The Life of Cyril Aloysius Daly

A Biography by his son with further Autobiographical information and commentary on Daniel's own life

Compiled by Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly

 Cyril Aloysius Daly was born on the 11th of August 6086 SC (1922 CE-AD). His father was Peter Paul Daly and Mary Ann Daly (Nee McLean). Cyril was the 7th boy of 9 boys, the boys (in no particular order) being Vincent, Leo, Keith, Stan, Brian, Kevin, Peter & Frank, and his sisters being Molly and Philomena. Cyril was raised in Sydney in New South Wales in Australia. His first home was in the suburb of Clovelly, in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney, on the coast. Cyril served in World War II, but did not see any personal combat himself (fortunately, or I might never have been born). He worked in telecommunications sort of work in World War II. He was a war hero because he served his country against the terror of the Axis trio of Germany, Italy and Japan. After the war Cyril worked in different things, but ended up working for the PMG (Post Masters General) and for Telecom. Cyril worked for the PMG/Telecom area for 38 years. My family still has a painting which was presented to Cyril for his achievement from Telecom. It is a lovely painting of the Yaouk valley. Cyril married Mary Daly (Nee Baker) on the 26th of December 1968 in the Christian Calendar, which in the Haven Noahide Fellowship Calendar we would call the 26th of December 6132 SC. Cyril's ancestry traces back to Noah and he is a Noahide biologically and naturally. Cyril was raised in Roman Catholic faith and believed that Jesus was the Christ and died with this faith. His wife Mary Daly is, as of early 6175 SC, also still a practicing Roman Catholic, yet I (Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly) have been attempting to convert her to Noahide faith to accept Haven Noahide Fellowship.

 I have had dreams of Cyril Daly my father in heaven, and he has a beautiful spirit associated with him. I believe in my heart that my father will live forever in heaven, and that my mother Mary Daly, when she dies, will join him. I am hoping that they will realize the wisdom of the Rainbow Covenant of Noah and realize, as Genesis teaches, that the Rainbow Covenant is an Everlasting Covenant. I have firm faith in my abilities to convert him should I eventually die and go to heaven, so I truly believe that both Cyril and Mary will inevitably become members of Haven Noahide Fellowship once they realize that Jesus was not the Messiah of the Hebrew Scriptures and that the Jewish people were correct in realizing this truth and, further, that Christianity displeases God. The Noahide faith is an eternal faith, an everlasting covenant as Scripture maintains, and the Rainbow is a natural and supernatural sign of God’s divine intervention in mankind. The Rainbow Covenant is the family faith of Noah’s children and the Daly’s are most probably descended through Noah’s son Japheth to Nigall of the 9 Hostages, and on through to Peter Paul Daly (Cyril’s father) and to Cyril Aloysius Daly and to myself, Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly.

 In English Noahide Gematria utilizing Ordinal Equivalents, Cyril equals 67. Daly equals 42. So Cyril Daly is 109. Aloysius is 121. So Cyril Aloysius Daly is 230. Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly is 228 in Noahide Gematria Ordinal Equivalents.

Cyril had 5 children – in order of birth, Matthew, Brigid, Daniel, Jacinta and Gregory. His grandchildren in order of birth are. Madalene, Jayden, Georgia, Ronan, Amelia, James & Rachel so far. Madalene, Jayden and Georgia are Brigid’s children through David Bridges. Ronan, Amelia and Rachel are Jacinta’s children through Alan Bradley. James is Gregory’s child through Christie Daly (nee Gonzaga). Cyril died in 2007 in the Christian or Common Era Calendar which would be 6171 SC in the Haven Noahide Fellowship calendar. His funeral Service was well attended. Trish Kirby gave the eulogy for Cyril Daly as she did for my brother Matthew. It was excellent on both occasions.  Cyril liked to take photographs, and we as a family still have many of them. As a family we used to go to Buckenderra in New South Wales, for Telecom Christmas parties. These were wonderful times for the family, and I have good memories of them. I remember some early memories of Cyril and myself in Berridale. I was being cheeky and say Zee instead of Zed. Cyril said if I said Zed he would let me have a biscuit (and I think it might have been a Granita biscuit). I obeyed him, but when I had the biscuit I cheekily said Zee anyway. I was a bit of a devil. I remember another memory being in the verandah of 7 Bent Street in Berridale and saying to dad I will stay up all night with you. I didn’t do that in the end, but the memory is still with me. I remember playing in a box which dad had brought home from Cooma, and then the Goodies came on TV. I played in the box for a while longer, then went inside. I remember the time which dad brought home a clock, and we still have that clock here at 29 Merriman Crescent. One of the hands of the clock is currently unattached, but it can be put back on if it needs to be. The clock was made in Korea. This goes back to the 1970s. I have recently thought the clock might be a bit of a collectable, but the family should really keep the clock forever. I have some photos of my dad Cyril Aloysius Daly and I want to keep them forever.

I remember being up in Sydney recently when Auntie Molly had just turned 100, just before she died, and looking at her I was speaking with my mum Mary and saying, doesn’t she look just like dad, and mum agreed. We went up to Sydney with Gregory and Christie and James I think, and we visited Auntie Shirlie (Uncle Stan Daly’s wife) in Caringbah, were we talked about family things. I saw a picture of my cousin Colin, who looks a lot like my brother Matthew. Coming back from that trip to Sydney we listened to a CD, and I was really enjoying the final song by the Pretender’s (500 Miles) which finished perfectly just as we got back home to 29 Merriman Crescent. I was thinking to myself what a good celtic song to sing. I remember another time with Cyril and the family near Nimmitabel were there was a telecom office, up in the forest. We stayed the night and played Monopoly. It was a lovely memory. I think we might possibly have gone more than once.  I remember many visits to Tathra as a kid with the family. We would collect shells and swim in the ocean and play on the rocks. And I remember a time when in Infants school my mum Mary was chosen to accompany a school visit to Tathra. It was a lovely time for me.  I remember a family visit to Uncle Peter’s in Sydney with the family and there were other uncles there. I made some jokes and I think it was Auntie Pat who said I was clever or something like that. I remember we stayed at Uncle Kevin’s with Auntie Pat’s a lot.

There was this time in 1989 CE when Cyril took me and my friend, whose nickname was noodles, up to Sydney to see the Bon Jovi concert. Me and Noodles were up the back a long way from the stage, but I did see Jon Bon Jovi and the Bon Jovi band in person, even if from a long distance. There were two girls in front of us who we thought were cool. I bought a Bon Jovi T Shirt with a heart on the front of it at that concert, and I remember seeing a guy with a Skid Row T Shirt which I thought was very cool.  Bon Jovi have been one of my favourite bands for a long time. I have listened to the Albums Bon Jovi, 7800 degrees Fahrenheit, Slippery When Wet, New Jersey, Keep the faith, These Days, Crush, Bounce, Have a Nice Day & Lost Highway. Hopefully I will get around to hearing the rest of their albums in due course.  My brother Gregory recently saw Bon Jovi live in Perth with Christie. He said they were good.  I remember listening to Bon Jovi on the radio in Perth when we visited just last year in September, and the song ‘When We Were Beautiful’ was playing, and it was a very touching experience for me.  I have had a number of dreams about Bon Jovi, very cool ones, and I love the band heaps.  I remember when I was younger listening to the Bon Jovi song ‘Bad Medicine’ being played in the Cooma Pinball Parlour. The first Bon Jovi album I owned was a tape copy of ‘Slippery When Wet’ which Damien Asanovsci had given to me. Later on I bought New Jersey on tape and I loved the album after a while. I thought it was not very good on the first listening, apart from Bad Medicine and 99 in the Shade, but after a while I adored the album. There was a time me, Damien Asanovsci and Peter Dradrach were working up at the Jindabyne Trout farm, and I had brought along my tape player and I played Bon Jovi up there. The trout farm was a great place, and I have good memories of my time there. They had a clock, like our current grandfather clock, which you had to pull down the bars to make the clock work.  Damien rolled a Ute on the farm for the short while we were working there, but he didn’t get into too much trouble.  When I got back to Cooma I talked with my family about the time, and I remember the time with Brigid when we talked a bit about it. I think I had a tan when I got back. It was good work, not too hard, but we pinched some drinks a little bit because we were thirsty. But we definitely earned our money, and it was about the first paid job I had. I got a cheque for the work, which I cashed probably at St George, probably in the bank account which I still have. It was a building society in those days, but is now a Bank and has recently merged with Westpac.

My father supported the Eastern Suburbs Roosters Rugby League side, as he was from that part of Sydney. My mother Mary also supports the roosters, and I assume she did so to support her husband's team. Matthew, my brother, initially supported the St George Dragons when he was younger, but supported the Roosters later on in life, perhaps because of Cyril. Dad was quite a placid gentleman of a father, though he occasionally had a temper. He never beat us, though, but did bring out the strap rarely when we were younger and gave us a very mild strapping. There was never anything fierce in Cyril's punishments, and he was an excellent father and very appropriate disciplinarian. Of course, dad enjoyed Classical music, and I do remember us watching 'Amadeus' here at 29 Merriman Crescent a number of years ago. Dad liked comedies like 'The Two Ronnies' and 'Open All Hours', but shared with me once that the 'Porrige' comedy was about criminals, and he had a few issues with the show because of it. Obviously he felt that criminals probably shouldn't be glorified in some way, which likely reflected his understanding of his faith. I think, from memory, mum was possibly a lot more social at church than dad, but I can't really remember for sure. Dad was usually with mum out the front of St Pats after church service, and I guess he probably did talk a lot with the congregation. He went faithfully to church every sunday his whole life and was a very devout Roman Catholic, and prayed the Rosary all the time. He read those mini pamphlets which Catholicism produces quite a lot, but I don't recall a big devotion to the old Bible we had in the family, yet I assume he probably knew it well enough. He was a very competent driver of the family car, and didn't speed ever. In fact, I remember in trips from Berridale and to Cooma as well as Canberra always asking dad to go faster. Fortunately he was wise enough to ignore me. When we moved from Cooma to Canberra, we did the move ourselves (or most of it – details are fuzzy) and me and dad went down a couple of times in the station wagon and filled it up with stuff from 6 Bradley to take it to our new rented home in Kambah. He did a basic load, but I insisted on adding a few more things to fill up the car properly. I think he was mainly concerned with getting beds and things up to Canberra on these trips. I remember one time dad took me and Greg out to the Murrumbidgee river because I had hassled him to do so. I didn't even want to go that badly, and we went to the other section with the large bridge. I jumped off it once, and Greg had done a little bit of swimming, but we didn't stay terribly long that time, and went home. But dad had taken us anyway which was kind of him. Dad kept a lot of notes in notebooks related to his work, a lot of it on jobs and things he did for Telecom, going here and there to fix things up. He seemed a competent enough worker at Telecom, though he didn't terribly highly in the organisation, but he always did his work and worked until retirement age. He was a faithful man to work and his occupation and I look back now very proud of a father who raised his children, saw to their schooling and ensure we never went without. We also had enough toys, entertainment, and although mum was the driving force behind it, we definitely had a good share of holidays. Mum and dad argued from time to time, but the definitely loved each other. The undertook Marriage Encounter weekends with their church, were they developed their relationship with each other. I am extremely grateful to have a father which lasted the distance in his marriage and didn't cop out when the going quite possibly got tough. I will always remember that if and when I get married. Dad had a host of tools and enjoyed gardening. He built our first billy cart, and we learned to build them ourselves later, and he taught us to us hammers and nails and screwdrivers and saws. In the garage he had stacks of boxes of those transistors they used in old telecommunication equipment. There were all sorts of odds and ends in the garage, and much of our youth, especially in Cooma, was tinkering around with this or that. He made a little phone system for us in Cooma, which was a wire running between two boxes, were you could speak in one end and hear in the other. It was loads of fun as kids.

