On October 22nd, 1916 Mary May
Brice, a housekeeper at the Greenock Arms Hotel, gave birth to a son at Nurse
Aron’s Hospital, 23 Flinders Street, Kent Town, in Adelaide, South Australia.
On October 30th the birth was
registered and the names of the baby were given as Lewis Frank. No father’s name was recorded, and the
informant was a J. Briggs, who was the husband of Honora Briggs, who was “Nurse
Aron”.
This was Mary’s second child. The year
before in November she had given birth to a daughter, Mary Louise, again at
Nurse Aron’s, but in that case the informant was her employer Theodore Wilhelm
Vetter.
Mary had first started working for Theodore
when he was living at 8 Brown Street, Norwood with his wife and three children.
Mary was employed as a housemaid. Theodore
then ran a Contract Timber Company in Pirie Street, Adelaide. In January of 1915 Theodore’s Timber mill
caught fire, and the whole of the establishment was destroyed. An inquest was held and the findings were
that an “unknown person” had set the place alight. The Insurance Company that Theodore had his
business with refused to pay and Theodore then decided to leave Adelaide and
take up the Licensee of the Greenock Arms Hotel. Theodore’s wife decided not to go to Greenock
but to stay in Norwood. However in early
1916 Theodore’s three children Ivy, Millie and Theo joined their father at
Greenock. Mary went along and became the
housekeeper.
Young Frank spent the first 3 years of his
of life in the Hotel. The older Vetter
children were very much part of local school community, with all three
participating in various functions held by the school and the local community
to support the War effort. They would
have played with their housekeeper’s two young children, and most likely it was
a happy household.
In 1919 two things happened that changed
Frank’s life and that of everyone staying in the Greenock Arms Hotel.
A
photo of Frank taken at Port Adelaide
In the 3 years that Theodore Vetter had
been running the Greenock Arms Hotel he had been, at times allowing certain
members of the public to come in and have a drink after hours. In October 1919 Theodore lost his license and
could no longer run the hotel.
At the same time, Theodore’s wife had been
suing him for divorce on the grounds of adultery. The case was heard in September and the
divorce was granted as Theodore had stated that he was the father of the two
children of Mary May Brice, his housekeeper.
With this announcement, Theodore’s three
children left Greenock and returned to Adelaide to their mother, and by the end
of the year they had moved to Perth.
Frank was never to see them again.
In June 1920 Theodore Vetter and Mary Brice
were now living in Brighton, and on the 17th June 1920 they were
married in the Registry Office in Adelaide.
Frank Brice was now Frank Vetter. He was actually known as Louis Frank
Vetter.
In September 1921 the family moved into 23
Oleander Street, Brighton. In later life Frank said that the time in Brighton
was the best time of his childhood. They
had a nice house, a big car, and it was close to the beach and sand hills,
which he liked to visit. Also a new
sister arrived with the birth of Joan, again at Nurse Aron’s Hospital in Kent
Town.
In 1922 Frank and his sister Mary started
to attend the private school, that was ran by the Fleming sisters, Dorothy and
Winifred, called Hopetoun. The school had only opened that year, on February 8th
and was situated in the hall adjacent to St. Jude’s Church. The Fleming sisters had been privately
tutoring and Mary, and possibly Frank, may have already been taught by the
Flemings.
On the 30th of January 1923
Frank started at another school, Brighton Primary. He was to stay at this school till April 1926
when he and his sister Mary were transferred to Goodwood School. It was about a 14 minute walk to school from
their home, and only one block past where they had attended the Fleming’s
school.
The Goodwood Primary School was a bit
further. They would have had to catch
the train or bus. Frank started there
first on April 19th, 1926 and his sister Mary the following
month. Why they left Brighton but were
still living there we do not know, but on the 12th February 1927
Frank and Mary started school at Le Fevre Primary school.
The family was now living on the corner of
Military Road and Hart Street, Semaphore.
This was very close to Port Adelaide, where Frank’s mother had grown up,
and also where her aunt, Maggie Powell lived.
Maggie and her husband John Powell, had raised Mary Brice and her
brother Frank, after their mother Annie had died when Mary was only 8. Also at the age of 12 Mary Brice had attended
the same school her two children were now at.
It was while the family was living at
Semaphore that more events happened that would change Frank’s life.
In May 5th a representative from
the Adelaide electric Supply Company called to get payment for the unpaid
electricity bill. Frank’s mother
answered the door, and then went back inside.
The man, Francis Pascoe, from the electricity company, thought that she
was going to get the money to pay the bill., but Frank’s father came back
instead. Theodore told Mr. Pascoe that
he was going in to the city the next day and would pay the bill. Mr. Pascoe told Theodore that if the bill was
not paid then he would being turning the electricity off at the meter box. Mr. Pascoe then attempted to enter the house
to do so, and Theodore promptly pushed Mr. Pascoe back, and allegedly hit him
across the side of the head so hard that Mr. Pascoe was deaf in that ear for
about 3 days.
This led to Theodore being in court on a
charge of assault, and both he and Frank’s mother were declared by the judge to
not be truthful witnesses, and also highlighted that Theodore was having
financial problems and by the end of 1927 he had declared himself insolvent.
In July of 1927 Frank changed schools
again, this time to Ethelton Primary, but his sister Mary stayed on at Le
Fevre. But by September of that year
they both started at Norwood Central School as the family was now living at 5
Queen Street, Norwood.
For the next two years life seem to go well
for Frank. His younger sister Joan started school at Norwood Infants in January
1928 so now all three of the Vetter children were at school. There was no change of home address or
school.
In mid December 1929 Frank left school
having passed his Qualifying Certificate.
The certificate marked the completion of primary school, and students
were tested on English, Maths, History and Geography[i].
Over the Christmas period and into January
it became very evident that he did not want to stay with his father, and very
much not work with him having witnessed how his father worked with others.
On March 11th, 1930 Frank took a
pushbike that he found in the school at Norwood and rode off towards the sand
hills near Glenelg. Frank was now
setting on a path where he would be deciding which way it led.
[i] “The Qualifying Certificate marked
the completion of primary school. Students were examined in English,
Mathematics, History and Geography up to Grade VII standard.”
Centre for Studies in Literacy, Policy and Learning Cultures University of
South Australia.
