Jimpa’s Golden Wedding Anniversary

This is the transcript of the above article:

Memories of 50 years ago
Mr. and Mrs. H. Brown, of Davidson Avenue, Concord, celebrated their golden wedding anniversary with a party for 80 guests at Burwood Town Hall in Condee [sic] Street.
It was from this same street that Henrietta Hogan left her home to become Mrs. Brown 50 years ago.
Mrs. Brown's sister and her husband, Mr. and Mrs. F. Laycock, of Putney, who were bridesmaid and best man at the wedding, were among the guests.
Owing to illness Mr. Brown's sister, Mrs. Doreen Hamilton, of Port Kembla, who was also a bridesmaid, was unable to attend.
Telegrams of congratulations were received from the Governor, Sir Roden Cutler; the Premier, Sir Robert Askin; and Federal and State parliamentary representatives, Mr. W. McMahon and Mr. L. Mutton, as well as from Concord Council and the local Senior Citizens' Club.
The official table was highlighted by a two-tiered golden cake, made by Mr. Bert Turvey, who was master of ceremonies.
The couple's son, Mr. Keith Brown of Armidale, came to Sydney for the occasion with his wife and four children.
Also helping entertain the guests, were the Brown's daughters, Mrs. G. Gallagher and Mrs. Ronald Turvey, both of Concord.

The Depression was no doubt tough for Nan and Jimpa, as for many, many others. It’s likely that period had a great effect on many of her habits, including having a store of lovely clothes, underwear, tea towels and so on which were never used, just saved ‘for good’, but things never seemed to get good enough ‘for good’.

We don’t know much else about that part of their lives, or how long it lasted.

After World War II, and for the rest of their lives together, they lived at 31 Davidson Avenue, Concord.

It was a 3-bedroom Housing Commission property, which was in effect the start of a NSW Government ‘rent to own’ program after WWII. People applied for a home to rent, with their rent also representing a repayment of the purchase price so that ultimately, ownership passed to the ‘tenant’.

From documents found in Obbie’s house, Davidson Ave was allocated to Horace Brown (as a tenant) in April 1948.

Darryl’s memory is that the rent was paid at a little ground floor window in a building not far from Nan and Jimpa’s home – perhaps where Concord Library now stands on the corner of Wellbank and Flavell Streets.

In October 1955 Nan and Jimpa were given the opportunity to purchase their house for £2,493. There was much back and forth with the Housing Commission about wanting the tenancy assigned to Nan so that the purchase could be in her name, possibly to give her a greater sense of financial security. The tenancy was eventually transferred in May 1956, when they were paying £12 per month rent. Then the purchase seemed to stall until October 1958, when the house was revalued and sold to Nan for £3,600, which is 50% more than it had been just 3 years before, a period during which CPI was just over 10%.

At the age of around 12 or 13, Ian remembers being given the responsibility for taking the passbook plus the regular repayment to the State Bank of NSW on Majors Bay Road, Concord. Each payment was another step towards ownership. He doesn’t recall the specific day or date, but Mum used to tell us just how proud Nan was on the day the final house payment was made. One of Nan’s rare grins, we’re told.

Jimpa always took his ‘own’ cash out of his pay packets each payday and then gave Nan the rest. No ‘open finances’ for this family – many families at the time operated this way. As far as we know, Nan never knew how much Jimpa earned.

Although times would have been tough, somehow Nan managed to stash away some savings from her housekeeping money. This was a secret from Jimpa, and when she died it caused major issues. Having no will, despite Mum’s enquiry (more on that below), meant that the Government specified what would happen to her assets, which presumably included the house. Darryl’s memory is that it was one third to Jimpa, and two thirds to her children. There was much discussion between the three children as to whether they should give their share of the money to Jimpa, but the concern was that he may fritter it away, so each held on to it. Dad’s share was held in a bank account for many years in case Jimpa needed it, but eventually was used to buy a holiday house.

