Celebrate Living History Mini Magazine - In memory of Clarice Artis

Howdy folks! I can’t believe its nearly Christmas, time sure
goes fast.
I just heard one of my very first senior stars Clarice Artis
passed away in June at the grand age of 103. She was a
wonderful person to interview and it was a great pleasure to
meet and get to know her. At the age of 72 she was inspired
by a 92-year-old diving champion to get out her togs and
start swimming again. She went on to become a champion
swimmer at the Masters Swimming at age 97!
Clarice proved that it doesn’t matter how old you are, if you
put your mind to it, you can do anything. Clarice leaves
behind a wonderful legacy and proves that age is really just
a number.
This semester I had the pleasure of hosting two interns from
Griffith University Talitha and Isabella it was wonderful to
have them on board and see their stories evolve over time.
That’s what I love about Celebrate Living History is that I’m
constantly exposed to stories from all generations.
5Follow our mascot Ava Dognar to Page
For every generation
Stories to make you
smile.
1
Bev with Clarice Artis one of her very first
Senior Stars in 2012.
Clarice passed away at the age of 103 in June
Semester 2: 2018
Words from Bev
Wilkinson Words from Bev the founder
of Celebrate Living History
1
Hilda Fletcher
Meet our interns
A Nurses Tale
Vox Pop with
Jenny Smith
Clarice Artis
Blaise McCann
Sponsors
Funnies
Contact Details
22

Celebrate Living History www.celebratelivinghistory.com October Edition 2018
2
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Lorem.
byline
[Name]
The Interesting Life of Hilda Fletcher
By Talitha Organ Fletcher
So he and his army mate decided to share a
house. They had the bedroom and the box
room upstairs, as it was called, because Mrs
Currier had more children and we shared
the front room. We had two double beds,
right next to each other. Me, Dot and Ida in
one and dad, mum and Edwin, who we
called Sonny, in the other,” she explains
from her sitting room in Mudgeeraba, Gold
Coast.
These memories and experiences are ones
that seem so foreign to your average
modern Australian. Most us grew up in our
own bedrooms, with hot water available all
the time and of course, our modern
appliances and technology. Listening to
such recollections sounds like a BBC period
drama come to life.
Though, despite not having a lot and
struggling to get by at times, Hilda only
remembers her childhood with fondness.
She explains that whilst they never went
hungry, they didn’t often have access to
many different foods.
Follow our mascot Ava
Dognar to Page 3
Part 1 – Growing Up
January 29 1921, Edwin and Emelia
Phillips welcomed another baby girl in
their family but at the time, no one had
any idea of the extraordinary life that she
would go on to lead. She would travel the
world, join the army, emigrate halfway
across the globe and survive a direct
bombing by German forces in the Second
World War. At 97, Hilda May Fletcher, has
seen and experienced enough love, loss
and adventure for two lifetimes but finds
herself with a wonderful legacy and one
incredible life story.
Raised in Staines, Middlesex in the United
Kingdom during the lead up to The Great
Depression and World War II, the Phillips
family struggled to make ends meet when
Edwin came home after serving in the first
world war. They shared a three bedroom
house with another family, Mr and Mrs
Currier and their six children for several
years.
When dad came back after the war,
of course I wasn’t born then, but he had
trouble finding work.

