About Denham, Shark Bay, Pearling and Mark Rubin in ‘The History of the North West of Australia’, edited by James Sykes Battye and published in Perth in 1915

Title page, The History of the North West of Australia, edited by James Sykes Battye, VK Jones & Co., Perth, 1915. Image courtesy of the State Library of Western Australia.

Another online chance discovery, a PDF of The History of the North West of Australia, sheds some light on what life was like in pearling industry towns such as Denham and Broome as well as vast cattle stations like Warrawagine and De Grey in the Pilbara region and beyond.

Leon Krasker’s inspiration for coming to Western Australia, Mark Rubin, owned those two stations, cattle ranches in the American parlance, as well as a large fleet of pearling vessels of the sort in which Leon and Mathilde Krasker had bought shares.

World War I put plenty of industries depending on foreign trade out of action for the duration and pearling was no exception.

Leon Krasker’s solution to the cessation of foreign travel lay in business trips to Adelaide and Melbourne to cater for the domestic market in pearls for adornment as well as pearl-shell buttons and belt buckles.

After Leon’s death Mathilde took over the business and continued trading with clients such as Kozminsky, now reborn as Kozminsky Studio, then at 4 Block Arcade, Melbourne, accompanied by Robert while still an infant, with foreign business trips resuming after war’s end.

Pages 260 and 261, The History of the North West of Australia, edited by James Sykes Battye, VK Jones & Co., Perth, 1915. Image courtesy of the State Library of Western Australia.

Although Denham was much smaller than Broome, its advantages lay in less competition for access to its pearling beds and in a different species, Meleagrina imbricata, commonly known as the Shark Bay pearl, with its smaller shell being more suitable for buttons and manufacturing other small items.

The Broome oyster, Meleagrina margaritifera, was larger and could yield pearls fetching four figures in Australian pounds during the 1910s such as JS Battye’s example weighing 178 grains or 11.5342 grams and worth £3,000 in 1911.

Battye notes that pearls from Shark Bay had a yellowish lustre while those from Broome were more white due to the differences in local waters, proven by transplanting pearls from one location into the waters of the other.

Page 185, The History of the North West of Australia, edited by James Sykes Battye, VK Jones & Co., Perth, 1915. Image courtesy of the State Library of Western Australia.

The History of the North West of Australia and its companion about the whole state, The History of the North West of Australia, both by James Sykes Battye, are free to download and provide invaluable insight not only into the Western Australia of the past but why it is as it is nowadays.

Links

• Australian Dictionary of Biography – James Sykes Battye (1871–1954)
• Project Gutenberg of Australia – Western Australia: a history from its discovery to the inauguration of the Commonwealth, by J.S. Battye (1871-1954) – HTML – text
• State Library of Western Australia aka Battye Library – The History of the North West of Australia’, edited by James Sykes Battye, 1915 – PDF
• Wikipedia – James Battye

Robert Krasker’s father Leon Krasker is listed several times in ‘The Western Australian Directory’ aka ‘Wise’s’ of 1914, in Alphabetical, Towns and Trades Directories

Front inside pages, ‘The Western Australian Directory’ aka ‘Wise’s’ of 1914. Image courtesy of State Library of Western Australia at https://slwa.wa.gov.au/collections/collections/post-office-directories/post-office-directories-1910-1919/western-3

When Leon Krasker made his first trip from Britain to Broome and back in 1907 did he go see Mark Rubin for advice on how to become a successful pearl buyer and pearl dealer?

At different times Leon listed himself as being based in Broome and Shark Bay, then called Sharks Bay as it was so named by explorer and pirate William Dampier after he arrived there in August 1699, as well as at 99 Hay Street, Subiaco in Perth, Western Australia.