A lot of the family holidays were along the NSW south coast. When we were younger the family went to Tathra beach a lot, and I remember coming home sunburnt a heck of a lot. Dad and mum didn't go in the water to swim with us terribly much, and usually stayed up on the beach on the towels. But they might walk in the ripples with us a little, but not usually swim. Sometimes there were exceptions to this, but the norm was for them to stay on the sand as we went swimming or off to the rock pools to collect shells and cuttlefish and things. A holiday home in Terrigal in Gosford was visited a bit, but as we got older we went to Milton near Ulladulla a couple of times I think. Dad was usually the quieter one, driving the car, and talking with mum, while we kids were snapped at not to do this and that by mum an awful lot, and played and had our fun. Dad occasionally played cricket with us over the years, in the back yard at Berridale and Cooma, and here and there, but this diminished, naturally, as he got older. He was an indoors man a lot of the time, but he loved to tinker around in the garage and do things in there. Dad once taught me the secret of batting was to keep your eye on the ball, which I think he learned from Don Bradman's teaching on the issue. I think – I might be mistaken – but he also said the Don usually hit the ball along the ground a lot and was not caught out much because of it. Dad's book collection (which we still own) was mostly scientific technical sort of books, and he had a lot of work related Telecom manuals on hand. In many ways Matt took on dad's stylings in this department, as Matt kept his electronics studies material, and kept his notes and things, and is reminiscent of Cyril in many ways on these things. Matt liked to collect cables and cords and little electronic knick-knacks of various types, and gadgets and things, and I think a lot of that is Cyril's type of behaviour as well. I have probably inherited Cyril's religious genes, being very religious like he was, while Greg has probably got more of Dad's studious type of mentality and his academic scholasticism. It is sort of like Cyril's qualities were divided up among his sons. Dad had an old desk, which is still sitting her in this front room at 29 merriman were I am typing, and a lot of his notes and things are still in files in the desk, untouched by mum for the most part. If he came back from the dead today he could resume his life to a fair degree, and Matt also. The Camera dad have, Matthew seemed to have inherited, but I have it now, in the wooden cupboard in my room which had belonged to Matthew. I moved into Matt's room recently just before Greg got here again recently, and have settled into it. Naturally, we have turfed a whole lot of Matt's studied paperwork now, because nobody in the family really needs it, and its mostly just clutter now. There are many things for both dad and matt that we have retained, though, mostly the important and essential memorabilia of their lives. We still have dad's projector and his films, and Greg got it up and running a couple of years back, but it mostly sits in the closet now, as mum is starting to get on in life, and nobody in the family has much of an interest in those things. Jacinta seems to have a desire – or something mum said relating to that – to own the projector and films, so they will probably go to her one of these days. I will likely inherit dad and matt's book collection and mum is leaving me her book collection also when she eventually passes on. I do have a scrapbook of my father's of movie promo newspaper articles which dad cut out and pasted into the book. It is one of the permanent pieces from dad that I will keep forever. All his photos are still in the cupboard in the room connected to this one, and it looks like they will just sit there until mum passes, at which point I intend to get copies of them all from all the negatives the family still retains of them. There is a photo of dad and mum's wedding right beside me on the wall here in the lounge room and mum has her marriage certificate faithfully on the wall near her bed. Many things have changed since dad's passing (and Matt's also) but many things remain just the same. James, Greg's boy, is getting older, and he reminds me of Cyril in many ways. Soft like dad, and gentle, and of good manners. Mum says he is not close to her at times and feels at a distance somewhat from him, but he opens up to me all the time when he is around and we get along really well. James Daly is an awesome kid and I am very proud of Greg and Christie for producing him. I love him heaps. James full name is James Adelino Cyril Daly, and he takes his middle names from both his grandfathers. He is in Perth at the moment with his mum Christie and they are living at Christie's parents place in Forrestfield, while the home is being rented out, as the family tries to resolve its living situation and work situation. Greg's work at Centrelink is on a contract, and if that ends and he doesn't get alternative work, he will probably go back to Perth, but time will tell either way. As far as I understand it Christie still works at Medicare in Perth, so the family has two incomes at the moment. I am sure they will resolve their challenges in life in time. In latter years, when dad's parkinson's disease became quite prevalent in his life, he was on a wheelchair to get him around a lot of the time, and had become quite a frail old man and of soft speech. It was challenging to talk to him because he was very frail, but things could be said when necessary. We had a lot of carers who helped take care of dad, and they were good for the family and I miss some of them somewhat – without that help it could have been a real challenge taking care of dad. When Matt died, my sister Brigid started going back to the Catholic Church regularly, and now goes each sunday to the church mum goes to, Holy Family church in Corpus Christ parish. That was dad's church in his Macarthur years, and I attended there regularly briefly for a few months in my early 20s when I returned to Christian faith, although after that I went off to Pentecostalism. But Brigid goes regulalry now, and seems to have become somewhat faithful in the way and example mum and dad always set, and mum still does. If it was still my religion I would be going every Sunday myself and, knowing me, all the weekday services as well. Because there are no real believers in my faith in my community here in Canberra I have to do all my religious observances on my own, but I would definitely be very regular in a church if I was still a Christian. So, instead, I read the bible a lot and pray a lot and do things online. It is how I keep my faith and, perhaps many ways, how I walk in the religious tradition of my parents and those before them. The religion may have changed, but the tradition of fidelity to God and King remains the same. I think, of all the things Cyril Daly instilled in his children, it was most definitely a strong religious observance of going to religious assembly and honouring God. Perhaps more than anything else vital to a soul, dad instilled that in us, which gave us so much potential for have a relationship with God and knowing his salvation that, when it all comes down to it, without that in your life, what really matters that much anyway? Thank God dad and Mum care a lot about that issue as far as I am concerned, and will always be grateful for what knowledge of God they did in fact impart to the life of Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly.

One of the big things for us as kids was the yearly trip to Buckenderra on Lake Eucumbene for the annual Telecom Christmas party. Dad drove us there and the whole family went, fitting into the station wagon, all 7 of us, some of the kids in the boot, were I usually was, as we drove out to the four mile and took the off-road up towards Adaminaby and up to Lake Eucumbene. We would get things like cans of soft drink for free and I think there were always things like potato crisps and there was usually a barbecue with sausage rolls and probably steaks with fried onions. Dad would have obviously caught up with his workmates at such a gathering, and mum was incessantly mingling with all the people she came along in life anyway. We would have a rug or something, were mum and dad would sleep, and we might play along the shore of Lake Eucumbene, notice the birdshit from the seagulls I think (possibly), but the thrill of the day was when some old chum showed up in a Santa suit and gave all the kids presents. It sure made our day. When the day ended it was a long drive home, but there were lots of long drives home in those early years, especially back from Canberra. That is part of my deepest and fondest memories, the drive in the station wagon home from Canberra at evening after we had done our business in Canberra for the day, and I am sure dad and mum have memories of fondness from those times as well. I remember getting lost in what, I now remember as, the Canberra Centre when we were kids. It gave me bad memories for years, and I was delighted when dad walked past and out the entrance and me and Greg went and chased after him. I don't think dad had even noticed me and Greg had disappeared. Some of the big memories of our trips to Canberra were seeing the giant red golf ball at the golf course in Narrabundah (I think) just near Symonston. We didn't travel through Tuggeranong in those days to come to Canberra, but up the Monaro and past Fyshwick into Manuka, which is were we usually first got into Canberra from. Mum and Dad liked to shop in a Catholic bookstore called 'Pellegrinis' in Manuka in those days, and we went occasionally to a catholic outlet just across the road from St Christopher's cathedral in Manuka. Early childhood is a lot of memories of us going to this or that Catholic place or church or organisation, especially Vinnies in Cooma were dad did volunteer work and mum as well from time to time. I even did a little volunteering there myself on just a few occasions. That was dad's religion and that was dad's faith, and it kept his life very busy and was probably his biggest thing in life, looking back, apart from his work and things. Dad usually watched TV with us, and the family was usually around the TV set in the 80s for the Friday Night and Saturday Night movies which were a big deal for us as kids. We got a VCR as a family some time in the mid 80s and then movies became a more and more common thing, but they were pretty big news before that for us as a family in the earlier 80s, and TV was what we had and watched. I think our TV was a rental back than, but we owned later on and, as a lot of people can relate, they tended to proliferate in the household when they became more affordable. Ironically, these days it is not so much the fuss of paying for the TV, but paying for someone to take the damn old tube one away. In fact, life tends to accumulate a lot of crap in the average Aussie household I think these days and as your family grows in age and wealth it is more of a matter of where I am going to put the damned new things I have gotten. We're not exactly hoarders as a family, but we hardly need anything new these days. Almost more of a recycling thing really, with out with the old and in with the new, and sometimes it doesn't even have to be that old before we let go of it. Just the way of the world at the moment. Dad, in younger years, would have been more used to toasters that you toast one side at a time and then open the lids, turn the bread around, and toast the other side. I could imagine that would have been exactly what he had. But later on, like kettles and things, they became more elaborate. Obviously dad, being born in 1922 and dying in 2007 lived through a turbulent time of not only conflicts, but vast technological change as well. He probably would have seen the advent of TV and Computers and probably got something of a concept of the Internet, even though he was a bit old and out of touch by the time it was starting to really emerge. Dad was never a PC Computer man at home, dabbling with older technologies like 70s calculators and telephones of his era and things, but he is the kind of man who would have been had they been around in his generation. Quite possibly would have been an IT man if he was born in later generations. Amongst his old letters and work envelopes and things he had a lot of letters with 'O.H.M.S' on them, which I think were related to his time in Post Master's General. He worked in various places, and of course working up in the snow a lot of time during the Snowy Mountains Scheme years, though mum tells me now that he didn't actually work on the scheme itself, but did work up there during the time-frame. Ironically the Snowy TV mini series from the 90s I think it was, was set in Cooma, but it wasn't actually Cooma were they filmed because all the places were different. Dad enjoyed his TV, and watched a lot of it in Canberra years in retirement. He lived a quiet enough life I guess for the most part, and wasn't given to going on a huge number of trips personally, though he went with mum a lot. In latter years Greg and Mum and me and Matt and Dad would travel a lot here and there around the Canberra region on various trips with dad, getting him in and out of his chair and helping him to get along. Really, despite dad's frailty, they were enjoyable times, and in many ways the best years of my life. A lot of that was the early 2000s before dad died in 2007, and I hope dad enjoyed those years, despite his frail condition. One trip was out to the tracking station in Tidbinbilla, and I remember pushing dad along in his wheelchair, and pointing out the big dishes to him which he enjoyed looking at. Dad's sort of stuff, really. They were good times, those years. Really, quite good times. I was young in my Noahide faith, but happy with it, and I enjoyed my life with my family, and was, even though I might not have expressed it, very happy to be part of a family with a good father at the head. Since then, life has become gradually a bit more sedate, and I think that will go on for some more time yet, but I sense change is coming one day, and a more interactive life will start happening for Daniel Daly again. Not yet, but I'll get there. Naturally, dad had incontinence problems in later years, and the carers did great work, as did mum, in taking care of him properly. Dad WAS taken care of very well in his latter years. He had an active life, despite his frail condition, and mum was a wonderful lady to stand so dutifully by her husband and ensure he had the best of care for him in his latter years. He deserved it as well, and I have very fond memories of our final years together.

