XPost: alt.usage.english, alt.english.usage   
   From: peter@pmoylan.org   
      
   On 30/08/25 16:02, Aidan Kehoe wrote:   
   >   
   > Ar an triochadú lá de mí Lúnasa, scríobh Peter Moylan:   
      
   >> When I was about 18 years old, so in the 1960s, my father showed me   
   >> the ghost town of Whroo in Victoria. It had had a population of   
   >> 10,000 in the gold rush era, but afterwards it just disappeared. My   
   >> father had grown up halfway between Whroo and Moora (another town   
   >> that's close to disappearing), so he was one of the few people who   
   >> knew where Whroo was.   
   >>   
   >> When we got there, all I could see was bush. Then, gradually, I   
   >> noticed faint straight lines in the grass, that showed where the   
   >> foundations of buildings had been. That was all there was to see.   
   >>   
   >> Years later I went back there, and by following an overgrown bush   
   >> track I discovered the cemetery. It was mostly unmarked graves, but   
   >> I did find the grave of a French distant relative.   
   >>   
   >> Later on the town was rediscovered by the local historical society,   
   >> so now there's an information board.   
   >   
   > “The name is pronounced ‘roo’, and is thought to be derived from an   
   > Aboriginal word meaning lips. The word refers to a small, natural   
   > basin in the hilly terrain which held spring water. It is about 400   
   > metres south-east of the Whroo cemetery.”   
   >   
   > It’s a striking name.   
      
   The spring is surprisingly small -- just a hole in the rocks that's   
   filled with water. As I recall it it was much less than a meter in   
   diameter. The water was very clean, though.   
      
   When my father was a boy the local aboriginals were still living in   
   their traditional ways. They spent half the year at Whroo, and the other   
   half a little bit north at the Waranga Basin.   
      
   The "big town" in the area is Rushworth, population a little over 1,000.   
   ( went to school there for a short while. A single room, six grades and   
   one teacher. We didn't have books, only slates and slate pencils.) It   
   has the widest main street I've ever seen. You need a packed lunch to   
   cross it. The town was founded in the gold rush era, and they allowed   
   for growth. These days there's a centre divider with trees, separating   
   two wide one-way streets, but I remember when it was just a huge expanse   
   of road, big enough to contain a football oval.   
      
   --   
   Peter Moylan       peter@pmoylan.org    http://www.pmoylan.org   
   Newcastle, NSW   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)