Although Armidale was mostly composed of English, Irish, Scots, Germans and native born Australians for the first 100 years of European settlement, Greeks have also played an important part in our city’s story. From time to time the Armidale and District Historical Society has conducted functions which have revived memories of the Greeks, and there have been calls for more stories. This week we will look at the life of Charlie Pavlou who ran the Olympic Milk Bar opposite the Capitol Theatre (the old movie cinema where Bing Lee is now located) in Beardy Street.
Charlie was a well-known Armidale identity who was very popular in his own right, and he became famous when he did not sell out to Woolworths when their first shop was being planned. He was then omitted from the Grand Plan for that large site, and his shop and its successor building remain a memorial to what became known as “Charlie’s Last Stand”. But let’s go back to the beginning.
Born in February 1928 in Konia, Paphos, Cyprus, Charalambous (Charlie) Pavlou was one of the 10 children of Pavlos Onisiforou and Evlavia Michael. Five of the children died before the age of two, and Charlie had four surviving siblings (Harry, Nick, Leo and Agathy).
After his father had a stroke in 1940, Charlie and his brothers were taken out of school to help their mother support the family. Charlie had only four years of schooling. When he was 12 (and while still having to work the family’s fields), Charlie began a four-year apprenticeship as a tailor with one of his uncles. Charlie later earned seven shillings a week while he continued to learn tailoring from another tailor, and worked as a waiter for another uncle, while still helping his mother with crops of wheat, grapes, and a variety of vegetables to sell at market. He also took care of goats.
Charlie’s brother Harry was the first to come to Australia. Leaving his fiancé Maroulli behind, Harry went on ahead to get himself established in Australia. After he arrived he met Jack Ferros at a Greek café in Sydney. Jack was looking for people to work in his café (the White Rose Café) in Uralla. Two years later, Harry was ready for his future wife Maroulli to come out to Australia. She would be escorted out by her brother-in-law to be, Charlie. Jack Ferros sponsored Maroulli and Charlie to Australia.
They left Cyprus on Christmas Day 1950, landing in Sydney on January 26, 1951. Harry was there to meet them, and one month later he and Maroulli married at St Sophia’s Greek Church in Bourke Street, Surry Hills. When he arrived in Sydney Charlie was 22 and had about £10 and no English. His sister had paid his fare from her dowry and Charlie later repaid her three times the original amount.
Charlie, Harry and Maroulli worked in Walcha, then at Dubbo. Charlie stayed there for a year while Harry and Maroulli went to Uralla and bought a fruit shop which they had until they retired in 1979. Meanwhile, a year after Harry and Maroulli went to Uralla, they were joined by Charlie who was offered a job in Uralla by Nick Psaltis. Charlie was there for 26 months. He then rented a shop next to his brother’s, sold the business a year later and went to Moree to work in a Greek café for six months.
In 1953, Charlie and Harry brought their brother Nick to Australia. Nick paid his own fare. He helped his brothers in their work in Walcha, Armidale and Grafton at various hotels and cafés. Meanwhile, Charlie had gone to Foster on the coast to run another business for a year, then sold it because he wanted to go back to Cyprus to get married.
Charlie returned to Uralla for a few months before going back to Cyprus in August 1955 in search of a wife. While visiting his aunt in Katydata, he met a beautiful woman named Valentini Ioannou. They met on September 8, were engaged on September 19, and were married on October 23. Leaving for Australia on April 13, 1956 on the P & O liner Arcadia, Charlie and Valentini Pavlou arrived in Sydney on May 13, 1956. There is now a memorial plaque on the Welcome Wall at the Maritime Museum in Sydney to commemorate their arrival.
Travelling by train to Uralla, they came with all their possessions in a few suitcases and a big wooden trunk. For the next 16 months Charlie and Valentini stayed in Uralla where they worked with Harry and Maroulli. After the birth of their daughter Maria in 1956, Charlie and Valentini continued to look for a business of their own.
They found a shop to rent in Armidale and opened the Olympic Milk Bar on September 2, 1957. Nick lived with Charlie and Valentini from 1957 to 1965. He married in 1968 and moved to Sydney. Meanwhile, Charlie and Valentini’s family increased with the birth of their son Paul in 1959. Charlie and Valentini became Australia citizens on August 30, 1968.
Sincere thanks to Maria Pavlou for all her help with this story. It continues next week when we’ll look at the hey days of the Olympic Milk Bar and “Charlie’s Last Stand”.
