The Australian Museum Of Childhood - Port Adelaide
When you step into what was once an old school hall in Dale Street, Port Adelaide you step back in time to playtime. This is one man's twenty year search for the indefinable mysteries of childhood and here scattered across the room is Alan Griffith's toybox of infant memorabilia. Alan is passionate about the enormous contribution children have made to society throughout the ages, whether it's through charity drives or community work, or simply through the pleasure they give to us all by just being kids.
"I'm collecting all the stories I can find, on everything, anything that influenced children in their upbringing".
And for each of these pieces there's an interesting yarn, like this World War 1 tank, a classic piece of trench art, made by a member of Australia's fiftieth battalion from a discarded artillery shell. It's just one of many symbols of the age-old link between the horrors of war and the innocence of childhood. And throughout the collection there are also reminders of just how ingenius manufacturers were in tough times.
"This one was made in Adelaide back in 1952/53. It was made by castalloy, it's a little speed racer that when it was first made was only made due to the fact that these little rollers were left over from a run of curtain rings, so what the foreman would do was make up a car that would go with the wheels. When they finished making it, they asked all the toy buyers in Adelaide to come to the factory and the fella strapped one on each foot and skated around the warehouse to show how strong and durable they were".
Many of the pieces highlight how toys have played a political role like this World War Two jigsaw puzzle, complete with portraits of US President FDR and Australian Prime Minister John Curtin. And throughout history toys have been used to make many a moral point, like this board game designed to get kids to school on time, and make them suitably sorry when they weren't. The old hall was once a classroom for one of the State's early pioneers of education Sister Mary MacKillop and across the walls there's a photographic record of how kids amused themselves. And for the baby boomers, a reminder of how toys ere used to market pretty much everything including breakfast cereals.
"They used to come in a set. They'd have a little plastic pack and you'd pull it apart and you'd actually have to construct a train or the car or the little one down here that are kangaroos and you'd put a string on the front of the kangaroo with a weight and it would walk along the table. Now all these things the kids would have to put together themselves".
The Australian Museum of Childhood at 95 Dale Street, is open from Wednesday to Sunday or by appointment. For those adults who are really kids at heart, the admission fee is $2.50. Entry for children is free.
Contact Allan Griffiths on 08 8447 8403 or for more information email: info@postcards.sa.com.au