The holiday to Victoria in the 1980s was probably our biggest family holiday as kids. Dad rented a fold down caravan which we towed behind us, and we stayed in that on our journeys. We stayed at places like Creswick caravan park, and visited the Dinosaur park there, and some other places as well. Bendigo was visited as well as Ballarat, were we went to Sovereign Hill, the old Gold Mines. Dad did all the driving in those days (mum never got a license) and Dad would always sit in the driver's seat with mum nearly every time in the seat alongside him. In latter years there may have been some minor exceptions to this rule, but none that I can recall from memory. Dad always took care of the oil for the car and I remember often him testing the oil level for the car in his mechanics of taking care of the car. He probably did this a lot on our Victorian holiday, and one thing we did a lot on such trips was play a lot of cards. Dad liked Euchre, but mum liked Rummy. As little kids we played snap and fish a lot, but moved on from that in later years. Like the Milton trips in the holiday home we stayed in, we were very together as a family, and lived in each other's company constantly. Nothing escaped mum's notice, and she always ensured we had clean clothing and looked our best. The number of times she probably combed my hair when I was young would have been numerous. Dad himself was not an overly affectionate father when it came right down to it. He was in his very old age, a very kind and loving old man, who was probably doing his very best then to show proper love to his family. But mostly growing up he was a caring and thoughtful father, perhaps a little distant from the kids as they grew, but always responsible with them. I was a lot closer to my mother Mary in those years, and always have been closest to my mum of all people, generally, and Dad and I didn't talk a huge amount over my life, but when I was quite young he was definitely daddy who took care of us all. In the latter teens, though, I would hardly have cared very much, more concentrating on my gang friends from the arcade. In the early years in Canberra in the 1990s I probably talked to dad a little bit more about things, but I was mostly in my own world in those days, lost in depression and heavy metal, and didn't really have time for anyone really. But Dad would take me places, and he helped me out when I needed to go to job interviews and things by driving me there. I remember specifically a telemarketers job in Fyshwick he took me for, though I didn't really bother to try and get the job properly, mainly a requirement fulfilled on my job diary to get my next payment from social security, because I really wanted to just go to CIT in a few months from then anyway, and was just bullshitting about looking for work. I would simply ring up those ads which had jobs with phone numbers, ask if they had filled them, which they usually had, and asked them to take my details, so that I could put that on my job diary. Really, though, I just wanted to study at CIT, so didn't care at that stage. But If I had ever been offered a job I would have taken it – it just never happened because I had no real experience or qualifications. For those years in the early 90s I only talked to Dad, and ignored mum completely for 5 years, not talking to her at all except once on the phone when I had to, because I was ringing to get dad to pick me up from southside TAFE. I don't really recall much of what I probably talked to dad about in those days. He was in retirement, and spent most of the time at home with mum, probably watching a lot of TV and just pottering around the house. Though the Parkinsons sort of came in around then some time, and things were starting to be noticed on shakings and things. In the mid 90s, after my crisis, I disappeared off to various group houses and flats of my own for about 4 to 5 years, and I didn't visit home a huge amount in those years. But I did drop in from time to time, and occasionally stayed there in between moves and things. I was taught judgementalism of Catholicism by many of the Pentecostals I ran with at the time, which went to my head a bit, but later on in Noahidism all that nonsense gradually died away. It was nothing but protestant hype and winging as far as I am concerned, and did not relate to the real world and the actual way catholics did in fact live their life. Just bullshit from pride-filled biblical zealots who really thought their biblical devotions and works made them something special. A load of cobblers as far as I am concerned now, but I do give them a break because they are studious of the bible and do maintain good moral standards as people, even though irrationally judgemental. My friends Chris White and Paul Saberton are still pumped up on that hype, and I don't really rebuke them on it, as they just argue biblically ideas from revelation and, from experience, I am just wasting my breath to differ with them anyway. They don't really care about the facts of the situation, and follow 'Two Babylons' ideas of Hyslop wether he proved his case or not. But Chris and Paul are kind and loving people, just stuffed up with biblical zealotry as far as I am concerned. In many ways Paul is very grounded, but he needs to live in the real world for a time. Dad, on the other hand, lived in the real world his whole life, as did mum, and had a far more universal approach and understanding on life, much akin to the way Catholicism which means universal, likes to operate. I had a good grounding growing up, got into pentecostalism and saw the point some of them were driving at with various passages of scripture, but they push it to the extreme, and are not really in touch that much with the real world, nor try to be. The Devil's playground as far as many of the zealot pentecostals are concerned. God love em. Someone has to. Dad never really spoke to me about protestant christians, although Luther was mentioned a little bit as well as King Henry starting the Anglican church, but Mum and Dad didn't really say much about the other churches or worry about them much, although mum did say to me occasionally that if she hadn't been a catholic she would have been in the Salvation Army. Perhaps that says a lot. I found out, from conversations later, that dad did know passages in his bible well enough, and knew some standard catholic interpretations of some passages on philippians I was discussing with him one time in his old frailty. He knew how to answer as well according to his faith and saw his point, though I still disagree with his earthly views (whatever he believes now I don't know, because I hope he is in heaven) that the New Testament or the early church ever taught the Trinity. But obviously the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is what Cyril Daly solidly believed in all his life most likely. Parents and children don't always agree, but they should always love each other, and I think we managed that well enough when all is said and done.

In the Macarthur years dad became gradually older and older and, by the time I was finally starting to grow up and learn about people and loving them and respecting them, he had become a very old man, beset with Parkinson's, who was sometimes difficult to communicate with properly. Oh, we talked from time to time over the years, but in some ways I never really got the opportunity to know him well enough, which is possibly because of the big distance in age between us. Yet I have always respected my father, and really do miss him a lot. I continue to pray for him quite regularly now, as I do for others of my family in heaven. I hope to meet them when this earthly life of mine passes, and catch up a lot and really have a good old yarn with the old man about life and everything 'Daly'. Really, everyone has the best dad in the world, but mine is VERY suitable for Daniel Daly, and I would never consider trading him, nor my mum either. I admire them and respect them, and while we may have different faiths, I know they take God very seriously. I am proud of my parents. I love them both, very deeply, and need them forever in my life, and pray to God they will always be there.

Dad had tools in his tool boxes and out in the carport shed we have 2 metal cabinets full of odds and ends and things. Dad was no great organizer of things, but neither was he disorganized. Mostly a regular type of guy who would usually put things back in their right place, and with things like drill bits and pieces he would never leave them out but ensure they were packed away responsibly, like he did for all his tools. It's just that on the shelves were he put things they wouldn't necessarily always go into the same place. But they were always packed away appropriately. We still have as of today lots of wires and cables and all his tools and things, all out in the carport, and since by brother Matthew passed on last year, that stuff is basically left to me and perhaps Greg, who I doubt will be terribly fussed over it. But there are a lot of memories in those old things, and some times I sit out in the carport, even now in winter, just to be out of the house and feeling busy, even if I am just sitting there. All things considered, dad was an all round sort of a guy, with a blokey sort of aspect to him, but also a very academic one also. His work reflected that, being a technician for Telecom. His mind, like my brother Gregory's, was very mathematical and scientifice and while I myself have abilities in these areas, I am clearly stronger on things like Literature and Religion than Gregory, while he is stronger on Economics and Maths and Science, and we have about the same talent at music. It's not that we don't have the others strengths, its just that we don't pursue them a great deal. For example, Greg has written some fiction, but doesn't pursue it. Like I have said, it's like each of the 3 of Cyril's boys got a different share of his own qualities. Remembering back to Cooma years, I can't see Dad in my head a huge amount, but he was doing things often like mowing the lawn and having cups of tea with mum and guests and driving us to church and things. He watched TV regularly with the family, and we as a family watched a lot of Friday night and Saturday night movies together back in the 80s. In Canberra years, in his retirement, TV was a strong reality of his life. He did read books, and we have a family library full of various tomes, and he would often be looking at a book on Ireland or some such subject, and then he would be getting fed his dinner for, with his ongoing parkinsons problems, he faded away gradually with older age. He would laugh at the simpsons, in which he appreciated the sarcasm, but he had limits in what he thought was appropriate TV. Strangely, when I probably should have talked to him the most, coming into my 20s, I was living out of home in pentecostal group houses, and, by the time I should have been getting to know my dad, it seemed he had become too old, and too frail, and the mind, while it was there, couldn't get past the body so easily. We didn't have any great intellectual conversations in our life, as we didn't talk on any great subjects at all hardly, but there was an odd chat about religion later on, when I was Pentecostal. I am now wise enough to know that it didn't really matter who was right and wrong on that issue, as Dad kept Catholic faith perfectly well as any Pentecostal kept biblical faith. Dad went to church every sunday, but I never really saw him reading the bible as such. It wasn't his thing. Instead it was sunday missals and newsletters and booklets on catholicism, rather than a great scriptural devotion although I do know that he had read the thing. Later on, as he got frail, he still insisted on trying to confess his sins to a priest, and mum got a priest around from time to time, and he confessed, but she said to him he was so old and that God didn't need to hear them. She was probably right for the old man. The wheelchair was the main thing for his older age, and we pushed him all over the place and around various places on outings here and there, especially down to Cooma and Chakola and places like that. Dad was merciful man, and he had great love for his children's wellbeing. I know he hoped that Matt would get married one day, for I remember him reflecting on some of my words on the subject, and I bought my brother a ring recently, and sacrificed it to heaven, like I did for 3 of my uncles, just in case they need them, you know. For I have heard you might just need to own a ring if you want to propose later on in the heavenlies, and they are not that easy to come by. Dad loved us all, and prayed for us regularly, and I continue to pray for all members of the family also, using psalms especially, for all of us, praying regularly throughout the year for all the members of our family and extended family and friends also. I really do miss dad quite a lot now, and really look forward to seeing him again when I pass on one day. He was the foundation of my life, and his example on decency and responsibility will always be part of my cherished memories for my old man. I guess, if I was asked to describe my dad in 1 word, I would use the word 'quiet' to describe Cyril Aloysius Daly. He was certainly conservative and faithful and loving and kind, and a lot of other virtues as well, but he was more than anything else 'Gentle' and above that 'Quiet'. He was not a ruffian of a man, had a calm demeanour, the quiet type of guy, who worked carefully and with fidelity to get the job done, and didn't spend an eternity bragging about it later. He was a wonderful old fella.

