JOHNSTON, FREDA & JIM

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1952

Subcollections

Overview

Photograph accompanied by a letter describing the harvesting of rabbits for meat and skins during WW2.
a) Black and white photograph of woman and man. Head and shoulders. Both are well dressed, the woman at left is wearing a corsage of flowers, a necklace and a rabbit skin cape. The man at right, is wearing a dark pin striped suit and tie with a smaller bouquet on his left lapel.
b) Letter from the donor, Georgina Cary, noting the rabbit skin was from the Toodyay area.

Historical information

On pages 11-12 of the book, "The Life and Times of Wally Chitty" by Wally Chitty and Jenny Edgecombe, Wally remembers, "the [rabbit] plague came to Toodyay during the 1920s, migrating across the Nullarbor from the eastern states. My younger brother Leon and I used to sell rabbit skins to buy ourselves pushbikes... Prices went as low as fourpence a pair for big rabbits, but later up to about two shillings... As time passed, rabbit skins were worth more than rabbits. We might get up to a hundred pair in a night when they were in plague numbers. Going round your traps at night, you would hear them being caught a hundred yards behind you... When they were conducting campaigns during the plague to get rid of the rabbits, we used to buy a tin of Fauldings' strychnine jam for our property... I remember when they released the myxomatosis virus in 1952. This virus wiped out a good proportion of the rabbits. They released it at Bejoording Siding in this area."

Details

Registration number

cwa-org-37-2017.12a,b

Item type

Photographs

Material

Paper

Photographic Paper

Inscriptions and markings

Hand written inscription on back of photo, "Freda wearing rabbit skin cape/Freda & Jimmy at Georgie & Geoff's wedding August 14th 1952".

Keywords

Weddings