Celebrate Living History October Edition: 2018
3
Delicacies such as oranges were reserved for special events
such as Christmas and birthdays. The Phillips family lived in
the shared house with The Curriers until Hilda’s maternal
grandfather managed to obtain the family a council house at
71 Dalleygreen Road, Egham, Surrey when she was about
six years old.
“I remember thinking it was like a palace!,” Hilda recollects,
her English accent still shining through on certain words,.
“My sister, Dot, helped me pack up all my toys into my little
wagon and together we walked the one or two miles to the
new house. I thought we’d gone to heaven.”
A newly built house in the late 1920s would’ve had new
amenities that families such as the Phillip’s had only
dreamed about. Indoor bathroom and toilet, just for a start,
as well as three bedrooms to share between them and to
Emelia Phillips delight, a laundry room! “We used to have to
wash everything in the kitchen sink, we had no bath at the
house in Staines, so mum would do everything in the
kitchen. Which when, you’ve got two families in one house,
becomes very busy.”
The remainder of her formative years were happy ones
despite the Great Depression, she helped her mother
around the house and adored her father. “My father was a
lovely man. He never swore. Never raised a hand to us, or
his voice,” she says with a smile of fondness on her face.
“He used to call us his little ducks. We had a big staircase
that we would come running down, slamming the door
behind us. My father, who’d be sitting reading would say
‘Ducks, is that how we close doors?’ and we’d go back up
the stairs and shut it again quietly.”
Hilda attended an all girls school near her Aunt’s house in
Thorpe until she was fourteen, which was the usual age to
leave school for working class girls in 1935. She continued
to live in the family home and worked at a few different jobs,
such as in a button shop and a newsagency before the war
started. She spent her downtime going to the pictures with
friends, dancing with dapper young men at the town hall on
Saturday nights and shopping along one of many London
High streets until 1st September 1939 when Prime Minster
Winston Churchill announced that England would not sit idly
by as Europe was once again plunged into warfare.
I love to hear people’s
stories, simply put, and
when those stories come
from people that have
lived a completely
different life from me I find
them incredibly
interesting. I think that all
different kinds of events
make up the human
experience and we only
get to personally go
through a few of them, so
hearing and learning from
others is the best way to
understand and imagine
all the different kinds of
lives we could have.
Meet Talitha Organ
Fletcher our intern
from Griffith University
Continued from Page 2

4
A Nurse’s Tale
By Isabella Neal
Balmain, Sydney. 1975. A young, dedicated
woman by the name of Katrina Singh, pins on
her nurses’ cap and walks down the corridors of
Balmain Hospital to begin her shift.
Taking care of her patients of all ages was a
privilege and honour as they shared stories
about their lives and families while she devoted
her nursing care and attention to them.
Reminiscing about her nursing days, Katrina
says it was a lot like the television show, Love
Child.
“The 70s I knew was colourful, free spirited, new
age, exciting, full of promise; The mini-
series Love Child was meticulously on point of
life in the 70s particularly through the eyes of
the nurses and midwives,” Katrina says.
“The series resonated deeply with me and
memories, wonderful memories flooded back in
living colour of an era that held promise and
new found revelations.”
Katrina has always had a kind, caring, gentle
nature. She would even spend some of her time
of her days off, visiting the elderly patients,
brushing her elderly patient’s hair and making
them feel young again by applying their lipstick,
before tucking them into bed with a nice,
warm patchwork blanket. Helping her male
patients, Katrina would lend a hand with
shaving and applying a splash of cologne
followed by gentle sing-a-long.
Katrina loved to take her patients for walks,
or wheeling them outside to enjoy the
sunshine. Her patients would often sit and
reminisce about their early years with tears
in their eyes and Katrina would follow suit.
“My patients meant so much to me. I cared
expressly about their well-being and
dedicated myself to such. They trusted me
and we grew a bond of closeness as days
came and went. I would often put in extra
time before and after my shifts and on days
off, just to spend with them, brushing their
hair, playing cards, taking them for walks,
playing with the kids in the children’s ward”,
she says.
Follow Ava Dognar to Page 5