Various tools dad owned included hammers, saws, hacksaw blade, screwdrivers of various kinds, drills and drill bits including a manual hand rotating one, digging fork, digging spade, pick, axes, block buster's, ladders, trailers, lots of various nuts and bolts in jars, plenty of nails, files, whetting stone, alan keys, pliars, wrenches, spanners, cutters, electric sander and all sorts of other things, and bits and pieces of things, especially electronic things. In his desk he had things like hundreds of staples and pens and pins and safety pins and things. We still have the desk, which we got when he was in Cooma, and mum uses it now. I think some of his old files are still in there, and the photographic equipment is still there, the really old stuff. When he worked at the brick Telecom building in Cooma, I would often visit after school or sometimes on Saturdays for a little while when he brought me and often Greg and Matt in. I would wander around the big electronic boards full of wiring, or type away at a writer thing dad said I could write on, or drink water from the water fountain, which I just about always did. Dad usually sat quietly in the partitioned off mini-office area in the main section of the building, were he did his thing, and I always liked looking at the cool electronic calculator he kept from the 1970s. Matt inherited that calculator, but its gone now. Dad would discipline us as kids, but he never got really angry, or very rarely with us, even though we were a brat pack of kids. It all worked out as we got older though and the family stuck together through thick and thin. I am sure he learned how to raise children as a work in progress just as much as anything he he had learned from a book or his own family experiences, but I think, looking back, he did a pretty good job at it. Mum and him took to the task with responsibility and almost expertise. Mum had been a nanny in England, and had some training looking after children, so she always knew when we could have a break and when we had to be disciplined, and looking back I feel they usually worked together as a team to resolve the various problems which cropped up. It seems they likely always talked about it to resolve the issues, and while mum usually directed us in what was to be done, it seemed everything was talked over with Cyril beforehand. They worked together well as a team raising children, and despite the difficulties and challenges, I think the world of them both for the wisdom they were able to impart, more from their examples than anything else. If and when I have children of my own one day, I know the kind of responsiblities I will be entrusted to and, because of mum and dad, the kind of ways and lessons I know to be able to handle them. I guess, if I really have a problem with Cyril Daly, is that he has passed on, now, when I am at the kind of age which wants to chat with dad and ask him questions about life and really develop a good friendship. For so much of my life it was Daniel-centric vision, but I am starting to get over myself and see the rest of the world, and I really do wish I'd had another decade or so with my old man, just to nut out his wisdom on life, and to have a drink of beer with him, and uncle Kevin, and chat about the war and the cricket and old grandpa Peter Paul and life in general. Yes, if I have one complaint, is that, even though he lived to 84, he was gone to soon for this son of a gun. But life decides when, and I thank God our final time together was a blessing, and that he died in peace, content in a good home with a good family. He's buried at Queanbeyan lawn cemetry, with Matt now on top of him, and just the other day mum paid for another plot, which can have someone placed on top of it as well, which is for herself and myself when I finally pass on. It's not the same column going along, but it is in the same row I think, and we are not far from Dad and Matt. It's all paid for and the family knows so, when I rest in peace myself, I won't be too far from the man who gave me life in the first place. And that must be a good thing.

There was one time in Cooma, when I made a gate between the house and the garage (the shed). We had what was probably the side of an old cot or something, and I used bolts or fasteners of some kind and then, finding a chain which would support it, connected it to the house so that it swung as a gate. It lasted a few years or so, and I was proud of it and, from memory, I think dad paid me some money for doing the job although I never asked for the money. There was another time when I cleaned out the garage voluntarily, not thinking of money, organising everything and putting it all neatly away, and dad paid me for that as well. But when I had put a lot of comics on the account at the newsagency, even though I wasn't supposed to, mum and dad allowed me to do some chores to pay them off a bit. I think I probably overcharged them for the work I did, but I did do a number of chores to work it off, and they left it at that, and didn't hassle me about it. Of course, they probably knew I pinched a fair few pennies from mum's purse, but it was always grace which covered it. They didn't judge me too harshly. They were merciful and forgiving parents. I look back now and realize that dad had a caring heart, and he rewarded work and effort we did for the family. They were occasions I did think voluntarily for the most part, not expecting payment, but they paid me anyway. It was very kind of them, especially with 5 kids and what must have been a tight budget as mum stayed home looking after us all. I never went without clothes and food, though clothes had initially been hand me downs from Matt when I was a bit younger and he was still bigger than me. We got new shoes pretty regularly, and I was always in my school clothes, and they were always clean and washed and ready for school. The lunches were predominantly sandwiches, but some times we had lunch orders from the canteen, which were always my favourite days. They obviously did well balancing the family budget, and we had many regular holidays, looking back in fact it seemed we were always away some where doing this and that. There were a lot of coast trips, especially Terrigal and Tathra, and numerous visits to the Newmerella river and the Murrumbidgee, but we went to other places as well. Mum was usually the instigator in getting us out and about, and she said she often had to push dad to get us out somewhere, but he never really complained, and let mum handle the organising of those things, but, like he said, he was always there with us, and he watched over us as a responsible parent ought to do. With a moderate sized catholic family, they obviously budgeted well, and with his superannuation payout he was able to pay back his brothers for some of the money we got on house loans to buy the families first homes. When we moved to Canberra, we went into a payback interest only loan for many years from our bank, for the Macarthur house, but that was all finally paid off last year, and Cyril can attest to having afforded the family a Canberra home, largely through his own fidelity to his work. A responsible man, who provided properly for his family's needs – if anything else, that is an enduring legacy of the life of Cyril Aloysius Daly, as much a positive and good witness as any family man can hope to attain. He drove us everywhere, and he would even come and pick me up from Peter Dradrach's down town in the later 80s, after I had been at the Games Arcade or playing cricket at the Rotary oval nets in cooma, and he didn't need to do that, as I usually walked home from these things, but he did do it from time to time anyway, as he had done earlier on picking me up from Andrew Pighins house in Cooma West after work, as I went there after school. He never once roused at me for doing this from memory, never complained to me that I was too much of a problem, and always treated me with care and respect, and was a greatly caring father because of it. One of the things I felt later on in life is that he never really taught me any great moral lessons of the family as it where, but he did give me 16 years in Catholic church every Sunday, and his silent witness, retrospectively, is more than enough now for me to learn from his example of the Godly father and parent he was to me. He was a great dad, and I will always look fondly on how he did raise us, for I am well experienced now in how many parents of especially latter generations can fail so readily on these challenges of life. Good on you dad.

In 1967 dad was living in Jindabyne with a friend, working for PMG/Telecom, and he went on a pilgrimage to Lourdes in France were he met mum and a lady called Maeve. He had an interest in Maeve, but nothing ever eventuated, but he also met mum and the became friends. He returned home, and mum returned home to Hull, were she was staying the Presbytery of St Stephens at the time, looking after a priest, and dad corresponded with mum. He eventually proposed in a letter, and she said no initially, but after a while she said yes, and he came over to England and married her in 1968. They came to live in Jindabyne then, were they stayed, although they lived for a brief while in Braidwood. Matthew and Brigid were born while the family was living in Jindabyne, but then they moved to Berridale in early 1972 (I think) and I was born later on that year on the 20th of November back in Hull, because mum wanted to go home to have help from Grandma with the birth and early times of the new baby. In Berridale one of the friends of dad (who I remember) was Joe Scotland, who lived up the road in a more southern area of Berridale. The Luchetta's and the Lindstroms were good friends in the Berridale years, and I still remember the Berridale Catholic church intimately and the statues which were for a while kept in a vault in the ceiling. The church has a bell tower which is still there today, and Berridale is much the same as it was then, still around the same size and population and housing. Of course, next door to us in 7 Bent Street in Berridale was the Anglican church presbytery, with the Anglican Church at the end of Bent street. Dad would take the trip into Cooma each day to work at the Telecom building in Cooma, and while there had been options of buying a house in Jindabyne, they eventually bought 6 Bradley street in Cooma in the late 1970s/Early1980s, and the whole family moved into town. As I have said previously, the Berridale house had a double garage, and we kept chickens and had a dog called Toby (which disappeared one day) who was a little terrier, and had all our early adventures tromping around Berridale town. There was a tennis court across the road (a variant of which features in one of my 'Harvest' stories in the Chronicles of the Children of Destiny), but we never played on the court, and I wasn't sure if it was private or the town courts. Mum was really the centre of my world in those years, but dad was too, and we were a close-knit family who did our thing, and it was one of those lucky idyllic childhoods, before the schooling years began, and a harder world started becoming known. I think, in many ways, in such a small town, I was shielded from some of the harsher elements in life, for it was an idyllic little town, with beautiful summers, were everything was fascinating and interesting in the town, especially the weird bugs in the back yard which were native (it seems) to the region, and with the pool and the cannon in the park and Anzac day marches dad marched in each year, and plenty of brothers and sisters, and wonderful christmases were pillow cases were full of presents, filled a young life with imagination and happiness and very good times. But school started in the late 70s, and the boys at St Pats were tough, and I wasn't quite ready for the real world I soon found myself in. But, regardless of all that, there was a firm and protective hand from Cyril Daly on his family, watching over us, making the right decisions for us, and as when we came to Canberr in 1990, the move to Cooma in 1980 seemed like a progression of sorts, and in hindsight, the wisdom of God to lead us on to bigger and better things. Even if those things had a whole host of new challenges associated with them. I think dad probably liked Jindabyne and Berridale, for he worked all over the snowy mountains region with his work, and in Cooma he was living a life in a town he was well used to after his earlier years in the Sydney region of his youth. As I have said, dad didn't seem to attract a lot of personal friends to home very much, mostly friends of what I would call the family, but he was always at church each Sunday, and it seems, now, looking back, his friends and colleagues of the church were the main part of his life, especially the workmates at St Vinnies were he worked in various capacities, and were mum occasionally did some volunteer work sorting clothes and things into the various bins. St Vinnies used to be on Sharp Street, but moved to its current location on Vale Street back then, and so much of my childhood memories are of entering the store and asking mum 'Can I have this? Can I have this?' We'd get a lot of stuff we wanted, but not every single time, and we always had nice toys and things to play around with from the charity. Even now I shop very regularly at Vinnies here in Tuggeranong especially, and while I am no longer a Roman Catholic, if I were, I could imagine I would be heavily involved with such an organisation. The main friends of the family in Cooma years were The Collins across the street, who also were Catholic, and the Bryants and the Torley's. The Bryants and the Torleys are still part of our lives, and we see Gerard and his family now every now and again, who live in Theodore, down south in Tuggeranong. Jill Torley is a long friend of the family, but she is now in Western Australia, yet sends regular correspondence and cards and things to members of the family. Dad got along well, mainly it seems, with these sorts of people as his company for they were regular guests in our household, and, looking back, while he had a rare beer at home, he was not the kind of guy who ever really went out drinking with his mates at the pub. It wasn't part of dad's makeup. Oh, I am sure there was the odd beer at a pub with a co Telecom worker now and again, but I never once remember him going off to get pissed, as it wasn't part of his makeup. He was always a sober man, and for that I am eternally grateful for his good example.

