Trust News November 2013

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TRUST

news

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THE AFGHANISTAN EXPERIENCE

NATIONAL TRUST

Australia

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10 CHRISTMAS ISLAND HERITAGE

13 ISLINGTON RAIL

CULTIVATING MODERNISM

Ever been on a journey and couldn’t wait to tell everyone all about it?

Heritage Festival

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ARE OPEN

Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the Heritage Festival 2014.

Event Registrations are now open!

Visit www.nationaltrust.org.au/Heritage-Festival

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with editor Gina Pickerin g

ISSN: 1835-2316 Vol 6 No 4 2013 Trust News is published quarterly for National Trust members and subscribers in February, May, August and November.

Publication is coordinated by the National Trust of Australia (WA) on behalf of the National Trusts of Australia and supported by the Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities.

National Trust of Australia (WA) ABN 83 697 381 616 PO Box 1162 West Perth WA 6872 T: 08 9321 6088 F: 08 9324 1571 W:www.ntwa.com.au Editor: Gina Pickering gina.pickering@ntwa.com.au T: 08 9321 6088 Advertising: For advertising rates, contact the Editor.

Design: Dessein Graphics Cover: Operational Mentor and Liaison Team (OMLT) Delta leaves on patrol from Patrol Base Razaq. Photographed by Gary Ramage. AWM P09971.058.

Next Issue: February 2014

NOVEMBER – DECEMBER 2013 Greetings Acknowledging Afghanistan, the Australian War Memorial’s latest approach to contemporary conflict, is a feature of this edition.

There’s a celebration of spectacular influences and outcomes in modernist gardens and a retrospective of some of the National Trust’s bravest decisions and lasting legacies in New South Wales.

We visit extraordinary Christmas Island, a melting pot of communities and exceptional natural heritage values and young hands truly dig a new archaeology program at Western Australia’s oldest farm. Take a closer look at the World Heritage listed Royal Exhibition Building and surprising moments in Penang’s Love Lane.

Enjoy

Copy deadline:10 November 2013 Please help us to save our environment and circulate this magazine as widely as possible.

This magazine is printed on recyclable paper and packed in 100% degradable wrap.

The views expressed in Trust News are not necessarily those of the National Trusts or the Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities. The articles in this magazine are subject to copyright. No article may be used without the consent of the National Trust and the author.

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New Heritage Funding

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Afghanistan: the Australian story

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Seeking asylum for Christmas Island heritage

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Anniversaries and Brave Decisions

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Workshop woes at Islington

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Gabbie Kylie Foundation leads protective response

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Cultivating Modernism

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Defence Against The Devil Apotropaic Marks in Australia

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Archaeology in young hands

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Gold recipients at the Queensland Heritage Awards

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Heritage and the Holy

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The smell of an oily rag

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Outstanding collections

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A symbol of reform

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A new position for Governor Macquarie

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Revitalising Miss Porter’s House

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George Town connections

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The Royal Exhibition Building A rare survivor

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National Trust Way Holiday Tours

Gina Pickering | Editor

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TRUST NEWS AUSTRALIA NOVEMBER 2013

PERSPECTIVES

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New Heritage Funding

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Heritage Grants

GREG HUNT MP | MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT

Every day in communities around Australia volunteers are hard at work recording, restoring and sharing our local heritage. Without their dedication and devotion to rescuing historical artefacts and researching local history, our sense of who we are and where we’ve come from would be greatly diminished.

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n recognition of the work of hundreds of local historical and heritage groups across Australia, the Coalition Government has announced a new $1.4 million Community Heritage Grants program.

To support important local heritage work, grants of up to $10,000 will be made available to local historical or heritage groups for the conservation, development and exhibition of our cultural heritage. The grants can be used for a range of purposes including historical memorials, commemorative plaques and interpretive signs.

A grant could be used to restore a local historical or heritage icon for example, or perhaps create a local interpretive history trail or walk. Other uses for the program include holding exhibitions and heritage events and publishing local history books and other literature.

The aim of the program is to provide material support to those volunteers who invest an incredible amount of time and energy in collecting and preserving our local heritage.

Over the past few months we have been working closely with a range of community groups to help identify local heritage priorities. Projects put forward include the restoration of the former Mechanics Institute at Linton in country Victoria. The

1874 building contains one of the best surviving collections of books and memorabilia of a small library anywhere in Victoria.

At Cooma in southern New South Wales, plans are underway to restore a vintage railmotor for use on the historic Cooma Monaro Railway Line. In the Blue Mountains town of Woodford, the community is keen to place a commemorative plaque on an historic 1930s horse trough, a reminder of the days when working horses were an integral part of everyday life.

Meanwhile at Mornington in Victoria, the local historical society plans to create an audio walking tour of the town’s historic Main Street using QR codes mounted on walking tour plaques. Visitors will be able to scan the QR codes

ABOVE Greg INSERT

with a smart phone to download the voices of local residents recounting the town’s history.

Over the coming months we will consult further with local heritage and history groups on identifying priorities in each region and on refining the criteria for inclusion in the program.

Every local community across Australia has a unique and fascinating story and we want to help communities tell those stories.

The Community Heritage Grants program will open 1st July 2014.

Application details and criteria for approval will be released at that time.

Hunt MP (centre) announcing the Commonwealth Government’s Community Heritage Grants program in Bendigo. T. McGuffie.

Cooma Monaro Railway volunteers are keen to restore a vintage railmotor, similar to this one, for the heritage rail line. Cooma Monaro Railway Inc.

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Afghanistan: the Australian story MOJ NOZHAT | AUSTRALIAN WAR MEMORIAL

For more than a decade, thousands of Australian servicemen and women have been fighting in Afghanistan. At the Australian War Memorial, you can now experience the enduring place this conflict has in our nation’s history in a new exhibition, Afghanistan: the Australian story.

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he evocative exhibition presents the experiences of these men and women serving in Afghanistan and the Middle East Area of Operations and reveals the dedication and loneliness of their families who wait at home. The exhibition, featuring a multi-media presentation of interviews, offers a unique perspective, presenting the stories of our veterans and their families in their own words, set against a vivid backdrop of images and film footage of the conflict.

This part of the exhibition will be a “living display”, one that will evolve as more veterans share their stories.

Afghanistan: the Australian story explores all aspects of the war, both military and civilian, from building schools, roads and hospitals, to mentoring the fledgling army of a new democratic nation.

The advent of this unique exhibition – the Memorial’s first to feature a war not yet ended – was instigated by its Director, ABOVE The

Dr Brendan Nelson. When Dr Nelson first arrived at the Memorial as its new Director in December 2012, he told staff it was vitally important to mount an exhibition devoted to telling the stories of our Afghanistan veterans. He recalled that, when he had visited the troops in Afghanistan, an Australian soldier had remarked to him, “Sir, when I take my son to the War Memorial, I can show him what his great-grandfather did. I can show him what his grandfather did. But I can’t show him what I’m doing.”

“We owe it to our nation to tell the story of those Australians involved in fighting the war in Afghanistan and to tell it now,” said Dr Nelson.

“When you visit this exhibition what you will see, what you will hear and, most importantly what you will feel is a sense of what these Australians are enduring and what they have achieved on behalf of our nation,” he said.

The exhibition features a number of significant objects that reflect the ingenuity and heroism of Australian servicemen and women and illustrate the face of modern warfare; these include an engine cowling pulled from the wreckage of a Black Hawk helicopter that crashed in 2010 and used as a makeshift stretcher for the wounded and a Boeing ScanEagle, an example of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) that have been deployed

by Australian forces in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2006.

Dr Nelson hopes that this new Memorial exhibition will have a significant therapeutic role for the nation’s newest veterans and their families, through ensuring that their experiences in Afghanistan are more widely understood and acknowledged.

Australian War Memorial now farewells visitors with a Last Post ceremony at the end of each day. Australian War Memorial.