Mark Rubin had several addresses in Western Australia by the time Leon Krasker arrived:

Links

• Australian Dictionary of Biography – Mark Rubin (1867–1919)
• National Museum Australia – Arrival of English explorer William Dampier
• State Library of Western Australia (SLWA) aka Battye Library – Post Office Directories 1910-1919
• Wikipedia – St George’s House, Perth

‘The Northern Times’ reports on the death of Leon Krasker, father of Australian cinematographer Robert Krasker, BSC, on 30 September and 21 October 1916

The Northern Times, Saturday, 21 October 1916, page 4, ‘The Death of Mr. Leon Krasker: A Pathetic Message’. Image courtesy of the National Library of Australia via Trove at http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-page7365961

The little township of Denham in Shark Bay was some distance away from the pearling grounds the other side of the peninsula and where the luggers beached up to sell their wares to traders like Leon Krasker visiting Monkey Mia and Herald Bight.

As many non-indigenous travellers in the deserts of Western Australia have found, injury, thirst and death can lurk just around the corner if undersupplied and alone, and so Leon Krasker’s lonely death came upon him by accident during a normal weekly business trip.

Farbige Schatten – Der Kameramann Robert Krasker, by Dr Falk Schwarz, Part 1: The becoming of an artist, A riding accident (early translation from German into English):

Leon Krasker became a valued member of the community. He had organized his pearl trading tightly and rode his horse Battler every week to buy pearls from the fishermen along the coast. The ride on his horse was risky because Leon Krasker had lost a leg in an accident and was wearing a cork prosthesis. Again and again he was asked to drive in a carriage because it seemed safer. One day he didn’t come back.

The Northern Times, Saturday, 21 October 1916, page 4, ‘The Death of Mr. Leon Krasker: A Pathetic Message’:

The Death of Mr Leon Krasker: A Pathetic Message
Further particulars of the finding of the body of Mr Leon Krasker, pearler, of Shark Bay, whose death in the bush was reported some four weeks ago, have been received, and from these it appears that Mr Krasker left Denham for Herald Bight on September 22, and should have returned on the 24th.

On the morning of the 28th, Mr William Sunter, pearler, Shark Bay, left Denham with a lad named Ernest Adams to search for Mr Krasker, and, when about three miles from Denham they met a coloured man named Joe Hanup, who was in Mr Krasker’s employ at Herald Bight, on the pearling ground.

Hanup was carrying Mr Krasker’s artificial leg, and said he had found the leg on the track the night before, but did not see any thing of Mr Krasker.

They returned to Denham, and at 8 am they again left in company with Mr Edwards, Pearling Inspector, and Mr William Thomas, and when about 12 miles from Denham and 1 1/2 miles north of the water tank, they came across Mr Krasker’s body under a wattle tree about ten yards off the track.

The body was lying in a position which indicated that deceased died very easily, and no signs of any struggle were noticeable.

Mr Edwards picked up Mr Krasker’s pocket-book which was lying behind his head, and read the following to his companions, written in deceased’s handwriting: “I fell off my horse one hour before my destination and broke my leg. I start back for the tank and failed. Where you will find me the thirst killed me. I am sorry to die before life time, my cherir, I loved until my last. I leave everything to you. Don’t worry too much, suppose everything for the best … I expected relief … I kiss you my last. Kiss my children for me and also my parents. Your loving husband.”

This was signed by the deceased. Mr Sunter then left Mr Edwards and Mr Thomas in charge of the body, and continued on to Herald Bight to inform Mr Adams of Mr Krasker’s fate, and when a mile and a half along the track he picked up a visiting card belonging to the deceased with the following words written thereon: “4 o’clock on 22nd and have not reached tank, it is yet too long, and I suffer much with thirst. L.K.”

About a mile further on Mr Sunter picked up a legging, and another visiting card belonging to deceased which was found stuck in the side of the legging had the following words written on it: “I fell off my horse, broke my leg. Trying to reach the tank. September 22.”

The body was brought in to Denham, where the burial took place.

The Northern Times, Saturday, 30 September 1916, page 2, ‘Tragic Death’. Image courtesy of the National Library of Australia via Trove at http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-page7365941

The Northern Times, Saturday, 30 September 1916, page 2, ‘Tragic Death’:

Tragic Death.
News was received by the police on Thursday evening of the tragic death of Mr Leon Krasker, the well-known pearler of Shark Bay.

