General News
21 December, 2022
Peg turns 100
FROM being a child on a farm with Clydesdale horses to growing pineapples and mastering an ipad, the Loddon’s new centenarian Peg Cameron has seen changes over 100 years. She was joined by family and friends at Pyramid Hill Bowls Club where those...
FROM being a child on a farm with Clydesdale horses to growing pineapples and mastering an ipad, the Loddon’s new centenarian Peg Cameron has seen changes over 100 years.
She was joined by family and friends at Pyramid Hill Bowls Club where those stories of life were recalled.
Peg and late husband Norm moved to Pyramid Hill 53 years ago from Warracknabeal.
Norm managed the spare parts department at the local garage and they lived next to Ivan Vanderwell who turned 100 in June. Together they won many trophies on the bowling green.
Peg, who still lives independently, was born in Finley, New South Wales, in an era when “we did things machines do now”. Her father bred Clydesdales.
After finishing school, Peg worked on the farm and in a bakery.
She met Norm who had a motorcycle. “He put on the sidecar and we went to the pictures ... my mum knew before I got home to tell her where I had been,” Peg said.
Peg and Norm were engaged before World War Two, just as Norm enlisted in the Australian Army and was sent to the Middle East. They were married in 1942 when Norm returned and soon after he joined the Royal Australian Air Force serving in Australia’s north. After coming to Pyramid Hill, they both became involved in the RSL sub-branch.
Peg was active in the ladies’ auxiliary and later was secretary of the sub-branch.
That was after the venture growing pineapples in Queensland. “When we got there, they said there had not been a frost for years. We arrived, there was a frost and we lost the lot,” Peg said.
Peg and Norm had two daughters, Joy and Jeanette.
It has been the introduction to technology that keeps Peg in touch with her seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. “The ipad’s one of the best things I have ever got.”
Peg keeps up contact with the Pyramid Hill community with weekly visits to the senior citizens’ centre every Friday.
“There’s about seven or eight of us who play cards,” she said.
And Peg is unfazed about another warm summer.
“When I was a child there was no air-conditioning ... my father would fill the tin bath with cold water at 2 o’clock in the morning to cool down,” said Peg reflecting on 100 years.