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Seeking asylum for Christmas Island heritage KELLY RIPPINGALE | CONSERVATION ARCHITECT AND GINA PICKERING EDITOR NATIONAL TRUST (WA)

A National Trust of Australia (WA) delegation visited Christmas Island in September, invited to independently assess the unique heritage values of the place by Administrator, former ACT Chief Minister Jon Stanhope.

MAIN IMAGE Christmas Island red crabs live most of the year in the rainforest but migrate to the ocean for breeding in October or November. There are an estimated 120 million of these crabs on Christmas Island. Houndstooth Studio. TOP TO BOTTOM South Point Temple is one of 18 Chinese temples on Christmas Island. Each temple is specific to a particular deity or event in their religious calendar. A Brake NTWA. The Chinese Cemetery is nestled into the tiny coastal strip on the north eastern end of the island. The layout of the cemetery confirms to the principles of Feng Shui. A Brake NTWA. Recent conservation work undertaken by volunteers from the Christmas Island Detention Centre to remove paint from the 6 inch gun revealed the Royal Cypher. A Brake NTWA. Trust Councillor Robert Mitchell photographs the 6 inch Coastal Artillery Gun installed on Christmas Island in 1941. A Brake NTWA.

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diversity

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he isolated island situated 2,600km northwest of Perth makes international headlines as a politically sensitive and controversial entry point for asylum seekers.

Aside from its political focus, Christmas Island features incredible natural heritage values and a unique history of human settlement. Sixty-three percent of the island is national park and a popular destination for divers and bird watchers attracted to its varied endemic and migratory species.

The spectacular annual Red Crab migration is perhaps its most internationally recognised natural event.

Far less is known of the fascinating cultural heritage of Christmas Island and Mr Stanhope is very positive about the National Trust’s involvement in the island’s future.

“My hope is that the National Trust will guide, through the experience and expertise which it has, for perhaps the first time in the history of the Territories, the development of a master plan for the management, interpretation and preservation of the outstanding heritage values of the Islands,” Mr Stanhope said.

The Territories of Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands are small, remote and isolated but have a heritage as rich, diverse and as at risk as anywhere in Australia.

The first recorded sighting of Christmas Island was made by English sea captain John Millward of the East India Company in 1615.

Named by William Mynors in 1643, Christmas Island’s abundant phosphate deposits drew mining and settlement to its shores from 1897 and with this came a melting pot of nationalities.

Each of the Islands has a population dominated by people of Asian heritage, primarily Chinese and Malayan. The dominant religion on Christmas Island is Islam along with Buddhism and other Chinese spiritual practice.

People of European heritage comprise a small minority of the population.

National Trust CEO Tom Perrigo said there were a number of actively maintained Buddhist temples, a mosque, and Bahai shrine as well as highly intact precincts which reflect historic, cultural and social values.

“The Trust proposes to sign a memorandum of understanding with the Shire of Christmas Island to deliver cultural services as well as set up a heritage appeal to

support funding opportunities,” he said.

Mr Perrigo said there was great value in a commitment to develop long term programs with both the school and communities of Christmas Island and Cocos (Keeling Islands) based on a unique foundation of wide ranging heritage values.

“One of the special qualities of this community is that it’s small and diverse yet together it works very effectively,” he said.

Malay, Chinese and European c om mu n it ie s re t a i n t h e i r individual characteristics reflected in ceremonies and festivals held throughout the year.

Senior Trust conservation and interpretation specialists brought a range of expertise to the visit including an international military perspective.

Christmas Island was the only place in Australia occupied by the Japanese during WWII and a significant military profile on the island remains. In addition, work is currently underway in the highly significant Chinese and European cemeteries.

Mr Stanhope said managing heritage on Christmas and Cocos Island is made difficult by the isolation of the Territories, the tropical climate, the non selfgoverning status of the Territories and by the major other expenditure priorities which persist in the Territories.

“The involvement of the National Trust with the heritage of these Islands will, I think, have a profound impact on ensuring that it is appropriately recognised and protected,” Mr Stanhope said.

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Jon Stanhope, Indian Ocean Territories Administrator, speaking with Trust CEO Tom Perrigo during the recent visit to review heritage issues on Christmas Island. A Brake NTWA. LEFT National Trust staff met with a range of government and community groups during the visit including Shire Councillors and the Shire CEO. A Brake NTWA. RIGHT Blue-footed Booby. Christmas Island. Houndstooth Studio.

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Anniversaries and Brave Decisions ANGELA LE SUEUR | NATIONAL TRUST (NSW)

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When it was formed in 1945 the mission of the NSW National Trust was to protect significant heritage from demolition. However, the vision soon widened to include the acquisition of significant built and environmental heritage to protect and present it for the public to enjoy.

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y the 1980s the Trust had acquired a considerable portfolio of sites and properties.

While some were gifted to the Trust, others were purchased as a result of intensive fundraising, and action by communities determined to protect their heritage.

A number of the Trust’s most significant properties celebrate landmark anniversaries in Trust ownership this year. All operate as house museums, with lively programs of events, exhibitions and other cultural pursuits.

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50 years on Experiment Farm Cottage on the outskirts of Parramatta was the first, nail-biting challenge for the Trust. It stands on the site of the Colony’s first land grant, and was built by Surgeon John Harris who arrived on the Second Fleet and became one of the Colony’s most influential residents. The Trust was in no doubt about the need to acquire the Cottage and, with donations from members and the public, was able to make this its first property purchase – in 1961.

Oil Room, Norman Lindsay Gallery. J Miller.

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The community rallied but it was clear that a strategic approach was required to raise funds for this and future properties. The founding of the National Trust Women’s Committee in 1961 helped to ensure that and in 1963, the doors opened to the public for the first time.

Also 50 years ago, the elegant 1834 property, Lindesay, with its high vantage over the Harbour from Sydney’s Darling Point, was gifted to the Trust. The Gothic Revival villa was built by the young and well-connected Colonial Treasurer, Campbell Drummond

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Riddell, who moved into it in 1836 with his very young wife, Caroline Stuart Rodney. The site was blessed with a natural spring which, incorporated into the basement of the property, still provides drinkable water today.

40 years on 25 years on Forty years ago, on 24 February 1973, Governor-General the Rt Hon Sir Paul Hasluck officially opened the Norman Lindsay Gallery in the Blue Mountains. In his will of 7 March 1969, Norman Lindsay, one of Australia’s most prolific and highly respected artists and creators, left a significant number of his works and materials to the Trust. A public appeal and a magnificent donation of $50,000 from the connoisseur of paintings and lifelong friend of Lindsay, Samuel Henry Ervin (1881-1977), made the purchase possible.

35 years on It was the generosity of Harry Ervin, as he was known, which led to the NSW National Trust’s move to its current home on Sydney’s Observatory Hill. The building which started life as a Macquarie military hospital had been occupied by the former Fort Street Girls High School until the School outgrew the site in the early 1970s. Harry Ervin’s offer to fund restoration of the property and creation of a gallery – the S H Ervin Gallery - persuaded the NSW Government to lease the property to the Trust on a peppercorn rent.

The Gallery celebrated its 35th anniversary this year.

LEFT Vienna

In January 1985, a group of conservation experts braved the searing heat of rural Dubbo to carry out a detailed assessment of Dundullimal Homestead to determine whether the National Trust could afford to accept it as a gift.

The timber slab structure stands on the site of the Dundullimal Run, licensed to Dalmahoy Campbell in 1836. The distinctive ‘T’ shape of the house is complemented by finely crafted, elegant cedar joinery, with French doors opening onto verandahs.

After various adjustments and owners, the property was acquired

by Thomas Baird in 1871. His descendants, the Palmers, owned Dundullimal before presenting it as a gift to the Trust in April 1986.

Built on Sydney’s Hunters Hill promontory in 1871, Vienna Cottage is a palimpsest of changing socio-economic history.

