Vera Isabel Bermingham was my Mum. She was the second of four children to A G (Alf) and Annie Muller (Lobegieger), born in Boonah on 24th March, 1914, just a few months before the start of World War One.
The Muller children – Phyllis, Vera, Selwyn & Mavis in front
The rural countryside of the Fassifern Valley was then, as it is today – a rich and diverse farming and grazing district. Most of the Muller family had been farmers, ever since Johannes Muller had arrived in Australia from Germany in 1879. Alf and Annie’s farm ran beef and dairy cattle and grew market garden crops in the rich black soil country, now known as the Scenic Rim. The four Muller children, Phyllis, Vera, Selwyn, and Mavis enjoyed a typical bush childhood. They rode their horses to the nearby one-teacher school.
The decade of the 1920s was a vastly different world from today, especially in the conservative bush. The men worked the farms, ran the businesses, and were given the opportunities for further education, while most of the girls and women were packed off to school to learn typing, shorthand, and what was then known quaintly, as domestic science. It was generally expected that a young woman was preparing herself for marriage and a future family. I hasten to add, that it probably wasn’t like that in all families, but it was in Vera’s. By the time she had reached her teens, Vera was developing a tough and forthright character. She yearned for further education to take on the world in whatever field she chose. However, despite Vera’s protests, her learning was confined to the Commercial High School in Ipswich. After her school years were over, Vera worked at Humphreys and Tow, the local department store in Boonah, from 1929 -1937. Despite her disagreements with her father not allowing her to further her studies, Vera loved her job and life in and around Boonah. She enjoyed playing tennis and going for picnics around the beautiful Fassifern Valley with her friends in the various church and social groups that she was involved in.
Vera’s mother, Annie, was a private shy person with a quiet disposition. Although diligently performing her duties as a local politician’s wife, she was more interested in church, community, her garden, and family.
As Vera’s father – A G Muller began to develop his political career, Annie often preferred not to join him at many of the endless meetings, official openings and party functions, so his daughter Vera often went along, as his assistant. She was a young woman with a confident outgoing personality. Later in life she often talked about how she exasperated her father with her outspoken nature.
In 1938, she cut her ties with Boonah, and against her father’s wishes, she left the district to head for Brisbane, where she took up a secretarial position with the Vacuum Oil Company, now known as ExxonMobil. It was a big step for 24-year-old Vera to leave Boonah and move to “The Big Smoke”, but she embraced the change of the country girl who moved to the city. Although it was only a couple of hours away, it meant leaving her family & friends to start a new chapter in her life. Vera took to the social life in Brisbane like a duck to water. Working and living in the bright lights of the city was a massive change from the quiet conservative backwater of Boonah.
By 1939, World War 2 had commenced. Again in defiance of her fathers wishes, at the age of 25, Vera applied to join the Womens naval and air force units. At the same time, she also applied to get into nursing. Many of the existing fully trained Doctors and Nurses were being sent closer to the front line medical units. She was accepted into nursing training at the Brisbane General Hospital, now known as Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital. Vera threw herself into nursing with a real passion. From a medical training perspective, during the war years it was a fast track to learning the skills that modern day nurses then required, with many seriously injured and wounded troops being returned to Brisbane from the Pacific theatres of war.
Click on the following link – “The Museum of Nursing History” for a more detailed view and a great video of exactly what nursing training was like back in Vera’s day. https://metronorth.health.qld.gov.au/rbwh/about-us/museum-of-nursing-history
Lectures for nurses at Brisbane General & Womens Hospital when Nurse Vera Muller was doing her training
In amongst all of that, the young wartime trainee nurses found lots of ways to go out on the town to enjoy themselves and evade the 10pm curfew on the nurses quarters. When they did get a bit of time off, they posted a watch, so they could sneak back, in the early hours. Mum often talked about the Matron in charge of the Nurses quarters and the various Matron’s at the many hospitals she served at. They always had reputations for being very strict disciplinarians. The matron’s word was law. There was no ifs, buts or maybe’s. Apparently, some of the Doctors were even afraid of them. I guess it went with the territory.
