Long Haired Freaky People

Having recently cleared the property for a hard rubbish collection, I found a cardboard sign which predates our arrival at this property. I would suggest this was for the sale of the land before the house being built in the mid eighties. It had been jammed up against a side fence with just the plain back exposed. Cash & Co operated out of the Post Office in McBride Street. The street was named after the original owners of the Post Office and the building remains operational today (I believe it’s heritage listed). There hadn’t been a real estate agent in our township since cocky was an egg, that is until property prices took off two years ago and First National moved in. Immediately after extracting this relic I had the Five Man Electrical Band’s hit from 1971 Signs spin on the hidden turntable of my mind. It was one of the very first singles I purchased as an eleven year old thanks to my paper round finances. An absolute corker! The song was the lead off tune on their 1970 album Good-byes & Butterflies, but wouldn’t be released as a single until later that year as the ‘B’ side to Hello Melinda, Goodbye. Radio jocks commenced spinning the flip side Signs so MGM re-released the single with Signs as the ‘A’ side. In 1971 it peaked at #4 in the States and #5 on the Australian Go Set Charts.

And the sign said “Long-haired freaky people need not apply”

So I tucked my hair up under my hat and I went in to ask him why?

He said “You look like a fine upstanding young man, I think you’ll do”

So I took off my hat, I said “Imagine that. Huh! Me workin’ for you!”

I also had flashbacks to a local television series from the seventies Cash & Company. The show followed the adventures of two bushrangers, Sam Cash (Serge Lazareff) and Joe Brady (Gus Mercurio) at the onset of the gold rush in Ballarat. There would have been similarities to the early days of prospectors panning for alluvial gold in Cockatoo Creek. The original moniker for the township of Cockatoo was Devon. It was replaced with Cockatoo Creek and later, after the steam engines thundered down the tracks, it was abbreviated to the stations name of Cockatoo. Settlement didn’t take off until the beginning of the twentieth century when the rail opened the way for transportation of logging to the mills. The TV show was filmed in Sunbury (not far from Ballarat) and finished shooting just before the last iconic Sunbury Rock Festival (although the festival was held at nearby Diggers Rest). Confusing!

I’m off now searching the backlots for a vintage mouth organ sign. Hoping for one like the counter sign below (with Cockatoo of course) owned by Rick Nielson and for you purists here’s Ken VanEtten’s restored Boomerang sign.

Ch EssDawg

A few little snippets about alluvial mining at Cockatoo Creek, a photo of a Cockatoo gathering (a crackle) on our side fence and Cockatoo‘s in flight (afternoon delight) at Cockatoo Creek (Photographer Pam Sheppard) and a long haired freaky person.