For its first 50 years the two front, two back-roomed cottage with its lean-to was the hub of a large family of Irish origins which has maintained its connections to the area to this day. From 1926 it was owned by a descendant of the original Hillman family, James Frederick Hillman (Fred) who made the somewhat eccentric decision to lease the property and decamp himself to the poultry shed at the back of the orchard, where he lived

with his books and piano. However things turned sour for Fred as a result of post war legislation which protected tenants from rent rises and evictions. Unable to evict the sitting tenant and unable to exact the funds needed for maintenance, he and his family watched as Vienna slid into decay.

Ironically, many highly significant properties such as Vienna exist intact today as a direct consequence of this legislation, which made ‘modernisation’ impossible. The purchase of Vienna in 1984 was initiated by the Hunters Hill community in the lead-up to Australia’s Bicentennial celebrations. It was one of several properties conserved and interpreted as part of the National Trust-Amatil Bicentennial Program, and was opened to the public in May 1988.

What emerges from this story, apart from the tenaciousness of the National Trust in holding to its vision, is the value of partnerships to protect heritage – with government, business and the community. Today it seems unthinkable that properties such as those described above could be at risk. But they are. And while the National Trust (NSW) is most unlikely to stretch to further acquisitions in the foreseeable future at least, support for its aims to protect heritage of all kinds is needed today as much as ever.

Cottage prior to 1980s conservation works. M Walker.

Cottage today. C Shain.

RIGHT Vienna

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Workshop woes at Islington PETER LANGHANS | NATIONAL TRUST (SA)

The historic Islington Railway Workshops complex at Kilburn in suburban Adelaide faced further pressure mid-year when the State Minister for Environment directed the removal of the provisionally listed site from the South Australian Heritage Register. In 2011, rail heritage supporters and the National Trust of South Australia had nominated the whole site for State Heritage listing as a heritage complex following an earlier nomination of individual buildings and structures in 2010. While the Minister’s decision did not affect six long-standing State Heritage buildings, the decision is a substantial setback for the heritage value of the precinct.

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ating from the early 1880s, the Islington Railway Workshops were the principal facility supporting the state’s railway system in both manufacture and maintenance of locomotives and rolling stock and were a very significant employer of skilled trades-people and apprentices. During World War II, the workshops were also used for the production of major aircraft assemblies and military vehicles, employing many women in the war effort.

Today the workshops are a rare example of a still operational largescale railway workshop facility that has survived and evolved from the 19th century through to the 21st century. Now operated by private TOP

industry, the workshops still provide fully equipped facilities for the manufacture, maintenance and modification of all types of modern rolling stock, infrastructure and track plant.

The workshops originally covered an area of 38 hectares but, subsequent to rezoning of the site in 2010, the northern and southern sections were razed for retail and commercial redevelopment leaving only the central section of 17 hectares. The remaining section includes a variety of building styles ranging from ornate bluestone and red brick structures of the 1880s, through to more functional corrugated galvanized iron structures of the 1920s and 1940s.

The track work and associated infrastructure are also significant from an interpretive viewpoint showing how the various buildings of the complex relate to each other.

The two operational traversers (transfer tables) are also rare historical items in their own right.

It is notable that South Australia remains the only state in Australia where its principal historic railway workshops have not been recognised as a State Heritage complex. The Minister’s decision to deny this recognition because of what is perceived to be the public interest is a disappointing reflection on the value placed on industrial heritage by the elected state government.

Foundry. W Morris.

Shop. P Langhans. Fabrication Annex. P Langhans. Chief Mechanical Engineer’s Office. P Langhans.

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Gabbie Kylie Foundation leads protective response DAVID GUILFOYLE | APPLIED ARCHEAOLOGY

The Marbaleerup Heritage Complex north of Esperance, Western Australia, is a highly significant cultural area and identified by the Esperance Nyungar Traditional Owners as a priority for on-ground conservation and management actions. The area features a massive granite dome, a distinctive feature in the flat open expanse of the Esperance mallee hinterland. In 2008, the National Trust of Australia (WA) Gabbie Kylie Foundation (GKF) secured funding to undertake some urgent management actions at Marbaleerup – and the team addressed the impacts of water erosion, graffiti, and inappropriate visitor access.

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n early 2013, Senior Traditional Owner and Gabbie Kylie Foundation coordinator, Doc Reynolds, noticed some recent damage to the site – including graffiti on the signs along the walk trail surrounding the heritage complex.

More concerning, it was apparent that someone had “scratched” some of the art itself with a sharp rock. Doc reported the situation to the Esperance Nyungar Claim group and also reported the damage to Department of Aboriginal Affairs (DAA). Doc and Robert Reynolds (Senior Heritage Officer, DAA) carried out a brief assessment and some urgent funding was secured from South Coast Natural Resource Management, Inc. (SCNRM) for a community-based assessment as a first response.

Doc and representatives of each of the six Traditional Owner family representatives, along with archaeologist and GKF cocoordinator, David Guilfoyle, travelled to the area to assess the damage, remove the graffiti from the signs and discuss an action plan for long-term management.

The Gabbie Kylie Foundation was established in late 2007 as a holistic, community-based approach that integrates education and training programs with onground conservation works.

With support provided by the Federal Government’s Indigenous Heritage Program (Department of Sustainability, Environment, Population and Communities) and also BHP Billiton, the GKF structure provides an important, effective mechanism for coordination and management action to urgent caring for country projects. The recent vandalism highlights a vital need for a collaborative effort for further restoration, management and monitoring actions. The proposed actions and recommendations will be followed up by the Gabbie Kylie team on behalf of, and with full guidance from, the Elders and the Traditional Owners, with coordinated support from partners and supporters.

TOP TO BOTTOM Traditional Owners team removing graffiti from the signs via sanding and painting during a damage assessment trip. D Guilfoyle.

Assessing the damage to rock art panels. Doc Reynolds.

Damaged rock art. D Guilfoyle.

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C U L T I VAT I N G M O D E R N I S M E X H I B I T I O N S Cultivating Modernism: reading the modern garden 1917–71 Baillieu Library building (ground floor), The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Vic. 14 October 2013 to 31 January 2014: free entry, open during library hours Cultivating Modernism: French garden style of the 1920s and 1930s Tasma Gallery, Tasma Terrace, 4 Parliament Place, East Melbourne, Vic. 15 October 2013 to 31 January 2014: free entry, open during office hours Cultivating Modernism: reading the modern garden 1917–71 Civic Gallery, Hawke Centre, University of South Australia, North Terrace, Adelaide, SA 17 February to 31 March 2014: free entry, open during gallery hours TOP LEFT ‘La

Belle Fleur’ (Paris, 1931)

TOP RIGHT Landscaping for Modern Living BOTTOM RIGHT Australian Home Beautiful

All private collection.

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(California, 1958) (December 1936)

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Cultivating Modernism RICHARD AITKEN

‘What is a modernist garden?’ you might ask. As yet there is no definitive answer. The words ‘modern’, ‘moderne’ and ‘Modernism’ (often capitalised to denote its self-importance!) are frequently used interchangeably, to say nothing of ‘contemporary’, ‘functional’ and ‘international’. In truth, all of these words—in context—have some validity.

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any gardens have been described as ‘modern’, from Thomas Whately’s influential book Observations on Modern Gardening (1770) to Peter Shepeard’s Modern Gardens (1953). The term ‘moderne’ is often associated with the Art Deco style, popularised by successive expositions in Paris between 1925 and 1937. And ‘international’ is generally associated with the functional modernity of architecture from the 1920s to 1970s.

This last term perhaps gives us a vital clue in distinguishing between what is modernist and what is merely modern.

International style architecture developed in large part from the teachings of the German Bauhaus design school, established after the First World War. Wartime destruction had given rise to new social and physical needs, especially housing. Commonly linked was the need for health and social inclusion. New materials such as glass and steel, honesty in construction and design where form followed function, were its axioms.

But how might these be applied to garden design? Firstly the garden might become part of the

living environment, with outdoor spaces part of house planning— roof terraces in colder climates, patios in warmer. Secondly, the garden could be made functional, by the incorporation of spaces for children, edible plants, exercise or recreation, and in all of these aspects sufficient flexibility to enable change over time.

