"My uncle Otto was a wonderful uncle to me, he lived with us off and on at Granville. I can remember sitting on his knee listing to the wireless ( it was one of those sets with three big dials and a horn speaker on top of the cabinet lid.
Otto as a heavy drinker, and lost no end of jobs because of being drunk. He worked in tin mining at Tingha at one time, he was a tailer-out in a sawmill owned by Ben Wade at Invernell.
He had even been a tram conductor.
Despite the drink problem Otto was recognised as an outstanding violinist, he had a few trips to America on board the old 'Aorangi' in the days when ships had live music.
I think it was sunk in World War II, long after his time, he is said to be an amazing sight reader and could sit in any orchestra pit and start playing as though he had been there for months.
He played in Her Majesty's Theatre orchestra in Castlereagh Street at the age of seventeen - an achievement very rare, for those times; or indeed today.
Otto (violin) and a clarinet player had been 'dobbed in' to the manager of the Manly Cinema for turning up drunk for the Saturday matinee; they were to be sacked after the night show.
At interval they swapped the music for what should have been to Rossini's Overture to William Tell
