They Make Them Tough In Tumut Poem by samuel aragone

THEY MAKE THEM TOUGH IN TUMUT

Last year I went home to Tumut

A place I remember as a dream

For forty years ago my father worked

On the Snowy mountains scheme


I sought out the single room school house

For I had attended here as a lad

I was only here for six short years

But they were among the most joyful years I've had


Our teacher fresh from Ireland

Was a reasonably young man

He could not have been much past thirty

But we still called him old man Stan


He was a really gentle bloke

But as green as they come

He was frightened of the bush

And was often the butt of all our fun


Of snakes an all other creatures

He was absolutely terrified

For there were no snakes in Ireland

Unless St Patrick had lied


One day my mate's father

Killed a red belly snake in his shed

Its corpse we wrapped round the teacher's chair

You'd never know that it was dead


At roll call the tension rose

As the teacher went to sit down

The scream he let out

Could be heard in town


And then he bolted from that room

Still screaming like a banshee

I'm sure if there had been a ship

Back to Ireland he would be


Despite reassurance he would not re-enter

He could not be convinced that the snake was dead

Till my aboriginal mate pulled out his knife

And deftly sliced off the red belly's head


Then we place the head

In a jar of formaldehyde

When he saw the preserved head

He finally accepted the snake had died


But he resolved to become much tougher

And mounted that jar on the cupboard wall

And as the years passed to our consternation

He was never frightened easily at all


But we still played some awful tricks

Whenever we could on him

On one school excursion I jumped into the river

While making out I couldn't swim


Now the poor unfortunate teacher

Was at a loss as to what to do

Not only was the water flowing fast

But it was fairly freezing too


For the Tumut is an alpine river

With its waters flowing fast

Hiding dangerous rocks and branches

A false move could be your last


When I was out of the teacher's view

I swam strongly for the bank

For we knew a small hidden beach near there

Behind old Mcdonald's tank


But the teacher plunged into that current

And was soon out of his depth

Knocked sideways, upward, downward

He struggled to catch his breath


With water swirling round him

He searched for something to get a hand on

He'd never experienced such a torrent

This was not his gentle Shannon


He scrambled round the rocky outcrops

He struck out east and west

But the fast flowing mountain water

Just would not let him come to rest


We thought surely he was gone

When the waterfall took him over

Urgently now we snapped down our swinging rope

And headed on down the river


For we'd done this many times

When a new kid started at our school

But they were all mountain boys like us

And none of them a fool



For only a fool would brave that river

When the floodwaters were on the rise

But we were still adventurous innocent children

And none of us yet too wise


With urgency and desperation

We followed the river round

And when the teacher grabbed our rope

We dragged him to safe ground


Bloodied and exhausted

He was still as angry as all hell

And we thought that everyone is our class

He would certainly all expel


But he learnt from our Aussie humour

And Tumut made him truly tough

Though when we left school in sixth grade

He could not have hugged us all enough


And that was the last memory

I had of my teacher Stan

So now that I'd come home

I would try to find that old man


Sure enough I found him retired now

And living in the cottage behind the school

When I saw again that poor old bloke

I wondered how we could have been so cruel


He pretended to remember me

For many of his kids had returned to see him

And he knew that they would be disappointed

If he did not remember them


But I reminded him of the episode

Of the dead snake wrapped round his chair

And I pointed at the cupboard

And the preserved snake head that was still there


And then a flicker of recognition

Came to the old man's eyes

Together with a tear or two

Much to my surprise


And he told me quite candidly

He had come close to resigning that year

He hated the bush and Tumut

There was nothing to keep him here



But the kids of Tumut provided a challenge

And had woken his pioneering spirit

And if he had run home to Ireland

He would have been branded a "fecking idjit"


He had come to admire our ingenuity

And tried to outguess us every time

The episode with the snake

Had just been a harmless pantomime


But we had nearly actually killed him

With that episode on the river

For it seems that day

We had been just a tad too clever


He'd never been a strong athlete

And could not swim much at all

On the day he plunged into the river

It was his sense of duty that made the call


Now I grew in admiration

Of this frail little old man

And I realised the extent of the love for kids

Existing within the heart of our teacher Stan


So when it was time to leave

I held back a tear or two

For they make them tough in Tumut mate

And I'm from Tumut too