Overview

A long-forgotten Australia lives again in Colin Gascoigne's recollections of the 1920s and 1930s. The great depression had tightened it's grip on ordinary Aussies battlers and Colin is forced to grow up fast. These unrelenting heroes of Australia's hardest times were the lifeblood of a nation brought to its knees by the depression. At a time when unemployment was the rule and still rising, these ordinary Aussies were defined by an unstoppable will to battle on and survive without expectation or entitlement. Like so many others the Gascoigne family struggled on in uncomplaining determination. It's Christmas 1928 in Brunswick. School is over forever and an accidental fire at Hoffman's ""crop"" symbolically signals the end of an era for Colin, Laura and their schoolmates. As old acquaintances drift apart, new alliances begin to form as Colin's dad takes him to see ""Smokey"", the unofficial second-hand bloke, to buy Colin a gun. Smokey, and his mate Kak-handed Jack could get you anything you wanted provided it fell of the back of a truck. Colin and Smokey soon become firm friends. Failing as a good shot, Colin and his faithful dog, Prince, begin a rabbit trapping enterprise in the hope of feeding the family through ferreting. On a camping trip to Hanging Rock Colin kisses Laura for the first time, but on an outing to the flicks at the ""flea pit"" his old classmate ""Pip"" plants a kiss on him hoping he'll join her in the back row. On cracker night 1928 Colin and Smokey try to set up a prank by launching skyrockets from an old cannon only to have the entire cart load of fireworks explode on the back of a wagon. The horse is not seen again for days. Soon every bloke and his dog start up as a rabbitos and rabbit prices plumet. The 1929 stock market crash and 1930s great depression went hand in hand. Swagmen tramp the roads of rural Australia carrying their swag and billy, jumping on rattlers to travel and cadging a feed in exchange for woodchopping work. Destitute, Colin knows he and his dad must soon join them, leaving home to look for work carrying the swag together in Victoria's Wimmera wheat belt. The legend of the swagman generation is the very heart of the indomitable Australian spirit. They had the courage and ability to endure, asking only for the chance to have a go regardless of insurmountable odds. Colin's life up to and beyond that point defines the very term ""Little Aussie battler"" and for Colin the real battle is still ahead.

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