Maggie Dickinson

“Dad took me to see his sister once, my Aunty Flossy. She lived in St. Kilda. I must have been 2 or 3. I remember her couch. When I’m in St. Kilda, I become very still and when I look up at the lamps in the middle of Fitzroy Street I can superimpose my memory on them. The St. Kilda station, and the feel of being held in my father’s arms, him wearing his camelhair overcoat. My uncle [A.L.] Ayscough wrote a book about a crocodile named Allie [The Story of Allie the Crocodile: A few pages of laughter for youths and adults, 1931]. Thus, Allie the Crocodile, who visited Melbourne, swam in the Merri Creek, and gave kids rides across; sat on the island outside Emily Mac in Spring Street and went off with the Flying Doctor Service. The book was illustrated by Dad. It was sold at the price of 1 shilling. All the money went to the Hospitals in Melbourne. Our vestibule was filled with certificates of thanks from the hospitals.”

These are some of the earliest memories Suzi Dickinson had of her dad, recorded in a treasured scrapbook along with photos and other mementos of her childhood.

George Dickinson (1896–1952) was all-round man of the theatre. As a youngster he trod the boards alongside his sisters, Flossie and Maggie, and on returning from active duty during WWI, he performed in vaudeville, prior to becoming a respected cinema manager in the 1920s.

Born George Whitla Dickinson in Fitzroy, Melbourne, he was the son of Fenton Kerr Dickinson, grocer, and his wife Ida Elizabeth (née Faberg). George was the youngest of a family of four siblings: Fenton Carl (b.1886), Thomas Leslie Burgh (b.1888), Florence (Flossie) (b.1890) and Margaret (Maggie) (b.1894). As children, possibly encouraged by their mother, the three youngest children studied dancing with Jennie Brenan, and were seasoned professionals working with leading companies before they were out of their teens. Ida Elizabeth was listed as a theatre professional and may have gone on tour with the children.

George received his first ‘notice’ in 1906, when as one of Jennie Brenan’s pupils, he performed in a children’s version of the comic opera La Poupée, playing the character of Loremois. Another notice finds him at the Town Hall at Castlemaine in October 1907 performing in the Japanese operetta The Grey Kimona, alongside his sisters. In this review he is listed as one of the ‘fun’ makers along with the rest of the cast. And later the same month, when the company reached Broken Hill, he is mentioned ‘with credit’ for his impersonation of Harusatu, a soldier of the Damio.

Sheet music for ‘Ma Zu-Zu’ from The Fatal Wedding, with Maggie Dickinson on the cover, 1906

National Library of Australia, Canberra

Maggie Dickinson on the cover of the sheet music for ‘Red Poppy Dance’ from Cinderella, 1914–15

National Library of Australia, Canberra

But it was Maggie and Flossie who were to become the ‘stars’ of Dickinson family. Maggie had been in The Fatal Wedding when Meynell and Gunn staged the first production at Melbourne in March 1906. At the centre of the play is the melodramatic story of an illicit wedding, however it was a sub-story of a band of singing and dancing children that caught the popular imagination. Meynell and Gunn engaged F. Wynne Jones to compose new songs for the children. Dubbed the ‘Tin Can Band’, the children created a sensation, and the play ran for a month in Melbourne. At the conclusion of the season, the company toured throughout Australia and New Zealand with huge success. 

George may have been one of the forty or so children in the ‘Tin Can Band’, but it seems unlikely given his appearance in La Poupée in September 1906, when the Fatal Wedding company were still on tour. Maggie was most definitely one of the singing and dancing ragamuffins, earning a place on the cover of the sheet music for one of the songs from the show—‘Ma Zu-Zu’—for which she received excellent reviews. During the Hobart leg of the tour, for instance, she was described as a ‘young marvel … Her singing of “Ma Zu-Zu” was better than that of many an applauded “grown up”.’

Due to the success of the ‘Tin Can Band’, Meynell and Gunn employed F. Wynne Jones to compose a one- act operetta especially for the troupe. Featuring a libretto by Bulletin cartoonist D.H. Souter, it was called The Grey Kimona. The play toured throughout New South Wales, South Australia, and Victoria during 1907. The bill was augmented by scenes from The Fatal Wedding (featuring the Tin Can Band) and several Bioscope pictures. George and his sisters were most definitely part of this troupe.

After a visit to Australia in 1909 from Field Marshal Kitchener, who recommended that the country needed a stronger defence force, the Defence Act of 1910 was passed which made it compulsory for all boys aged 12–14 to sign up for junior cadet training and boys aged 14–18 to join the senior cadets. In 1911, George Dickinson became a cadet and was sent to the Broadmeadows Camp for training.

