Making Washing Day A Pleasure

Like most pieces of iron machinery made in the nineteenth century, this ‘Ewbank Jewel’ laundry mangle was built to last. And last it did, now as solid and sturdy as the day it left the Entwhistle & Kenyon factory in Lancashire, England, sometime after 1875. Mangles were used to quickly flatten sheets, towels and tablecloths, […]

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A Humble Remnant

This humble table played a simple role in a not-so-simple house, for two not-so humble families. It was used for ironing at Duckenfield Park House, a grand colonial home in Morpeth. Built in 1853-4 by John Eales (1799-1871), said to be the wealthiest man in the colony, the 45 roomed mansion was later occupied from […]

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Patience and Skill

In the 1870s, when Berry schoolgirl Helena Kinneally stitched the buttonholes, fancy borders and darning to create this needlework sampler, she probably didn’t know how useful those skills would later be, when she became the mother of ten children. Helena Kinneally (c. 1868-1904) was born in Victoria about 1868. She was the daughter of William […]

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