After her father was called up to fight in the First World War, she sometimes had to stay away from school to ‘look after the younger children while mum did the washing, as it was hard work carrying water from the rain tub to the wash house.’
The Farm Life building houses dozens of exhibits including a farmer's tool shed, wash house, kitchen displays, history of bathtub development, washing machine development from 1760 to 1940, and many other great displays.
In 2001, the students replaced a dilapidated concrete and tin wash house with a more traditional structure complete with a massive stone roof.
It retains the facade of the old wash houses formerly occupying the site, a place where women gathered and worked.
The locally listed facade on the east side of the original wash house is retained and partly wrapped around the new building, a fragment of the past linking women's lives over the centuries.
A judge heard the property was in a bad state of repair but the owners wanted to retain it as a storehouse or wash house.
To the right of the living room was an out-shot of the flat which was originally the wash house.
Water for everything, from a cup of tea to buckets-full for the laundry, was hauled 600m from a well by the girls until 16-year-old Bob dug a well closer to the wash house.
Washing, a central feature of household life, could be done in a wash house or at a creek or stream, normally on the plantation but, in the case of smaller holdings, outside.
The detached house with stunning views, which in the past has been a communal wash house, pie shop and toll house, was built by a retired dragoon guard 134 years ago.
In the past the home, which was built by a retired dragoon guard, has been a pie shop, toll house and a communal wash house.
It features pit props for roof beams, bricks from wash houses, a massive lump of coal for an alter and a half winding wheel on a wall.