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My Life in the Ragtrade: An honest snapshot of the golden days of the Australian clothing trade
My Life in the Ragtrade: An honest snapshot of the golden days of the Australian clothing trade
My Life in the Ragtrade: An honest snapshot of the golden days of the Australian clothing trade
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My Life in the Ragtrade: An honest snapshot of the golden days of the Australian clothing trade

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My Life in the Ragtrade is the story of the famous Australian brand names, many developed from humble beginnings yet made in clothing factories employing thousands of people, and the grand retail stores and clothing shops that stocked those brands.

In My Life in the Ragtrade, author Fred Wilkinson takes us on a trip back in time to the days of Sidney Myer's beginnings in Bendigo, to Flinders Lane, Melbourne ('The Lane'), travelling salesmen and hawkers, and names and slogans which we've all but forgotten: Anthony Squires, Sutex, Keith Courtenay, Pelaco, Crestknit, Chesty Bond, Love Me in my Glo-Weave, Hard Yakka, He's so good he thinks he's King G, and more. Then there were the retailers - Winns, Farmer's, Anthony Hordern, Mark Foy and more.

Shopping back then was an adventure, it was a pleasure to be served and customers were treated like royalty.

Come, join Fred on a walk down memory lane through Australia's rich textile, fashion and retail history.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateNov 18, 2014
ISBN9781925219319
My Life in the Ragtrade: An honest snapshot of the golden days of the Australian clothing trade
Author

Fred Wilkinson

Fred Wilkinson spent more than forty years working in the Australian clothing trade. His father, George Wilkinson, spent more than fifty years, starting in the late 1800s when he joined Sidney Myer as one of Myer’s first employees in Bendigo, Victoria, when Myer was still a hawker.Fred’s own career in sales and sales management included time with leading Australian menswear companies such as Anthony Squires, Levi Strauss, Keith Courtenay Clothing, D & W Murray and Sutex.After retiring and seeing the demise of a great industry with local manufacturers and retailers forced to close, unable to compete with the minority of large conglomerates flooding their stores with imported merchandise from cheap labour countries in their chase for huge profit margins, Fred decided to document the industry before the Australian clothing trade’s rich history was forgotten.The result is My Life in the Ragtrade.

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    Book preview

    My Life in the Ragtrade - Fred Wilkinson

    My Life in the Ragtrade

    Australia’s clothing trade

    so rich in history

    is now only a memory

    by

    Fred Wilkinson

    This is an IndieMosh book

    brought to you by MoshPit Publishing

    an imprint of Mosher’s Business Support Pty Ltd

    PO BOX 147

    Hazelbrook NSW 2779

    http://www.indiemosh.com.au/

    Copyright 2014 © Fred Wilkinson

    All rights reserved

    Smashwords Edition, License Notes

    This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to the original place of purchase and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

    Take a trip back in time to

    the days when we enjoyed

    competition, choice and

    shopping was an adventure.

    A story of the clothing trade –

    the great retail stores, our very

    own manufacturers – and the

    people who made it happen.

    ‘When the customer was King.’

    Author – Fred Wilkinson

    DEDICATION

    This book is dedicated to my father, George Wilkinson,

    and the many decent people who were part of

    Australia’s once great clothing trade.

    MY LIFE IN THE RAGTRADE

    Foy & Gibson, Smith Street, Collingwood. ca. 1906

    Courtesy State Library of Victoria, Shirley Jones collection of Victorian postcards. Accession no H90.160/1012

    INTRODUCTION

    It seems so long ago when a day spent shopping in any Australian city, suburb or country town was an adventure to be enjoyed by all. We had so many choices of where to shop and we purchased clothes manufactured right here in our own country.

    Today it’s almost just a memory, as we become immersed in a period of far less competition – buying clothes imported from overseas countries and putting up with a marked decline in the standard of customer service, if any, at department stores and discount chains. The result has seen huge profits for the few giant department stores and discount chains buying from overseas factories at ridiculously low prices, allowing them to retail merchandise at high, sometimes exorbitant, profit margins. In cities and towns around Australia a good number of our well known and respected department stores and traditional retailers, unable to compete, have been taken over or simply closed their doors.

    The result has been the same for Australian clothing manufacturers who employed thousands of people working for a good week’s pay in a happy environment. Since the 1980s, manufacture of clothing and apparel in Australia has declined to a stage where it’s almost impossible to find a garment made in our own country. Back in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, vigorous and healthy rivalry between Australian manufacturers and, in turn, the many department stores and traditional retailers who stocked their brands, kept prices competitive for consumers who, because of this competition, also enjoyed the highest level of sales service wherever they shopped. It was a time when customers were treated like royalty.

