A group of Newcastle families who have been friends for more than 90 years will have a big catch-up on Sunday.
Libby Maskey, who co-organised the get-together of about 70 people, said the families all lived close to each other in Merewether.
"Our grandparents were friends, our parents were friends, us kids were friends. And the next two generations underneath us were friends," Libby said.
The oldest generation has passed, but five from the next generation to attend the event are aged in their 90s.
Libby recalled the families picnicking and holidaying together in the 1960s.
They went water-skiing, fishing, crabbing and held loads of parties.
They holidayed at Smiths Lake at Forster and hotels on the Central Coast that she believed were named Flotilla and Waikiki.
Asked where on the Central Coast they were, she said: "We were just kids, we got thrown in the car and we went".
"We also went up to a friend's property - a farm at Merriwa," she said.
They would often be in and out of each other's homes.
"One house had a big slot car track set-up. Another had pool and snooker tables, with an old poker machine we played - a one-armed bandit," she said.
"We would just drift between the houses. And we'd meet at the cliff at the end of Bar Beach, off Kilgour Avenue, to go down to the beach."
Libby's sister Louise Barlow, down from Queensland for the event, said "we had great cracker nights at the cliff with bonfires that took weeks to make".
The families have the surnames of Langwill, Gardiner, McHattie, Wansey, Molyneux, Scott, Sanderson, Garrett, De Carvalho and Donald.
Party Line
Some of the families had what Libby called an "illegal party line" that ran between houses.
"It was wonderful," she said.
"You know in the old fashioned movies, where you have a square box on the wall with a crank handle you wind on the side. It was like that. Our parents strung up phone wires from house to house and across backyards.
"It was a good way to communicate between eight parents and 15 kids."
The number of rings determined which family the call was for.
"Three rings was for us," she said.
The phone line was used to organise meet-ups.
"It was a party line. Our parents were all fun people."
She recalled the families had a film night in the 1980s, showing home movies from the '60s.
"Some of our parents had those old Super 8 video recorders," Libby said.
"We had to abandon the film night and go home because we were laughing so much. Our kidneys were aching. We could not talk to one another for another second."
