Where did they work?
Family history is a fascinating study and, sometimes it’s very revealing. Do you ever wonder though, beyond the names and dates, what your ancestors did? Where they lived? Where they worked?
Occasionally we can help with some of this. You may have access at home to websites like Ancestry and Find my Past. If you don’t, then come to the library where you can use these databases free of charge. It is still only information however and it does not ‘show’ what society looked like. How can you understand how their lives looked and what conditions they lived in? Photographs mostly.
We were asked a few years ago, by a lady from Australia, if we had a photo of the building an old relative worked in. She had no idea which building or which street but definitely in Hamilton. His name was all we required - Currie. When we are recording our photos, we look to include as much detail as is reasonable. One detail we list as much as possible is names. Street names (obvious perhaps), building names, business names and organisation names. Thus it was not too difficult to find ‘Currie’ the insurance agent located in Victoria Street as these two photos show:
The small white building was the original Hamilton Borough Council office but in this image is the office of Frank Currie – Estate Agency and Queensland Insurance Co Ltd agent. This scene is 1913.
Eight years later, J. K. Currie is the agent with the barge board now only showing Queensland Insurance:
About 1923 that small building was demolished and J. K. Currie moved into the first floor of the Regent Theatre. On the two white windows on the right, it says, ‘Queensland Insurance Co Ltd – J K Currie, Inspector’:
Now he is a commission or salaried employee. We can assume the business has grown to a point where the Queensland Insurance has decided they want ‘an office’ in Hamilton, not just an agent. The job of Inspector was Currie’s for the taking and he took it.
His descendants can now get an idea of his business locality telling them more than a street address ever can.