Miss Gymkhana, R G Menzies and Me: Small Town Life in the Fifties by Kathy Skelton

Book Description

Secondhand. Good condition. Wear to book corners and edges.

Two days before Helen Wood, Miss Australia, in 1957 marries Ashley Cooper, tennis champion, Lorna Larcombe, Miss Gymkhana 1955 marries Squeaker Sullivan, fullback and captain of the firsts.

In our town, as Mrs Petrov was escorted across the tarmac, Cec Burley, the school bus driver and the spitting image of Mr Petrov, was "on with" Miss Pettigrew.

And while Mr Menzies, was trying to solve the Suez Crisis, Aunty Ida was square-dancing with strangers in the darkness outside the MCG while she waited for tickets to the Grand Final.

In small town life in Australia in the 1950s, the critical events and great occasions that touched nations and swept the world were sieved through a mesh of local goings-on. In that world, a young girl tries to learn the truth about love and marriage, communism, sex and drink, and religion in a small seaside town. (back cover)