It appears that Mr Krasker left Shark Bay on the 22nd instance on horseback, with the intention of riding to Herald Bight, but news was received that he had not arrived at his destination, so on Thursday morning a search party went out and found his body about 15 miles from the Bay.

It is surmised that he was thrown from his horse, as his leg was broken, and that the unfortunate man afterwards perished from thirst.

There was no Justice of the Peace available at Denham, and therefore no inquest could be held, but the body has been buried and full particulars will be sent to the Resident Magistrate for his consideration.

Mr Krasker leaves a wife and children, who are at present at Shark Bay, and much sympathy is felt with them in their sad loss.

Links

• National Library of Australia, Trove – The Northern Times, Saturday, 30 September 1916, page 2, ‘Tragic Death’
• National Library of Australia, Trove – The Northern Times, Saturday, 21 October 1916, page 4, ‘The Death of Mr. Leon Krasker: A Pathetic Message’

Robert Krasker’s father Leon Krasker and the reason for naming Krasker’s Tank in Francois Peron National Park in Shark Bay after him

Krasker’s Tank at Francois Peron National Park at Shark Bay in Western Australia. Image courtesy of Campedia.com.au at https://campedia.com.au/business/16311/kraskers-tank-francois-peron-national-park

Australian cinematographer Robert Krasker, BSC was just three years old when his father Leon died and the family, now consisting of mother Mathilde, George, Georgette, Marie aka Mitzi, Stephanie and Robert himself, had suddenly lost its major income-earner.

Based on recently found documents, Leon and Mathilde each owned a share in three pearling vessels and one hopes that Leon’s shares passed on to his widow.

Mathilde began describing herself as a pearl dealer on official documents from 1917 onwards until 1920 when her “profession, occupation or calling” was noted as “nil” on a passenger manifest followed by “wife” in 1923, “home duties” in 1926 and “retired pearler” in 1931.

Too much faith should not be placed in the accuracy of shipping documents as many seem to be written in haste and with some errors in spelling and ages.

Links

• Campedia – Kraskers Tank – Francois Peron National Park

The parents of Robert Krasker, BSC, Leon and Mathilde Krasker, owned shares in three pearling vessels in the north-west of Western Australia

Cover, Ships Registered in Western Australian from 1856 to 1969: Their Details, Their Owners & Their Fate. Image courtesy of Rod Dickson and maritimeheritage.org.

Ships Registered in Western Australian from 1856 to 1969: Their Details, Their Owners & Their Fate, by Rod Dickson

Introduction

Originally these registers were transcribed for my own personal maritime research but, as time went by, it became evident that they were important to other researchers, maritime and in other fields.

Mr Mike McCarthy encouraged me in the work and as it progressed it was published as a paper, (No. 80), in March 1994 for the Maritime Museum at Fremantle in eight volumes, each with its own index and biographical index.

These eight volumes, however, proved to be unwieldy and it was decided to redo them as a single entity. Since the original version was finished research has enabled me to add further information on the vessels, their operations and their fate and this has been added to the publication as it came to light.

Sometimes, just sometimes, exactly the right information suddenly pops up right at the top of search results and it not only fills in some gaps but reveals something unexpected but invaluable.

That occurred earlier this week when I was following up on a phone conversation with someone in the library at the Australian Maritime Museum who told me that Leon and Mathilde Krasker had owned shares in two pearling boats in the north-west of Western Australia.

A search engine turned up a huge PDF containing their names three times over, against three boats, and also revealed the name Mark Rubin against over 30 other vessels.

This had to be the Mark Rubin written about in Dr Falk Schwarz’s book about Robert Krasker, BSC, the Mark Rubin whose success in the north-west of WA had inspired Mathilde and Leon to risk everything as strangers in a strange land, sail to Fremantle, travel up the coast and set themselves up as pearl buyers and dealers as Mark Rubin had done not long before.

