VALE ALMA ELWELL: Alma died on June 18, 2025. The story below was written to celebrate her turning 100.
Susanna Freymark
Alma can’t remember exactly how many grandchildren and great great-grandchildren she has – 14 grandchildren, 31 great-grandchildren and 4 great great-grandchildren.
What she does know – with the utmost clarity – is how loved she is.
Alma stretches her arms outwards as she says,
“I’ve got the best family ever. They love you and want you here.”
Alma turns 100 today, Monday, January 27.
Born in Essex, England in 1925, Almeria Sheppard Gregory, known as Alma, was one of eight children.
“We had a wonderful family life, but all my siblings are gone,” Alma said.
“I’m happy to be here. I wouldn’t be sorry to be gone.”
On the veranda of her daughter’s home in Bungawalbin, Alma talks about life, war, honesty, and of course, her family.
Frangipani trees surround the veranda – Alma’s favourite flower – varieties of pink, yellow and deep crimson flowers bloom high in the trees.
Growing up, she lived in a huge house in Essex.
“It didn’t matter how poor you were – you had fruit trees,” Alma said.
She used to walk for miles with her brothers to go swimming and explore.
“We walked four miles to go camping,” she said.
“We watched the fire at Crystal Palace in London.”
Alma said as a child she only had one toy – a porcelain doll.
Her mother sewed her dresses and taught Alma about music.
During the Depression, when it was cold, her father put pieces of brown paper between the bed sheets to keep the children warm.
Alma said there were a lot of returned soldiers in the village of Chadwell Heath.
They had half a leg or were injured, she said.
They had jobs as postmen which Alma thought was unfair given their injuries.
During the war, Alma was part of the Land Army. This was an organisation established during World War I which recruited women to work on farms to replace the men called up to the military.
The women were known as Land Girls.
Alma was in charge of 12 Land Girls who picked beets and other crops on farms.
“The girls came from the East End of London. I took them out in the paddocks and we all worked,” she said.
Alma said she worked with them as she didn’t expect them to do any work, she wasn’t prepared to do herself.
This sense of fairness has been important in Alma’s life.
Then she met Peter Elwell at a farm where she was working.
“He came home from the war to help with the harvest,” Alma said.
“ I thought he was a bit of a nerd.”
Peter and Alma married and immigrated to Australia.
“We got off at the train station in Caisno, we had five children and I was very pregnant,” Alma said.
The family moved into a small fibro at Evans Head.
Alma said she remembered the insects and cockroaches and how small the house was.
They lived at Rileys Hill for four years before buying a farm at Doonbah near Evans Head.
Peter died 10 years ago.
“We were happily married. We had a lot of fun and a lot of children.”
At their Doonbah farm, they had cows, donkeys, pigs and chickens and grew a variety of crops.
Alma went through the 2022 floods and her granddaughter Belinda Cox said Alma took it in her stride even when the farm was flooded.
For Alma it is always about people – not what you do or don’t have.
She was known for always having a big pot of soup on the boil and anyone and everyone was welcomed to her home.
“Whatever was growing I used in the soup, sometimes I added a ham bone or roast chicken,” Alma said.
Alma is youthful in her outlook and open about her appreciation of life.
“I’m extremely lucky,” she said.
Yesterday, at her birthday party there were150 guests from all corners of the world, Belinda said. Some of the guests travelled from the UK.
Belinda holds her grandmother’s hands.
“We all take a leaf out of Gran’s books – to have integrity,” she said.
And always be honest, Alma said.
Happy Birthday, Alma.