And yet, application of modernist ideals was slow to influence garden design. Art, costume, graphics, or decorative arts were all easily fabricated in a matter of days or months, whereas gardens required a time span of years. Coupled with this was an

innate conservatism amongst many garden-makers, unable or unwilling to change their immediate environment as they might dress or decoration.

In Australia such conservatism exacerbated the slow uptake of modernist gardens. Decorative approaches fuelled by cubism and other art movements found some disciples, but functional European modernism was slow to filter from professional to popular minds. But with the Second World War, Australia’s worldview shifted from Europe to America and to the casual modernism of California.

Not only did this suffuse our garden making with a more climatically appropriate model but America’s optimistic outlook also suited Australia’s buoyant postwar years.

Yet as post-war development proceeded apace, opposing voices were beginning to be heard against the use of pesticides, unchecked tree clearance, urban blight. Such outrage heralded a new interest in the environment and ecology, such that by the early 1970s the foundations were being laid for a new, more sustainable form of gardening, one that continues to resonate strongly amongst a new generation.

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postcard of El Alamein Fountain, Robert Woodward’s masterpiece in Sydney’s Kings Cross.

Way Gardening (Melbourne, 1933) bringing the cactus, bush house, and native plants into new prominence.

Both private collection.

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Defence Against The Devil

Apotropaic Marks in Australia IAN EVANS OAM | HISTORIAN

The evidence for widespread belief in folk magic in Australia in the period from 1788 to the early twentieth century is steadily accumulating, providing a rich new field for research.

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aving established during research for a PhD that concealed objects, including shoes, garments and cats, were part of a tradition of folk magic in Australia, I looked for other practices that might have been carried here by convicts and settlers from Britain. In particular, I focussed on apotropaic marks that are widely found throughout that country. The word apotropaic comes from the Greek apotropaios which means evil averting.

Most marks found so far are in Tasmania where they have been recorded on an 1852 stable and 1820s kitchen wall near Hobart, on a granary of about 1850 near New Norfolk, an 1820s inn near Hobart, a mantelpiece in the courthouse at Richmond and on a circa 1830s front door from Bothwell which is now in Northern Tasmania.

In addition, marks have been identified on a rectory in rural Victoria and in two locations in the Melbourne suburb of Collingwood.

All were created with a compass on timber, stone or brickwork.

Several marks used in Britain have now been discovered in Australia. These include the hexafoil, often found in British buildings, as well as a mark consisting of concentric circles with a central dot, and an enigmatic mark in which lines come to a central point.

Hexafoils consist of a circle containing six arcs that converge in the centre of the circle. These and other marks are thought to have been intended to prevent entry by malevolent beings, to protect crops against vermin, to prevent fire and in stables to prevent witches from borrowing horses at night to ride to their covens.

The hexafoil is but one of a large number of protective designs that are now being recorded in the United Kingdom, North America and Australia. How these marks were supposed to work is the subject of much conjecture and virtually no evidence. They must have been seen as powerful and intimidating, invoking universal forces in ways not evident to us.

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Those who made the marks left no description of their modus operandi, nor did they record the reasons for what they did.

They may have feared evil beings from the invisible world that was believed to intermingle with the world in which they lived. Unseen but close at hand, it was thought that these beings plotted and schemed to bring harm to humans.

At a time when infant and child mortality posed enormous risks to families and when giving birth was fraught with the possibility of death anything that seemed to offer hope was grasped.

FOR MORE INFORMATION contact Ian Evans at PO Box 591, Mullumbimby, NSW 2482, by phone or fax to 02 6684 7677 or by email to evansthebook@gmail.com.

Ian Evans, “Touching Magic: Deliberately Concealed Objects in Old Australian Houses and Buildings,” PhD thesis, University of Newcastle, NSW, 2010. The thesis is available for download from the following Dropbox link: http://db.tt/ dbiR5JOr. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Thanks to Timothy Easton for the benefit of his many years of research into the material culture of folk magic in Britain and elsewhere.

hexafoil in the grand stables building at Shene. Marks of this kind are common in British stables and are believed to have been intended to prevent witches from riding horses to their covens during the night. Horses found sweating and exhausted in their stalls in the morning were believed to have been witch-ridden. S Dunbar; Hexafoils on the wall of the circa 1850 granary at Redlands near New Norfolk, Tasmania. The circle at left may be an incomplete hexafoil. The outline of the marks has been drawn onto the image for clarity. These are the largest group and the largest marks yet found in Australia. S Dunbar; One of the marks from the mantelpiece in the clerk’s room at the Courthouse, Richmond, Tasmania. This mark is a combination of concentric circles and a hexafoil. The fireplace lintel in this 1825 building is richly adorned with protective marks. S Watts.

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Archaeology in young hands JOY LEFROY | MANAGER EDUCATION & LEARNING AND LEANNE BRASS | ARCHAEOLOGIST NATIONAL TRUST (WA)

Old Farm, Strawberry Hill in Albany, Western Australia is the location for trialling a new Education & Learning pilot archaeology initiative developed by the National Trust of Australia (WA). The trial program involving Year 2 and Year 5 students from Albany Primary School enables schoolchildren (and potentially wider audiences) to participate in the process of archaeological investigation at National Trust properties.

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oy Lefroy Manager Education & Learning and Leanne Brass Archaeologist are adding to existing education programs developed for Trust properties with hands-on archaeological activities that engage students and teach them specific skills relating to archaeology. These will support the cultural (natural, Aboriginal and historic) heritage values of National Trust places.

Archaeology will be presented as a separate and distinct discipline to history – one that focuses on the material evidence of the past.

The study of archaeology holds a fascination for young people thanks to film and television shows but there are few opportunities for them to participate in handson archaeological activities for themselves. Offering programs that have been designed to teach processes and skills of archaeology at National Trust places will allow for a better understanding of the place and link to the historical knowledge and understandings of the Australian Curriculum.

Previous excavations undertaken at Old Farm, Strawberry Hill by archaeologists from the University of Western Australia have allowed for a deeper understanding of post-European settlement and the results have influenced the trial Education and Learning program.

Future excavations at this site are ABOVE Albany

proposed to explore the preEuropean and first contact period.

Between 2010 and 2012, the National Trust undertook to produce three Australian Curriculum History programs specifically for use with Old Farm, Strawberry Hill. These programs, introduced in 2012/2013, relate to the changing landscape since European settlement in 1826 and are available online.

They are written specifically for teachers of years 2, 4 and 5 and relate to the themes of The Past in the Present, First Contact and The Australian Colonies. The hands-on activities delivered on site are designed to suit the

curriculum requirements and to engage the students with a greater understanding of the original land use, both pre and post European settlement. As well as a tour of the house and grounds, students really enjoy their time in the gardens assisting with the planting, weeding and harvesting of crops.

The programs are delivered by Western Australian Museum (Albany) education staff with assistance from Mike Harvey, Old Farm, Strawberry Hill Manager and volunteers.

FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT

http://www.valuingheritage.com.au/Old_ Farm,_Strawberry_Hill,_Albany.html

Primary School students joined National Trust Archaeologist Leanne Brass for the trial ‘dig’ at Old Farm, Strawberry Hill. J Lefroy NTWA. 15

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1 Gold recipients at the Queensland Heritage Awards DR VALERIE DENNIS | NATIONAL TRUST (QLD)

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Cairns Foreshore Development. R Gesink; 2. Brisbane City Hall - Foyer. Brisbane City Council; 3. Brisbane City Hall - Oak Table room.

Brisbane City Council; 4. ‘Back to Brisbane’ event. MacArthur Museum; 5. Governor’s Desk setting. QUT; 6. ‘Back to Brisbane’ event. MacArthur Museum.

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GOLD

Eight imaginative and successful projects received Gold at this year’s Queensland Heritage Awards, presented at Old Government House, Brisbane in October.

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he Brisbane City Hall Restoration deservedly received the John Herbert Award as the most outstanding nomination.