    Saddened at what happened to the industry that was a major part of my life I decided to start searching in bookstores and state libraries to find out if any book or record of the Australian clothing trade’s wonderful history had been published, before it was all forgotten. I also visited the National Library at Canberra, only to find books relating to fashion, the odd book written about certain individuals and companies they started, but nothing telling the story of our once great clothing industry and its people as it should be told. That’s when I had the idea to write this book about the clothing trade’s golden days – days that were such an important part of Australian social history – while at the same time paying due recognition to all those people who were part of it.

    So join me for a trip back in time to relive the days of our grand department stores, our manufacturers, warehouses and the salespeople and commercial travellers who sold their goods.

    You will read about the people who began in humble circumstances, who with perseverance and determination took setbacks in their stride before going on to build some of our greatest companies. A number of these pioneers started off as hawkers, trudging from house to house selling their wares, some eventually earning enough to buy a horse and cart or travel the country with Cobb and Co, but all of them blessed with that ‘stroke of genius’ that makes great men. There is much more – stories of our great warehouses and the men who founded them, known in their day as ‘Merchant Princes’. Then there’s the ‘Birth of the Blues’ – the jeans phenomenon of the 1960s and 70s that revolutionised fashion and people’s lifestyles. Any book on the clothing trade would never be complete without yarns of life on the road selling and the wonderful days of commercial travellers staying at old country hotels and making friends.

    At the very least, this book reflects on times when courtesy, camaraderie and business decency prevailed. I hope you get the same pleasure from reading the book as I had writing it – and recalling such wonderful times.

    Fred Wilkinson

    2014

    IN THE BEGINNING

    Myer’s management staff, Bendigo store c. 1920

    Author’s father, George Wilkinson, seated on left.

    Image courtesy Wilkinson Family Collection

    Where It All Began

    During the years I spent in the clothing trade it often occurred to me that if it hadn’t been for genes passed down from my father, my life may have taken a different direction. If my theory is correct, then I guess it all started for me when twenty year old Simcha Baevski arrived by ship in Melbourne from his homeland, Russia, in March 1898. Elcon, his older brother, had already arrived and taken a position with a clothing manufacturer in Flinders Lane, Melbourne. Both had adopted the surname Myer for their Australian journey, the Christian name of a family member back home – and what an amazing journey it turned out to be for the young Simcha, now Sidney Myer, who would go on to become the founder of Myer’s, and undoubtedly the greatest retail merchant Australia has known.

    Sidney’s parents had given him a letter of introduction to a family friend who manufactured underwear in Flinders Lane, Melbourne. Flinders Lane extended from one end of the city at Spencer Street, to Spring Street at the other and was the hub of the clothing trade, with its great warehouses and manufacturers. He began work in the underwear factory as a warehouse assistant for a short period after his arrival before taking to the road as a ‘hawker’ – calling on suburban households with samples of clothing and fabrics from Flinders Lane wholesalers. His friendly personality and enthusiasm soon brought results and it would not be long before the young Myer decided to look for opportunities further afield.

    The city of Bendigo in central Victoria, rarely out of the news at the time, was forging ahead on the back of a gold mining boom that resulted in major banks, merchants and various leading companies establishing bases there. After travelling to Bendigo by train for the first time and seeing the prosperity and growth taking place, he decided to make it his base, sensing an opportunity to develop a good business selling to households in Bendigo and other flourishing mining towns of central Victoria, some up to fifty or more miles away. He would set off with his samples, walking miles calling on households in the district. The major warehouses of Flinders Lane had established branches in Bendigo that he could purchase stock from to fulfil orders he obtained in his travels.

    My father, George Wilkinson, was born at Bendigo in 1884, one of eleven children. When we lived at Cohuna where I spent my childhood years, one of his sisters, Minnie, my Auntie Min, would relate stories about Sidney Myer coming to their house in Bendigo – and why he was considered to be head and shoulders above other hawkers of the time. Hawkers would normally knock on the door, then ask if they could show their samples, but Sidney Myer would ever-meticulously drape samples across the front verandah of the home in a display that would catch the ‘lady of the house’s’ eye – then knock on the door. Is it any wonder he was a cut above the rest and people bought from him, when he had such ideas? Another story she loved telling was of Sidney Myer calling at their home one day and my father, who would have been around fourteen years of age at the time, cheekily looking up at him saying, ‘One day I’m going to work for you Mister Myer.’ And sure enough, he did.

