TATURA resident John Maher fondly recalls the rich aroma of tomatoes being processed into sauce at Rosella and lively memories of the Tatura Show from his childhood. As the eldest of six children and a direct descendant of the town’s founding Maher family, John takes pride in the legacy, with a street named in their honour.
Charles Maher was born in 1788 in Tipperary, Ireland. His wife Anne Maher (nee Cahill) was born in 1792. They were married in June 1811 and had six children. Their son John, the youngest of the clan, married Margaret Ryan and they moved to Boston, USA in 1850. After a short stay they had one son, who died as an infant. They then decided to travel to Australia and had a second child, Charles, who was born on the ship in September 1866, four days before landing in Australia.
Charles grew up in Epping where his father John started a wheelwright business. The family then moved to Kilmore and at the age of 19 Charles married Florenda Pinniger from Ballarat and they moved to Tatura to start a new life in 1873.
Due to hard times and crops failing, they were to be sold up by the bank. Charles stopped ploughing to watch the sale of the property and on arrival, found two fellow pioneers, Matthew Cahill and Thomas O’Reilly were the successful bidders. Without dismounting their horses, they told Charles to farm the land until his debt was cleared and it would be his again.
After some good years, the Maher’s purchased land on the west of Tatura, now known as Winter Road.
Charles’ parents, John and Margaret, moved to the area to be by their son. John died in 1883, and Margaret passed away in 1905 and both are buried in the Tatura Cemetary. Tatura Cemetary is on a sandhill on Winter Road and is still used today by the local community, on land donated by the Maher family.
Charles and Florenda had 10 children: Margaret, Mary, Anne, Sarah, John, Alice, Patrick, Nora, Kathleen and Frances. Mary married Jeremiah Ryan to grow the Ryan dynasty that resides around Tatura to this day.
John remained a bachelor, became a councillor and had Maher Street named after him. John and brother Pat continued to run the farm, and they imported Clydesdale stallions from Scotland and New Zealand and would take the stallions around the district to service the mares. Both brothers were good horsemen, became jockeys and are life members of the Tatura Racecourse.
In the 1920s, Pat purchased his own farm on the outskirts of town on Rushworth Road, where the original home still stands. The Maher’s sold the family farm and Pat’s farm in the 1930s and purchased the Commercial Hotel in Tatura, which they ran for over 20 years and sold to Dick Warton in 1959.
Pat married Lorna Hanley after the sale of the hotel, and they retired across the road to 54 Hogan Street. Frances married George Bartlett, an engineer in the district and a relative of the Bartlett soft drink dynasty. Notably, George designed the Murchison bridge. They had four children – Jack, Mary, Margaret and Frank. Mary still resides at Parkvilla aged care at Tatura Hospital, and Margaret resides in her home in Kew, Melbourne, and frequently visits her hometown of Tatura.
Pat and Lorna had two children, Florenda and Bernie. Florenda married Brian Cummins from Toolamba and are both buried in the Tatura Cemetary. Bernie Maher married Judy Warburton and they had six children together.
John Maher, their eldest son, still resides and runs a business in Tatura. He is married to Sandra Scouler and they have two sons, Daniel and Robert, who are the sixth generation to the town.
