Today marks thirty years of employment with the Department of Health as a public health microbiologist.
Hard to believe I started on a two week Christmas vacation fill-in. Only two of us wanted to do the two week placement when offered it during our exams. The others all wanted a break. Finished the exams on the Friday and went into the job on the Monday.
Had a good time and they apparently liked me as at the end of the two weeks they said to come back the next Monday!
I went for an actual interview in April the following year and got a permanent position.
Suddenly in the July they realised that I had not had my medical so I rock off to that and now I have to confess a guilty secret.
I have lied on a government form.
They measured me and told me I was five foot tall. Being an honest person I said “No I am 4 foot 10 and a quarter inches (hey that quarter is important!)”
“No you are five foot”
“No I’m not”
“Look do you want the job or not?”
“Yes I do”
“Then you are five foot tall now sign this form”
And I did. In the 1980s the Queensland Health Department still had a height restriction. Females had to be five foot plus to be employed.
So my thirty years might not have happened for the sake of an inch and three quarters.
How many of your ancestors worked thirty years for the same employer?
I have a few who have worked for the railway and some government departments. Many others have worked in the same occupation such as being agricultural labourers, granite quarrymen, shoemakers etc.