Nurses quarters at Royal Brisbane Hospital. The heritage listed building has been fully restored & is now part of a campus for the latest trainee nurses
I have no doubt, that if her father (A G Muller) was aware of what was happening with his daughter’s life in Brisbane, he would have been mortified. The dedicated Nurses and Doctors all worked incredibly long hours. The pay was terrible, and the work was tough, but she loved it and made a host of lifelong friendships. Vera completed her nursing training and went on to get many promotions, including being in charge of the elite Medical Research Ward at Brisbane General. Here, she saw all the most challenging cases every day. Vera described it as the most interesting job of her life. She had also studied and gained her midwifery certificate. Vera had a hand in delivering many new Queenslanders into the world. Her passion though, was in acute nursing, caring for the most seriously ill, on their road to recovery.
Vera’s life took its most decisive turn in early 1948, on the Ipswich to Boonah railmotor. Anyone who ever took that train trip will never forget it. Today, it’s about a half-hour drive, but in the 1940s/50’s, that train journey lasted about three hours, stopping at every whistlestop and siding for a yarn with the locals, and to drop off the mail and the milk. A perfect start to a lifelong partnership, between the Nurse – Vera Muller, and the PMG (now Telstra) Telephone Linesman – John Francis (Jack) Bermingham. It’s fair to say they had plenty of time to get acquainted on that epic 1948 train trip home to Boonah, to see their respective families.
Vera was from a strict German Methodist family. Jack was from a devout Irish Catholic family. An interesting ethnic mix in ultra-conservative Boonah in 1948. Jack was also a divorcee, which back then, definitely put him on the outer with the Catholic Church. He had a son (John Francis Leslie Bermingham) from his previous marriage. I’m not sure Jack had ever held any strong religious beliefs, but I do know that he was deeply offended by his ex-communication from his church (& some members of his own family), even to the degree, that I don’t think he ever set foot in a Catholic church again.
Vera and Jack Bermingham were married at Brisbane’s Albert Street Methodist church on 9th February 1949. The newlyweds were straight off to Townsville for a short honeymoon and Jack was back to work installing the new automatic telephone exchanges across North Queensland.
Vera and Jack lived in Townsville, Ayr, Bowen and many other towns during their time in the north. Vera also worked in many different hospitals around North Queensland. She wasn’t overly keen on working in regional hospitals, after working in the busier, metropolitan Brisbane hospitals dealing with acute health care that she had done during and after the war.
The first of their 3 children, Robert was born in Ayr, Nth Qld
Jack was then transferred to work in the south western regions of Queensland, working around the Texas, Wallangarra, Dirranbandi and Goodiwindi areas. Vera & baby Robert (born in Ayr NQ) were based in Boonah, living in a rental house in Church Street. In 1951, Jennifer was born in the Ipswich Maternity Hospital, so Vera and the two young children were now living in Boonah, with both sides of the family nearby.
Vera finally put her foot down with her husbands nomadic lifestyle and Jack retrained as a PMG draftsman in 1954, the year I (Geoffrey) was born. Jack was now drawing up the plans for the new telecommunications systems, that he had formally been installing in country areas, and was now working in the Brisbane CBD.
As an interesting side note, as a child when visiting Boonah, I never once saw the two families together- both sets of grandparents (the Mullers & the Berminghams), and that’s considering they only lived a couple of hundred meters apart in Macquarie Street Boonah. Whenever I was in town, it was always to visit one family or the other. I can’t emphatically state that there was a divide, either by religion, social class, or ancestry. But, even as a kid, I picked up on the fact that there was a gap between them, and it was a gap much wider than just the physical distance between their actual addresses. As I got older, I began to understand how religion, class structure, and racial and ancestral backgrounds operated back in the days when the pioneer settlers first arrived in Queensland, in the mid to late 1800s. Many of the senior conservative residents of Boonah were still functioning on old outdated morals and principles, into the 1950s and 1960s. Both sets of grandparents still carried the strong religous and cultural beliefs, that were the result of the earlier times they were brought up in. Maybe some differences were still considered too hard to agree on. However, it certainly didn’t stop Vera, who always held strong Methodist beliefs from her German background, from marrying her husband who was brought up in a devout Irish Catholic family.