In this project, as the inherent qualities of the 1930s City Hall were being restored, innovative technologies and materials were introduced to rectify the fabric, structural, fire and life safety deficits. Now, as in the years since the 1930s, the building lies at the heart of the civic and community life of the Brisbane.

Brisbane City Council concern about the appearance and functionality of the Centenary Swimming Pools was behind the project that won Gold in the David Eades Award category – for application of sustainability principles in the conservation of a heritage place. The architectural and artistic aspects of James Birrell’s modernist influenced design had been diminished by unsympathetic alterations undertaken since 1959 and equipment was obsolete. This project recovered Birrell’s design where possible, revitalising the pool complex through repair, refinishing, conservation and an upgrading of access.

Cairns locals are re-establishing their connections with the No. 2 Wharf Shed and Wharf No. 1 through the Cairns Foreshore Development Project also recognised at the awards. The timber and corrugated iron wharf shed has been adapted for future commercial and retail use related to the adjacent Cairns Cruise

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Liner Terminal, while Wharf No. 1 has been opened for public use through a covered kiosk and adjacent public area ‘follies’ designed for children of all ages.

Charleville locals digging into the town’s Second World War history kickstarted and developed Convoy Tour, a tourist-focused, tag-along driving tour conducted daily. This project received Gold in the Governor’s Heritage Award category through connecting archival records and the oral histories of servicemen and locals with places and objects related to Charleville’s busy wartime airfield. A key feature of the tour is the once top secret Norden Bombsight storage building, an almost forgotten connection to Charleville’s interesting past.

Imagine it is the late nineteenth century and the Governor of Queensland has invited you into his library. It is an impressive, stately room with cedar table and nine comfortable leather chairs.

Books and papers are scattered on the table, as if the Governor has just concluded a meeting and is about to commence his correspondence.

A telephone with a winding handle and no numbers sits in the centre of the table. This setup received an overwhelmingly positive visitor response to the project, Reimaging the Governor’s Library – Old Government House, another recipient of Gold in the Governor’s Heritage Award category.

The Governor’s Heritage category also recognised Ipswich City Council for an audio tour project promoting the cultural heritage significance of Queens Park. The sometimes quirky history of Queensland’s first park can be accessed through audio applications designed to be downloaded to a smartphone or accessed through a hired MP3 player.

To enhance the relationship between community and heritage, the City of Gold Coast was also recognised for an integrated program that included a local Heritage Register, new brochures, a website, conferences and an educators’ bus tour.

The seventieth anniversary of General MacArthur’s arrival in Brisbane during the Second World War was the hook that harnessed a three day celebration and the assistance of thirty other organisations in order to bring the history of Brisbane during the 1940s very much to life.

Mostly the work of volunteers, ‘Back to Brisbane’ – Brisbane’s Wartime Heritage’ was a welldeserved recipient of Gold in the Community Heritage Award category.

of the 2013 Heritage Awards.

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Heritage and the Holy GINA PICKERING | EDITOR NATIONAL TRUST (WA)

A clash of interests and values is never far away, especially at cultural heritage sites.

This was highlighted when a group of researchers and practitioners met at a Collaboratory in Hobart to discuss the History of Heritage: Emotions in Blood, Stone and Land. Brought together by the Australian Research Council Centre for the History of Emotions 1100-1800 (CHE), twenty participants soared through topics including Tasmania’s Aboriginal continuity, medieval times, family, religion, war, the latest Scottish Museum, as well as heritage values associated with the development at Elizabeth Quay on Perth’s waterfront and a new interpretation plan for the Swan and Canning Rivers developed by the National Trust of Australia (WA).

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key aim of the research centre is to formulate policy suggestions for improving Australia’s social and cultural well-being. There are valuable synergies as the Plan for the rivers includes a ‘whole of river’ focus linked to the well-being of rivers and the community.

Sometimes we see most clearly in the company of friendly strangers and one of the talks at the Collaboratory, entitled The Monuments of Westminster Abbey 1570-1640, provided an insightful way into thinking about the spirituality, competition for access and native title negotiations associated with unique riverscape which is central to one of world’s oldest cultures and which determined the location of Western Australia’s capital city.

Professor Sherlock, Vice Chancellor of the MCD University of Divinity, Melbourne described tensions that emerge between heritage and the holy at Westminster Abbey, London where more than a million people visit each year to explore a 700 year old building central to the Anglican faith and resting place of royalty, poets, priests and others.

“...The significance of these rivers cannot be underestimated nor should it be understated – the spirit of the river system is the running soul of our Noongar people.”

SWAN AND CANNING RIVERS ICONIC TRAILS PROJECT LIVING CULTURE — ­ LIVING LAND AND ITS PEOPLE. SOUTH WEST ABORIGINAL LAND AND SEA COUNCIL. SWALSC (2010).

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Looking west at sunset on Swan River. G Pickering NTWA. the banks of Swan Regional Riverside Park. G Pickering NTWA.

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Between the lines The Abbey like Perth’s riverscape is a spiritual destination and striking a respectful balance over its use is a challenge for all the community. The case of the Abbey highlights the importance of management, mindfulness, respect, privilege of access and timing.

Perth’s internationally recognised riverscape has been a drain, a rubbish tip, a sewer and a jetski opportunity. It is also a continuing spiritual force for one of the world’s oldest cultures - the Noongar people described recently in the following way. “...both the Swan and Canning Rivers the Derbarl Yerrigan and the Djarlgarro Beelier have a strong Noongar connection and epitomise sense of place values for the Noongar people. The significance of these rivers cannot be underestimated nor should it be understated – the spirit of the river system is the running soul of our Noongar people.”

The important intersection between heritage and the holy recognises and encourages a way forward and provides the opportunity for the community to consider and embrace joint responsibility for the significance of Perth’s riverscape and its uses.

[Some of the ideas in this article are inspired by From the Barracks to the Burrup

by Dr Andrea Witcomb and Dr Kate Gregory.]

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JOLLY GOOD ALE AND OLD AUTHORS: ALISON PAINTER, TIM COOPER AND ROB LINN PUBLISHER: OPENBOOK HOWDEN ISBN 9781921755149 REVIEWER:

NORMAN ETHERINGTON AM NATIONAL TRUST (SA)

This wonderful piece of business history deserves an international readership. Even among the vintners of Europe it is rare to encounter a major firm that has remained in family ownership for 150 years.

When Thomas Cooper began brewing ale on his premises in 1862 he could not possibly have imagined that his business would live on into the twenty-first century as world-renowned operation with a clientele scattered right across the globe. Even at the beginning he stood out from other brewers through his insistence on quality ingredients, traditional techniques and Methodist principles. Yes, Methodist principles. In 1862 the temperance movement was spreading its tentacles through Wesleyan churches, but abstinence was a personal choice. Thomas refused on principle to brew draft beer or sell to public houses. He dealt solely in bottled ales and stout for private consumption.

Readers who, like me, have had only a vague idea of how ale differs from lager, will learn a great deal about the art of brewing from this book. Thomas Cooper produced beer through the warm, top-fermented process at a time when other brewers had turned to lager, which employs refrigerated bottom-fermentation. A whole century would pass before Coopers would try their hands at lager production. Another distinction of Thomas’s operations was his reluctance to employ sugar as an aid to fermentation, preferring to stick to the old English formula of malt and hops alone. Slow evolution rather than revolution was always the Coopers’ way. The company stuck to delivery by horse-drawn drays right up until 1947 and their distinctive ovate label retains its nineteenth-century character.

In a world filled with MBA graduates preaching change management, creative destruction, leveraged buyouts and everchanging logos, Coopers proves that creative conservatism works.

The story of how the firm withstood a determined takeover mounted

by Nathan Lion will have readers on their feet cheering. Perhaps it will someday feature as a Harvard Business School case study. It ought to. The 12 former breweries, 22 inns and 244 hotels on the National Trust Register of Classified Places attest to the recognition of beer’s historic importance to South Australia. The recognition of Coopers as a National Trust Icon in 2003 was entirely predictable.

