Story by ABC Open Producer Jane Curtis
They didn’t have to worry - it was a volunteer firefighter giving them a free book, and inviting them and their kids to check out the fire truck parked in their driveway.
The book they received is called Walmer Fire Brigade: Our Past and Our Future 1942 - 2011. Its 64 pages are filled with beautiful colour photographs and stories that tell the history of the Walmer community fire brigade.
Building on her work with fire brigades in the Regional Arts Victoria project Illuminated by Fire, Community Development worker Deanna Neville joined Bill Davies, Walmer Fire Brigade Captain 1962 - 1989, photographer Julie Hough, and a group of volunteers to put the book together.
The book is beautiful in its design, with old maps, photographs like the one above, and meeting minutes.
“The book lent itself to have big feature pages with each decade featured,“ said Deanna.
Deanne says the book was published and given away to local residents “to be aware of and acknowledge the past” and interestingly, as a way to recruit new members.
A recruitment tool
“Fire brigades, not just in this district but elsewhere as well, really need something to help them get more recruits, ” says Deanna.
“Interestingly, the history of this particular fire brigade and others like it didn’t come from the Goldfields. Bendigo, Maryborough, Castlemaine and Maldon have had or will have their 150th or 160th anniversaries. But bush brigades like Walmer came about in the Second World War, after the bombing of Darwin, when it was realised by our government that the Victorian food bowl was at risk.”
“In World War Two, there were 30 families in the Walmer Fire Brigade area. Every farming family in the district was a member of the fire brigade. If you think about the history of fire brigades, community halls, churches and so on, they are built by these families.”
“There are now over 300 houses in the Walmer area. A lot of the new locals will not know that they are part of the Walmer Fire Brigade, they won’t know that you can join, or that it’s volunteering.”
For newcomers and 'tree-changers' to Central Victoria, it can be sometimes difficult to connect into a new community.
A book like this shares the history of an community asset in a beautiful and thoughtful way - and by doing so, encourages new people to become part of its living history.
Read Walmer Fire Brigade: Our Past and Our Future 1942 - 2011 below - click expand on the publication for a full screen view.
Read more about Walmer Fire Brigade.
Read about another relevant and interesting ABC Open project: Resilience: Disaster, Resilience and Recovery
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