5
Katrina fondly remembers an elderly lady by the
name, Mrs Lake. She played an everlasting role
in Katrina’s nursing life.
“Mrs Lake had the most kindly blue eyes; she
was so sweet. She had long soft silvery white
hair that I’d brush for her and pin up in a bun.
She couldn’t really speak but communicated
with by smiling, pointing, nodding etc. I’d often
spend time with her reading or brushing her
beautiful hair. She loved a piece of chocolate
every now and then, too. I loved that grand,
graceful lady,” Katrina reminisces.
Katrina is very proud of her nursing days and
often shares her feelings to her daughter.
“I was always very proud to dress appropriately
in my nurses’ uniform – stockings, brown
nursing shoes, white paper caps which we were
taught to fold correctly into shape and pin on to
our neatly coifed hair”, Katrina says.
“I’d pin on my nurses watch to my uniform and to
top it off, I’d donned a royal blue, woollen cape.
I’d just feel so proud to be in a profession that
offered care, comfort and love to all”, she says.
It was during her early nursing days that she met
one of her closest, dearest and oldest friend’s to
this day. Also working as a nursing student, Inga
later became a Godmother to Katrina’s youngest
daughter, Isabella in 1997.
“One of my best friends I met when nursing in
1975 when we were both 17, and we are firm,
loving friends to this day. Inga and her husband,
Michael (who was also a nurse) are Godparents
to my youngest daughter”, she says.
Katrina’s love and compassion for people has
been clearly inherited and shared by her
daughters as they nurture their own families.
That’s just a testament to Katrina’s strength and
abilities. She was a great nurse and the skills
she developed throughout the years have
sustained her.
Continued from Page 4
Meet Isabella Neal our student
intern from Griffith University!
What attracts you about being an intern
at Celebrate Living History?
I love learning about other people’s stories,
backgrounds and what makes them, them. I
love meeting people who are willing to share
their stories and explain them in a way that
makes me feel like I’m right there with them
on their journey. I also love reading and
hearing about old love stories, and the
typical “back in my day…” narratives full of
heart and nostalgia. I like that Celebrate
Living History approaches these topics with
good intentions and love. It’s lovely to read
heartwarming stories every now and
again, instead of hearing bad news on the
TV and in the newspapers everyday. It’s like
a breath of fresh air.
Who is an older person that you admire
and why?
I admire my Nanna, Zillah, who has lead a
full life. Taking care of her five young
daughters since the early 1950s, two of
which were severely handicapped. Nanna
has faced a tough life, which of course
hasn’t been at all easy. She is a selfless
lady, who always puts
her family before herself (even if she is ailing
with her own health), and has been a tower
of strength for each member of my family.
Nanna is the matriarch of this family, and
her strength has been passed down through
every woman in the family, myself included.
Her strong Christian faith and spirit never
ceases to amaze me, and I will always be
grateful for everything she has taught me.

6
Continued from Page 1. Meet Jenny Smith founder
of the Divorced Women’s
Club.
What advice would you
give to the younger
generation?
Never let the fear of failure or
other peoples’ opinions about
what you ‘should’ do with your
life stop you from doing what
you want to do. Your success
is based on your version of
what you want to do, and it
might take venturing down
many different paths before
you find that something that
really lights up you.
It’s the journey and who you
become that is the best part.
What motivates you to
keep working after 60?
There is no motivation – it is
simply that I still have many
things I want to achieve in my
business, I’m fit and healthy, I
don’t feel that age is relevant
to anything we want to do in
life, and to be honest I feel like
I’m just warming up. I also
spend most of my time with
people who are 20 to 30 years
younger than me both socially
and in the work environment.
The learning never stops.
Over the year I have been on a mission to improve my
public speaking skills, so that I may confidently complete
my bucket list goal of speaking at Ted X, which is a
program that includes live speakers who talk about
amazing ideas and achievements. One day I would like to
talk about what I have learnt from my six years of
running Celebrate Living History.
Looking back to the very start of CLH, I was very
determined to interview seniors. Even at one stage
crashing a senior’s meeting, so I can interview their
members. I still remember the shocked look on the
senior’s faces when I rolled in the door. They were not
expecting me but still gave me an opportunity to speak
during their tea break. That meeting broke all
stereotypes of seniors that I had in my mind. I was
expecting scones and jam. And lots of seniors just sitting
around talking, I was pleasantly surprised when musical
instruments came out. And I was having lots of fun
joining in. Sometimes the best moments in life come
when you are least expecting it. To this day I’m still very
good friends with some of the people from that group!
Over the year I have been interviewing entrepreneurs
from two very different generations the over 60s and
under 30s. It all started as a curiosity to see what makes
people passionate about their business ideas. And what
makes entrepreneurs determined to succeed and keep
going even when things don’t go to plan. I’ve learnt so
much that I’ve decided to put all the interviews together
into one book. It was not my original intention, but like a
true entrepreneur I’m delving into an unknown path. I
have no idea how to create a book, but I’ll give it a go. If
you don’t try, you will never know what magic can
happen.
I hope you have great Christmas and a fantastic New
Year!
Till Next Time! Bev