Mum told us that she regularly took Nan to the bank to add to her secret account. One day Nan got back into the car with a smug look on her face, which Mum took to mean that she’d reached a significant target. Like many who lived through the Depression, perhaps she was being cautious, and having money in the bank would have provided her with a sense of security.

Karen remembers Nan telling her that she’d leave “a little something for us children”, although how she planned to do that without a will we don’t know. Whatever the case, nothing was forthcoming

As young adults, Dad, Obbie and Dorothy settled within a very small geographic vicinity of their parents:

Mum and Dad bought a home at 31 Wellbank Street, Concord, a 6 minute walk from Davidson Avenue.
Obbie moved around, at times within greater Sydney, and at one stage lived at 13 Meadow Street, Concord, just over a kilometre from Nan and Jimpa.
Dorothy and Greg bought or possibly built a home at 60 Davidson Avenue, a mere 300 metres up the street from Nan and Jimpa.

Nan was incredibly house proud. Incredibly.

Nan and Jimpa’s House - Inside…

A front living room had a burgundy-coloured lounge/divan, covered in plastic to protect it, which made it uncomfortable and cold, but a blanket over it made it a little warmer during winter. There were great art deco mirrors, and flying ducks on the wall - quite kitsch now, but very stylish at the time. There was also a pianola that was rarely played, although Karen remembers being allowed to play it as a piano.

Beyond the living room were three bedrooms, a dining room behind a kitchen, laundry, and a sunroom which was the main meeting and gathering area for the house.

There was no hot water. Washing and washing up was done with boiled water, and there was a gas heater in the bathroom for baths and showers. You turned the gas on, lit a little pilot light on a metal arm, then swung the arm into the heater – and whoosh! – the gas was lit, and hot water started coming out.

Both the bathroom and the toilet next to it were carpeted. The toilet had the added protection of a shaggy mat to protect the carpet, along with a matching seat cover.

We all remember the hallway rugs. As a high traffic area, Nan decided to protect the carpeted hallway with a collection of rugs. There were different types – a bluish terry-towelling loop pile number, and probably a wool rug or two. But the pride of the collection was the fluffy genuine sheepskin tanned hide. The irony about Nan’s rugs was that we weren’t allowed to walk on them, which must have increased the wear on the hallway carpet all around the edges.

As a small child, Darryl found it easiest to navigate the hall by doing a weird ‘wide-jump’ – left foot to right – until he got to the other end. Any footprint was investigated, and the culprit found and appropriately admonished. On one occasion, our cousin Kevin O’Brien (Jack and Celia’s 5th child) visited. Kevin wore big army-style boots and the indent that he left on that sheepskin was HUGE and couldn’t be blamed on any of us kids. Fortunately. Some serious brushing got the consistency of the ‘fluff’ back to its rightful state. In fact, brushing the lambswool rug was a ’treat’ that we kids were allowed to do at ‘special’ times. Simpler days.

In Nan and Jimpa’s bedroom, the top dresser drawer held Nan’s clean underwear. Buried under that was a bag of mini chocolate coated honeycomb or some other treat that came from the old Woolworth’s Variety stores. We were allowed one piece each when we visited.

On Sunday mornings, Nan and Jimpa would sit up in bed and read the paper, after the paper boy had passed it through the open window.

The linen cupboard was full of things that Nan ‘kept for good’. Towels, sheets, tea towels, boxes that when opened and the tissue paper was peeled back , revealed ‘special’ underwear - slips, stockings and the like – all gifts that Nan loved, but never used.

Nan and Jimpa’s House - Outside…

The lawn was mowed regularly, and the place always looked pristine from the outside. Nan used Brasso to polish the OUTSIDE taps. Karen recalls seeing Nan tackle the Brasso-ing of both the outside taps AND the indoor door handles on at least one occasion.

The breeze block concrete ‘tiles’ which separated the driveway from the backyard were painted about once per year - gloss white, of course, so there was no way that the concrete could ever deteriorate.