I was talking with Auntie Shirlie, Uncle Stan Daly's wife, about dad. She is quite old now, and her memory is not what it used to be, but she had some comments on dad. Like I said above, she found him a 'Quiet' man. But she added, in her own words, that he was 'Strange', in the way he would come to dinner with them, and pick at his meal (which was good food) and be very quiet. I kind of feel, thinking about this, it is sort of were myself, Gregory and Matthew, and even little James (Greg's boy) get a lot of our quirky natures. Dad took lots of photographs and was a scientific and rationale sort of man, but from memory he seemed to express creationism as his viewpoint on origins as opposed to evolution, so from my perspective he really was a sound thinker on a lot of things. But I can see, from Shirlies statements, were I may get some of my schizophrenia and odd ways about myself also. Dad had parkinson's in later years, which is a lack of dopamine in the brain, wereas with my psychosis I get too much of that stuff, but it sort of reflects that kind of person who often has those academic qualities associated with him or her, who also has a gifted mind and often odd quirks which people notice about the character. Very often these are quite religious people, for from my own personal experiences there are a lot of very religious people in mental health circles. Maybe it was something in Dad's DNA, or maybe it was lot more of his strict parenting from an old catholic man who, from Auntie Shirlies own words today, was quite a domineering personality, but dad was a strictly disciplined man in many ways, and very religious himself on his Catholicism, so had those often different to society aspects of his life which mark him out as different in some ways. Hopefully special ways. Dad was bright and intelligent, and his religion and occupations throughout life were a vehicle through which he could express that quiet mind and quiet thoughts, and I assume he was mostly a happy enough spiritual soul, who had a deep appreciation of his faith, and likely a strong respect and devotion to God. We went to church every single Sunday as a family, and dad was very religious about this. My sister Brigid, since Matt's death last year, now goes regularly to church as well, at Corpus Christi were mum goes and, if I had remained Catholic, the new devotion to God I found again in my early 20s would have been leading me in a very similar pathway of dad and my uncles and grandparents catholic devotion. But I found the oldest covenant, and focus my energies on Noahide faith. But I am equally as serious about my old man on religion, and have learned to appreciate Catholic faith more so now, seeing it as a development from Judaism in many ways, and dad will not find me at all slack in my prayers or biblical devotions or writings and discourse on the faith of God Almighty. I believe I have kept the family faith, and while I can't call Jesus Christ or God, I accept him still on a personal human level as a teacher of Gospel truths, and Torah, my new foundation, is eternal in my heart, the rainbow enduring from my and dad's ancient ancestor, Noah himself. I have an older faith, dad, I will tell him. Older than even old Abraham's. Hope that is good enough for you old man, but yes I am damn serious about devotion to El Shaddai as well. Yes, dad had a lot of devotion to religion, to put it bluntly, so if you actually knew him, you would know that I was raised in a very religious household, not really a fundamentalist one in attitudes, probably more in touch with a mainstream focus in society, but definitely one which accepted religion at its heart, and took God seriously when it was time for Church and Godly devotion. Mum calls herself a conservative liberal, and I think that sums up a lot of our own family's way of doing things spiritually. We take it seriously, but are not TOO dogmatic, and we can live and let live and get along with the world well enough as well. We are a grounded family, easy to get along with, generally humble and quiet and serious kind of people, but we can enjoy a good laugh like the next fellow. Yes, dad laughed a lot, and enjoyed comedies on TV, especially Dad's Army and the Two Ronnies, but even some of the more modern comedies in his older age he could have a bit of a chuckle about. As I have said, there were limits, but we are a godly family and, despite our flaws, or perhaps in spite of our flaws, we feel we give a good witness for the faith of monotheism.

Dad liked to watch movies of his era. I have a scrapbook of dad's filled with cutouts (usually from a Catholic newspaper) on old movies of the glory days of Hollywood, which he cut out and stuck into the scrapbook. He took films and had a projector (which is still in the family with a lot of his old films). He was a photographer as well, and this seemed to have been his main hobby or pastime for his life. We have lots of dad's old books on film and photography, and this is one of the legacies he has left his offspring. I remember as a kid I also had a scrapbook (an old notebook of dad's) were I took cutouts of footrot flats cartoons from the papers and pasted them in. I guess I may naturally have followed in dad's way of doing things. He liked the Marx brothers and Laurel and Hardy and things of that era quite a lot, and I remember watching 'Duck Soup' by the Marx Brothers with dad in latter times. He was an older man when he had me (mid 40s) and I always seem to remember dad being an older sort of man, a little distant in some ways, from an older era. He was conservative, and didn't meet my potential expectations I guess from school that dad's be with it and have mates they drank with and stuff like that. He was too old for that, in reality, and from a more conservative world. It is just the way it was, and I guess I didn't always connect with him in some ways because of it. A little bit distant in some ways. But his dad was in his mid 40s when he had Cyril as well, and it's like a very old generation gap separates us all. A different culture and experience of world events, a different appreciation for the struggles in life, because while I have now certainly had my own struggles, I never really saw war as a nation, or depression (which dad would have seen in his youth) or challenges like that. He would have really known the difficulties in life, and probably worked hard to shield us from those things because of it. I have grown up in Australia in a prosperous era, where recession has been the main challenge of the early 1990s, but with strong government support for welfare and social initiatives. I haven't had the challenges of life dad had in his own era, and I perhaps take a lot for granted because of it. The world turned many times over dad's life, living through the 20th century and some of the 21st. He would have seen technologies come and go and new things would have been a constant part of his experiences. He was a technical man, and in Telecom worked with emerging technologies, but its ironic that, something recent like 'Telex' is now replaced, and so suddenly, and that things come and go, not in lifetimes, but in a matter of a few years, and months even. It must have been a very challenging life to have lived in many ways, and exciting in many others, and I could well appreciate that he might have often had concerns about staying up to date in his working knowledge and things like that. But whatever challenges came his way, he worked till he retired at 65, and had 38 years of employment with PMG-Telecom upon retirement. He went the whole distance, and I am proud of him because of it. He knew CD technology in older age, though I never really saw him handle a CD, but he did listen to the music when it was put on, and he would have been well familiar with computers from the 1970s and early 1980s, probably working with various things. I don't think he had a PC as such at Telecom (not really sure on that), as the exchange was mostly other types of telecommunications technology of its day, but he would have had to stay abreast with all of that to do his job properly, and it is a credit to him that he managed to do so and not be made redundant. We had a lot of transistors of the old type in the shed (not the radios, but the transistors which went in televisions and things like that) and I feel he was probably most familiar with earlier technologies of probably the 1960s for the most part, which seemed to be a lot of his textbooks, and 1950s also, and that seems to be the era of the best of his knowledge, but he pulled through, and kept at it in his job, and managed to do various tasks for Telecom of substantial nature. Obviously, especially in this current era, and even more so in technological industries, the world changes so very quickly, and it can be frightening to constantly keep up, but thankfully he kept his knowledge relevant enough to maintain his employment, and the weekly or fortnightly wage was always paid, and the family always got by. Again, it is a credit to him for taking on the challenges of life and seeing them through for the sake of his family.

 I have other memories about Cyril Daly, but that will do for now.

 All the best.

 Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly

Loving Memories of Cyril

By Jenny Knee & Diana Archer

We remember Cyril as a gentle, humble man with incredible faith and are grateful for having known him. Praying the Angelus meant a lot to Cyril - at the end of each of our Wednesday SVdP meetings we would join with him in praying the Angelus at midday and out of love & respect, prayed it together with other Vincentians at the beginning of his funeral. With Mary’s help, Cyril attended our meetings for as long as he could. He would also attend the men’s shed while he could. Cyril was fully accepting of his illness. We remember his smile & appreciation when we would visit him in hospital or at home. We never heard him complain or say a bad word about anyone. Cyril’s love of Mary, love of his children, grandchildren and for all his family was evident and reflected in prayer. He held you all up in prayer. Cyril was forever grateful to Mary and in his prayers always used the words “Mary does everything”. Cyril was a great example of how living a life of faith; living it with love, acceptance and forgiveness can touch the lives of those around you. Cyril is remembered with great respect and with love.