Queenslanders have always copped a lot of jokes, from the people of the southern states of NSW & Victoria about being 10 years culturally behind the rest of Australia. Although only a couple of hours south-west of the state capital Brisbane, Boonah in the 1960s was still operating in the mindset of the early 1900s in its cultural attitudes and outlooks. In saying that, I believe most provincial towns across the state would have been similar. In 2023, some of them (with their racial, religious & environmental beliefs) are still living in that time warp.
Vera’s political beliefs, coming from a traditional farming family, were always going to be on the conservative side. However, in saying that, I know that she was definately a critical thinker who valued rational over dogmatic ideologies. She certainly didn’t always agree with her father’s Country Party (later The National Party) political beliefs or even her husband Jack’s staunch Liberal party views.
Consequently, Vera had a pragmatic, common-sense approach to her views and attitudes on life. She was a realist. One of her favorite sayings was – “Just get on with it”… meaning, there isn’t much point in dwelling on your problems…. move on, and make the best of what you’ve got.
The family had bought a home in suburban southside Brisbane. Vera had wanted a more stable life, instead of the migratory lifestyle they’d had, since being married. Vera and Jack raised the three kids in the post-war baby boom period in Australia and we all attended local primary and high schools.
Vera was always going to be drawn back to her beloved nursing. Now having a more balanced way of life, they both decided that she could return to work, doing daytime shifts at the Princess Alexandra Hospital Acute Nursing Care & re-hab (these days ICU – Intensive Care Unit), and picking up night-time shifts specializing in other hospitals around Brisbane. All while being a mother to three young kids. Besides that, the extra income would be handy. They’d been relatively late starters with a family, with Jack being 43 & Vera being 35 when they were married, so they were also late starters getting into the housing market and commencing to pay off a mortgage.
Vera’s nursing career was long, and filled with great distinction. Throughout her nursing career, she had worked in emergency departments, hospital research wards, ICU, surgical, re-hab, general care & recovery, maternity, and in aged care. I honestly believe that her passion for nursing & health care would likely have seen her continuing to do the job until the day she dropped, if she didn’t have a family. Nurses, by the nature of the profession, have a natural instinct for care. Nursing is considered a noble profession due to the unwavering dedication, care, and compassion that nurses provide to their patients. They are not only tasked with medical responsibilities but also play a vital role in offering emotional and mental support to patients and their families. Vera finally retired from thirty-eight years of nursing in 1978, at age 64. She had to take care of Jack during his last years, up until he passed away in 1984, finally succumbing to Alzeimers disease.
After Jack’s death, Vera wasn’t one to sit around and twiddle her thumbs. She travelled extensively, going to visit Hong Kong & a trip to China, caught up with old friends and continued to live an active lifestyle, now with an ever increasing tribe of Grandchildren to care for. She eventually had thirteen grandkids.
Geoff, Robert, John & Jen with Vera on her 90th birthday
Vera Isabel Bermingham (Muller) lived a long and fruitful life, and she too finally died 11th October, 2008, aged 94. She had outlasted all her siblings.
I am Vera and Jack Bermingham’s son – A G (Geoff) Bermingham. My wife and I have three children – Andrew, Jarryd & Kathryn.
I think Vera would have been very proud to know that her Grandson Andrew Bermingham recently graduated as a Registered Nurse and is now following in her footsteps and working in the health care sector.
Andrew & Pankaj have blessed us with a beautiful grandaughter – Samara Isabel Bermingham (Vera Isabel Bermingham’s Great Grandaughter)
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