George’s older sisters continued their stage careers appearing in J.C. Williamson productions. During 1912–13, Maggie was in the pantomime Puss in Boots; and the following year, 1913–14, she played the Spirit of the Cave in The Forty Thieves. In 1914–15, she was principal dancer in the Red Poppy ballet in Cinderella. In 1913, she had danced for visiting prima ballerina of the Imperial Russian Ballet, Adeline Genée, to great praise.

Likewise, Flossie achieved success in musical comedies, including The Belle of Mayfair, The Arcadians, and The Count of Luxembourg. In January 1914, however, she left the stage to marry Charles A. Wenman, an associate director and producer for J. C. Williamson’s. The couple would have two children, Patricia (b.1914) and Sunday (b.1919).

When the UK officially declared war against Germany on 4 August 1914, seventeen-year-old Cadet Sergeant Major George Dickinson required permission from his father to join the Australian Imperial Force. The following year, in March 1915, aged eighteen years and five months, he enlisted as an engineer. On his form, his occupation is recorded as ‘Electrician’.

George in uniform

Suzi Dickinson collection

1st Australian General Hospital at Heliopolis

Australian War Memorial, Canberra

George’s service record shows that he joined the 2nd Pioneer Battalion, 24th Battalion, 6th Australian Infantry Brigade. On the 8 May 1915, the 24th, 21st, 22nd and the 23rd Battalions marched out of Broadmeadows Camp and then took the train to Port Melbourne to begin their journey to the front. The HMAT Euripides was originally fitted out to carry ‘136 officers, 2204 other ranks and 20 horses’ and transported the young soldiers of the Australian Imperial Force and other ‘reinforcements to battalions serving in Gallipoli, Egypt, and on the Western Front’. An entry from a diary kept by one of the soldiers on the same ship described the following about their experience:

By 30 May, 3 weeks out to sea and 5 soldiers had died in the past 6 days; 1 of sunstroke and 4 others of pneumonia. Several others lay in the ship’s hospital—given ‘little hope’ by the doctors … By June 11, the Euripides had sailed through the Red Sea and Suez Canal and reached Alexandria … Soon after, the 6th brigade was at their base in Heliopolis, about 3 miles from Cairo. The daily routine consisted of Reveille at 4am, Parade from 5–8am, a lecture in the large tent from 10.30am–12 and more Parade from 4.30–7.30pm.

Dysentery was rife in the training camps around Cairo and by 22 July 1915, George was dangerously ill and had been admitted to the 1st Australian General Hospital at Heliopolis, converted from the Palace Hotel. The next entry on 10 September 1916, the record shows that he disembarked at the training camp at Mudros, Alexandria, transferring to B company with British Expeditionary Force at the Suez Canal on 4 March 1916.

A response from the Australian War Memorial team to the query concerning his whereabouts from the date of his release from the hospital to his reassignment with his battalion to go to Europe on the Western Front, suggested George was recorded as ‘out of danger’ on 15 August 1915 and as a result ‘he was likely to have been sent to Gallipoli as he had recovered and assessed as available for duty’. The 2nd Division was formed in July in order to take part in the post–August evacuation of the troops from Gallipoli until 15 September when they were sent to the Western Front in Europe ‘where it had the distinction of taking part in the final ground action fought by Australian troops in the war’.

Soldiers working on decoy heads

Australian War Memorial, Canberra

On the Western Front, showing the misshapen camouflage trees

Australian War Memorial, Canberra

Camouflage trees in the workshop

Imperial War Museum, London

The trees on the battlefield

Imperial War Museum, London

Records indicate that George disembarked at Marseilles 28 August 1916 and made his way to the 2nd Australian School in Flesselles near Fromelles on the Western Front returning on 10 January 1917, and he was detached from duty with 2nd Pioneer Battalion to go to a training camp in Fovant, England, for special training in the field. This information is followed on the record by a stamp with the words: ‘With Unit France 12.6.18’. On 22 June, George is reported as ‘Detached with Division Camouflage School’ and from 24 August to 14 September he is shown as ‘Detached with Camouflage Office’. Finally on 1 October he proceeded from Folkestone to Le Havre in France, marching out on 6 October to rejoin 2nd Pioneers Battalion in the field.

The French Army created the first dedicated unit to train soldiers to use various techniques for ‘camouflage’ which is a French word meaning ‘dress for the stage’. The people who practiced this art were ‘camoufleurs’. Photographs of these studios include people making ‘decoy’ heads used to pinpoint the position of snipers and construction of false trees as observation positions where in some cases, existing trees were removed, copied and replaced, fitted out for an observer. The French camouflage unit with studio was in Amiens only 12 miles from George’s billet at Flesselles.