There was always a beautiful display of flowers and woe betide any weed that had the temerity to poke its ugly head out in the front garden! A particular touch from Nan was a bed of gladioli planted along the front, close to the footpath.

As well as the gladi, there were lots of very hardy ‘wax’ plants, with tiny little delicate flowers. There was also a huge staghorn fern that grew on a block of wood, hanging under the big tree in the backyard.

In the back corner of the yard, there was a shed for Jimpa to kill some time and just poddle about. Darryl remembers a block of wood with nails part-hammered into it, and a little hammer that he would use to bang the nails down until they were only just sticking up above the wood. Then Jimpa would pull them out, part-hammer them in again, and Darryl would start over.

Nan worked especially hard to keep her home in beautiful condition, inside and out. The word among family was that “she’ll die with a broom in her hand”. As events transpired, that was pretty accurate. Nan suffered a stroke while holidaying at the shop Mum and Dad ran in Armidale, where she was helping to clean and sweep. Sadly, Nan died in Armidale hospital.

The Brown’s weren’t great cooks…

Nan always had chocolate biscuits which, for we kids, was a great treat. They weren’t fancy Arnott’s biscuits, just a no-name plain biscuit covered in chocolate in a clear cellophane bag, but we didn’t care. Unlike Mum and the O’Briens (GREAT cooks!), the Browns were more plain in their tastes and cooking habits. There were always cakes and biscuits at Nan’s, Obbie’s and Dorothy’s, but they were shop bought. A real treat for us as we always thought we were hard done by having to ‘make do’ with homemade equivalents.

Devon and tinned ham were frequently on the sandwich menu when we had lunch at Davidson Avenue. Nan would buy small knobs of devon in soft plastic wraps. You’d cut the top off and peel back the plastic, then cut off round slices. Devon, which is still available in ‘quality’ outlets is described as made of ‘several types of pork offcuts and offal, basic spices and a binder’, but this description seems as though it may have come from the science department rather than the marketing department. Wikipedia shows the following tasty little number as it’s representative picture of a slice of devon.

But Nan didn’t restrict herself to this king of meats. She also bought ham in oval-ish tins. I say ‘oval-ish’ because they weren’t quite oval, but more pear-shaped. I’m guessing that was some clever marketing ruse to make you feel that the meat, once removed from its tin, was some sort of special ‘cut’ from the pig. I mean look at it – that’s a primo cut of pork right there!

To make sure that only the most dogged connoisseur of piggy delights could access the mighty ham, access was not made easy. You had to peel the special ‘key’ off the bottom of the tin, loop it through a bit of the edge, then wind it around the tin until the base and lid of the tin were separated and you could get to the ham. The key ended up having a long, slim ribbon of metal wound around it – this, plus the base and lid of the tin, were all razor sharp! How we didn’t slice ourselves to shreds, or were even allowed to do it, I don’t know.

The slab of ham was turned on to a dinner plate, and we used a butter knife to scrape all the jelly/aspic off. Even just saying that sounds gourmet.

Nan and Jimpa – Family Times

Nan and Jimpa quickly settled into their roles as parents and providers for their three children - Keith, Olive (‘Obbie’) and Dorothy.

Family became the focus of their lives, and with the arrival of Keith’s four children, Karen, Ian, Darryl and Vanessa, and later Dorothy’s children, Bruce, Rohan and Evan, the family circle widened. Nan and Jimpa doted on the grandchildren and spent much of their free time with them and various other family members, including Nan’s sister Dorrie, her husband who was known to us as ‘Uncle Porky’, their daughter Joyce and her husband Frank, along with their children Mark and Anthony. And although Obbie and Ron didn’t have children, they were also an integral part of the Brown family unit.

While Nan and Jimpa weren’t great ones for entertaining, they were regular visitors to their three children’s homes, and weekends were frequently spent picnicking with the families at various locations within driving distance of Concord. Birthdays, Christmases and dinners, were shared around the three locations.

