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Penny and Christina use digitized newspapers to research their guest's family or personal history. The newspapers are hosted in Trove, the National Library of Australia's online research portal.
(piano music)
00:09 This podcast was recorded on Aboriginal land, the land of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nations. It also discusses events that occurred on the lands of the Dja Dja Wurrung people. We pay our respects to their elders past and present.
00:24 (piano music)
00:34 PENNY:: Hello everyone. This is a follow-up episode we're going to be talking about Chorkles Nellie Louise Kasner Moss again.
Now in this episode we have my dad, Peter Tangey, as a guests and we get straight into it. So before we start I thought I should give you a bit of a recap on what we know so far about Chorkles. To get the full back story it would be really good if you could listen to Pen Hall: A Rose by Any Name and Chorkles Book of Rhymes cos they were our previous episodes that we did with Dad.
So Chorkles lived with Pen Hall in Newstead in Central Victoria and that's how my dad got to know them when he was a kid and he used to go to their house every Saturday to do odd-jobs for them.
Now Chorkles was an extremely unconventional person for the era. She dressed in men’s clothing and swore and shouted quite a bit. We're not sure whether she was qualified as a vet but she certainly had a lot of veterinarian knowledge and she treated sick animals in the district. So she became quite a well-known and respected person in the community.
So in the episode Chorkles Book of Rhymes we discussed Chorkles’ childhood. Her father, Matthew Kasner Moss, was a prominent doctor who practiced in Echuca and then Perth. He was Jewish but after he had his children, his children were not raised Jewish. Chorkles did an Arts degree at Perth University. She played tennis very badly and went to some bridge parties. And that's pretty much what we know about that time in her life.
And while she was living in Perth she met Pen Hall. And Pen Hall was a married woman, in her 30s. She had a sort of a socialite background, her mother was a prominent women's rights campaigner. And her father had been mayor of Brisbane. And Pen Hall was a very glamorous person who attended a lot of sort of society events. In many ways, Chorkles and Pen Hall might seem like opposites but the two of them met and they obviously got along very well and they ended up breeding cocker spaniels together and eventually they moved to Victoria and they lived together for decades after that and were partners.
So we're going to be picking up on Chorkles life in the 1950s. She would have been in her 40s. She was in quite a few newspaper articles at that time.
02:58 (piano music)
PENNY: Hello Peter, you're back. This is my dad Peter he's back on In Those Days.
PETER: I'm excited I'm back in Melbourne again. It's wonderful.
CHRISTINA: It's been a hot minute since we last saw you.
PETER: But I'm feeling home sick.
CHRISTINA: You can go home after this, Peter.
PENNY: Yeah, we'll get you back on the train fairly soon. And the reason that we got you back is because our subject, Chorkles Nellie Louise Kasner Moss is such a big topic that we've had to break her into two.
CHRISTINA: That's a bit painful.
PENNY: To digest her. Please do go back and listen to our previous episode, which is all about Chorkles.
CHRISTINA: Otherwise you'll no idea what we're talking about.
PENNY: You won't know who she is, you'll have no context.
She's now living in Victoria. We're in the 1940s. There's quite a few articles in the paper all relating to one incident that Chorkles was involved in. And this was when Chorkles gave evidence into the Victorian Royal Commission inquiring into the Origins, Aims, Objectives and Funding of Communism, the Communist Party of Australia. It was a Royal Commission. It was run by Supreme Court judge Sir Charles Lowe.
Now Dad, you grew up in the Cold War. We got the tail-end of it really.
CHRISTINA: It was warming up by the time we were around.
PENNY: Yeah. What did you know about communism growing up?
PETER: I suppose there's a whole lot of family background and all sorts of things involved in this because, as you know, my parents were Catholic and I mentioned in the last episode that Chorkles converted to Catholicism. And the Catholic Church's position, there was a famous Bishop of Melbourne Dr Mannix and people have done a lot of research and know a lot about him, I don't, but the bottom line is that the thought was that in communist countries such as China that Catholicism was banned, outlawed, the participants were persecuted, perhaps in Catholic terms martyred and that sort of gave the right of the church to certainly encourage people to be very anti-communist. And it was felt that communism took away people's freedoms. And that's the sort of background that I think Chorkles would come from.
PENNY: And also, you know, Stalin was running around being awful. And I think a lot of people on the left took a long time to realise exactly what had gone on.
