The Foreign Order
by Honey O'Donoghue - 14
My grandad’s name is Joseph O’Donoghue. I call him Naha. He was born in 1939 in Mayfield, near the BHP steel mill, two or three months before World War Two started.
Naha’s special object is a small anvil that was made at the BHP as a “foreign order” for my great-grandfather James O’Donoghue. James was born in Ireland in 1900 and worked at the BHP where they made railway lines and lots of other things.
A “foreign order” is something you’re not supposed to be making but you do it anyway – ‘don’t let the bosses catch you!’
This anvil is special because it has been in Naha’s family for about 80 years.
The anvil was made from a small piece of railway line which the workers cut and shaped to a point. It can be used to flatten out a piece of iron or any sort of metal – ‘you just hammer it down, it’s a very, very hard steel.’
It is important to Naha because his father died when he was only fourteen years old. The anvil is the only thing that he possesses that belonged to his dad.
The anvil did not mean very much when he got it. He was very young and the anvil had always been there but when he got a little bit older he got more attached to it.
When I asked these questions it nearly made my grandad turn around and cry. It made him look back into his soul and the many years of his life. It is not the sort of thing my grandad would turn around and talk to people about.
I did not know anything about the anvil or my great grandfather until I interviewed Naha. Now it is not a ‘foreign order’ but a link to the past and something that he will pass on to someone in his family.
by Honey O'Donoghue - 14
My grandad’s name is Joseph O’Donoghue. I call him Naha. He was born in 1939 in Mayfield, near the BHP steel mill, two or three months before World War Two started.
Naha’s special object is a small anvil that was made at the BHP as a “foreign order” for my great-grandfather James O’Donoghue. James was born in Ireland in 1900 and worked at the BHP where they made railway lines and lots of other things.
A “foreign order” is something you’re not supposed to be making but you do it anyway – ‘don’t let the bosses catch you!’
This anvil is special because it has been in Naha’s family for about 80 years.
The anvil was made from a small piece of railway line which the workers cut and shaped to a point. It can be used to flatten out a piece of iron or any sort of metal – ‘you just hammer it down, it’s a very, very hard steel.’
It is important to Naha because his father died when he was only fourteen years old. The anvil is the only thing that he possesses that belonged to his dad.
The anvil did not mean very much when he got it. He was very young and the anvil had always been there but when he got a little bit older he got more attached to it.
When I asked these questions it nearly made my grandad turn around and cry. It made him look back into his soul and the many years of his life. It is not the sort of thing my grandad would turn around and talk to people about.
I did not know anything about the anvil or my great grandfather until I interviewed Naha. Now it is not a ‘foreign order’ but a link to the past and something that he will pass on to someone in his family.
