Old Man Bill, Grandma’s Story

• Claire Hawker, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2012

Gran leant over me tucking in the sheets daintily. ‘Can you tell me a story?’ I asked Gran. She smiled and sat down in the arm chair beside me.
‘I’ll tell you the story of old man Bill. I loved it when I was a kid.’ She replied and I nodded my head in agreement. ‘Old man Bill thought he had enough money and enough space. He loved his wife though, so he kept working. That was when the trouble arose. The company went bankrupt because they had too many workers. He was fired the day the tragedy happened. He did not want to tell his wife that he wanted to work in Australia, there was plenty of money there. However he told her that night. It took a lot of coaxing and several boxes of chocolates, but they finally booked a ship to head for Australia the next week.
He was going to work for ‘the Snowy Mountains Scheme’, it had a lot of workers and was easing off the worst of the depression in Australia and other countries. Old man Bill and his wife spent the rest of the week packing up the house and buying food and water for the trip. The next week they were on the ship to Australia. The dolphins leaping up beside the ship, salty water spraying up onto the ship’s deck every time.
It took 3 months but they were finally in Adaminaby. It was beautiful with lots of buildings and many, many people. Old man Bill got to work as soon as possible. He was one of the workers who built the pipes. He was also very proud of his work, it was satisfying - helping your new country. At the end of the scheme he had a lot of money and a huge house. However this never satisfied him, he loved the bush and had decided that he wanted all the peace and quiet that was there. He sold his house and moved into the bush. They formed another house with the money they had got from selling the last one and had a nice business running the farm. They sold pigs and sheep and cattle. He was finally happy. The word got around that a rich man was living in the bush called old man Bill, so people decided to move out there as well. Without old man Bill’s passion, we would never be able to have fresh grown vegetables and fresh meat in Australia otherwise. He was the farmer that started the farms, and to this day his farm is still there, someone else lives in it of course.’ She finished. ‘Who lives in it now?’ I asked as she reached out to turn off the light. ‘Us’ she said, and turned the lamp off.