Happy anniversary baby, got you on my mind (Little River Band)

Happy birthday Dulcie! (Photo credit: Graham Purdy)

Wie geht's?

Quite a few April anniversaries happen that need some commentary. 

There are plenty of happy occasions to celebrate. We've had my parents wedding anniversary (on the 18th in 1953), Jacky and my wedding anniversary (on the 21st in 1984), and mum's birthday (on the 23rd in 1930).

There are also two losses of life anniversaries in April: Lucy Adsett, a.k.a Ma (on the 3rd in 1974) and our dear friend - Margo Buchanan-Oliver (on the 25th in 2018).

I know these are just names and dates to the blogosphere, and that a lot of others celebrate their own anniversaries as they come up but clearly without Lucy and her daughter Dulcie Adsett and then her wedding to the strapping young pharmacist Graham Purdy, you would not be reading this, because I would not exist.

That's a huge debt of gratitude I owe all three.

That Earth-shattering event in 1984 also means that our four children exist and consequently, our four grandchildren also exist. So, I think you'll agree, that one is worth a massive celebration as well.

Love and peace - WNP

Jojo was a man who thought he was a loner (The Beatles)

Get Back (You may say I'm a dreamer - Chapter 1, part 6)

And they're off...

April 18, 1953, at St Barnabas' Anglican Church in Mt Eden, and Graham Purdy was joined by his bride, Dulcie Mary Adsett, at the alter. She was being given away by one of her older brothers, Mel Adsett.

Also present - her mother, Lucy Adsett,the bridegroom's parents, Harry and Christina Purdy, their friends and officials. Nita Selman (nee Evans) was one of the bridesmaids and Bob Pegg, a pharmacist friend of Graham's, was best man.

The wedding album shows a confident and radiant bride in the bloom of youth and a dashing if somewhat nervous looking groom.

Appropriately, the wedding breakfast took place at Lewis Eady's store. 

After a honeymoon in Norfolk Island via Sydney, the future looked bright. 

Nita (left), and bride

Merv, Bob (best man), groom

Life together began at 5 Oak Street, Royal Oak, a quiet suburban street close to Mt Eden where the Purdy family lived, Mt Albert, where Graham had gone to school, and One Tree Hill, where the Adsetts lived.

New jobs for both of them were at a Royal Oak pharmacy, Walls and Roche: Dulcie as a shop assistant; Graham as a pharmacist.

The mid fifties were stable years in New Zealand (pronounced Nu Zild). the National government was in office and in firm control thanks to the Prime Minister, Keith Holyoake. 

Honeymooners 

In the arts it was a momentous time - Lolita (Vladimir Nabokov) was published, Waiting for Godot (Samuel Beckett) was performed, James Dean kicked it with Rebel Without a Cause, Bill Haley hit it with Rock Around the Clock, Marlon Brando was riding a wave On the Waterfront, and Bond, James Bond made a mark with Casino Royale.

Clearly, culturally, things were never going to be the same again. This was the nucleus of a new phenomenon - popular, or pop culture; something that would eventually become very dear to my heart.

And then 1956 rolled to its sleepy close and 1957 burst forth and Dulcie Purdy found out she was pregnant. 

The Purdy clan swung into preparations for the big day looming over the family. Christina had no doubt - it was going to be a girl, her grand-daughter. She immediately went out and bought the most expensive doll she could find and put it on the top of her wardrobe in Roch-dene, and waited as 1957 rolled on.

Love and peace - Wozza

All the girls around her say she's got it coming (The Beatles)

Get Back (You may say I'm a dreamer - Chapter 1, part 5)

Graham Purdy at MAGS - top left (I think I inherited his legs!)

After leaving Mount Albert Grammar, Graham trained as a pharmacist. Clever guy! Chemistry and science was his thing at school and his interest culminated in making it his career choice from school.

He passed his pharmacy professional examinations in March 1952 and then got himself a good job at Eccles' Pharmacy in Queen Street, Auckland.

Graham was nuts on swing - Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw, the Dorsey brothers, Lionel Hampton, and Nat King Cole amongst others. With his buddies from school, Bruce Purser and Mervyn Hynes sometimes in tow he would come into Lewis Eady's music store, among other places, to try and find some of the latest jazz releases.

Funnily enough I would replicate this scenario twenty years later when I'd also make the journey into Queen Street with my best buddy from Mount Albert Grammar, Greg Knowles, to find my own records.

It was the late forties and the Labour governments trade restrictions after World War Two were still in place. It made records, in his words, 'scarce as hen's teeth'.

Graham's favourite haunts were Bond and Bond and Lewis Eady's. Especially Lewis Eady's.
  

Graham's 21st party (with his mum and dad and pre Dulcie date, Dawn from Cambridge)

At this time, Dulcie was in transit from Bond and Bond's Custom Street store to their K. Road store as manager. When she left that job she joined 'Miss Mac' in Lewis Eady's record department, which just happened to be opposite Eccles' pharmacy.

Teenage Dulcie

Graham would frequently get the tram at lunch time, spending the two pence fare to try his luck for a 78 rpm record that cost 4/6 (about 45 cents). In his carefully presented chemist smock and his 'thin and haughty air' (according to mum's flippant memory) he'd chance his luck with the cheeky, bubbly, shop assistant.

Graham kept up his charm offensive by swapping one dram bottles of Richard Hudnut Evening in Paris, which was rationed and highly sought after by young women, for his prized swing records.


Dulcie was not impressed. She thought this brash, lanky, persistent, young, chemist guy was a pest. He was, after all, out of her league, or so she thought.

She wasn't well educated by comparison but what she lacked in formal education she made up for in chutzpah and common sense. She sensed that she and the chemist guy were poles apart and yet...the bond grew.

The crazy gang Part 1- ripping it up at the Pursers (Graham far right with date Dulcie Adsett)

She entered his social sphere, playing card games  with Graham and his friends, the Pursers and Merv Hynes. 

The crazy gang part 2 with my godfather Meryn Hynes (4th from left), Bruce Purser (centre)
Dulcie Adsett (4th from left) with thin and haughty Graham Purdy (2nd from right)

They joined the Auckland Swing Club together (I wear the badge on my suit) and as Graham's persistence began to pay off...

...chemistry happened (pun intentional).

Love and peace - WNP