The Life of Mary Philomena Daly

 A Biography by her son

Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly

with thoughts from my own life intermixed

Mary Daly was born in Kingston upon Hull in England in the United Kingdom on the 7th of July 1937. She was the third child of Tom Baker and Gladys Baker, her two older brothers being Terrence and Gerald. Mum and Terrence didn't get along terribly well she tells me, but she and Gerald seemed to get along better. Mum remembers the war years. Hull was bombed a fair bit when she was a wee little one. She saw real war devastation, but seemed to come through unscathed emotionally. She liked music a bit, and some of the stars she liked were Lonnie Donnegan and Val Doonican. She tells me she was a bit too early for the Beatles, and doesn't appear to have had much of an inclination for the music of the 1960s or later. We always had the radio on in Berridale, and she listened to that, but I don't think she really ever became much of a fan of latter music artists, although in latter years there have been some bands she likes, like 'The Priests' and she is fond of the lads 'The Justice Crew' but is not really into their music as such. More of a Father Chris Riley fan who was instrumental with the lads. She studied at a Girls Catholic School, taught by French Nuns, in Hull, and then worked in various jobs, before meeting my father Cyril Daly on a Lourdes pilgrimage in the mid 1960s. They married and Matthew, my older brother, was born on the 21st of October 1969. They lived in Jindabyne to start with in New South Wales, but then moved to Berridale, not far from there. My mum and dad are big parts of my childhood memories. There was one time when I was outside of 7 Bent Street in Berridale were we lived and I wanted to get onto the roof. I had explored the entire perimeter of the House and deduced I needed a ladder. Dad had a heavy metal blue ladder (which is currently rusting in the back yard of 29 Merriman) which I attempted to unfold to put against the house. But I was too little and got caught in between the folds of the ladder. I screamed and screamed for mum for a number of minutes, before she finally appeared. I was so thankful to her for it. She tells me that one of her memories is me coming home from school on my first day and saying ‘Thank God for That’. Mum has a definite English accent, still does, and has not yet taken out Australian Citizenship, but is a permanent resident. But she calls herself and Aussie Pom because she has lived in Australia longer than she lived in England. In Berridale we went to the Catholic Church from my earliest memories. Mum and Dad would take us in the car, the family, and I would sit there, staring at the cross, not thinking much except that it was boring. Mum and Dad prayed the rosary at home in those days and we occasionally had people over to pray at nights. Mum was in the kitchen a lot and the radio seemed to be perpetually on. I remember hearing the new songs and learning them quickly, and liking them. Mum likes some of the old artists from around the 1950s, but doesn’t really listen to them at all. She listens to classical music mainly when she listens to music.  There was a time when Grandma Gladys in England sent us a big box of stuff from England. We got lots of surprises. Mum would visit Mrs Luchetta in Berridale a lot and some of the other Berridale residents. She always seemed to be very chatty, and we would stay behind after church was finished for mum to chat to her friends, which she has never stopped doing after church and still does. I remember that Mum went into hospital a while after Greg was born, and she had a miscarriage. I figured that out in time. When Greg was little I remember wanting to hold him, but mum said Brigid would, because she was older or something like that. We travelled to Cooma via the bus when we started school. I remember one time, coming home, we had missed mum at the bus stop in Cooma and came home alone. There was a big doll she had made, and I was ever so grateful to her and hugged her for it. It meant the world to me and I really loved my mother for it. I remember riding my first bike out the front of 7 bent street on the road. Mum would look at us and I would shout ‘Watch me’ as all kids do.

We moved to Cooma around 1980 and the ‘Collins’ were across the road. We lived at 6 Bradley Street, and Mum became friends with Mrs Collins across the road, who also went to the Catholic Church. Us kids played with Peter Collins a lot, who also went to the Catholic School and was in Jacinta’s year. Peter’s cousin was David Lancaster, who was in my year. David was a pretty big guy, and I liked him, but I was never too popular with him or the other kids in the Catholic school. At times I was a little bit befriended, but not much. However, around 15 I befriended some of the kids from the Public school and had a new gang. That is were I seemed to fit in and probably explains why I eventually left Catholicism. Sort of, in my mind, Noahide equates with ‘Public Schools’ (aka State Schools in Australia), and Catholicism is for Christians. Even though, as a courtesy to Jesus, I attended the Catholic Church last Sunday (I go a couple of times a year) mainly to honour the early commitments I made as a Catholic in my youth, I really am not a believer in Catholicism or Christianity. But, in truth, Jesus, to my mind, just started a ‘Torah-Like’ ministry anyway, and the moral and ethical teachings of Jesus probably do deserve to last forever and, in a non Christian sense, he deserves to have a spiritual community based on his teaching enduring throughout eternity. Sort of a ‘Kosher Jesus friendly Assembly’ which is NON-Christian and NON-Messianic in any way, because he WASN’T the Messiah, but he taught some good ideas anyway. To my mind, he wanted to start a spiritual community, so for his evangelistic efforts he deserves some sort of permanent legacy. Jews sometimes call him one of their own and a watered down gospel could maybe one day pop up in some sort of Jewish assembly which didn’t mind Jesus on a personal human level. I had some ideas for a ‘Gospel of Jesus of Nazareth Ministries’ which removed all the ‘Christ’ ideas from Matthew Mark and Luke and all the scathing anti Jewish comments (which I think Jesus is now over with in his heavenly domain – were I do believe he lives alongside the righteous who have died) and start a Jew friendly Jesus club, for want of a better word. Someone might do that one day. 

Mum is a big Jesus fan, of course. Quite into him these days, and serves on the altar as a ‘Minister of the Eucharist’. She is FAITHFUL and has hardly missed a Sunday service in her whole life, just like my father, and my older brother Matthew. My brother Gregory goes a lot of the time as well still. I personally really wish I had a Noahide fellowship here in Canberra to attend, as I would probably go practically every day – but Noahidism is just beginning, so I concentrate on my personal studies and devotions. Mum went to ‘Galong’ in New South Wales to the various Catholic retreats at the monastery there throughout my years growing up, with Dad. We kids were bought along a few times, and it is a lovely place. You definitely notice the peace and tranquillity in the place which is through all the prayers of the saints offered up to God. I am quite sure God keeps faith with Catholics as well and loves them dearly. I just think they haven’t quite worked out yet that he isn’t a Trinity and connected to Jesus in that sense. They are two separate beings. Jehovah’s witnesses know this – Catholics will hopefully eventually work that out. But God definitely loves the faithful Catholic Church, and they are his people too. As it goes for all the people of the God of Noah and Abraham. Mum is of average height for a woman, a little bit of extra weight, which has diminished in her older age. She reads constantly, mainly thrillers and crime dramas, but other stuff as well. She watches a lot of the British television programs on crime drama, as well as being a big fan of ‘Home and Away’. Her best friend here in Canberra is ‘Trish Kirby’ who is a strong theological lady in the local Catholic Church here in Gowrie were they both attend. Trish’s husband ‘Ron’ is non-religious, but I think he is a great guy, and there grand children ‘Liam’ and ‘Noah’ are tops. Trish has been a strong friend of mums for years, and gave the eulogy a few years ago at dad’s wedding. Dad lived to 84. Mum misses him, but life goes on in the end. She keeps his photos up around the house. They were a faithful couple in their marriage – definitely took it seriously – and were great examples to me because of it.

 Religiously she is strong in the faith, without being too strict or too modernistic. She feels there is something to Christianity simply because it has continued to exist for so long. She might be right. She has standard catholic paraphernalia around the house, including a small Jesus statue, some pictures and other stuff, but doesn’t go on about it too much during the week. She studies the bible from time to time these days, and seems to be keeping the faith even stronger in her elderly years. To my mind she has definitely ‘Walked the Walk’ and has never slacked off. She is a genuine Catholic Christian. Nothing fake about her (or dad for that matter on the issue). She has worked with St Vincent de Paul society, as has dad, and done teaching of RCIA and taught religion to little kids in school. She has been quite involved with the Catholic community her whole life, and is the ‘Real McCoy’ when it comes to a practicing Catholic. She probably gets along a bit better with her daughters than her sons, but this seems to be a feminine bonding thing. But we are a strongly connected family, and it is good living here with her at 29 Merriman, despite our arguments which crop up. She gives as good as she gets, but she always knows when to give it a rest. Another of mum’s strong friends is ‘Jill Torley’ who now lives over in Western Australia. Jill writes letters to mum a lot (and she also sends me birthday cards) and we have known Jill and her family for years now. Jill is a very faithful Catholic like mum, and a big reader of the Bible as well. Jill has a few sons, and Paul Torley has been close to the family as well. Mainly in Cooma years, even though he now lives in Canberra as well like us, but he has a lot of children so is a very busy man. Jill sometimes does artwork in the letters she sends, and writes little short stories from time to time. She is quite a good artist. Of course, she trained in music and is a piano teacher. These days she is well retired from that life as far as I understand it. Mum studies a lot with father Michael Fallon’s scripture studies groups at the ‘Curtin Catholic Centre’ in Woden. Michael has written a large number of commentaries on the bible, and his translations of the text are very good. We have a copy of his ‘Isaiah’ commentary, and it illuminates the text in a way I hadn’t seen before. He is a quite competent priest, and currently is parish priest in the Kippax church. He has a website if people want to go looking for it.

 Mum likes shows like ‘Dancing with the Stars’ and likes to watch ‘Sunrise’ on channel 7 a lot. She is usually busy enough and is out most days of the week doing this or that with some group or another. She has a form of diabetes and gets medication for it, but a recent medical improvement has helped her ‘Sugar Levels’ quite a bit. She is doing well now. I think, when all is said and done, Mary Daly will likely be very happy with her life. She has led a positive, helpful life – been faithful to God with the knowledge she has – married, raised 5 good kids, and been a positive servant of the community. She has a good reputation with a lot of people and, to my way of thinking, has benefited mankind because of it. She leaves a good legacy to her offspring. When she finally passes I will do up a myspace site dedicated to her, but can’t do that because she objects to such things. But when she is dead I will do it anyway whether she likes it or not. And while she probably wouldn’t like me posting this biography online, I am going to do it anyway simply because I want to make sure she is remembered. I think, in time in the next life, she will approve of what I have done. All things considered, Mary Daly was and is and has been a good virtuous woman of God. She would be the first to say she was not perfect, but she has always cared, always loved, and always done her best. I am proud of her.