PETER: And I think in that time, and I'm still not sure that people understand today, that there is a very big difference between socialism and communism. I always envisaged, even though Chorkles come from a privileged background, in a sense, a doctor it's not working class, that Chorkles was always willing to help people. Always willing to help people who were a bit down and out. And I would describe Chorkles in my memory as an anti-Communist socialist.
PENNY: That's very interesting. Chorkles' evidence to the Royal Commission was quite sensational and it was reported in a number of papers.
In the Herald on 26 July 1949 they actually described Chorkles’ physical appearance, which they didn't usually do for witnesses. And so it says:
“The witness was Miss Chorkles Nellie Louise Kasner Moss, of Welshman's Reef, Victoria, farmer. She was dressed In Jodhpurs, flat-heeled brown shoes, a man's grey overcoat and scarf, and a man's brown felt hat.”
We don't know which man she stole them off.
That sounds like Chorkles yeah?
PETER: That is exactly. That is how she felt comfortable. In some ways it is okay because this was her saying 'Okay, I'm as good as a man'. Even though, and I can dress as a man if I want to. And you've gotta stand up and listen to me because even today you put a frilly frock on and people don't listen quite as intently.
PENNY: Yep, that is probably a really sad thing.
CHRISTINA: That's why I'm not listening to you much today Penny. It's the frilly frock.
PENNY: It's the green turtle-necked jumper. There's also a photo of her. It's very grainy, but I think you get the idea.
CHRISTINA: Yes.
PENNY: So Chorkles’ evidence, the reporting on it I found a little bit confusing cos it goes in a few different directions but I think the clearest description is from the Argus 27th of July 1949.
"Woman farmers’ evidence at Red inquiry:"
The fact that she was a woman farming and the fact that she looked unconventional, people were definitely noticing it and putting in those comments.
"Evidence of statements on Communism allegedly made to her by university tutors, and conversations with other people, was given by a woman farmer at The Royal Commission on Communism yesterday.
The witness, Miss Chorkles Nellie Louise Kasner Moss, of Welshman's Reef, Victoria, said she had been told by a Mrs Daniel Taylor, a tutor at Trinity College, Melbourne University, that "political opponents would be liquidated if the Communist Party came to power, became they would be too dangerous if left alive."
Miss Moss said she first met Mrs Taylor and her husband while studying at Perth University in 1928-29.”
Mrs Taylor was then Miss Grubb.
CHRISTINA: Bet she was.
PENNY: "Chorkles did not hear of them again until 1943, when she heard that Taylor was lecturing at Melbourne University and his wife was at Trinity."
All three of us, we're all Melbourne University graduates.
CHRISTINA: Alumni.
PENNY: Christina, you Arts/Science?
CHRISTINA: Did Ars/Science then just did teaching after that.
PENNY: Me Arts/Science. Dad?
PETER: Science.
PENNY: But you started off doing Engineering, but you didn't like that.
PETER: I don't know how but I passed the first year. And then got out of it.
PENNY: And then you went back and did Science Teaching.
PETER: Science Education. I wanted to be a teacher. I didn't want to be stuck in a chemical factory.
PENNY: I think that was a good call for you actually Dad. And I've got a photo of the Grub here. If anyone wants to see the Grub.
CHRISTINA: I'd like to see the Grub.
PENNY: There she is.
CHRISTINA: Strange hair.
PENNY: Yeah.
CHRISTINA: Strange hairline in general.
PENNY: Yeah.
PETER: Did she have anY larvae?
PENNY: No, I don't know and it's really frustrating actually. I haven't been able to find out what happens to the Taylors after this. But they were an interesting couple. I'll read you this article about the Taylors from the West Australian on the 15th August 1933. And it's about their early relationship:
"SUCCESS AT OXFORD.
Perth Students Master Difficulties.
Mr. D. Taylor and his wife, Mrs. Mabel Taylor, were each given first-class honours in the recent Modern Greats examinations at Oxford. Coming from Western Australia in 1931 they surmounted great monetary difficulties in order to secure high Oxford distinctions. Mrs. Taylor is the only woman placed in the first-class Greats this year and it is believed to be unprecedented for a husband and wife simultaneously to secure firsts.
CHRISTINA: Well done.
PENNY: Usually either the man's a dud or the woman's a dud.
CHRISTINA: They can't both be winners.
PENNY: Exactly.
"When the Taylors found that, living separately, they would not have enough money to complete their courses they married"
CHRISTINA: It's the only solution.
