Don Roulston Buzzard

12.1
The Family Business in Toodyay

The business the Buzzard family was to buy in Toodyay was an agency for Elders Smith & Co., a competitor of Wesfarmers in the stock and station agency business. But it also had the agencies for H.V. MacKey, selling Australia’s first commercially viable Sunshine combine harvesters, Chevrolet (and later Holden) motor cars and trucks, Mobil Oil, as well as a well-stocked hardware and farm supply store. The sum paid for the business is not known but Brian would have had very little savings after the war, and as an employee of stock firms would not have had accumulated enough to buy the business with his own money. Jack Weaver, from Goomalling, W.A. helped the family financially to buy the business but he was paid back in two years.

Brian probably sought financial assistance from another source as well. Edith Gladys MacKenzie was also a partner in the business. She was the wife of a baker in Wongan Hills. It is not known when the partnership was formed but it was dissolved in 1953 and Don was taken on as a partner.

Don taken on as partner in Buzzard & Co.

Buzzard & Co, Toodyay

Soon after buying the agency business, Brian started advertising in the Toodyay Herald newspaper on 7th November 1947.

First advertisement for Messrs. Brian Buzzard & Co.

Brian integrated himself into the community of Toodyay and became a member of many civic, social and sporting clubs. He was on the local cricket team, a member of the rifle club and the golf club, Returned Services and League (RSL), Agricultural Society, horse racing committee, and was a benefactor or patron of many other organisations. Don meanwhile was caring for their children as a “stay at home Mum” which was the norm in those days.