For Tony Centra, life began in Sale 70 years ago on a steam train, and a small bungalow on Desaily Street. He arrived in Melbourne on October 1 1953.
His family eventually joined him and completely left Italy behind. The Sale ALDI supermarket now stands on the site of the Centra family’s first home.
These are recollections and memories from Tony’s earlier years in Italy and Australia, as shared with his brother, Peter Centra.
TONY Centra was born on August 29 1937 to Rosa and Giovanni Centra in the small village of Borgo Celano, in the province of Puglia. The village was more commonly known as “Villagio” and was situated between San Marco in Lamis and San Giovanni Rotondo.
Tony was the eldest of seven brothers and sisters – Mary, Angela and Nick (twins), Lou and Mick (twins), and Matt, who were all born in Italy. Over time, Tony was to become an invaluable supporter of his parents and his siblings.
The family lived in a small rented house in the one room. No electricity and no running water. An oil lamp provided the family with the lighting they needed.
As Tony has explained – “The family was dirt poor.”
“We lived a peasant life, just surviving.”
Work was to become the main method by which Tony helped to support his family.
Tony had limited schooling, having only completed five years of primary.
As he has said, “I didn’t learn much at school … I wasn’t very good at school.”
Life’s experiences were to become Tony’s education. He would turn his hand to most things and through aptitude and determination, he would succeed.
Heavy manual work was to become the main method by which Tony helped to support his family.
From the very young age of 11, Tony commenced work. He worked with his grandfather “Tatuch” Nicola at “Lu Vosc”, on a small plot of land owned by Peter Stefanetti’s father, Michele, who was in Australia at the time. Michele was one of the first from the Villagio to migrate to Australia and he was to be instrumental in the Centra family eventually migrating also.
At Lu Vosc, Tony helped with the planting and harvesting of potatoes and wheat, two important staples the family needed to survive. Lu Vosc was 6-7 kilometres from the Villagio and Tony walked a bush track each day to go to work. There were no roads.
Tony’s next job, as barely a 12-year-old, was working as a shepherd, towards the village of San Giovanni. He looked after a herd of goats with the owner. One night they stayed in a small primitive stone hut; just the one room with all the goats inside at night.
Having been there around a week, Tony recalls waking at night and finding that the owner wasn’t there. He became frightened and he cried. The next day the owner came back and Tony told him he was going home.
“Mum and dad were not happy I left the job,” Tony said.
“Papa kicked my arse back to the owner.”
Papa asked the owner if it was true that he had left his son alone, and yes, that was the case. Papa then told Tony: “You finish today and then come home”.
Few words from Papa but enough to say he supported his son and wanted him to be treated well.
As a 13-year-old, Tony gained employment in a road building gang. Pick and shovel were the tools for this back breaking work. There was no machinery except for a jack hammer used to dig holes in the ground so that explosives could be used to help clear the very rocky terrain for the road building.
Tony persuaded the boss to allow him to use the jack hammer. It was very hard work and his wrists swelled from the continual vibration. Tony also helped fill the holes with gelignite and a fuse for detonation. On one occasion he added a fuse that was too short and he barely escaped with his life as the gelignite exploded. Tony still has the large scar on his ankle where a stone hit him with great force.
Tony, who was around 13 at the time, was then to go on to work in a stone quarry between the Villagio and Foggia. It was very manual work with picks, sledge hammer and explosives – all to supply the growing city of Foggia, which was the provincial city of the region.
There was no campsite and no water. Tony and the other men slept on the floor of the local caves which had been uncovered during the excavations for the quarry. They slept on the ground with a blanket on top.
It was a very primitive and hard life for Tony and his fellow workers.
Food consisted of only bread that Tony’s mum had given him. This was the food for every meal.
Tony started work as the water boy but soon was put to work on the sieve which separated the fine sand. He recollects the wind stirring up the sand and getting into his eyes. There were many tears from the discomfort at these times, with the tears helping to flush out his eyes. The only water was for drinking, with a man bringing around a bucket and cup to the workers.
The day’s work at the quarry started at daylight and finished when the bus from Foggia came by in the late afternoon. They had no watch or clock and this is how the working day was measured. Tony thinks work finished at around 5-6pm.
Tony then went on to work on a farm, looking after the pigs, sheep and ducks. There were no fences so Tony had to be with the animals all the time to look after them. Horses were used to plough the land. He also had to clean out the stables each day.
Tony’s bed whilst he worked on the farm was the concrete horse trough, with some hay underneath him for some very small element of comfort.
He managed to get home possibly once a month when he cried to the boss: “I want to go home to see mum.”
Home life in the Villagio was not easy. There was the constant rhythm of life to do what was essential to survive. Tony recalls the very cold winters when heavy snow would have the family ‘locked up’ in the one room home. They had to have enough food stored to get through these times. Food consisted of chickpeas, walnuts, chestnuts, broad beans and potatoes. Mum would make bread once a month in the community oven. The family had to have enough wheat stored so that mum could make the large round bread loaves called ‘Panettone’.
A memory Tony recalls was mum handing him and his siblings a handful of chestnuts for lunch.
“That was it – nothing else.”
He also remembers when the twins (Nick and Angela) were born that mum had difficulty feeding them. Tony would take them to a local woman who had a baby and who had extra milk to spare for the twins. Papa, ever resourceful, believed this was not sustainable and decided to buy a goat, and the milk went to the twins.
The goat then lived in the one room with the family. Papa had a job pruning olive trees and he would bring the cuttings home to feed the goat.
Nothing was wasted.
Nappies for the babies that came along also needed to be cleaned and washed. This was problematic in winter. There was a well in the room but no electricity The solution was a small domed top charcoal burner called a ‘Vrascier’, with the nappies placed on top to dry. There needed to be forward planning for the winter with Papa and Tony cutting boxthorn bushes and burning the branches to create the charcoal to be stored for the winter. Nothing was left to chance. Planning ahead was critical.
