Turning the corner into history

On my usual run this morning, I came down West St in Umina and was about to turn left towards the beach when my mind went back about 55 years when Umina was very much a different place to what it is today.

Most runners I know tend to switch off rather than think about aching calf muscles and cardiac arrest.

If I had been running 55 years ago, I would now be turning "Nutt's Corner".

This was a general store selling everything from kerosene to corn beef as well as a fantastic range of lollies, including liquorice straps and musk sticks.

There was also an interesting rumour that Mr Nutt Senior was the proud possessor of part of the male anatomy which had been brought back from overseas as a war souvenir.

No one had actually seen it, so perhaps it was another urban myth.

Diagonally opposite Nutt's store was the post office and paper shop ran by the O'Toole family, together with their three lovely daughters.

Next door was Knight's butchery boasting two or three butchers' blocks and sawdust on the floor.

Further down Trafalgar Ave, on the eastern side, was Murray's General Store and next door was the well known Bingham's Haberdashery which sold everything from King Gee overalls and shorts to sunhats and swimming costumes all with skirts as a concession of modesty.

Certainly no bikinis and everything was manufactured in Australia.

I can remember the proprietor, Wally Bingham, who incidentally looked like an undernourished Winston Churchill without the ubiquitous cigar, presiding over the shop on a raised platform, peering over his glasses and writing in his books.

Charles Dickens could not have created a better scene!

Behind Bingham's was a dry cleaning business operated by the much-loved Dick Carrol and his charming wife.

Opposite Bingham's was the Seabreeze Cafe owned by a Greek couple, Pete and Peggy Pawdelis.

I think they were the first to install a jukebox and a table tennis table.

They were open seven days a week and you could always count on getting a great hamburger, with beetroot I might add, well into the night.

One day, what we would now call a vintage motor vehicle was parked in front of the cafe with an old toilet cistern installed above the windscreen.

The chain dangled near the driver's window and it was just a matter of pulling the chain to clean the windscreen.

All sorts of messages were painted on the vehicle, the mildest one being, "Don't laugh, your daughter may be inside".

Trafalgar Ave, back in those halcyon days, was lined on both sides with magnificent date palms thus giving the street the appearance of a tropical drive right to the beach.

Unfortunately Gosford Council for some nebulous reason decided the palms were a danger and removed the lot.

Even though I was only a kid I remonstrated with council workers and I was assured that suitable trees would be planted in no time.

That was 55 years ago and of course we are still waiting.

Well that's enough reminiscing for now ... more to come on my next run.

Fred Landman, Daley's Point