The people of the Goldfields

The Goldfields of Western Australia was and still is made up of many people, from poets to politicians, from saints and sinners and everything in between. I hope to tell you the stories of some of these people either famous or infamous or just the ordinary folks. Sometime the most ordinary people do the most extraordinry things

Coles’s Find – a fair prospect

28/01/2023 By Moya Sharp 6 Comments

Sunday Times 6 June 1920, page 1 Cole’s Find Near Wiluna How a Returned Soldier Discovered a Goldfield by Horace Stirling George Cole, the discoverer of Cole’s Find, 11 miles south of Wiluna, is a scion of a family of 15, four of whom first saw the light within an interval of eleven months. His […]

Leslie Frederick Carter – grave tales

28/01/2023 By Moya Sharp Leave a Comment

This week with ‘grave tales’ we are doing it the other way around. With someone being born in the Goldfields but dying elsewhere. On the 21st of February 1899, this finely dressed young man was born in Paddington Western Australia. Paddington was in the Broad Arrow Goldfield 27kms north of Kalgoorlie along the main road […]

The Kalgoorlie Dog and Poultry Society

21/01/2023 By Moya Sharp Leave a Comment

In the late 1890s and early 1900 there were many social clubs in the Goldfields of Western Australia. Sporting and church groups were popular but there were many others with something to suit everyone. One of the more unusual groups was the ‘Dog and Poultry Society’. This may seem an odd combination with dogs and […]

The Coolgardie Chambers – a family story

21/01/2023 By Moya Sharp 3 Comments

The Coolgardie Chambers was one of the first ‘Chamber’ buildings in Bayley Street, Coolgardie. I was recently sent these two amazing photographs by Julie Marshall who has allowed me to share them with you. Thank you Julie. Julie tells me, her Great Grandfather is Edward Charles Sharland or ‘Ned’. He is identified in the above […]

The Quantock Girls – grave tales

21/01/2023 By Moya Sharp 5 Comments

Ida was one of five girls from the Quantock family that lived in Kookynie at the turn of the last century. She died at the age of 19 yrs, 10 months on the 12th of May 1908 in the Kookynie Hospital from Typhoid fever. The above photograph was taken not long prior to her death. […]