Australian Dictionary of Biography – Mark Rubin (1867–1919):

Soon after 1900 Mark moved to Broome, Western Australia, centre of the pearling industry, where he quickly became a leading pearl dealer, travelling yearly to London. He also owned a large pearling fleet. About 1901 the family moved to London, although Mark continued to spend most of his time in Australia. Believing that war in Europe was inevitable and that wool would be more in demand than pearls, he bought several large sheep stations in 1912-13, including de Grey and Warrawagine near Port Hedland, Western Australia, and Northampton Downs in Queensland. He also transferred his pearl-dealing business to London and Paris. Mark died at Fontainebleau, France, on 6 November 1919, leaving a fortune.

Leon Krasker had travelled from Broome to Fremantle on 12 October 1907 on the Charon, just one leg in a probable round trip from Britain to Western Australia and back.

His imminent arrival in Fremantle on the Oruba from London earlier that year had been announced in a publication named Empire of Saturday 24 August 1907, and further research may turn up passenger lists with further details.

Mark Rubin appears to have already been well set-up financially before arriving in Broome from the eastern states after engaging in various businesses there whereas Leon, Mathilde and their then young family of one boy and two girls had left Hackney in London in straitened circumstances according to Dr Schwarz’s book, Farbige Schatten – Der Kameramann Robert Krasker.

Fact Checks

• “Leon Kracker” – His name is, of course Leon Krasker despite official documents and newspapers mistakenly naming him as Louis and other variations of given name and surname.
• “Mathilde Kracker” – In the same way, her name is actually Mathilde Krasker.

Links

• Australian Dictionary of Biography – Mark Rubin (1867–1919)
• Improve Sailing – What Is A Boat With 2 Masts Called? (5 Options)
• Maritime Heritage Association – Ships Registered in Western Australian from 1856 to 1969: Their Details, Their Owners & Their Fate – Transcribed and Compiled by Rod Dickson, Merchant Seaman. October 1996. – PDF

Australian cinematographer Robert Krasker’s father Leon Krasker died in an accident in Shark Bay, Western Australia, in 1916 when Robert was just 3 years old: here is Leon’s gravestone

Leon Krasker, Denham Cemetery, Denham, Shark Bay Shire, Western Australia, Australia. “In loving memory of Leon, Beloved husband of Mathilde Krasker, died 26th September, 1916, aged 39 years. He left his home in health and strength, No thought of death was near, He had no time to say farewell, To those he loved so dear.” Image courtesy of Find A Grave at https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/208683139/leon-krasker.

Extract and rough translation from Farbige Schatten: Der Kameramann Robert Krasker, by Dr Falk Schwarz, published in 2012:

A riding accident

Leon Krasker went about his business, the family had settled down in Shark Bay, which at the time was repeatedly noted as Sharks Bay on official documents. The Kraskers lived at 25 Knight Terrace (known as “the pearl dealer’s cottage”) on Denham’s seafront, right on the Indian Ocean. Leon Krasker became a valued member of the community. He had organized his pearl trading tightly and rode his horse Battler every week to buy pearls from the fishermen along the coast. The ride on his horse was risky because Leon Krasker had lost a leg in an accident and was wearing a cork prosthesis. Again and again he was asked to drive in a carriage because it seemed safer. One day he didn’t come back.

The Shark Bay Chronicle provides an account of Leon Krasker’s final hours:

“Krasker used to ride a horse called ‘Battler’ over to Monkey Mia and Herald Bight to buy pearls. When he returned he always brought mail in his saddle bags from the men at the various pearling settlements. He would take the letters to the post office, and the post mistress Gladys Lloyd would put the letters in the mail bag for the next State ship.

He was always punctual. One day the ship was due and when there was no sign of Krasker, Mrs Lloyd became anxious about him. A search party set out from town on horseback and found Krasker’s body on the road three miles from the turn-off on the road to Herald Bight.