PENNY: "and lived in a village three miles from Oxford, from where the wife cycled to lectures."
CHRISTINA: What did the husband do? He got a chauffeur driven limo.
PENNY: Maybe she dinked him. I don't know. How did you go for money when you first moved to Melbourne Dad?
CHRISTINA: Bit rude Penny.
PETER: It's not about me Pen. But I was in the very, very lucky era. I was able to get a Commonwealth scholarship when I doing Engineering and then I was able to change over to a studentship, a teaching studentship, which bonded you to the Education Department for 3 years.
PENNY: For life.
PETER: But it was better money than the Commonwealth scholarship. And
CHRISTINA: That's how you get them in.
PENNY: And then you to go and teach in the country or something.
PETER: You went to go and teach in any school they told you to.
CHRISTINA: You just got told to.
PETER: Except, and this is fantastic, the word HECS had not been invented. And I feel so sorry for the people today, the stories I read of hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt and then those people trying to buy houses with that debt on top of more debt. I was in the lucky era. Very lucky era.
PENNY: So do you get along well with other Boomers when you give them these opinions?
PETER: Well, I think all the Boomers know that. And some of the Boomers went on to have children and seen how harder it has been for them than it was for us. Free education! And that was one of the mantras of both the major political parties at the time.
PENNY: Yep, sorry back to the Grubb and husband.
"During terms the husband did the housework while she was particularly busy."
CHRISTINA: Controversial!
PENNY: That is disgusting.
CHRISTINA: Times were really tough.
PETER: This was reported in the '30s.
PENNY: Yeah. 1933.
"During the University vacations Mr. Taylor earned a little money teaching in London County schools and when these also went on holidays, husband and wife found that the cheapest method of living was to cycle in the country, sleeping under the stars."
I suppose it was summer, it was alright.
"Finally they rented an orchard near Oxford for five shillings a week"
CHRISTINA: And ate the apples exclusively.
PENNY: Aw, and had the runs!
PETER: Plum trees obviously.
PENNY: "And completed their studies in philosophy and economics in the open air."
Well they didn't need laptops so they would have been able to do it.
"Mr. Taylor and his wife (formerly Miss Mabel Grubb) are both graduates of the University of Western Australia. They left for England with Hackett student ships in 1931"
Which is like a scholarship.
"and after their marriage, Mrs. Taylor's studentship was withdrawn."
CHRISTINA: Yes. Excellent work.
PENNY: You don’t need money if you have a husband.
CHRISTINA: No, just latch on.
PETER: And don't forget this is in the days that it was often thought that women didn't need an education because they'd stay at home and look after the children and that the husband was the bread winner.
PENNY: So the thing that I did think reading about this was they were both academic high-flyers and I do think maybe it's possible that Chorkles could have been a little bit jealous.
CHRISTINA: Maybe.
PETER: Possible.
CHRISTINA: But she got called out if there was a down cow. It doesn't get much better than that. I'd be pumped to get that call. "I'm coming!"
PETER: Was there any, now I know there was evidence to the inquiry, the Communist inquiry but was there any evidence that these two people were communists.
PENNY: Well I didn't find that afterwards but anyway. And it was okay to be a communist. It was a question of what influence you were trying to have on other things and whether you were doing it legally that was the issue. At this point the Communist Party wasn't banned so it wasn't illegal to be a communist.
PETER: But it takes us back to the times where it might have been thought that some universities were, had communist cells in them.
PENNY: Yes.
PETER: And that influence, and recruited people to become so-called undercover people.
PENNY: This is exactly what, you and Chorkles are of one mind. I'll keep reading her evidence.
"I saw Mrs Daniel Taylor in the 1944-45 long vacation. I asked her if she was a Communist. She said she wasn't, but that she and her husband were sympathetic to the Party", Mrs Moss said.
"I asked her how that squared up with their University duties. She said everyone had an axe to grind, and that lecturers and tutors were in excellent positions to influence students. She explained that the conspiratorial aspect of holding views which their parents knew nothing about, appealed to adolescents."
Which is probably true.
PETER: Which is probably, if you read certain aspects of the media today, maybe suggesting the same thing. 'Bloody left-wing teachers'.
CHRISTINA: Peddling our agenda.
PETER: And the ABC!
PENNY: They're still saying it, aren't they. But Dad when you were at uni during the ‘70s did you feel like your lecturers and tutors try to get you into any?