Continuing on now in 2014, me and mum are living here at 29 Merriman Crescent still. Greg (my brother) is staying with us at the moment, and working at Centrelink, trying to get things right with him and his family situation, with Christie (his wife) really wanting to live in Perth were she is from, and Greg probably preferring the east coast. But if Greg continues on in the work they will probably move over here yet again. Mum keeps her day busy with a lot of church related activities, mostly the 'Bailey's group' were they pray and chat, and some gentle exercise meetings and other things. Trish Kirby remains mum's closest friend, but Jenny Knee is also a part of her life. Of course, Brigid and Jacinta (my sister's) take up a lot of her time as does the family in general (were all her worries come from, she would tell you). Mum helped us all out recently with some money which came into the family, and a lot of work has been done on the house to improve it. New kitchen a while back and now a new bathroom and toilet and back door and painted rooms. It is looking quite good the house now, and there is work being done on the roof soon to fix up some broken tiles and other things. Recently mum was at a Galong weekend (and I think Brigid went as well) and it was run by a nun from melbourne. She enjoys her Galong retreats and they revitalize her life. Matt's death (my brother) last year affected mum strongly, but life moves on (as she said the other day) and time heals things I guess. The death in the family has been accepted and Mum is strong and has coped with it. She visits the Cemetery were Dad is buried with Matt from time to time and has a few quiet thoughts for them. They are buried in the Queanbeyan Lawn cemetery, just near the Jerrabomberra township, which is not that far from Macarthur were we live actually. Mum continues to read her thriller books quite a bit, which is how she occupies herself, and his been knitting all sorts of things recently. Some of them have been for people in East Timor (and she asked me were that was) to help them out. A lot of her time is knitting and reading and watching TV and usually she makes the evening meal for the family. She enjoys watching TV a lot, and channel 7Two is probably her favourite. Most mornings she watches 'Sunrise' on channel 7 with David Koch and Natalie Barr and Samantha Armytage and co, and she enjoys that greatly. I usually sit with her for a while and watch a lot of it as well (and its a great show, channel 7. Really well done). She usually watched the Morning Show with Larry Emdur and Kylie Gillies aftewards, but recently has been watching Studio 10 or whatever it is called on channel 10 for something new. The mid day movie is commonly watched and Escape to the Country, Bargain Hunt and then things like My Kitchen Rules and Masterchef are very popular. The British Crime stuff like Inspector Morse and Endeavour and Jack Frost and others are always watched, as well as Midsomer Murders and Poirot. All Saints we have been watching recently in the afternoon, and City Homicide, and she enjoys 'A Place Called Home' on 7 on sunday nights a great deal. Very good show again channel 7. TV has been a big part of mum's life for a long time now, because it gives you something to do and keeps you informed. Her life is really quite balanced on how she spends it and she seems happy enough. There are usually outings from time to time with Brigid, especially places like Gold Creek were they buy things they like and they have gone to England 3 times now (I think) in recent years, and have returned with lots of knick-knacks. She spends time talking with the neighbours, including Bernadette across the road, Doreen and David Grima next door, who have always been faithful friends, and Diana Archer down the street in lower Macarthur. Mum is generally a conservative lady and doesn't approve of a lot of my musical tastes. And she obviously has somewhat conservative views on sexual morals and thinks shows on TV push it a bit too much on various issues from time to time. I tend to think she is somewhat a product of her era (as a lot of older people are I guess), and perhaps doesn't easily connect with the idea that our latter generations have, in general, a lot more liberal standards. But she gets along with the world and the culture well enough and is happy enough and is by no means a fish out of water. I should probably take Solomon's advice more and listen to the wisdom of my mother more, because she probably knows what she is talking about.

Mum was telling me today (Shrove Tuesday 2016) about how when she was younger she used to attend the Shrove Tuesday Fancy Dress party at her Church, Sacred Heart Church, in Hull. She went as a Red American Indian a couple of times, and had cocoa on her face, and her brother Terrence went one year as a Cowboy singing a song, and her brother Gerald went one year in a Dutch girls outfit. Today me and mum had pancakes, and this really begins the religious season of Lent, which starts tomorrow on Ash Wednesday. She was recalling some childhood memories on the subject. In the last while mum and me and have visited my sister Brigid's place in Calwell for dinner a couple of times. The first time Brigid's whole family was there and we had a lovely chicken and bacon dish, a risotto of some kind. The other night Brigid invited us over again, and we had pork chops with potato and honey carrots. We watched 'Our Zoo' on ABC, which I really enjoyed, but mum mostly read her book. I think she is still reading the same one, which is a Wilbur Smith book, one of her favourite authors. At the moment mum is in very good health, looking at her, seems strong enough in both her mind and body, but she sometimes forgets minor things. It doesn't appear to be Alzheimers though or anything like that really – mainly just older age. She's quite a strong lady still, and it feels like she will be around for quite some time yet. Recently she went with Trish Kirby to see the movie 'Joy' which was alright as she put it. In the middle of last year she visited England again with Brigid, and had a good time, and this year her brother Gerald is probably going to be staying with us here in Canberra, and with the strong possibility Greg and his family will be coming over from Perth for Christmas over here, it will be a big family gathering Christmas this year. All in all mum is doing well at this time in February in 2016. Anyway, I will continue on with this again some time and share a few more details about my life with Mary Daly from younger years.

It's the 2nd of July 2016, and I have some new stuff on mum. It's been a sedate enough last 6 months for mum here at 29 Merriman Crescent. Mostly life as usual. She got involved with a Special Catholic Presentation group on 'The Dark Night of the Soul' for a little bit, and we had a chat on that. She shared some of the ideas of how life usually is a travel up to God on top of the spiritual mountain in the traditional view, but in the Dark Night of the Soul view, there are periods were you dip right down for a while, in soulsearching melancholia, before regaining your ground and continuing on upwards. There seemed to be some truth in that idea from my perspective. She mentioned that in her Baileys group she's getting a little bored now with some of the conversations, one of the reasons being that they don't really discuss Vinnies work much anymore, and just chat about life. They'll now only be doing the group twice a month, in the first and third week of each month, instead of every week. Mum likes to share anecdotes of her life story with me regularly, and talks about people from church and her friends and family she grew up with. We continue to watch shows like Bargain Hunt and Family Feud, and we are enjoying Masterchef Australia quite a lot, which is probably the best show we watch together a bit, but I'm in my room a lot of the time. Today she is off voting, and says she will probably vote for Labour, but might vote for the Christian party. We chatted about things, and I suggested she should vote for the party which best represents her values, and she said that was probably the Labour party. She is shopping also this afternoon, which she usually does about once per week, and Trish Kirby usually, but not always, shops with her. It's Woolworths more often than not, but sometimes Aldi and Coles as well. Nearly always in Tuggeranong somewhere, and Erindale has long been the place she likes to go. Her, Trish and Matt used to do the shopping after church each Sunday nearly every week, but since Matthew died a few years back, and recently since Trish has starting going to another Catholic Church in Tuggeranong, things are on no set pattern for when she gets the shopping done, and she just gets it done when she can. I have a little bit of a winge when we're running low, but she tells me its not easy, and she does the best she can do. She's great though, and at 78, soon turning 79 (just a few days away on the 7th), she's in good health, and can appear to still do the things she does physically well enough. She's not an olympic athlete by any means at her age, but she's no couch potato either. Mostly her health is good, and she's a strong and determined lady to live out life to the very end. She's no quitter. Her Baileys group friends gave her some nice birthday presents the other day, and Jenny Knee made a nice cake, which I got to eat most of when she brought it home, as she didn't really fancy it. She's going to England yet again next year, and of course her brother Gerald will be visiting us and staying with us here in Canberra later on in the year for about 3 months. Mum is a content lady, has no plans for ever moving house again, and is completely settled here at 29 Merriman. Her life is still full and active enough, and I sense she is mostly happy with the fortunes of her children. She has concerns that Alan (Jacinta's husband) is a bit too selfish, but she does say she likes him. Arguments between us aren't terribly fierce much anymore, and we are always on talking terms even right after a tiff. We get along well enough as a family, and life is good enough for the most part at the moment in the life of Mary Philomena Daly nee Baker.

That's all for now.

A Poem written by Mary Daly mid 2017.

"Age" by Mary Daly

Is it the years that pass us by,
Or is it the memories of us as a child?
Our age is a number, what does that mean?
Is it the time passed that we have seen?
A boy of seven and a man eighty-three
No matter how long the years have gone,
Age is a number, just let it be.

Copyright 2017 Mary Daly

Loving Thoughts of Mary

by Jenny Knee & Diana Archer

When we think of Mary we can’t help but smile and be grateful for her friendship.

She is a steadfast friend, has a good sense of humour, has a great memory for birthdays and is exceedingly generous.

We have a laugh each time we remember Mary travelling to Perth by plane with the Christmas turkey, still frozen, on her lap. She knew it would be defrosted and ready to cook by the time she got there!!

Thinking of Mary, we remember her love of and devotion to Cyril. She was determined to nurse him at home where she believed he wanted to be and with help was able to do so.

When we see teapots we can’t help but think of Mary as she loved collecting them, especially if they were from the UK.

She loves to travel and often reminisces on times past and journeys travelled.

Thinking of Mary we also picture her many colourful rugs, beanies, baby jumpers & booties knitted and crocheted so quickly for those in need.

We also think of Mary wearing good shoes because “it is important to look after your feet by wearing good shoes”. Her Mother taught her that. She has a taste for good things and an eye for colour. She knows what she likes and is quick at making decisions. Once that decision is made she is happy with it.

Mary is known for her honesty. We trust her to always give an honest opinion or answer, even if it is something we may not want to hear. We value this in Mary.

Mary is loyal to her family & friends, is forgiving and is accepting of what life throws at her.

She rolls with the punches. Like Cyril, Mary has great faith and is often heard saying “leave it in God’s hands” and praying “Thank God for all the good things that have happened during the week”.

Mary loves her friends and loves her family - she feels pain for others, cares for and puts other first. She only wants the best for us all. When good comes her way, Mary wants to share it with others.

We have been blessed with Mary & Cyril in our lives.

The Life of Gregory Peter Francis Daly

A brief bio by his Big Brother Danny Daly

Copyright 2015.