7
Chatting with Clarice Artis champion swimmer at 97
To celebrate Clarice’s life, we are publishing her story from 2012.
Clarice was one of the very first seniors our founder Bev Wilkinson
interviewed. May her legend live on.
Clarice Artis is a golden girl with a can-do
attitude she talks about being a champion
swimmer at 97.
Inspired at 72 by a 92-year-old diving
champion, Clarice decided to change her
lifestyle.
“I thought I have to do something, it was 25 or
more years since I’ve been swimming,” she
says
“I didn’t play sport, hadn’t been into the sea
even though I lived there from when my
children were youngsters,”
“I made up my mind I was going to go
swimming the next morning at the local pool.”
The next day Clarice woke up at 6 am full of
enthusiasm to take over the pool.
“I’m just going like an Olympian doing a lap, I
got about two thirds of the way and I thought
what’s wrong with me, I just felt like I was
going to have a heart attack and I grabbed
hold of the side and a couple of women came
along and they said are you alright?” she says
“They helped me out of the water and very
disappointed I went home.”
This experience did not deter Clarice and the
very next day she went straight back into the
pool.
“From then on I was going three times a week
and I did about 50 laps till I was 80, and
developed heart trouble but I still went
swimming,” she says.
One day while coming out of the water a
gentleman decided to pop over and ask if she
was in the Masters swimming.
“I said oh no I’m too old, he kept ringing me
until at 86 I joined he greeted me and said
the Australian Championships this year are in
Victoria I’ve entered you in 50, 100, 200 and I
nearly dropped in my tracks I thought how
dare he do this,” she says
“It was only about a month off, I got very
cross with him I said you have no right to do
that I’ve never been a race in my life,”
“I went in them and broke all the records, that
was in backstroke only I could not believe it,”
“I broke my own record the next year, and
won a lot of medals.”
Clarice says the secret to thinking young is to
keep active.
“Look after yourself not only physically but
mentally as well, I do crossword puzzles and
play cards once a week,” she says “I advise
people to walk a lot, keep moving otherwise
you lose it and it is so true.”

8
Meet Blaise McCann she has an online marketplace for
curvy women
It all started with a goal to chat to entrepreneurs
over 60. Then out of curiosity we decided to chat
to entrepreneurs under 30. We believe these two
very vast generations can learn and grow from
each other.
We head to Sydney Australia and chat with
Blaise McCann founder and CEO of Hear Us
Roar an online marketplace for curvy fashion.
What motivated you to start your own
business?
I’ve been a plus size model for the past 10 years
and the brands I was working for were not
catering to the younger generations of curvy
woman. Very dowdy and outdated. In particular –
I was at a runway show for a major department
store and the plus size models looked so out of
date and the straight sized models were in these
amazing beautiful clothes for everyday and at
that moment I felt so frustrated that this was all
that was on offer for plus size. So I started Hear
Us Roar – I poured my frustration into the
business.
What are some of the most important lessons
you have learnt in life?
Cheesy – but, never give up. Its so easy to walk
away, but once you have started something its
sheer determination and grit that keeps things
going. I’ve also learnt on the complete opposite
side to this – self care is just as important as
working hard. My favourite mantra is from Dita
Von Teese she once said “You can be the
juiciest, ripest peach – but there will always be
someone who doesn’t like peaches.”
What advice would you give to your
younger self?
University isn’t the be all or end all. There is
more to life than books and remembering
information. The bad will always swing to good
eventually. Have dreams and don’t ever be
afraid to chase them.
Who is an older person that you admire
and why?
Chelsea Bonner – an inspiration to me from
when we first started working together. She is
my modelling agent, she built her agency off
the back of a dream. She built it with vision
and excitement and love. She has also done it
with grace, always kind and takes the high
road in unpleasant moments. She is an
amazing woman to have around me!

9
12
Thanks to our sponsors and supporters!
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Contact Edie and Vanessa at Mornington Peninsula Book Keeping
Edie May: 0414 318 969
edie@morningtonpeninsulabookkeeping.com
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vanessa@morningtonpeninsulabookkeeping.com
https://www.morningtonpeninsulabookkeeping.net

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PO BOX 11253
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Celebrate Living History Mini Magazine - In memory of Clarice Artis