When the Coopers horse-drawn delivery wagon next crosses your path, raise your glass to a great advocate for heritage.

FOR MORE INFORMATION http://store.coopers.com.au/shop/product/ coopers-150-year-history-book/

example of memorialisation at Mosman Park. G Pickering NTWA. 19

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The smell of an oily rag MARK PILKINGTON | AUSTRALIAN AIRCRAFT RESTORATION GROUP

Australians have played an important role in the development of world aviation. Think of the those familiar names Hargraves, Hawker, the Smith Brothers, Hinkler, Kingsford-Smith and Ulm to name a few. Aviation has also played an important role in the development of our nation through defence, Flying Doctors, Air Ambulances, regional airlines, national and international air travel, aerial mapping and geological and more.

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national aviation museum has eluded Australia for the past 40 years.

In 1975 the Federal Senate Inquiry into Museums and National Collections (The Piggott Report) identified the need for three new national museums, Museum of Australia, (established 1980) National Maritime Museum, (established 1991) and a National Aviation Museum.

The Portrait Gallery, the Museum of Australia and the Australian National Maritime Museum have all been delivered, but the National Aviation Museum remains the only major recommendation of the Report not yet delivered.

T h e Au s t r al i a n A i rc r a f t Restoration Group (AARG) is renewing calls for the creation of a formal national aviation museum, and considers its collection can form the basis of such an outcome.

The AARG was formed more

than 50 years ago, as a company limited by guarantee along similar lines to the National Trust. It set out to save important and rare aviation heritage and has operated Australia’s largest and oldest volunteer run aviation museum at Moorabbin since 1965.

T h e A A RG c om m e n c e d collecting historic aircraft, engines and artefacts in 1962, at a time when these items were being scrapped, burnt, sold overseas, or left to rot away. The AARG has since built a nationally significant collection, on the smell of an oily rag, and housed in a third world facility, while other countries such as the USA, Canada, France, Belgium, Thailand, and China have opened formal national aviation museums. Most recently in 2011 India announced it would create a national museum for this purpose.

The national aviation museum proposal has languished on the

BACKGROUND Harry

agenda of successive governments for decades. It briefly came close to reality under the Kennett Victorian State Government in the 1990s working with the then Hawke Governments, as the National Air and Space Museum of Australia (NASMA).

The AARG has now collected over 8,500 written signatures towards a formal petition to be lodged in Federal Parliament, and the AARG has separately been collecting letters of support from former Prime Ministers, former Deputy Prime Ministers, former State Governors, influential business identities, and heritage and community groups FOR MORE INFORMATION visit http://aarg.com.au/nam.htm, info@aarg.com.au or call 0418 174 957 MARK PILKINGTON is

the Secretary of the AARG and formerly involved in the Point Cook Airfield Preservation Action Groups efforts to save Point Cook in the 1990s.

Hawker and his Sopwith Tabloid at Caulfield Racecourse provided an aerial display watched by 40,000 people on 6 February 1914.

Australian Aircraft Restoration Group.

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Outstanding collections CHRIS TASSELL | DIRECTOR NATIONAL TRUST (TAS)

The properties and collections of the National Trusts of Australia document Australia’s history in a way that is unmatched across the nation. They tell the stories of the Australian community, including key moments that have shaped the nation as well as individual contributions made at work, home and at play.

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epresented amongst these the national themes are agriculture, mining, industry and commerce, transport and communication democracy, migration, law and order, domestic life and creativity.

National Trusts’ collections provide a powerful insight into the lives of colonial governors such as Macquarie and Latrobe, State Premiers such as Sir Henry Ayer and many others involved in politics at all levels of government.

Mo s t s i g n i f i c a n t l y, the collections also provide both insight and understanding of the lives of two of Australia’s most prominent prime ministers, Joe Lyons and John Curtin who both lead the country at times of great uncertainty. The collections associated with Joe Lyons also document the contributions of the first woman elected to the Federal House of Representatives, Dame Enid Lyons.

The power of protest is also represented including the early meetings of the Antitransportation League in Tasmania with its aim of halting the transportation of convicts. Chaired

by James Cox of Clarendon, this became the first inter-colonial political movement and was to lay the seeds for Federation championed so vigorously by Sir Henry Parks who delivered his “Tenterfield Oration” in that town’s School of Arts.

That the National Trust is able to manage the collections associated with Joe and Dame Enid Lyons, John Curtin, Sir Henry Ayers and many others in their own homes or that of Sir Henry Parks in the Tenterfield School of Arts further distinguishes the Trust’s commitment.

These collections are often viewed within the context of the place in which they are displayed.

However, a more encompassing view reveals that in their totality many of the Trusts’ collections are of national significance, the Australian early colonial furniture collection, or the collections documenting the influence of Cornish mining in Australia and colonial deep sea whaling to name but a few.

Together the National Trusts’ collections provide an insight into Australia’s history that reflects the geographic diversity and diverse community experiences of the entire country, which is quite a remarkable achievement for a community based heritage movement.

TOP LEFT Japanese

Doll, Mt. Lyell Mine Manager’s Office, Queenstown, Tasmania. TOP RIGHT Portrait of the ship “Runnymede” by Maritime Artist Richard Barrett Spencer. RIGHT Royal Worcester Ewer “Collingrove”, Angeston, South Australia. Bottom Locomotive Manufacturer’s Plate, Port Pirie Railway Station Museum.

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A symbol of reform

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Iconic Pine

MARGARET MUNRO

Queensland boasts some outstanding trees. The ancient Antarctic Beech Trees (Nothofagus moorei) of the Scenic Rim - relics of Gondwana, the mature coastal Norfolk Pines (Araucaria heterophylla) – which evidence the State’s longstanding beach culture, and the large Eagle Street Fig Group in the Brisbane CBD - anachronistically crammed between modern high rises.

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ertainly the world’s largest natural stand of what must be Queensland’s most iconic tree – the Bunya Pines (Araucaria bidwillii)- near the northern edge of the Darling Downs would be at the head of the list. The magnificent 500 year old Curtain Fig (Ficus virens) on the Atherton tableland that stands over 50 metres tall with its curious growth of 15 metre roots that fall curtain-like to the ground, fascinating tourists for over a century, would also be a major contender. However, the significant tree in Queensland that has one of the most interesting stories is a rather unimposing Cypress Pine (Callitris cupressiformis) about 700 km west of Brisbane and 100 km north of the New South Wales border, in the sandhills of Cunnamulla.

In 1880, Cunnamulla was situated at the junction of major stock routes and had become a prosperous rural town of about 200 people, having had an influx of entrepreneurial graziers. On 16 January of that year, a stationhand, by the name of Joseph Wells, entered the Queensland National Bank armed with a six chamber revolver and demanded money from the bank employees. William Murphy, a witness who owned a store adjacent to the bank, attempted to help and became wounded in a scuffle. Wells made a hasty exit from the bank only to find a crowd of onlookers waiting outside, but his series of misfortunes were to be further compounded. Firstly, his horse’s bridle broke - so he ran to the outskirts of the town, threatening to shoot two pursuing onlookers who were armed. He then took refuge in this pine which became known as the ‘Robber’s Tree’. At the time it was covered in considerably more concealing foliage than the current image shows. His hiding place may have remained undiscovered had it not been for a sheep dog which had followed his scent and Wells was found by police with the dog barking at the foot of the tree. Wells was charged with armed robbery with wounding.

He was tried and found guilty in courts in Toowoomba, received the death penalty and was executed on 22 March 1880. Wells is buried in Toowong Cemetery, Brisbane.

Joseph Wells became the last person to be executed in Queensland for armed robbery, many people believing that this penalty was too severe. One of his supporters, Arthur Rutledge MLA, on becoming Attorney General, legislated to have armed robbery removed from the list of capital offences in Queensland. The Robber’s Tree, therefore, serves not only as a reminder of Cunnamulla’s bungled bank robbery of 1880, but a symbol of reform of the country’s criminal penalty system.

