Ms Jones grew up in West Wallsend but unbeknownst to her, she did not know her mother Agnes Bowie had taken part in a bicentennial project for the town in 1988.

Students from West Wallsend High School interviewed older residents from the town who lived through the wartime years and Great Depression.

Lake Mac Libraries unearthed the 24 tapes nearly a decade ago and the original recordings were digitised by Community History officer Judy Messiter in 2008. 

“We were alerted by the West Wallsend Museum that the tapes existed and they asked us help with digitising them, mostly for preservation initially,” Ms Messiter said.

“That was in 2008 then they just sort of got forgotten about. People must have found out that they existed and started to ask me for copies of them more recently.”

One of those was Ms Jones’s brother John Bowie.

He asked for a copy of his mother’s interview and surprised his sister with it as a Christmas present.

“My mother died in 1990, so just after that was recorded,” Ms Jones said.

“She was a happy lady and that was one thing that came through in that tape, that no matter what the hardships they had in the depression, they were happy. 

“I didn’t really listen to much the first time because I cried the whole way through it. When I played it again I learned things that I didn’t know.”

Ms Messiter said after digitising the tapes “I know those people on those tapes and their stories quite intimately”.

“People talk about how hard it was during the depression and what they went through,” she said.

“Some tell interesting stories about characters in the area, so those characters would’ve been lost if they hadn’t been on those tapes.

“They talk about long lost names for places out there and where those physical places were and that’s really good too for historical purposes. That’s the sort of memory that we’re really interested in because that’s social history.”

Ms Messiter said Lake Mac Libraries wanted to preserve “people’s stories” and have created a place online where residents can submit their own memories.

“Those stories are things that will get lost if they’re not recorded, and a lot of that social history does get lost over time,” she said.

“It was a really interesting project and it’s really elicited a lot of sentiment and a lot of emotion in the people listening to those recordings.

“I’ve had a lot of people who have given me hugs and told me that it made them cry.”

The West Wallsend Oral Histories can be accessed through the Lake Mac Libraries online portal at www.history.lakemac.com.au.

West Wallsend Museum can be contacted through www.facebook.com/groups/635047489897544/.