The Australian War Memorial Collection. Test site
Port Moresby, New Guinea. "Look through the window and what do you see? A most enormous BANANA tree! A foot and a half when we brought it home... Now look how big the dam' thing's grown!" The view out the window of the room used by Padre P. Sands, the first RAAF chaplain in war-time New Guinea, who obtained and furnished a Rec[reation] Hut. Note the large banana tree. Once the hut was finished, Padre Sands and Billy Challoner formed a concert group called the Moresby Microbes. This group performed 50 weekly concerts between 8 May 1942 and 28 April 1943, including a "Jubilee Concert" which was the last. Padre Sands wrote the verse which accompanies each photograph in an album given to LAC Frank Lansdowne, a member of the Moresby Microbes, now held in the Private Records collection at the Australian War Memorial. (Donor J. Treseder)
Port Moresby, New Guinea. "Meet the Padre, the bloke in the HUT! The doors of which are never shut. Recital or concert or cinema show - He pressed the button, the blokes made 'em go!" Portrait of Padr
Port Moresby, New Guinea. "Soldier, Sailor, Airman, Priest, Gather together to our Household feast. Where the week-day's merriment Becomes the Sunday's sacrament." The altar on the stage used by the M
Port Moresby, New Guinea. "Here's the MARBLE STAIRCASE Entrance to the show Wipe your feet upon the mat, And give your nose a blow!" The stairs leading to the entrance of the Rec[reation] Hut which wa
Port Moresby, New Guinea. "For billiards and reading And writing, we come - Be blowed to the Black-out! The Rec Hut's our Home." Two members of the RAAF reading and writing in the Rec[reation] Hut tha
Port Moresby, New Guinea. "For billiards and reading And writing, we come - Be blowed to the Black-out! The Rec Hut's our Home." Two members of the RAAF playing billiards in the Rec[reation] Hut that
Port Moresby, New Guinea. "This is the Padre, a scrounger renowned, But we furnished the REC HUT by the loot that we found! At Moresby he lost all his middle-aged spread And most of the fluff from the