He had stopped to open a gate, and on re-mounting had been thrown from his horse, and in the fall had broken his good leg. The unfortunate man began dragging himself along the ground towards a distant sheep watering point. However the effort was too much and his strength ran out before he could reach it. He perished on the lonely track. Leon Krasker had a notebook and pencil with him, and before he died he scribbled a note relating what had happened to him and wrote a will.” 

Leon Krasker did not make it to this simple water outlet. To date it is known in Denham as Krasker’s Tank.

The cause of death is entered on the official certificate: “Fell from horse and broke leg and perished from shock on the beach 12 miles from Denham.” He died 11 miles from Denham. The day of his death was dated September 26, 1916. In his last notes shortly before his death he wrote to his wife:

“I start back for the tank and failed where you will find me – the thirst killed me. I am sorry to die before (my) life time, ma chérie, I leave everything for you.”

Three days later, the burial took place according to the Church of England rite in Shark Bay Cemetery. On the tombstone it says:

In loving memory of Leon
Beloved husband of Mathilde Krasker
died 26th September, 1916 aged 39 years
He left his home in health and strength
No thought of death was near
He had no time to say farewell
To those he loved so dear.

This tragedy left the family helpless and disconsolate. Leon had died in the middle of his life, in the middle of constructing his life’s work, in the midst of his business as a pearl dealer. He was survived by five dependent children aged 3 to 11 years.

What should Mathilde Krasker do? Going back to parents and in-laws in France was impossible because the First World War was raging in Europe. A voyage by ship was unthinkable in 1916. So there was nothing left but to take over her husband’s role and, in addition to looking after the children, continued the business as best she could. On a business trip on board the ship Ormonde to Melbourne in 1920, she stated that her profession was “merchant”.

Fact Check: The pleasures and terrors of researching family histories at genealogy Web sites

The image above is a screenshot of the search results for “Leon Krasker” at a popular genealogy Web site that I recently accessed at the State Library of New South Wales. I’ll be heading off there again soon to continue my research and fill in some of the many gaps I’ve found at all such Web sites that I have accessed so far.

The “Shark Bay Pioneer Krasker Family Tree” looks the most promising though this partly redacted preview contains some odd errors.

For example, Leon Krasker’s name according to every official document he filled in and signed has him as exactly that, Leon Krasker, as he had Australianized his first name by removing the accent acute from the e, altering Léon to Leon.

No official document has him as also being Louis or Kersker and there is the verifiable fact that he was born in 1877 in Tulcea, Romania and not Tula in Russia.

Leon’s wife, whom he married in Paris on 26 May 1904, was Mathilde Krasker née Rubel and she was born in 1880 in Chernivtsi, a town now in Ukraine although it was in Austria and named Czernowitz when she was born.

These details are subject to confirmation by official documents.

The Krasker family had two addresses in Western Australia from where they most likely lived and worked given the nature of their pearl trading business and the needs of their children: 99 Hay Street, Subiaco and 25 Knight Terrace, Denham in Shark Bay 800 kilometers to the north of Perth.

Mathilde Krasker was named simply that and not somehow also named “Macherie”: the note Leon left for her when he was dying on the track between Denham and Herald Bight in Shark Bay in 1916 addressed her as ma chérie, that is, my dear or my darling.

“I start back for the tank and failed where you will find me – the thirst killed me. I am sorry to die before (my) life time, ma chérie, I leave everything for you.”

Fact Checks

• “Louis Leon Léon Krasker Kersker” – Leon Krasker’s name after he removed the accent acute from the letter e was exactly that, Leon Krasker, and that is how he spelled it on official documents.
• “Matilde Mathilde Macherie Matilda Rubel” – Mathilde Krasker’s name after she married Leon Krasker was exactly that, Mathilde Krasker, and that is how she spelled it on official documents. Her maiden surname was Rubel though her parents appear to have changed it to Norman after moving westwards from eastern Europe.
• “Marriage: Worcestershire, England” – The weight of evidence currently points to the marriage between Mathilde and Leon Krasker having been conducted in Paris and not Worcestershire, but that can be confirmed with potential access to their marriage certificate if such a record is still in existence.
• “Birth: Tula, Russia” – Léon Krasker was born in Tulcea, Romania.