The Armistice was signed in on 11 November 1918 at LeFranc port near Compiègne, beginning the negotiations to end the war. Remembrance Day commemorates this day at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. However, the fighting did not cease immediately. On 9 January 1919, George was hospitalised again. Remaining at the front, he took part in Concert party duties, possibly drawing on his many skills acquired through his theatrical experience of touring and being on the stage. He returned to Australia on 5 June 1919 on HMAT Mahia. The Treaty of Versailles which officially ended World War I, was signed on 28 June 1919.

Sidney Culverhouse and Maggie Dickinson

HAT Archive

Maggie Dickinson

HAT Archive

The young soldier returned to Melbourne and renewed his connections with the entertainment industry. Family anecdote has it that during the early 1920s, as Dickie Dickinson, he was performing as a singer and comedian in vaudeville at the Melbourne Tivoli. At this time, live theatre was struggling as a new form of entertainment was capturing the public’s imagination: the ‘moving pictures’. Though they had been around since the late-1890s, there was a growing sophistication in the movies being produced and the American movie industry, with its centre in Hollywood, saw Australia as a lucrative market. To cater for the demand, new theatres were being constructed throughout the cities and suburbs. This period saw the growth of the cinema chain, which provided the mechanism for the films to be distributed and screened. As theatre promoters vied for the attention of cinemagoers, the selection of films was just as important as the comfort of patrons. And as the decade wore on, the introduction of ‘talkies’ made it even more important for theatres to be fitted with the latest equipment to ensure state-of-the-art picture and sound quality.

Lygon Theatre, East Brunswick, photographed in the 1940s

State Library Victoria, Melbourne

Melbourne’s movie men. George is four along on the second back row.Everyone’s, 22 October 1924, p. 24

Trove

George joined Melbourne’s growing list of ‘movie men’ in the early 1920s. One of his first roles was as clerk of works, on the construction of the Lygon Theatre at 186 Lygon Street, East Brunswick. The new building, which was part of Frank Thring Sr’s Electric Theatres chain, was designed by Ballantyne & Hare, Melbourne-based architects who would go on to design Hoyts’ flagship Regent Theatres in Melbourne and Sydney. Opening in 1924, the Lygon Theatre proved very popular, and when Thring’s Electric Theatres merged with Hoyts’ Pictures in 1926 to form Hoyts Picture Theatres, it became part of Australia’s two largest cinema chains, the other being Greater Union. The same year that the Lygon opened, George was photographed with a group of fellow theatre managers. On 18 March 1925, Everyones wrote glowingly of the new Lygon Theatre:

A visit to the New Lygon Theatre, East Brunswick, proved most interesting. This theatre, which was built fourteen months ago, is unique in some respects, among the picture theatres in Australia. It accommodated 1600 people and has no dress circle, yet each patron has an uninterrupted view of the screen. …The Lygon Theatre can boast of fine lighting effects and a good stage with modern lighting. The interior of the theatre has received the Adams’ Decorate treatment; the walls being daintily picked out in light buff and Wedgewood blue. … Manager George Dickinson, a brother of the famous Maggie, presides over the house in an able manner and nothing is left undone for the comfort of patrons.

Earlier, in 1921, Maggie Dickinson, who had become a principal dancer with J.C. Williamson’s, married her dancing partner Sidney Culverhouse (also known as Sidney Yates). They had a huge showbusiness wedding, with guests including Gladys Moncrieff and the Tait brothers. George was best man. Immediately following their wedding, they departed for England on honeymoon and to further their careers. During her ten years abroad, Maggie appeared at the London Coliseum and Alhambra, and on the Continent. She would return to Australia triumphantly in 1932 to supervise the ballets and dances in Bitter Sweet and Waltzes from Vienna.

Alhambra Theatre, Brunswick

cinematreasures.org

George’s window display promoting the horror movie Frankenstein.From Everyone’s, 31 August 1932, p.26

Trove

In June 1928, after four years at the Lygon, George is reported to be manager at the Empire Theatre in Bourke Street, Melbourne. He may also have spent time at the Regent, Fitzroy and Trocadero, Footscray.

In 1928, George married Ella (Ula) May Reid in Melbourne. Ula worked as an English teacher, but she was also a pianist who improvised for silent films. It is likely that the couple had settled in Brunswick, for by May 1931, George is managing the Alhambra Theatre at 828 Sydney Road, a position he held until 1934.