    Sidney Myer rented a room in Bendigo for the purposes of storing stock, wrapping, and sending out orders he obtained during his travels – there were times he would be away for almost a week visiting outlying towns, returning on the Friday with orders to be dispatched. He employed my father to carry out these duties while he spent his time calling on households. In 1899 he purchased a hand cart and later a horse and cart. Sidney, with his brother Elcon rented a small store for seven shillings per week in the Pall Mall, Bendigo – Elcon managing the shop, while Sidney continued calling on his ever-growing number of customers. Sidney Myer bought Elcon’s share of the business in 1901, Elcon moving to Melbourne where he opened a factory. He then put my father George in charge of the store, while he continued looking for business outside. The Myer’s store, fast becoming a favourite with Bendigo housewives for the value it offered, grew at such a rate Sidney Myer decided to spend all his time at the store. He took over the premises that became vacant next door, removed the adjoining wall, then used the extra space to display and stock a greater range of merchandise. The most amazing story in Australian retailing was beginning, created by a young man, Sidney Myer, a salesman with the talent and ideas of a merchandising genius who possessed that wonderful entrepreneurial ability to attract customers to his stores, in turn, making shopping at them an exciting adventure.

    By 1907 Myer’s staff had grown to sixty and in 1908 they acquired the Craig Williamson department store, situated in the busiest part of the Pall Mall, Bendigo. My father held senior positions in various store departments, at the same time organising window and in-store displays. He left Myer’s for a short time in 1909 to travel to Kalgoorlie in Western Australia where he worked for Brennan and Company, clothing importers. The references he took with him from Myer are still in my possession – glowing in their praise of his ability as a salesman, one even referring to him as a ‘capital salesman’, a marvellous term I have never heard used, or read of over the years to describe such a person. He stayed in Kalgoorlie for around eight months, before returning to Bendigo and taking up work again at Myer’s.

    In 1911 Sidney Myer took over the Wright & Neil department store at Bourke Street Melbourne. He wanted Myer’s trained staff for this new store, so he called on his more experienced Bendigo store people to come to Melbourne and work with the Wright & Neil staff, until the new store was established. My father worked at the Bourke Street store, staying in Melbourne for almost two years before returning to Bendigo – working again with Myer’s, until he married my mother Elsie Williamson, at Bendigo in August 1923, he then moved to Cohuna where he took over Hutchinson’s Clothing & Mercery Store.

    Cohuna is north of Bendigo on the Victorian side of the Murray River, its main industry was dairy farming. Hutchinson’s Clothing was located on one of the town’s main corners opposite the Cohuna Hotel. The shop became, ‘G G Wilkinson’s, The Quality House.’ Advertisements appearing in the ‘Cohuna Farmers Weekly’ from those years would have made his old boss Sidney Myer proud. The slogans ‘You’ll Always Get Value For Your Money’, ‘Defy King Winter in a Wilkinson Overcoat’, ‘Our Prices Meet Your Needs’ and ‘The Place Where Goods and Prices are Right’, leapt out from the pages.

    I was born in 1933, the youngest of three children, and those childhood years spent growing up in Cohuna were treasured times. Sometimes after school I would go to the shop where my father would teach me a few little tricks of the trade. Customer’s parcels were always wrapped in brown paper and tied with string in those days. Dad could break the string by snapping it across his fingers, rather than cutting it – when he taught me how to do it I thought all my birthdays had come at once. Occasionally he’d let me give customers change from the old wooden cash drawer under the counter that had all those different size compartments for halfpennies, pennies, threepences, sixpences, shillings, florins and notes – the currency at the time. Other times I got to help with window displays and on Fridays after school when Dad gave me a shilling for helping in the shop, I would race down to meet my mates at Cohuna’s ‘Cosy Corner Cafe’ to have one of their famous ice-cream sundaes. My father sold the shop, but kept a share in it for a couple of years after we moved to Melbourne in 1948, keeping his eye in a couple of days a week working at Jack Martin’s Menswear store in Glenhuntly.

    Over the years ahead that I spent in the clothing trade there were times my thoughts wandered off to those Fridays after school and my father, letting me help with small tasks in his shop, just hoping that one day I would follow him into the clothing trade – I’m darned glad I did – they were great years and provided me with so many wonderful memories. My father spent fifty-two years in the trade, a figure I couldn’t match, but I still gave it a go, notching up a shade over forty. After all, I guess ninety-two years between us is not to be sneezed at. Now you’ll understand what I meant about genes.

    Lastly, there seems to be various schools of thought over the store name and whether it is, Myer, Myers or Myer’s. At the risk of upsetting a few I will be using the latter, as a sign of respect to Sidney Myer, who emblazoned Myer’s across his first store in Bendigo.

    Learning The Ropes

    My interest in the clothing industry began in early 1952 after applying for a position as a salesman with Sutex Distributors. Owned by the Abrahams family, Sutex was based in Coppin Street, Richmond – an inner city suburb of Melbourne. The company manufactured ladies’ hosiery, men’s socks and knitwear, ladies’ skirts and knitwear – along with acting as distributors for a number of well-known brands. I went for an interview with their sales manager, Mr Herb Pascoe, and was over the moon when he told me I would be

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