But in the ‘social events stakes’ the highlight of the year was the annual family holiday to Avoca Beach. It was a firm favourite with all members of the Brown family.

While Nan and Jimpa frequently tagged along with Mum, Dad and we children, there were a few occasions when the entire clan descended on Avoca.

Karen recalls a particularly memorable holiday where pretty much all members of the family turned up. This must have been the mid 60’s as neither the Gallagher children nor Vanessa had made an appearance. That year, the family group holidayed together in ‘The Pink House’ at Avoca.

Karen also remembers learning to eat Christmas pudding on that trip, because the rule was that no one was allowed to keep the silver coins unless they ate pudding, and by hook or by crook, she wasn’t going to miss out on those threepences, sixpences and maybe even a shilling!

Nan’s sister and husband owned a holiday house right on the beach and on a few occasions the family stayed there during the winter months. The house is still there, and the large pine tree which featured in a number of the Brown’s home movies, remains right out front. At this house, and in many others around that time, shillings needed to be inserted into a meter in order to keep the electricity on.

Karen can also remember another holiday house where she first experienced the ‘night cart’, which to a city kid was quite a fascinating sight.

Nan and Jimpa - Other stories

Considering that we spent a lot of time at Nan and Jimpa’s as children, there were no toys of any sort. Well, aside from Darryl’s piece of wood and a handful of nails.

That said, Nan did teach us how to break into the old metal Commonwealth Bank piggy banks! It was great fun – we’d take the money out, then put it back, take the money out, put it back. We were easily entertained. An old sticky tape tin full of buttons was something else to occupy us.

One of Nan’s home remedies was a concoction of Chateau Tanunda brandy, sugar and hot water – which was a strange choice for a teetotaller. It was used to treat an upset stomach, the rationale being that it either “settled” said stomach, or made you throw up, which also served to cure the upset.

Nan was also fond of Pond’s Cold Cream, both as a night cream and as a treatment for sunburn, which was a fairly common occurrence in the days before sunscreen. She’d slather it on thickly, with the promise that it would ‘draw out the heat’. That it did indeed, but left the heat lying on the greasy, sore skin. Not a pleasant experience.

Nan and Jimpa never owned a car, so Mum (and likely Dorothy, as Obbie never drove) would pick Nan up each week to take her shopping. One time, Mum – ever practical – asked if Nan had a will. “Joan’s after my money” was Nan’s take on this, and she didn’t talk to Mum for about a month. It’s a testament to Mum’s care for Nan and Jimpa, and her attitude towards forgiveness that, despite Nan’s ‘silent treatment’, Mum continued to regularly pick her up to go shopping or take her somewhere, but that Nan refused to break her silence until she was good and ready. All through this time, Nan never stopped accepting Mum’s offers, but from pickup to drop-off all that could be heard was stony silence.

When we all moved to Armidale, Nan bought the four of us an electric blanket. These were a luxury at the time, and this was a very extravagant thing for her to do. She obviously dipped into her savings to pay for them.

Jimpa smoked ‘roll your owns’, and a packet of Champion tobacco and some Tallyho papers were always good for a birthday or Christmas present. He taught Karen how to roll cigarettes for him at quite a young age, and she wasn’t too bad at it. It’s good to see valuable skills like this passed on from generation to generation. 👍😂

Later, he had a cigarette rolling ‘machine’. It was a small, shiny metal contraption. You put a cigarette paper on it (after licking the edge), then a row of tobacco, pulled a little lever, and you ended up with a rolled cigarette.

Jimpa at work

Jimpa was a printer, who worked in a printing business at Redfern. His daily commute was a bus from Concord to Burwood railway station, then a train to Redfern. There was a ‘fast train’ which stopped at just a few stations beyond Burwood, then at Redfern. Other trains were slower and did ‘all stops’ which extended the trip by 10 to 15 minutes.