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Tree. Valarie Doyle.

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A new position for Governor Macquarie CLIVE LUCAS | CLIVE LUCAS, STAPLETON & PARTNERS, ARCHITECTS

Lachlan Macquarie, the fifth governor of NSW, is the most renowned of the colonial governors of New South Wales - which 200 years ago stretched as far west as to include part of South Australia, the Northern Territory, the whole of Victoria, Queensland and of course Van Diemen’s Land. The town of Albany in the south of Western Australia too was founded as a military outpost of New South Wales as part of a plan to forestall French ambitions in the region a little later in 1827.

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acquarie dotted the land with his name (and that of his second wife Elizabeth Campbell) in streets, rivers, mountains, towns, forts, ports, counties and more. In recent times banks, high schools, universities, regions, even shopping centres have been named after him, but still no official monument in the city was created.

Marie Bashir, his successor (she is the 37th governor of NSW), has changed all that.

Devoted as she is to Australian history, Professor Bashir set about to erect a statue in his honour at the top of Macquarie Street in Sydney, in Queen’s Square, at the entrance to Hyde Park.

The street and park are Macquarie’s creations and the entrance to the park is where he had Francis Greenway (his appointed Colonial Architect) design a screen as an entry to the park. While this was not built, 200 years later Professor Bashir chose Terrance Plowright as the sculptor, and Clive Lucas, Stapleton & Partners were commissioned to design the pedestal.

A Blue Mountains resident, Plowright has undertaken some of the largest fine art commissions TOP The

in Australia and overseas, and has won acclaim for Australian art on a grand scale. Of his inspiration for the Macquarie statue, he said ‘The qualities within Macquarie that inspired me were his humanity and his extraordinary strength of character and intelligence.

I attempted to create the face of a gifted man, judicious and full of dignity. As well, I worked on developing within the body language the presence of authority but tempered by his great desire to imbue, within the colony, egalitarianism.’

The inspiration for the pedestal was the circular neo-classical pedestals commonly in use in the early nineteenth century. The inscription is cut in simple bold block letters finished in gold leaf.

On the face ‘Major General Lachlan Macquarie Governor of New South Wales 1810 – 1821’ and on the rear the date ‘MMXII’ as well as his places and dates of birth and death.

In front of the pedestal set in the pavement is a circular bronze plaque with Macquarie’s coat of arms and detail of its unveiling by Governor Bashir.

The Governor, the Premier and the architects wanted the statue centred on the axis of Macquarie Street and Hyde Park, but the City Council said no and alas Macquarie sits off centre. However, the design is so that it can be ‘wheeled’ into the centre of the avenue leading up to the Archibald Fountain. This is where the old Viceroy deserves to be.

statue of Governor Macquarie in Queen’s Square Sydney. T Plowright. plaque unveiled by Governor Marie Bashir. T Plowright.

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Heritage revitalised

Revitalising MISS PORTER’S HOUSE ROLAND BANNISTER | NSW NATIONAL TRUST

The volunteers at Miss Porter’s House look forward to the revitalisation of Newcastle’s West End under the NSW Department of Planning and Infrastructure’s Newcastle Urban Renewal Strategy.

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he House, and the Porter family, have been part of the evolving commercial, social and cultural landscapes of Newcastle’s West End since James Porter established his first shop there in about 1880.

The city of Newcastle has suffered a great deal in the past several decades as it slowly morphs from a centre of heavy industry to a place of education, health support, environmental research, commerce and services.

The West End - the area in which Miss Porter’s House is located - has been characterised by decline: buildings falling derelict, derelict buildings being demolished, and the spasmodic development of a few new buildings of dubious quality.

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Blewett’s horse and cart in front of Blewett’s Saddlery and James Porter’s grocery, probably in the late 1890s. NTNSW. Porter 1844-1921. James Porter was a long-time member of the Grand United Order of Oddfellows. NTNSW.

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Australia’s largest Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet now sits on the site of the gracious old Palais Royale and under that, an important Aboriginal midden. It is characterised too by the proliferation of cheap pubs, tattoo parlours, sex shops and brothels, and small optimistic businesses that rise and fall within a season.

Ironically, a number of fine heritage buildings survive, despite the general decline.

As well as Miss Porter’s House, there is the former police station, the TAFE art school buildings, the Royal Theatre, the Bank Corner, the old Water Board building, Stegga’s Arcade and several commercial buildings in Hunter Street.

But Miss Porter’s House is unique in that it is the only heritage building to retain its original form, to house its original contents, and to continue to function as a going concern.

Members of the Porter family occupied the House from 1909 to 1997. Since then the volunteer committee of the National Trust has maintained the building itself, the gardens and the valuable collection of artefacts housed there, and raised money towards its upkeep.

Although Miss Porter’s House presents a quiet face to the street, a great deal of activity goes on there.

At the turn of the nineteenth century James Porter’s grocery store and J Blewett’s Saddlery shared a building in Hunter Street on land that is now a car park for Balance City Health Club. In 1909, he sold the back portion of his land to his son Herbert for 10 shillings. Herbert asked his architect brother, Wallace, to build a free-standing terrace house facing King Street for himself and his fiancée Florence Jolly.

Herbert and Florence married in 1910 and their daughters Ella and Hazel were born in 1911 and 1914. Sadly, Herbert died in 1919 from Spanish ‘flu and Florence was left to raise the girls. She died in 1970. Ella and Hazel remained single and lived in the family home all their lives until Ella died in 1995 and Hazel in 1997.

Hazel bequeathed the house and its remarkable collection of domestic and personal items to the National Trust.

Miss Porter’s House’s tag line is Linking people of the past, the present and the future.

This tag encapsulates the Trust’s philosophy: the House and its collection are a tangible evidence of lives lived, and of the waxing and waning story of the West End.

Between the lines SEEKING WISDOM: A CENTENARY HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA EDITOR:

JENNY GREGORY

PUBLISHER: UWA PUBLISHING, CRAWLEY, WA, 6009 ISBN 781742584881 REVIEWER: STEVE ERRINGTON, ROYAL WESTERN AUSTRALIAN HISTORICAL SOCIETY REPRESENTATIVE ON NATIONAL TRUST (WA) COUNCIL Teaching commenced at the University of Western Australia in March 1913. With a professor of history and economics (Edward Shann) among the inaugural academic staff and a strong history department ever since, the university is well placed to document its own major milestones. Fred Alexander covered the first fifty years in his monumental Campus at Crawley (1963). In 1988 Brian de Garis, editor, provided an update with Campus in the Community which recognized the new emphasis on research.

Now, Winthrop Professor Jenny Gregory has edited the present volume to celebrate one hundred years of teaching, research, university life, and community service. Happily, the new book returns to the beginning with many splendid early photographs and previously untold stories. The shocking presumption of the foundation professors who wanted a University Library instead of being content with the State Library is one such.

But the emphasis of Seeking Wisdom is on the second halfcentury. It is wide-ranging with graduates who became test cricketers and Olympic medalists receiving almost as much attention as prime minister Bob Hawke, Nobel laureate Barry Marshall and chief justice Robert French. It begins with a chapter on the beautiful grounds of the Crawley campus then launches into descriptions of the buildings, commencing with the jarrah and galvanized iron temporary buildings in Perth city centre, one of which, beautifully restored, still graces the Crawley campus.

All graduates were invited to submit their memories of student days and these interleave the thoroughly researched formal chapters on governance, equity and diversity, and the international student presence. There are fond memories of ‘Prosh’, the annual student processions through the city, the ancient rivalry of engineering and law students and of college life.

The activities of the Guild of Undergraduates (now the UWA Student Guild), make regular appearances but, oddly, the organised voice of the staff associations are nowhere heard.

Readers might also remember (p. 221) Miss International as Tania Verstak not Versak, and John Gillett (p. 68) was more likely president of Societies Council in 1952 than the Socialist Council.

