First Aid splint : Mrs Edna Adam

Plain length of light coloured wood with 'E.ADAM' inscribed in ink at one end on each side.

Wooden splint issued to Mrs Edna Adam when she was undertaking St John's Ambulance First Aid training at a National Emergency Service (NES) centre at Henry Street, Punchbowl, Sydney in 1942. The centre was a large private house located just opposite the Punchbowl Boy's High School. Edna's daughter Val was aged about 10 or 11 in 1942 and remembers that the First Aid classes were run by the local St John's Ambulance Association and co-ordinated by local NES Warden. Val recalls that 'the ladies stayed on to make camouflage nets, and as a school girl I used to help my mother with this, the nets being hung up on two hooks on the back of our kitchen door and made with a wooden hook. The ladies also knitted socks, mittens etc for the soldiers.' Val recalls that 'every morning before going to primary school, I hung an envelope around my neck which contained chewing gum, bandaids and cotton wool, in case of an emergency, and that envelope stayed on me till nightfall. We were told that if there was an air raid, we were to lie down in the gutter for protection. If the air raids got really bad, the local Church had arranged for all the local children to be evacuated to Mudgee. I still remember the tape on our windows and the black Feltex over the air vents to block out the light.'