One of nature’s true gentlemen

FRED Sadlier was an infinite and generous source of information. If you wanted to know anything about Yarra Glen, ask Fred.
His reminiscences of Yarra Glen covering more than 90 years were published by the Yarra Glen and District historical Society in 2006 ensuring his amazing talent for detail, for resurrecting characters long gone, for breathing life into the ordinary and extraordinary events of the past, would not be lost to future generations.
What will be sorely missed is the spoken word, his beautifully understated delivery, his entertaining turn of phrase and the twinkle in his eye.
On 26 March at St Paul’s Anglican Church where Fred was baptised and spent many a happy and sad time (including fixing a nasty lean some years ago), Stephen Sadlier paid tribute to his father in a beautifully woven story, told in the Sadlier tradition and evoking both a tear and a twinkle in the eyes of the large crowd of family, friends and community members.
Fred was born at Lilydale on 6 October 1915, the second child of William and Ethel Sadlier. He had an older sister, Elinor, and a younger sister, Betty.
They grew up on the family farm at Glenview Road and went to the local state school – where he later served as school president.
Childhood memories included Saturday night shopping trips into town with treats of lollies and the magic of the kerosene lanterns along the main street, swimming in the Yarra River, rabbiting, the annual Beach Picnic to Brighton, Mordialloc or Williamstown and going by train to the Royal Melbourne Show.
“They spent all day at the show, then stayed the night with one of Granddad’s six sisters in Preston and next day would go to a picture show in Melbourne and then catch the train home,” Stephen said.
“At 17 years of age he became involved with the Yarra Glen Show Committee.
“His first role was as steward of the vegetable section.
“He then moved on to be secretary of the dog section for seven years and then cattle secretary for 11. Often he had to juggle work and the show and mum (Gwen) started helping out,”
He was made an honorary life member of the show.
He joined the Christmas Hills Rifle Club when he was about 17 or 18 and shot competitively winning many trophies and about the same time was rising each morning at 3.30am to milk cows at a neighbouring farm.
That particular skill came in handy when as a volunteer at Gulf Station his job was to demonstrate how to milk a cow by hand.
He was 24 when the 1939 bushfires raged through Yarra Glen destroying the farm and family home.
Fred recalled the experience 70 years later in an interview with the Mail just a month before Black Saturday, 2009. He was devastated to see history so tragically repeated.
After helping his father rebuild the farm he enlisted in 1941 with the 20th Field Unit serving in the Northern Territory and nearly two years in New Guinea.
Stephen said Fred’s army mates were so important to him.
“They shared things that only they could understand,” he said.
In recent years, Friday afternoons at the RSL, catching up with mates, yarning and playing pool were a highlight of the week.
“After the war, things were pretty tough on the farm so Dad got a job with the Melboune and Metropolitan Board of Works (MMBW) and worked predominantly on the 10 mile length of channel between the Christmas Hills Road and Watsons Creek.
“As kids we were lucky enough to go with him on many a Saturday,” Stephen said.
He worked on the MMBW for some 37 years.
In 1953 Fred met the love of his life – Gwen Threlfall.
“Fred was in hospital in Melbourne and nurse Gwen offered to visit him. Friendship blossomed into romance and they were married on 24 September 1955.
They raised their family, Jenny, Stephen and David, in the community they loved.
Their mutual love of the bush, nature and involvement in community activities helped build a life-time bond.
He was a founding member of the local historical society and received Award of Merit from the Royal Historical Society of Victoria for his many years of service.
“What he managed to retain about the early years of Yarra Glen, its buildings, its people, its heartbeat was nothing short of amazing,” Stephen said.
St Pauls was a special place for the Sadlier family.
“Dad rarely missed a service for 90 years; church secretary for 35 years, he mowed the lawns, fixed this and that, was responsible, along with his very good friend Bill Lawrence, for refixing the original buttresses after the church began to lean.”
In 1993 he received a Mountain Views Honour for his service to the community of Yarra Glen and surrounding district.
He had a life-time love of plants, animals and nature with a special knowledge and affection for native orchids.
Poetry was another great love, along with crossword puzzles, the Mighty Bombers, Test cricket and the vegie garden.
Most of all he loved being a family man.
“Over the years he told us many times of how much we all meant to him, how his life took on new meaning after being married, having the three of us, of his extended family when we all married and, of course, his 11 grandchildren whom he adored and who adored him,” Stephen said.
He said his father grew up in a simpler time, but none-the-less had a remarkable ability to accept change.
“There was one car in Yarra Glen when he was a boy.
“No electricity or running water, horse and buggy was the transport of the time, the only natural gas came from cows and horses!” he said.
“Dad was very content with his chair, sitting at the same table in the same home that he and mum set up on the same piece of land that he loved so much,” he said.
Stephen described his father as kind, gentle, loyal and humble, persevering and caring man who was a wonderful son and brother, a loving and loyal husband, father, grandfather and friend.
“He loved the bush and its wildlife and wild flowers, he loved Yarra Glen and its surrounding districts and its heartbeat, he was part of that heartbeat and will remain so and, of course, he loved us.
“Dad was and always will be nature’s true gentleman.”