Phelan and Atkin Family History

A little postscript after my series of posts on my great-grandfather Joseph Charles Martin Cowan that I just had to share. On 12 December 1890 the North Melbourne Advertiser was reporting on Essendon council business, and noted that "Cr. Cowan moved that the Railway Commissioners be requested to keep alight the lamp on the west side of the Ascot Vale Railway Station in Bloomfield's Paddock. A good deal of free love went on here at nights to the disgust of the residents.' This prompted the following from the  Melbourne Punch on 15 January 1891, who felt so strongly that they were moved to poetry! How hideously unsympathetic men may become as they grow old! We don't suppose that rhyme will touch their flinty hearts, but the situation demands a stanza, and it shall have it – though we should be slain by public subscription afterwards. O, Councillors of Essendon, Famed for your gifts of tongue, Do you forget completely The days when you were young? Ah, you co...

Joseph C. M. Cowan: His Circumstances Changed I h ave previously mentioned how Essendon was swept up in the land boom of the 1880s and the depression of the 1890s that followed. Wikipedia provides a brief explanation: During the 1880s, there had been a speculative boom in the Australian property market. The optimistic climate was fostered by the commercial banks, and also led to the proliferation of non-bank institutions such as building societies. Operating in a  free banking  system, there were few legal restrictions on their operations, and there was no central bank or government-provided deposit guarantees. The banks and related bodies lent extravagantly, for property development in particular, but following the collapse of the land boom after 1888, a large number of enterprises that had borrowed money began to declare  bankruptcy . Joseph Cowan was one of many men caught up in the boom. One of the many building societies that sprung up was the Doutta Galla, of...

Joseph C. M. Cowan: Councillor and Mayor of Essendon ***Before launching into Part 2 I want to mention that I have updated Part 1 to include a description and photo of another building designed by Joseph Cowan, still standing today in Moonee Ponds.*** On 10 September 1884, Joseph Charles Martin Cowan married Florence Davenport at the Presbyterian Church in Ascot Vale. Joseph was 36 and Florence just 19. The couple's first child, a daughter - named Magdalene after Joseph's mother - was born on 29 October 1885. Four more daughters followed (including my grandmother Bertha in 1890) and then four sons after that (though one, Alfred, would die as a toddler in 1899), but I plan to write more about them in the future. In 1888 there was a large two-volume history of Victoria produced called 'Victoria & its Metropolis'. It included a biographical list of many prominent men and Joseph Cowan scored a mention as a noted architect. Yet an even more public life for Joseph...

Joseph C. M. Cowan: Mason and Architect In terms of public life, the most prominent of all my ancestors would have to be Dad's maternal grandfather, Joseph Charles Martin Cowan. Joseph was an active member of the community in Ascot Vale, where he was a well respected member of the Freemasons, a successful architect, and served many years on the Essendon council, including one stint as mayor. For Part 1 of his story I will look briefly at his life and career as a mason and an architect. But first, some background. A portrait of my great-grandfather, Joseph Charles Martin Cowan Joseph Charles Martin Cowan was born in 1847 to Scottish parents in Barcelona, where his father Robert Walker Cowan was working as an engineer. He was baptised in the neighbourhood of Sant Martí de Provençals. By 1849 the Cowan family was back in Scotland, in the town of Inverkeithing, Fifeshire, which lies just across the Firth of Forth from Edinburgh. Within a few years Joseph's father Robert ...