At the Alhambra, George was a popular and well-liked manager, and his inventive window displays, used to advertise the current films, were often commented upon in the pages of Everyones. In 1932, for instance, he created an atmospheric window display to publicise the horror movie Frankenstein, and in 1933, for the bush comedy On Our Selection, he decorated a window to resemble a farm with gum trees, koalas, and rabbits.

At this time, family anecdote has it that he worked with Melbourne-based sculptor Ola Cohn, when she started working on the ‘Fairy Tree’, which was installed in the Fitzroy Gardens in East Melbourne in 1934 as a contribution to the centenary of Victoria. At some stage, Cohn made a model of George’s head in plaster which was finished with her signature bronze patina. Under her guidance, George also produced a fine patinated bust of his sister Maggie.

Ula and George on their wedding day, 1928

Suzi Dickinson collection

A self-portrait of George

Suzi Dickinson collection

In 1935, George left the Alhambra and returned to the Lygon, where he remained until the outbreak of war. By this time, he had two children, Georgina Ola (b.1930) and Margaret Florence (b.1933). A third child, Carl Reid, was born in 1935, but died soon after his birth. Ten years later, in 1945, the couple would have another child, Suzi.

The family tradition of raising funds for worthy causes was reported on the 25 April 1934, when The Bulletinannounced that ‘Sunday Wenman solo-danced and the committee dashed about all night with hot soup and oysters’ at the Rose Ball at the ‘barn-like’ Forty Club raising money for the Melbourne Hospital.

The Argusalso reported on 7 June 1939 that George Dickinson was a member of the organising committee for the Gala Show at the Princess Theatre, raising money for the Children’s Hospital. The event also featured an exhibition by the pupils of J.C. Williamson’s dance instructor Jennie Brenan who trained generations of outstanding young dancers, including George and his sisters.

George during his time at Hoyts

Suzi Dickinson collection

Later in the year, Australia officially entered World War II on 3 September 1939—and George was keen to do what he could for the war effort.

Drawing on his skill as a manager, performer and cartoonist, he organised events, encouraged recruitment and raised money for the support and care of returned soldiers and the local hospitals.

In June 1940, for example, articles in The Argusand The Heralddescribed fund raising efforts by medical orderly Private George W. Dickinson, who having established the ‘Black and White Canteen’ (the unofficial sketching syndicate of the AIF), was raising money for the Comfort Fund by drawing humorous sketches of incidents in the medical examination room and selling them for £1 each.

During his second round of war service, George was based at the Royal Park Camp in Melbourne.

On 28 July 1952, aged just 56, George died unexpectedly having been admitted into the Royal Melbourne Hospital in Parkville for an operation. He left behind a talented seven-year-old daughter, Suzi Dickinson, with scant memories of her loving father. Her own career as a jazz singer reflected his love of the theatre, passion for performers and performing, compassion for the suffering of others and commitment to civic responsibility many times over.

Suzi in the 1960s when she was singing jazz at David McIlraith's Lido Theatre Restaurant in Melbourne

References

Tasmanian News, 21 July 1906, p.4, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article180346885

The Argus (Melbourne), 10 September 1906, p. 11, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article201681479

The Register (Adelaide), 30 September 1907, p.3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article57367872

Mount Alexander Mail, 28 October 1907, p.2, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article200391979

Everyones, 26 September 1923, p.35, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-548984024

Everyones, 22 October 1924, p. 24, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-558645631

Everyones, 18 March 1925, p. 19, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-547396108

Everyones, 27 June 1928, p.33. http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-565566244

Everyones, 26 September 1928, p. 42. http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-587521380

Everyones. 17 December 1930, p.18, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-555984218

Everyone, 6 May 1931, p.30, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-559441685

Everyones, 25 November 1931, p. 20, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-553781699

Everyones, 31 August 1932, p.26. http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-582738321

Everyones, 22 February 1933, p.36, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-548797119

The Bulletin, 25 April 1934, p.37, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-607395677

Everyones, 6 March 1935, p.17, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-543986007

Everyones, 27 March 1935, p. 17, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-543986064

Everyones, 4 September 1935, p. 19, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-552100216

The Argus (Melbourne), 7 June 1939, p.15, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12136496

The Argus (Melbourne), 28 June 1940, p.5, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12477612

The Herald (Melbourne), 29 June 1940, p.3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article243228572

The Argus (Melbourne), 30 July 1952, p.13. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article23178398

Acknowledgements

Antoinette Birkenbeil is indebted to professional genealogist Peggy Aeschlimann whose extensive family history research has provided the basis for the article.

And thanks to Suzi Dickinson for sharing her memories and for embarking on this journey of discovery