Evenings saw the trip reversed (of course!), except that there was a pub right under the railway bridge at the bus stop at Burwood station. Jimpa used to stop there each afternoon for a drink (could have even been two, we have no facts either way), then hop on a bus back to Concord. For the reasons above about Nan’s history, she hated this and on a bad day she’d complain about him being ‘tipsy’ when he arrived home at Concord. Ian can say he only ever saw him ‘tiddly’.

Jimpa worked well into his 70s at the same printery at Redfern. We’re guessing that he progressively got moved to lighter duties, and that keeping him on was an act of decency by the employer, in our estimation. Something that wouldn’t happen that much these days.

Jimpa in Armidale

After Nan died in 1974, Jimpa lived on for 20 years, outliving his son (Dad/Keith), who died in 1990. As a widower, Jimpa would come up to Armidale for extended stays. In those days, it was about an 8-hour drive from Sydney to Armidale, so sometimes Gillian and Darryl would take him as far as Muswellbrook, meet up with Mum and Dad for lunch at the Club, after which Jimpa would head off with them. Darryl joked it was like a prisoner transfer!

Jimpa had plain tastes in his food, as most men of his era did. Rich sauces and such weren’t his style. One night, Mum made a French dish called ‘Navarin of Lamb’ which involved stewed lamb, onions and a range of ‘new’ ingredients that were starting to make their way into the Australian culinary world in the 1970’s. It was a very tasty dish, but it only ever made this one appearance to Ian’s recollection.

Now of course Jimpa would have had no idea what ‘navarin’ was, but there’s no way he’d believe it was good old fair dinkum Aussie food with a ‘fancy’ name like that! So, we were told that if Jimpa asked what it was, we were to answer, ‘lamb stew’.

Dinner was eaten, the wash up completed and off to the rumpus room for some TV viewing. Sometime later a rather wicked smell pervaded the room. We looked at each other, a few questions were asked, and it became clear that Jimpa was the perpetrator. Much to our olfactory dismay, he’d proven his point – no rich sauces for him. After a few minutes of banter at his expense, Jimpa decided it was his bedtime, so he bid us good night and headed off to his room, where the odour of digesting lamb was no doubt rich in the air for the rest of the evening.

At that stage, the rest of us could all ‘relive’ the experience and in the process, Ian declared that, “Jimpa has just had a serious fart attack” (a pun on a heart attack). Well, that was it for Dad – he just cracked up laughing and couldn’t stop for a long time. In the jokes stakes that night, future accountants 1, others 0.

Even though family called Horace ‘Jimpa’, his friends and workmates knew him as ‘Horry’. When was the last time you heard of anyone called Horace or Horry? Horry and Henrietta – I defy you to find one married couple with those names.

Anyway, on most of Jimpa’s trips, we’d go out to Tilbuster when something big was on at the farm - shearing, dipping, or the like. Tilbuster was a farm of around 1,000 acres which was owned by Mum’s brother Jack (John) and his wife Celia. It was about 8km north of Armidale.

This particular time, Jack was in the ute moving a mob of sheep from one paddock to another. Trained sheepdogs were being used, and some untrained ‘sheepdogs’ (Jimpa and Ian) were also ‘assisting’ – opening and closing gates, helping push breakaway sheep back toward the mob, and so on. At one stage, one of the trained sheepdogs (coincidentally named Horry) did something silly and Jack bellowed out across the paddock ‘Horry you dumb bastard, get a way back’. Well, Jimpa jumped with a quizzical look on his face that said, “WTF did I do wrong?”.

On one of his later visits to our Oak Tree Drive home in Armidale, Jimpa slept in much later than he normally would. After a while, Mum started to get worried and commented that she couldn’t bear another passing in Armidale - a reference to Nan’s passing some years previously. She kept popping in and out of the bedroom to check up on him and sent Karen in as well. Finally the pair went in together and were leaning over Jimpa’s face to see if he was breathing. Suddenly Jimpa awoke with a start, staring at their faces just inches from his and shouting out, “Ah. What? Eh. Ah.” And, while he gave them quite a start, they both breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Closing chapters for Henrietta and Horace

Nan and Jimpa were staying with us in Armidale in August 1974. Mum and Dad were busy with the running of the shop during the day, and we guess that they’d involve Nan and Jimpa as they could, taking them down the street to local wholesalers or suppliers, just for the sake of an outing.