Mathilde Krasker’s £1000 legacy from husband the late Leon Krasker stolen first day out from Brisbane while taking her children on trip to Paris for their education in 1923

‘Dundee Courier’, Monday 19 February 1923, page 3, ‘Pearl Necklace Disappears’. Image courtesy of Trove at National Library of Australia. Gale Document Number: GALE|JE3227957671.

More reports from Daily Mail, The Sunday Times (WA) and The Sunday Times (UK)

When Leon Krasker died on the track between Denham and Herald Bight in Shark Bay in 1916, his widow Mathilde Krasker suddenly had to find a way to replace Leon’s income as a pearl trader.

Leon had left behind five children all in need of clothing, educating, feeding and housing, a family comprising George (aged 11), Georgette (aged 10), Marie (aged 8), Stephanie (aged 6) and Robert (aged 3).

No evidence has been left behind of how successful Leon’s pearl trading business had been just as no information is available as to how lucrative it might have been after Mathilde Krasker took it over, declaring it as her profession on several official and travel documents in subsequent years.

By the time the start of 1923 came around George was 17, Georgette was 16, Marie was 14, Stephanie was 12 and Robert was 9.

They were the children of parents who grew up speaking multiple languages – Mathilde with German and French, and Leon with Romanian and French – and the Krasker kids’ clearly non-English surname stood out against the mostly English-surnamed children amongst whom they learned, lived and played in Western Australia.

The five young Kraskers had been born into several countries with several different native languages – French, English and Strine – and needed decent education in two of those languages if they were to succeed in life within Australia and outside of it.

If George and Georgette had completed their formal education by late 1922 then they were in need of training for suitable professions and would that have been available in Denham at the time?

What further education and career training were suitable to meet Marie’s, Stephanie’s and Robert’s needs in Denham or Perth?

Leon and Mathilde had been educated in Paris and Leon had also trained there as a goldsmith, amongst extended family members who were jewellers and goldsmiths, tailors and furriers, so they knew the quality of the education that was available formally and informally amongst the arcades, galleries, museums, salons and streets of the French metropolis.

Further incentive to move back there may have already revealed itself in nine years-old Robert, a creative inclination that could hardly have been satisfied in Western Australia enough to turn it into a life-sustaining career there.

If Mathilde Krasker had planned on financing her family’s travel, sustenance and education with Leon’s legacy then she could not have foreseen it would be snatched away from her just after departing the port of Brisbane.

In his book Farbige Schatten – Der Kameramann Robert Krasker, Dr Falk Schwarz writes that Robert Krasker endured two life-shaping tragedies, his father’s death and falling ill with the malaria and type 1 diabetes that wrecked his health, shortened his career and lead to a premature death at the age of 67.

I suggest that the theft of the pearl necklace that Leon had bestowed to Mathilde was a third life-shaping tragedy, one that would have deeply affected them all, compounding tragedy upon tragedy and shaping all the Krasker children’s lives in ways they never deserved.

According to the CPI Inflation Calculator, “£1,000 in 1923 is equivalent in purchasing power to about £75,782.69 today, an increase of £74,782.69 over 101 years”, and in 2024 Australian dollars that is equivalent to $146,479.98.