During a number of these early years, Papa was absent fighting at war for the Italian army, as a prisoner of war by the Germans and then when he migrated to Australia. Tony was relied upon by his mother to help out more than ever during these times.
There was great hardship for mum and her family whilst dad was away. In their married life, mum and dad were to be separated from each other for more than 10 years. The pressure of looking after the family in Italy for mum was to be eased by extended family support and assistance from the small community.
The Centra family’s gradual journey to Australia came through the Stefanetti brothers – Michele (Peter’s father) and Luigi. They had been in Australia before the war and were interned during the war as ‘Enemy Aliens’ – (Migrants from any country with whom Australia was at war). After the war, they both wanted to remain in Australia, and Michele got his two sons to come out (Peter and Mateo).
Then Peter asked Papa to come out too. This was in 1951. It was a brave move. As a 40-year-old man, he reluctantly left his family to travel into the unknown to a foreign land. His hope was to establish himself with work and to save enough to bring his family out to Australia also.
Tony was to also play an important role in this plan. Papa was sponsored by the APM planting trees out at Longford. He would go on to work in manual jobs for the remainder of his working life, often working a number of jobs, seven days a week. He would never return to Italy in his lifetime. He only had bad memories of his hard times there. Papa was a wonderful provider for his family and Tony followed in his footsteps with his own admirable work ethic.
It was then Tony’s turn.
One day mum said to him: “You have got to go to Australia to be with your father.”
There were no questions asked. It had to be done.
Tony set off on September 4 1953 on the boat ‘Neptunia’ from Naples. He was farewelled at the port of Naples by his mum.
He was happy to leave for Australia but unhappy to leave his mother and brothers and sisters. Tony recalls as if it was yesterday the emotional farewell to his family in the Villagio.
Tony was 16 years of age when this next uncertain stage in life began. He had no bag and no change of clothes when he boarded that ship. This in itself highlights the dire poverty of the family.
Tony recalls his first memory on the ship.
“There was so much food. I had never seen so much food in all my life!”
During the trip, he bunked in with the women and children. He was seasick every day and he cried a lot, missing his family.
Papa and Luigi Staffanetti were at Station Pier to meet Tony and they spent the night at a boarding house. It was called the “100 rooms” and the next day they hitched a ride with a milk truck with Tony sitting on the large metal milk crates in the back of the cabin.
The train to Sale was a steam train. They stopped at Warragul and Papa gave Tony his very first beer. He skulled it.
Life in Australia commenced in a small bungalow behind Peter Stefanetti’s house in Desailly St.
The Sion nuns had sponsored Tony to work with them at the Sion Convent girls school. Luigi Stefanetti had made the arrangement as he worked for the nuns and lived at the Convent in a small cottage on Codrington St.
Tony worked at the Sion Convent for around 12 months as a gardener.
He only saw Papa on the weekends, as Papa was working in the ‘bush’ for the APM.
He often said to Papa that they had to get the family out to Australia – “We need to get my mum and brothers and sisters here.” He missed his family. In those early times, Papa said they couldn’t afford it yet.
Tony recalls that he was paid two pounds at the time, when the average weekly wage was 12 pounds. He didn’t think this was fair. When Gino Nocci spoke to Tony about taking his job at the brick works in Traralgon, Tony was keen to go.
Papa was reluctant for him to take on the job because he feared he would not see his son again.
Tony took the job. More hard work. Making bricks, digging up clay, stacking and removing bricks from the kiln. Tony also had to stoke the furnace at night. It was tiring work. Each meal consisted of only bread and butter.
His home was a very small cabin on the brickworks site. So small that the bed needed to be moved to open the door. There was no toilet. He ‘went’ behind the bushes.Tony had a break for the better when he was told of the workers canteen at the new hospital in Traralgon on the highway (now demolished).
He ended up having his evening meals there and paying one pound a week for this.
He was looked after by the lady who was the canteen cook, maybe because he “licked the plate dry”, she gave him more food. She also made jam and peanut butter sandwiches for him for his lunch. Tony appreciated her kindness.
He had been working at the brickworks for three weeks and then went on the bus home to visit Papa.
Tony vividly recalls he had 30 pounds in his pocket to give Papa and a flagon of sherry.
The bus dropped him off in Raymond St and Tony walked to the house that he was helping Papa to pay off. Papa answered the door and his eyes lit up. He said – “I thought I had lost you.” They both cried.
Tony repeated his request – “I want mum here.”
The plan to bring the rest of the family was taking shape with the purchase of the house from “Nanna” who lived in the front house. The house cost 300 pounds. The Sale ALDI Supermarket now stands on the site of the first Centra home. Tony remembers the walls were made of hessian and in winter the house was very cold. Additions and improvements over time made the Raymond St house a home for the Centra family.
The passage for the seven family members to come out to Australia was 700 pounds. They arrived in 1954 and the family grew in 1956, with the addition of Peter. The family was complete.
The Centra’s were the largest family to leave the Villagio for a better life. Many other families followed in their footsteps.
Tony continued to work to assist mum and dad to pay off the house. He worked at the butter factory (now the gallery and library on the highway) for 10 years before going on to other work and success. Tony was a most valuable and respected worker in all jobs during his working life.
Tony was a great support in many ways for his family, both as a young boy in Italy and as a family focused man in Australia.
Tony Centra can be very proud of himself and his contribution to the wellbeing of his family.
As a family we are forever grateful for mum and dad’s brave decision to come to Australia. The current and future generations of the family will reap the rewards of the hard work and sacrifice of our parents and Tony.