PETER: Well, definitely no because I was studying Science and Maths.
CHRISTINA: Appealed more to the arty one.
PETER: Yeah. There's not a lot of Communist philosophy in Pythagoras, is there?
PENNY: Probably not. And Christina, did you?
CHRISTINA: I didn't pick up on any communist undertones. I just, just a lot of left-wing stuff that was, basically about getting good t-shirts.
PENNY: Yeah, but no espionage?
CHRISTINA: No espionage, disappointingly.
PENNY: No foreign governments influencing you?
PETER: I did have one teacher though that I think probably was a bad influence on me.
PENNY: What did they do.
PETER: They'd say 'Can Peter Tangey please report to me after this lecture'. And I'd waltz up and say 'What's wrong?' He said, 'I want to have a quaddie, will you go down and put it on for me?'
CHRISTINA: Nice.
PENNY: Beautiful. Okay.
"Later in 1945 Mrs Dan Taylor complained about working conditions and exploitation of the working class. She said the Communist Party did not want the Federal Government to implement its social services scheme because it would make the working class complacent and indifferent to the Communist Party.
"Some time between January and May of 1946 Mrs Taylor asked me why I would not co-operate with the Party. She said I was acceptable to the farmers in the district... She suggested that I should at least cease opposing the Party's activities in the area, otherwise it would be unpleasant for me when the Party came to power."
CHRISTINA: Oh god.
PENNY: So one of the things that's interesting about that is that Chorkles is claiming that Mrs Taylor is saying that she had influence on farmers. Do you think that would be true that Chorkles would be able to talk to people about and influence them on her...
PETER: I think, there probably is grounds to suggest that. You know, she was a very intelligent person and in those days you've gotta remember all the politics was one-to-one.
PENNY: It wasn't on Facebook.
PETER: No Facebook. A bit of telephone stuff. I'm sure you might allude to this later but you know, even the big politicians where they did the Town Hall of every country town. It had to be personal and that was how people got their information.
PENNY: Yeah, that's interesting. And did you ever talk about politics with Chorkles?
PETER: I suppose in some ways I did, but not in a deep way like we're thinking about it now. She never ever tried to really influence me in the way I thought. As I said, there was no, there were papers and all of that but political parties published pamphlets on their policies and you could hand them out like notices for the comedy festival.
PENNY: People put them in the bin.
PETER: No television, or television had only just started and there was, at that time, a big split in the Labor Party.
PENNY: Which was based on, a lot of it was based on Communism the section of the party, the Catholics who really opposed communism broke off into the DLP. Is that right?
PETER: It was all based on three things: Communism, the Catholic Church and the Labor Party and many of the, much of the Labor Party were made up of working-class people, working-class Irish Catholics. And once the church started to put out the message that Communism, and you wouldn't be able to practise your religion, pretty powerful. And then there's Reds under the bed, which is what some people, like Chorkles, would perceive as the problem. There's people like Mrs Grubb who's portraying to be a normal citizen who's really surrepticiously undermining the thinking of society and then of course what happened with the Labor Party there was the split. And like when that occurred I was only 3 year old but you pick up on the history of it. And you have no greater or worse enemy than when you've fallen out with a friend. And I think it's the same in politics today. Some of the people's biggest enemies in politics are people on their side and I've heard lots of very good stories of politicians whose best mates are on the other side of parliament. Now, when the split came it was vicious, it was nasty. The end result of it was that it kept the Labor Party out of government until Whitlam-days. That was because the DLP was formed, they always gave their preferences to the Liberal Party, which kept the Liberals, even though on many elections, by the, you know, a bees dick, as they say. And don't forget these DLP people who left the Labor Party, in my opinion only, others may disagree, they were socialists who were so anti-communist it come out the other side.
PENNY: Right, okay. So these pamphlets?
PETER: Oh, you're getting back to the pamphlets. I'm in Year 9. Little snotty nosed boy from Newstead. You had to write an essay on something or other, a composition we might have called it those days. And I had no understanding of subjectivity whatsoever. And my, I'd been up at Miss Moss's and she had all these DLP policy pamphlets around. And I said, 'Can I have a couple of those?' 'Yeah, yeah, yeah'. So I thought I'll write this bloomin’ essay pretty quick so I can go out and kick the footy or catch a fish. And I just quoted great big slabs out of these DLP
PENNY: Well, this must be correct.
PETER: DLP, you know.
PENNY: It's printed on nice paper. I like the font.
