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#AceHistoryDesk – Life as a secretary at the ABC in the 1950s involved everything from typing to giving out the cricket scores

Noelle Beasley went to work for the ABC in Perth in 1950. She was employed as a secretary but quickly found herself asked to do everything from running the concert department to appearing on the cover of the broadcaster’s magazine.

Ms Beasley was working in advertising at radio station 6PR when she and a friend were offered jobs at the ABC in Perth, almost by chance.

“There was some gathering of radio stations and my friend from 6PR and I went, we met the ABC representative who said, ‘You wouldn’t be interested in coming to the ABC to work?'”

Noelle and her friend both said yes, because it was “a bit more prestigious” and also had higher pay, she said.

Ms Beasley (then Noelle Willcock) was assigned to work for the concert department under manager Grieg Frieze and quickly found the job to her liking.

“I just enjoyed the whole feel of it. It was so sort of relaxed. Everybody mingled, the people that were in the studios, the managers, we were called secretaries, we were all together,” she said.

The concert department managed the West Australian Symphony Orchestra (WASO) and arranged performances all around the state.

“We organised their schedules, and we organised the visiting artists,” she said.

“They played various country towns – Geraldton, Bunbury, Albany. They went north too.

And Ms Beasley said they all helped out.

“I always had tickets to the concerts but sometimes if there was a shortage of anyone working at the theatre, we would just fill in there as well,” she said.

“But that wasn’t the only thing I did because we were multi-tasking.”

Cricket scores and modelling

The multi-tasking extended to helping out cricket fans.

“When the cricket was on in England, they asked a couple of us to do the night-time switchboard. That was a bit different,” Ms Beasley said.

The ABC wasn’t broadcasting the overseas matches but still aiming to provide a service to the cricket-mad public.

“We’d say, ‘Good evening, ABC. How can I help?’

“And they’d say, ‘Would you give us the latest cricket scores’ because although they [the ABC] didn’t broadcast the cricket, people could ring up and get the scores,” she said.

“But the good thing was, we had a voucher so that we could go out and have dinner, and that was really exciting.”

She and her colleagues were also often asked to be models for The Broadcaster magazine, which was published by West Australian Newspapers and gave all the radio station schedules. She appeared on the cover several times.

At one point Mr Frieze, her manager, became ill and was away for six months, at which point she simply took over running the concert department.

“It was fine, I was so familiar with it, and it wasn’t a very tense job, we sort of paddled along,” she said.

“The man that employed us was called Mr Griffiths and he also was a very gentle man.

“He really looked after the people that he employed; he was always interested in what was happening with you.”

Signing in on time

While the extra duties didn’t attract any additional pay, Ms Beasley said there were other ways to get ahead.

“You could increase your pay by doing exams or different tests to see if your typing speed was up and then you’d get a little rise and by the time I left, I was earning quite good money for a typist,” she said.

“In fact, my husband-to-be was working for International Harvester at the time, and I earned more than him.”

While she remembers the ABC as a relaxed and easy-going place to work, there were rules about timekeeping.

Every staff member had to sign in at the beginning of the day, and a line was ruled in the book at 9am, showing up people who were late.

“I was really rather known for being late for work,” Ms Beasley said.

“And once I had my pay docked.

“My signature was only a minute or two minutes after nine, or possibly five.

“I had to put my earrings on. It made me late,” she said, laughing.

A rambling place

Until 1961, when the ABC moved to a new purpose-built home on Adelaide Terrace, the ABC occupied a former RSL building on St George’s Terrace, next to Government House and in front of the Supreme Court.

“It was a rambling place, it went all over the place. There was a green area in the middle and I used to walk out the back and through the Supreme Court gardens to catch my tram home,” Ms Beasley said.

“Our lunch room was where we left all our gear and that was right next to Government House.

“Any big event going on there — if there was an orchestra — that was right outside the window so we had the benefit of music.”

When Queen Elizabeth II came on her tour of Australia in 1954, ABC staff were in the perfect position to glimpse her.

“She came along St George’s Terrace, and it was the time of the polio outbreak, so she was a little bit removed when she came along with the cavalcade,” Ms Beasley said.

“We all rushed up the drive. Someone had a step ladder, and so we were all up there.

“There was no-one left in the ABC although the studio still would have been broadcasting the events.

“We raced up and waved away and then she popped in next door to Government House, so that was fun.”

Ms Beasley left the ABC in 1954 when she got married.

“Of course, if you got married you had to leave. You couldn’t work there, or anywhere in a government job,” she said.

Ms Beasley turned 90 last year, making her almost the same age at the ABC itself.

She has many fond memories and to this day has kept the friends she made working at the ABC, as well as a love of music.

“I’m a subscriber to WASO and I go to quite a few of their concerts during the year,” she said.

“I was introduced to the WASO really because of what I was doing at the ABC, so it’s given me a lasting pleasure really.

“But I always listened to the ABC. Always. Because they don’t have ads. And they’re not silly.”

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