Gregory Peter Francis Daly was born on the 14th of February 1976 in Cooma Hospital, New South Wales, Australia, the third son of Cyril Aloysius Daly and Mary Philomena Daly nee Baker. Greg had two older brothers, Matthew Joseph Anthony Daly (born 21st of October 1969 in Cooma Hospital) and Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly (born 20th of November 1972 in Hull Maternity Hospital, England), as well as two older sisters, Brigid (born 26th of October 1971) and Jacinta (born 8th of January 1974) both also born in Cooma hospital. All five children are the children of Cyril and Mary. Greg's first home was 7 Bent street in Berridale. He is a redhead, and I remember us holding him in the back yard when he was little. Greg was bright - straight away at school he was academic, and the brains in the family. Excellent at mathematics, technically minded like his father. Greg went on the family holidays like us all to Tathra and the East coast of NSW. He played with me and Peter Collins a lot of the time in Cooma, were we lived in the 1980s, at 6 Bradley Street. I remember Greg had a Transformers dinobot which I was always jealous of. Greg liked dinosaurs a lot as a kid, and he had a star chart globe later on which lit up the ceiling of a room with the constellations from a lamp inside it. He played armymen with me constantly as a kid, and we played cricket in the back yard for years. Greg was reasonably popular at school, and had friends, and had a crush on a 'Chelsea Mensch' he once told me. Greg would go to the river Murrumbidgee with us and swim. He would also go with me and Matt and Gerard Bryant to a river just beyond Numerella a lot as a kid, which had a whirlpool sort of mini rock falls, and it was great fun. Greg read the same sorts of fantasy books I read in his teens, and he read all of Alan Dean Fosters 'Spellsinger' series (6 volumes) which I owned but never got around to reading, and he also read Mike Jeffries 'Loremasters of Elundium' series which I also owned but never got around to reading. Of course, he read the Belgariad books, and loved them like me and Matt, and he probably read 'The Twilight Realm' by Christoper Carpenter but I can't remember for sure. He's a big Star Wars fan like me, and owns the original trilogy on video Cassette. He is musical, like me, at the keyboard primarily, and has advanced to level 4, but says its too much time and practice to bother with going anymore. Greg married Christie Gonzaga a number of years back, and they have one son James Adelino Cyril Daly. Recently Greg was in England with mum (who is still there on a 7 week holiday) with James, and he had a good time. Mum reported James came out of his shell a lot, and took a shining to Josie, Madelenes friend. Greg has degrees in commerce/economics sort of field and philosophy I think and a grad dip in accounting from memory, and has recently studied aged care to work in that field. He worked in the Public Service here in Canberra for a number of years, as well as in Perth were he currently lives, but didn't like it much. He has worked at Woolworths a fair bit, and worked for YCW (Young Christian Workers) for quite a while before his other main jobs. He met Kylie Letham (I think that is her surname) in YCW and dated her for a while, but that didn't last, and he met Christie in YCW also I think, and ended up marrying her. Greg has remained Catholic his whole life, and went to St Pats in Cooma from kindie to year 8 I think, but then Marist brothers in Canberra when we moved to Canberra in 1990. He might have done year 8 in Marist - I can't remember for sure. Greg composes, and has written several piano melodies in his time, as well as working on a concerto/symphony sort of work. He also has recorded a song called 'Holiday' with Christie on vocals, and its an ok pop song. Greg listens to a moderate amount of modern music, but is not huge on CDs. He likes TV a fair bit, and supports Carlton in the AFL, Australia in the Cricket, and the Bulldogs in the Rugby League like me and Alan Bradley, our sister Jacinta's husband. Greg has seen them play live a number of times, and we've both seen them play live the Canberra Raiders here in Canberra. Greg had a go at writing a few years back a Sci Fi work called the 'Sentopol Wars'. His grammar needed work, but he had good ideas for Sci Fi. I think he can write ok, but needs to wait till later on in life when he has more knowledge and experience. He has capabilities in this area. Greg has a good friend who worked with him in Tax here in Canberra called Terrence, and I am a friend of Terrence as well. We went to Terrences place in North Canberra a number of years ago with mum, and had a good time. Terrence lives with his mum and dad. Greg drinks beer, and is known to occasionally get intoxicated, but he's no drunkard. He's a good brother, and I think life will ultimately work out ok for Greg. He has family, a home they are paying off, and things are ok for him. I am sure he himself would want things to be perfect, but that's just the way of life for some of us, isn't it. Greg's a good bloke, and a good brother.   Written Monday 14th of November 6179 SC / 2016 CE. Gregory is now working aged care, doing work going to peoples homes to help them with their activities. He studied aged care earlier this year, and left his public service job because it wasn't working out for him. They had rented a place in Perth where they were living, and were renting out their home, but now he is again living in his Forrestfield address with his family. Greg occasionally goes fishing in Mandurah near Perth with his father-in-law Adelino, and sometimes with his wife. Greg has mentioned to me that Christie, his wife, is a bit of a feminist, and from personal observations she is concerned on women's issues somewhat. Greg is continuing to work on his story 'The Sentopol Wars', and he emailed me a recent update which had shown a lot more story development and growth. He intends to finish it eventually. He has a website on youtube which has a couple of videos on it, and uses Facebook. Greg will be coming to Canberra for Christmas time this year, and staying for about 3 weeks. Other anecdotes from Greg's life, my mother has shared with me, include he played the Glockenspiel at St Pats school. He did a major project with Ben Peacock on currencies at school. Ben was a good friend of Greg's and he visited him once (perhaps more) in Goulburn where the Peacocks moved to. (as an aside the Peacocks used to send us a yearly letter they mailed out to family and friends on what had been happening in their lives). Christopher Peacock, Ben's father, was Greg's sponsor for his Catholic Confirmation, and they celebrated the confirmation night dinner at the Chinese Restaurant at the 4 mile outside of Cooma. Greg took the confirmation name of 'Paul' when he was confirmed that day. When Greg was in England as a kid with mum on holiday they once visited the Hull Little Theatre to see the King and I. Uncle Gerald also took Greg down south and they visited a monastery as well as Oxford and London.   

The Life of Peter Paul Daly

A Mini Biography by his Grand-Son

Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly

I never met Peter Paul. He died before I was born. Dad (Cyril) tells me he was a hard man, and I get the feeling dad didn’t appreciate it that much. I think dad said he had a taste for classical music, so he must have had some records. Mum also told me that Peter Paul played the fiddle, so obviously he had a fondness of music. Peter Paul was the son of Peter Daly, who worked as a Grocer in Mullingar (who dad recalls as also being Peter Paul Daly) and Maria Daly nee Molloy, and he was born in Earl Street, Mullingar in Ireland on the 6th of July 1876. Peter Paul's father, Peter Daly, was on the Town Council of Mullingar, serving as Chairman of the Board from 1888 to 1899. Of Course, Peter Paul Daly was born at Earl Street in Mullingar. Also from that time period we have this online record of Denis Daly and his family. The address was 3 Earl Street in Mullingar from the 1911 Census. Denis was born about 1857, which potentially makes him a brother of 'Peter Daly' the Town Commissioner, due to the Earl Street Residence were Peter Paul Daly was born.

Peter Paul Daly was baptized into the Roman Catholic Church on the 11th of July 1876. Funnily enough my brother Gregory was born 100 years after Grand-pa, in 1976. At one point in Peter's life he worked as a Tutor in Orange, NSW and at another he worked as a cellarman in one of the Pubs on one of the main streets of Sydney (ie Pitt or Elizabeth or York street or something like that). Peter married Mary Ann McLean (born 26th of June 1885 in Sydney, the daughter of Duncan McLean and Mary McLean nee Finn) at St Mary's Cathedral in Sydney on the 10th of February 1908. Joseph Daly, his brother, witnessed the marriage and signed on the certificate. They had 1 girl, Molly, followed by 9 boys (in no particular order) Stan, Keith, Frank, Leo, Vincent, Cyril, Brian, Peter & Kevin, followed by another girl, Philomena who was last of all. Here at 29 Merriman crescent we have a photo of Peter Paul with some of his boys, as well as a photo of him with his wife (my grandmother) Mary Ann. Peter lived at 43 Arden Street in Clovelly in Sydney where the family was initially raised in Cyril's years, and it would have been a tight fit with so many children. The whole family was Roman Catholic, and it appears they were quite religious and Grandfather probably went to church every Sunday like dad. His son Leo was a Marist Brother, and the whole Clan were involved with Church throughout their lives and kept the faith. I remember going along to St Vincent de Paul with uncle Kevin in Sydney one time, and that uncle Frank went to the latin mass later on in life. Each of the Daly boys seemed actively involved with the Church. Peter Paul used to go to Mass every morning, and he would read the papers in the park before work. He went to Mass up in Waverly at Immaculate Heart instead of Arden Street church, because he preferred those priests who wore the brown habits. At home in Arden street, it was a small 2 bedroom place, with a lounge room, and the family would sit in the kitchen, while Peter Paul sat alone in the lounge room very often. An anecdote from the family is that every afternoon, on radio 2BL, Peter Paul would be listening and 'God save the King' would come on the radio at 4 O'Clock, and he would storm down the hallway in a huff (In true Irish fashion). Auntie Shirlie provided that anecdote for me. His wife Mary Ann died on the 5th of July 1939 at 43 Arden Street, and this was recorded in the Sydney Morning Herald in the obituaries on Thursday the 6th of July 1939 (available to view online). There was a requiem mass for the repose of her soul held at St Anthony's church, Clovelly, on the Thursday morning at 9 O'Clock. The funeral party would leave the church, after Mass, for the Botany Cemetery. By request there would be no flowers. According to online records found at the 'Ancestry' website, Peter lived at Waverly in Sydney in 1915, Coogee in Sydney in 1930, Coogee in Sydney in 1937, Waverly in Sydney in 1943 and Clovelly in Sydney in 1963. He died on the 20th of June 1965 aged 88. Grandpa Peter has 'Daly' features in photos of him from younger years, and I can see were his son's get their looks. I am grateful to my grandfather for having my father, and without him I would not be here. I am sure he is in the heavenlies, receiving his reward and enjoying his rest, and my prayers and best wishes are for him.

 Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly 

The Life and Times of Thomas Joseph Baker

A Mini Biography by his Son, written for his Nephew Daniel Thomas Andrew Daly upon request

Gerald Baker

(Copyright Gerald Baker, Thomas Joseph Baker & the Catholic Church 2014 AD)

Your Grand-dad was born on the 9th of September 1902 in West Hartlepool, the son of Terence & Ann (Formely O'Neil) and was baptized at St Joseph's Church West Hartlepool. He has one brother, John (The Father of Theresa). If you are interested your mother will tell you about her. He had a sister called Kitty, the mother of Mary Haswell In Brisbane, and another sister called Celia, who had a son named Terence and was a Thames Pilot but he died some time ago. His mother died young. He may have had other sisters but I can not remember, but your mother might. I presume he attended a Catholic school, may be St Josephs. After he left school I don't know what he did, but in 1928 he must have been working in the Steel Works because he declared 'Personan Non Grata' so was out of work. I can't understand this as he was a very gentle man and I can hardly see him as a firebrand leader. Anyway, he then came to Hull. His sister Kitty had married a fellow called William Tongue who worked on Railway and had been moved to Hull. Your Grand-dad had hoped to get a job on the Railway but ha had poor eyesight, so they would not employ him. So he became a bricklayer labourer. He then met and married your Grand-ma and eventually Terence, myself and your mother came along. They lived at 27 Brazil Street Hull where I was born ( I can not understand why there is not a Blue Plaque on the door!) They then moved to 89 Newbridge Road but then the war started and we got bombed out, so we had to move to 58 Preston Road and live there for the next 30 odd years. Your Grand-dad then changed jobs and worked at Benningas Margarine Factory. I think he left the building trade because he suffered from Rheumatics in his legs and I think working outside in all Weather didn't help. He then worked for a ship repair company and finally for the Docks Board, again as a bricklayer labourer until he retired. Your grandfather was a devout Catholic and after he retired he and your Grandma attended Mass every morning. Your Grandma had done that most of her married life. That reminds me, while he was still working he used to call in at the church on his way and leaving work to stoke the boiler to keep the church warm. He also washed the church windows which must have been hard work because they had leaded lights. After he retired we moved to 18 Ganstead Lane. It was a Bungalow with a big garden which he kept tidy. Like me he had no great love for gardening. His great joy was playing with your cousin Caroline and when your mother came with Brigid and Matthew he was in his element, playing with Matthew and trying to get Brigid to sleep. I think he had a happy few years in retirement, but when he was 76 he became ill and died in Kingston General Hospital, Beverly Road on the 29th of August 1978. Well that's about all I can remember. Your mother might be able to fill in some more or ask her to have a word with our of Mary Haswell's daughers. They may have a family tree of the Baker Family. I am enclosing a copy of the 1871 Census which gives detail of your great grand parents, and maybe your great great grandmother.

Gerald Baker

2014 AD