CHRISTINA: Yes.
PETER: Yes, so I thought, 'Yeah that's alright, I've done a pretty good job here.' Well it comes back. And probably for the first time in my life I felt rejection. There's red ink all over it. 'How can you prove this?' You know, 'Where's your source for that?' And it certainly I learned a very big lesson that day. As a little Year 9, I didn't understand the political consequences of some of these statements and all the things that were quoted. Like, all I know is that it was one of the most intensely embarrassing experiences of my teenagerhood.
CHRISTINA: Oh yuck.
PENNY: I remember one comment that I once got back on an essay that I just passed she'd written 'This essay suffered' - cos the whole thing was meant to be about post-modernism. And she writes 'Your essay clearly suffered by the fact that you clearly don't understand what post-modernism is'. And I just read it, and it was like
CHRISTINA: Yeah, kind of missed the whole point.
PENNY: It's fair.
CHRISTINA: It's a very confusing concept.
PENNY: It was one of those essays that I wrote going, 'Look, it doesn't make sense to me, but maybe
CHRISTINA: But what I've heard is
PENNY: But maybe what I'm writing will make more sense to someone else.
PETER: When I was doing a Bachelor of Education after I'd started teaching I forget the topic that we had to write on but, you know, what influences a community, or something like that.
CHRISTINA: I do.
PETER: So I sailed into the influence of a country football club on a community and how important it was. Now, this lecturer obviously just didn't get it. I got the same sort of red stuff and whatever that I had before. But I didn't worry about it then, because I knew I was right.
PENNY: Yeah, and they just hadn't understood.
PETER: And as you know, a very good friend of ours, Dr Matthew Nicholson, has made a career of writing about Australian football and its importance to the community.
PENNY: And actually, really just following in the footsteps of Peter Tangey.
CHRISTINA: You trailblazer.
PENNY: May be plagiarism.
PETER: That lecturer just didn't get it.
PENNY: Anyway, Chorkles kept giving this evidence. There's a few different strains. There's something about a politician who she thought was too pro
PETER: Can you name the politician?
PENNY: He was called Taylor as well.
CHRISTINA: Too many Taylors!
PETER: Stitch 'em up I said. Stitch 'em up.
PENNY: Chorkles was basically involved in trying to get someone in instead of a Communist. You know, it's confusing and complicated. She really slags of her old friend Mabel Grubb and Taylor. Her evidence was not particularly well-received by the Commissioner. And I found a 1973 a thesis written by Vicky Rastrick Who said:
“The effect was considerably aggravated by Moss's poor performance as a witness. Lowe's cautionary remarks betrayed a hint of real irritation at the hysterical tone with which she delivered her charges of Communist ill-doings, and particularly, at her persistent refusal to limit herself to the questions asked.”
So she doesn't seem to have been a particularly good witness, but I do also wonder whether sometimes maybe her physical appearance and her unconventional style.
CHRISTINA: People were biased against her.
PENNY: Whether she wasn't taken seriously. Like, when you look at the Herald, which chose to describe her physical appearance even though they never did that for other people and put in a photo of her and it's kind of all. I do wonder. I think she was running off on a tangent and she was at one point asked 'What's your opinion of communism?' and she said, 'I loathe them.' So she was definitely just completely biased. But also, I do wonder a little bit.
PETER: Whether she was taken seriously because of the way she dressed. And I think it's quite normal that people who, rightly wrong, are passionate about an issue, run off on a tangent and keep bashing away.
PENNY: They do. And look, and I think Lowe did. I think he probably did an okay job on the Commission. It probably wasn't what people expected. It didn't turn into a witch hunt like in America.
PETER: McCarthy.
PENNY: Yeah, that didn't happen. And apparently he did seem to really try and understand the principles of communism, people said. In his report he said:
“Communism presents a view of history and an outlook on life which evokes from its adherents a fanatical devotion, and promotes in its opponents a fanatical hatred. Each of these responses is very apt to distort the testimony of a witness so affected, and both are likely to cause the witness to relate for fact what is really no more than suspicion.”
PETER: Probably very astute.
PENNY: And I think that probably wasn't what the government was hoping he would conclude. In the end, I think actually there was some espionage going on but he said that there wasn't. And he said it's clear that the Communist Party thinks that the law is wrong, they will break the law and they are involved and they are trying to influence things in any way that they can but that he didn't think that it was espionage at that time.