Fact Checks

• “Mrs Krasker, a Rumanian …” – Mathilde Krasker was born in Chernivtsi in 1882 when it was located in Austria and thus she was Austrian at birth, and now her birthplace is in Ukraine. She was a naturalized Australian at the time of the theft.
• “a wealthy woman passenger …” – An assumption based on what exactly? That Mathilde Krasker had a pearl necklace and some US dollars in her possession before they were stolen?
• “a parcel of pearls, valued at £100, and 10 American 10-dollar gold pieces …” – Reports disagree on the contents and value of what was stolen so which newspaper’s reporter is more credible?
• “A pearl necklace, worth several hundreds of pounds …” – That is quite some difference between £100, £1000 and “several hundreds”.
• “Mrs Krasker’s husband, recently deceased, was pearling in this State for a time.” – If by “pearling” they mean diving for pearls then that is incorrect given he was a dealer in pearls and pearl shells for buttons, buying from pearling lugger captains to sell on the world market. Leon Krasker died in 1916 and the theft took place in 1923 so that “recently” equates to seven years.
• A parcel of pearls, a score in number, wrapped in a package, or a pearl necklace? – More disagreement about the facts between journalists and which of them is correct?

Krasker family members Leon, George, Georgette, Stephanie & Marie feature in early twentieth century newspaper reports from Western Australia

Georgette Krasker and Marie Krasker in The W.A. Record, Saturday 14 January 1921, page 6, Results of the Schools: Alliance Francaise Examination, Trinity College of Music. Image courtesy of Trove at the National Library of Australia, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/212402545

Leon, George, Georgette, Stephanie and Marie Krasker in Kalgoorlie Miner, The Blackwood Times, The Daily News & The West Australian

Like the Krasker children I was taken to a small, remote town in Western Australia located between desert and sea and with a junior high school that could be described as mediocre at best.

It did accidentally introduce me to photography, a mixed blessing given what happened when I tried to turn a hobby of stills photography into the profession of cinematography at a place that could loosely be described as an art school in the state’s capital city.

That was more than half a century after Mathilde, Leon, George, Georgette and Marie arrived in Perth from London, then headed off north to Shark Bay and its declining pearl fishing industry with the aim of making their fortune as traders in pearls for personal adornment and pearl shells for carving into buttons.

Denham and its main pearling lugger beachheads of Herald Bight and Monkey Mia were at the end of their boom years when fortunes could be made from pearling and turned into agricultural empires like those of the legendary Mark Rubin, tales of whom had inspired Leon and Mathilde to chance it down under.

As soon as my family arrived in our new town and home-to-be, my shock and disappointment were acute and I realized that the top-quality education I had taken for granted in Brisbane and that was to be my launch pad to the world was no more and the next few years were to be a struggle.

Brisbane was, of course, no comparison to the London and before that, Paris, that the Kraskers had left but I had suddenly lost exposure to good libraries, live musical performances, an art gallery and a museum, immersive education in multiple languages and an extended family that was not particularly close but nonetheless gave me a feeling of belonging and a history of sorts.

I have no idea what Mathilde and her children were thinking when their ship entered Fremantle, nor their impressions of Subiaco and then Denham in Shark Bay after the 800-kilometer trip there but Leon had already scoped out Western Australia during his voyage there in 1907.

He surely told them of the challenges to be expected in Shark Bay and spoke of his hopes of matching the fortune Mark Rubin had made further north in Broome.

In establishing two addresses in Western Australia, 25 Knight Terrace in Denham and 99 Hay Street in Subiaco, was Leon Krasker giving his children the hope of better things than what a tiny town in remote Shark Bay could offer and were they are least partially schooled in the state capital?

While I don’t have all the facts at hand, clues are available in the press clippings above.

George’s Christian Brothers College examination results, Georgette’s Alliance Française medals and prizes, and Marie’s music theory and pianoforte honours are evidence of their engagement with the educational opportunities available in Perth and possibly Denham while Stephanie, first of the two children born in Western Australia, corresponded with Auntie Nell of The Daily News Children’s Column and donated to its Sunshine League Cot Fund charity.

Leon Krasker, too, engaged in charitable endeavours, giving to the YMCA’s fundraising campaign in 1916 in the middle of the Great War only months before his tragic death on the track between Denham and Herald Bight.

So far though I haven’t come across mention of young Robert and what he may have been up to in the years before his deep and growing interest in art and then photography took the family back to Europe.

…