The house was in the same building as the shop, but the ‘house’ had its own front door and back door. Nan was home one day, sweeping front and back around the house. She felt unwell and had a rest, but eventually finished up having a home visit from Dr John Waters who diagnosed a stroke, so Nan was admitted to Armidale Hospital where she stayed for some days until her ultimate death. As mentioned earlier, the family had always said Nan would likely “die with a broom in her hand”, and it turned out they were pretty close.

We can’t recall the specific length of time Nan was in hospital, nor whether Obbie or Dorothy were able to get to Armidale before Nan’s end came. She was subsequently transported by hearse to Sydney for her burial at Rookwood Cemetery.

Karen remembers Jimpa being gutted when Nan died, saying, “What am I going to do now?”. After all they’d been married for over 50 years and they were of an age where the man of the house had a high degree of dependence on his wife to keep the house running and the meals coming. He’d not only lost his life partner, which would have been devastating on its own, but he now had to face a future fending for himself.

As it turned out, Jimpa survived on his own for 20 odd years after Nan died. When the time came, and he could no longer stay safely on his own (the gas heater was always a particular concern for family), he was admitted to a nursing home run by Seventh Day Adventists (SDA), about two-thirds of the distance between his old home in Davidson Avenue and Obbie’s home.

Jimpa was in a shared room with three other residents, and the place unfortunately smelt of urine, an odour common to many of these places, particularly back in the 1980’s. One day Ian visited him in the lunchroom, sitting at a table while they talked. Jimpa pointed to a lady on the adjacent table, just a metre or so away. The lady was mumbling something incomprehensible, and Jimpa just pointed to her and said, “She’s a bitch”. Of course, this wasn’t the way he used to speak, so presumably some of his filters had turned off by that stage.

The most ironic story about Jimpa’s time at the nursing home came just a few weeks after he was admitted, when his doctor (Dr John McCarthy, also of Davidson Avenue, Concord) paid a visit to see how Jimpa was settling in. “Is there anything that would make things better here for you, Horry?” asked the good doctor. Jimpa admitted that he missed a beer in the afternoon, so the doctor promptly prescribed a daily beer, to be dispensed by the nursing staff. The staff didn’t have to buy it, that was Obbie’s job.

So there was Obbie who was teetotal, regularly buying beer for her Dad, with the SDA staff serving it every afternoon to Jimpa in a Seventh Day Adventist nursing home which was supposed to be totally ‘dry’. It must have raised a few questions any time one of the bigger bosses did a fridge check.

The SDA nursing home was temporary as Jimpa became one of the first residents at a brand new nursing home village in Ryde called ‘Dalton Gardens’.

It was very progressive for the early 1990s, having three levels of care – independent units, a private bedroom and bathroom with shared living and all meals (and a beer!), and full hospital-style care. Jimpa was in the middle level of care and was very popular there as a 95-year-old male surrounded primarily by women. It was a lovely place, ground floor, Jimpa’s own furniture from his house, and a sliding door out onto a grassed courtyard. Most importantly, none of those nursing home smells!

While generally well, Jimpa did need surgery. The doctors debated for some time whether they should operate, weighing up his future without the surgery, versus the risk of the surgery itself on a 95-year-old. They did go ahead, and while Jimpa survived the surgery, he remained in hospital and passed away soon after it.

If you’d like to continue with the Brown’s story, and read the story of Joan and Keith, please click here.

If you’d like to read Joan’s Eulogies from her son Darryl and her brother Cyril, please click here.

Unfortunately we can’t locate the eulogies for Keith.

Written by the Brown children - Karen, Ian, Darryl and Vanessa, edited and augmented by Rob Landsberry, last modified 15 May 2024