PETER: It's the same, exactly it is today. Other countries aren't allowed spies.
PENNY: But we've got 'em.
PETER: And we're not telling you who they are.
PENNY: Yeah so. So it was just really interesting to get that little glimpse of how other people saw Chorkles at the time, I think.
PETER: Yes.
PENNY: So your family Dad, obviously big split not just in the party but in the community. Lots of animosity. Which way did Pa and Nana go?
PETER: Well, they were Catholic. So I think at the time, I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure I'm right, that Dad was Secretary of the Newstead Labor Party and again in those days, lots of country towns had their branches of the political parties. I know there was a branch of the Country Party in Newstead. I think the Liberal Party might have been based in Maryborough, but I'm not sure. But, all the little country towns had Labor Party branches. And it did cause big splits between members of the community. And remember, a lot of this is worked out on religious grounds. Which it's improved so much today of course. You know, the Catholics went to the DLP. A lot of the Country Party people would have been Church of England, they tended to be more wealthy, all the Presbyterians. So Dad definitely went to the DLP and Mum. And that's where he would have found a lot in common with Chorkles. I think they used to discuss politics together, but I didn't sit around listening to them.
PENNY: Yeah, fair enough. So when you were growing up were you aware of who was Catholic and who wasn't?
PETER: Yeah, cos you'd see 'em at church. And there was also in those days, you couldn't go to each other's churches. You know, somebody died, you didn't go to their funeral. You'd turn up at the funeral.
PENNY: And you had to get, yeah, sometimes there had to be like special dispensations to go to someone's wedding and things.
PETER: This is a story you may not have heard Penny and Christina but there's quite a few years past so I'm gonna let it out now.
CHRISTINA: Alright, let it out. Here we go.
PENNY: This is an exclusive.
PETER: The new Methodist minister was appointed to Newstead. And of course Dad was a key member of the RSL and this man, I think his name was Mocksom had been a padre in the Army, I think. And Dad and he didn't see things eye to eye too much at all. Peter Ward, me mate, was around at my house playing and Mr Mocksom came around to our house. Voices started to get raised and Mr Mocksom I can recall saying 'Look with your outlook and with your religion there's not much hope.' And dad said, 'You're nothing but a bloody communist.'
CHRISTINA: Just let it out.
PETER: And at this stage Mr Mocksom took a swing at Dad or Dad took a swing at Mr Mocksom. Mr Mocksom landed, Dad's got blood pouring out of his nose. Brother Bill happened to be there as well, I think.
PENNY: Brother Bill'd have a go, wouldn't he?
PETER: Got him out the gate, you know. And you know, I hadn't seen my dad bleeding before and this is quite
PENNY: Was Nana there? She would have beside herself.
PETER: She would have been screaming her lungs out. It's pretty shocking. And it did happen on our property. He come to us, you know. Anyway, 5 minutes later this Mocksom comes back at the gate and he yells out to Brother Bill, 'I've lost my watch will you get it for me?'
CHRISTINA: Brazen.
PETER: And our pathway into
PENNY: Yeah I remember it
PETER: Gate it was a concrete pathway. And Bill looked around and found the watch and picked it up and he threw it into the concrete path and said, 'There it is Mr Mocksom. Pick it up yourself.'
CHRISTINA: Wow.
PETER: Now of course this caused some division in the community.
CHRISTINA: Just a little bit.
PETER: You were either on Bill Tangey's side or Mocksom's side. Which was very much based on religion. Except, and you need Brother Bill to confirm this, there were very few people who castigated Dad. Dad had work friends and others who were Methodist, people in the RSL like Digger Hall who stuck with Dad like shit to a shovel. And Mocksom was run out of town.
CHRISTINA: Without his watch.
PENNY: He had no idea what the time was.
PETER: No heart. No ticker.
PENNY: He just kept being late for everything.
PETER: So that's the family story that you may not have heard.
PENNY: I mean it just shows, I'm sure there were things like that happening all over the place, of just these really heated
PETER: See I may have been 8 or 9 at the time.
PENNY: I mean and you know, I don't think Pa was usually in fights, was he?
PETER: No. Definitely not.
PENNY: Well thank you so much Dad for coming in again and telling us more.
PETER: It's lovely to see you Christina.
CHRISTINA: You too Peter.
PETER: Glad there's plenty of ways you can edit this.
(Piano music)
PETER: We can't put people in boxes.
PENNY: That's right.
PETER: Although we all finish in one in the end.