Social distancing is nothing new. This photo shows my Nana, Linda Gamble (nee Hadden) as a nineteen-year-old isolating at Cherrypool in 1938 with friends and family. Cherrypool is a location on the Henty Highway between Hamilton and Horsham. All from Hamilton, the group camped out to protect themselves from a polio outbreak in early 1938. When Nana talked of the photo she always laughed because isolating themselves was basically useless because a number of Hamilton people made the eighty-five-kilometre trip to visit during their time there.
As we’ve seen over the past weeks social distancing has led to novel ways to fill in time. That was no different out at Cherrypool. The campers came up with the idea of a mock wedding with Nana as the bride. That’s when this photo was taken. A mock wedding in the bush is not an option for us at this time but we can learn about our past and Western District Families is a good place to start.
The main section of Western District Families has more than 430 posts. You can simply start at this post and start scrolling or you can view the posts by category such as Western District History and Cemeteries. In the right sidebar of this page, you will see the drop-down box for categories. You will also see the Pioneer Obiturary Category and from there you can read the seventy-nine Passing of the Pioneers posts from the most recent. Or if you are looking for the obituary of a specific person, go to the tabs at the top of the page you will find the Pioneer Obituary Index. There you can find a person within the alphabetical lists. Click on their name and you will go their Passing of the Pioneers entry.
Another tab at the top of the page is the Western District Links. There are some useful links for websites if you are interested in researching Western District family history or local history including Facebook groups and pages. You will also find links to all the Western District newspapers digitised at Trove.
There is also Hamilton’s WW1 with 160 biographies of men and women who served. Hamilton’s WW1 is divided into Enlistments, Women, and Memorials., Whichever you choose, just click on the underlined names to read a biography. There are nine new biographies available. They are:
A handy tip while reading the posts and pages at Western District Families is to click on any underlined text which will take you to further information on a subject. It may be a website like, Trove or the Australian Directory of Biography or it may be a related WesternDistrict Families post.
If you’ve made it through all that, you could check out the Western District Families or the Hamilton’s WW1 Facebook pages. You don’t even have to be a Facebook member to view them either. On the Western District Families page recently I’ve been posting links to books about Western District history you can read for free online. Plus there are 1000s of photos you can browse through. You will find links to both pages in the right-hand sidebar of this page.
If after all that you find yourself twiddling your thumbs again, try the Western District Families YouTube Channel. You can view nine videos I’ve made including the Western District Families 2018 Album made up of photos shared to the WDF Facebook page.
Or you can view the playlist I’ve put together including sixty-seven history-themed videos from across the Western District such as ‘Mrs Funk and the Dunkeld and District CWA Cookbook’. Aged 100 in 1910, Mrs Funk reads through the cookbook and is reminded of people, recipes, and stories from her past in Dunkeld. You will find that video and more on the link – WDF YouTube Playlist.
Happy reading and viewing.
Western District Families 
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