Professional Cutie
Ella’s great-great-grandfather was a police constable at the station near the railway in Semaphore, the suburb where Ella lives today. Fifty years later, Ella’s great-grandfather Frigyes Tobias, known as Fred, was the last stationmaster in 1977/78, as the station was being prepared for closure.
Given the chance to take with him a memento (for a nominal cost), Fred took with him the long bench seat from the platform, where his wife Aileen (Ella’s great-grandmother) had sat while waiting for her father so many years before. This beloved bench has been passed through the family, taking up fond space in the hearts of Ella’s grandmother and mother, and recently returned to Semaphore, in Ella’s own home.