APPLE SEED PURSE STORY

“Conversation with Ruth: Ruth tells of her ‘Gran’ Lotte Woollard who died in Melbourne in1969. Gran had a purse that was a treasure but one that she allowed her grandchildren to play with “if you were very careful”. Ruth was one of those children and “Gran’s little darling.” She clearly remembers not only playing with the this purse – a woven ‘apple seed’ purse – but also that it “was wonderful.” This was in Melbourne in the 1950s and so far as Ruth knows Lotti had never visited Tasmania. Well she hadn’t until she visited her in George Town after she had moved to Tasmania with her parents in the 1950s.

By then her parents had moved to Tasmania and it turned out to be their, and Ruth’s, new home. Her father moved for work reasons and intended to return to Melbourne after two years. That never happened and her childhood in Melbourne has fond memories.

Lottie’s purse had stories – and possibly sentimental memories – but Ruth’s memories of it suggest that Gran would have had it since the 1930s. Lotti never talked about how she came by this purse but there was a story there somewhere otherwise she wouldn’t have treasured it so. Ruth cherishes her memory of this purse too. So much so that she has drawn it from memory and in her memory – WATCH THIS SPACE – it will always be as “Gran Woollard’s purse”. (Pers Com … 03.03.2009) “