Builder looks ahead to 101st year

By Kath Gannaway
WHEN Mick Vaughan, a Bayswater builder, came to Healesville in 1930 to build a house in Westmount Road, it was the start of one very special Healesville relationship – and many more.
Mick met his wife-to-be Eunice ‘Girly’ Cherry while he was building the house.
The couple raised their three children, Val, Howard and Pam, in Healesville, he built shops in the main street, houses all over the place (to quote Mick), played and coached football with the Healesville Bloods and established a joinery business next to the Grand Hotel.
For three years he worked up at Eildon building houses for American construction company, Utah, before the dam was built.
There was a lot to look back on for Mick, who is widely regarded as an identity of the town, when he celebrated his 100th birthday with family and friends on 20 February.
Mick’s early days in Healesville were interrupted by the war.
He spent four and a half years overseas as a sergeant in the engineers and served in the Middle East and the Pacific.
“I joined up late, when the Japs started to bomb us. I thought I have to be in it and served all over the place – Borneo, Singapore, Egypt … wherever we were needed to build camps, latrines, hospitals, provide water for the camps … whatever was wanted,” Mick said.
The war years could not have been easy but he says he wouldn’t change any part of those years.
“I would do it all again; wouldn’t change anything,” he said.
“I have a mate, we joined up together, and he was at my birthday,” he added reflecting on the fact that most of the blokes he served with are gone.
He played amateur football in Melbourne and says he loved the game.
A mounted football presented to him when he won the 1933 goal kicking competition with 106 goals takes pride of place in the billiard room at his Healesville home.
Mick has seen lots of changes in Healesville, in fact, changes in almost everything, over his lifetime.
And while he bemoans the fact that Healesville is not the country town it used to be, example … “You can’t even buy a shirt, or get a pair of boots in the town,” … he acknowledges that the re-emergence of the town as a major tourist destination has its benefits.
In fact, not only is he putting his money on the return of trains to Healesville, Mick says he is planning on being around to see it.
“It might be a long shot, and it may take a few years, but I think they’ll have the train back again.
“The town will be like it used to be when as many as 3000 people used to get off the trains here,” he said.
Mick said his birthday parties (one in Healesville and one in Warrnambool where he worked as a builder) were just wonderful.
Seventy-five letters and cards, including one from Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, one from Parliament and one from the Governor General, and, as always, lots of family and friends around, made for a memorable celebration.
There’s no secret to his longevity, he says.
“I’m just an ordinary, hard working bloke. I’ve been fortunate; I don’t have any problems and I’ve had good family and friends.”