The motto ‘Seek Wisdom’ was adopted by the UWA Senate in September 1913. The present reviewer, a UWA chemistry student in the 1960s, plundered this as ‘Seeking Wisdom’ for a column he wrote for Pelican, the student newspaper. Professor Gregory has here restored dignity to the phrase and produced a book that all former staff and students can enjoy.

FOR MORE INFORMATION http://uwap.uwa.edu.au/books-andauthors/book/seeking-wisdom/

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George Town connections CHRISTINE LEWIS | COUNCILLOR NATIONAL TRUST (WA)

Helping someone to understand a new idea is best done by taking them from something they know, understand well and find engaging, then gradually moving them towards something new. This truism, for educators, museum curators and heritage place interpreters, emerged during a visit to Malaysia’s World Heritage Listed George Town, Penang.

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ommunicating with visitors about a place is not just a matter of telling them facts, it’s about engaging them on both an emotional and intellectual level.

Scholars specialising in the colonial era would be well aware of the many connections Australia has with South East Asia. These connections are not necessarily well known by the first time visitor to Penang, well not this one anyway.

George Town has some obvious connections between colonial Australia and early Penang, an example being Captain Francis Light (1740–1794) and his son Colonel William Light (1786–1839). Captain Light, on behalf of the East India Company, took possession of Penang in the late eighteenth century. Light

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was the first superintendant of the colony and was instrumental in establishing its tolerant approach to a community of many cultures.

Captain Light’s son, Colonel William Light, is an important figure for South Australians as he founded the township of Adelaide in 1836 as Surveyor General of the free colony.

Another connection between the two places for Australians is Sir Frederick Weld, (1823–1891).

Weld was born and educated in England and became a New Zealand Premier and a governor of various British colonies. He served as Governor of Western Australia, Governor of Tasmania, and Governor of the Straits Settlements. Weld Quay in Penang is named after him and so are a range of places in Western Australia and Tasmania.

Wall mounted interpretation Chuan St Market, George Town, Malaysia. C Lewis.

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In July 2008 the Malaysian cities of Melaka and George Town, both located along the Straits of Malacca, were inscribed as a single ‘cultural property’ on the World Heritage List by UNESCO. They demonstrate outstanding universal values associated with world trade in the East and Southeast Asia dating from the 15th century, multicultural living traditions and architectural styles reflecting many cultural influences.

There are many visitor experiences available in George Town today, but one consists of a series of amusing, informative and engaging wrought iron images of aspects of the outstanding universal values of the core and buffer zones of the World Heritage Area of George Town.

Take the Love Lane image displayed in the Core Zone of George Town. This part of George Town was known during the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as the place where rich traders and settlers would keep mistresses, away from their businesses and families. Thee interpretative signs sprinkled throughout George Town engage visitors on both an emotional and intellectual level with the story of the place, whetting their appetite to know more. A painless and intriguing way to learn about a place and its history.

TOP LEFT Details about Love Lane are delivered in many languages. C Lewis TOP RIGHT George Town landscape, Penang. C Lewis.

LEFT Matters of love on display in Love Lane, Core Zone, George Town. C Lewis BOTTOM RIGHT Chuila Lane, Core Zone, George Town. C Lewis.

BELOW A mix of cultures Stewart Lane, Core Zone, George Town. C Lewis.

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The Royal Exhibition Building A rare survivor

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with interEnCaTURE ti grandure onal

PETER DOWLING | NATIONAL HERITAGE OFFICER AUSTRALIAN COUNCIL OF NATIONAL TRUSTS

On May Day 1851, Queen Victoria formally opened a great fair in a grand, purpose-built glass and iron building in Hyde Park, London. The building, now gone, was known as the Crystal Palace and the great fair, or rather, industrial exhibition, was to mark the true beginning of a series of international events - the Great Exhibition Movement, a phenomenon that spread across all continents and was to last until 1915.

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Royal Exhibition Building remains an imposing structure in Melbourne’s city area.

Royal Exhibition Building set within Carlton Gardens has outstanding universal values as a rare survivor of the international exhibition phenomenon.

BACKGROUND PROV, VPRS 3686/P1, Unit 375, Item EBM 1.59 Reproduced with the permission of the Keeper of Public Records, Public Record Office Victoria, Australia.

RIGHT The

TRUST NEWS AUSTRALIA NOVEMBER 2013

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GLOBAL

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he idea of celebrating local and national manufactured goods and technological achievements had been around for almost a century. Exhibitions were being held throughout Europe, but the London exhibition in 1851 and the construction of the Crystal Palace building to house the exhibitions was a benchmark to which following international exhibitions aspired in espousing a nineteenth century passion for discovery, creation, technology and building. It all led, so it was believed, to better lifestyles and cultural advancements.

In 1880 and 1888 it was Melbourne’s turn to host exhibitions and the Royal Exhibition Building and its surrounding Carlton Gardens were designed to showcase Melbourne and Australia’s achievements to the world. Despite the great impact of the international exhibitions worldwide, few of the grand buildings constructed to house the exhibits remain today. The Crystal Palace burnt down in 1936 but many of the other buildings were designed as temporary constrctions and were dismantled following the exhibitions. The Royal Exhibition Building is one that has surived.

The Exhibition Building, now a well-loved feature in Melbourne’s landscape, was designed by Joseph Reed (1823 -1890) who has left an architectural impact on Melbourne with his work and designs of the Public Library, Town Hall, Wesley Church in Lonsdale Street and the Bank of New South Wales in Collins Street to name a few. The building is constructed of brick, timber, steel and slate and contains style elements from the Byzantine, Romanesque, Lombardic and Italian Renaissance linking it to the grandure expected for an international exhibition.

It boasts many of the important features that made the exhibitions so dramatic and effective. Standing

on busy Nicholson Street the high dome is a real eye-catcher, which rises above a giant entry portal and a fountain. Other entry portals around the structure add to its grandure and the spacious Carlton Gardens surrounding the building give it a kind of breathing space from the surrounding city that would have offered respite to the visitors. It does just that today. Even though it was a building designed for ephemeral exhibitions, it was a building that was meant to last and continue to be part of a city’s culture.

On 9 May 1901, the first federal parliament was opened at the Exhibition Building. The Duke of Cornwall and York, (later King George V), declared the parliament open at a great function attended by over 12,000 people. This important event in Australia’s democracy led to the building and gardens being included on the Australian Government’s National Heritage List in 2004.

The heritage values stated are: The Royal Exhibition Building and Carlton Gardens, the venue for the grand opening of the first Australian Parliament in 1901, has outstanding national historic value for its role in the defining event of Federation. It is the place where the Commonwealth of Australia’s first Parliament was commissioned and sworn in, on 9 May 1901. The Royal Exhibition Building and Carlton Gardens is a tangible symbol of the country’s pride in its technological and cultural achievements in the latter part of the nineteenth century.

Together with the associated gardens the Royal Exhibition Building is the most significant extant nineteenth century exhibition building in Australia.1 Also, in 2004 the Exhibition Building and the Carlton Gardens were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. It was a first for Australia to have a purely cultural site listed as a World Heritage

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place. Previously the other sites on Australia’s World Heritage list had been natural or a combination of natural and cultural places.

The inscription reads: The Royal Exhibition Building and the surrounding Carlton Gardens, as the main extant survivors of a Palace of Industry and its setting, together reflect the global influence of the international exhibition movement of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement showcased technological innovation and change, which helped promote a rapid increase in industrialisation and international trade through the exchange of knowledge and ideas.

The building has added significance in its rarity as the only substantially intact example in the world of a Great Hall from a major international exhibition.

At the end of the nineteenth century a distrust of the great exhibitions and their grandiose buildings began to form in most countries other than the United State. There was no longer a real belief that technological progress brought with it better living conditions. In fact, there was an increasing element of drudgery in most people’s work and an existence of poverty in the midst of plenty. By 1915 the world changing conflicts of the First World War were well advanced making such international exhibitions on such grand scales quite impossible.

The Royal Exhibition Building, set within the Carlton Gardens, has outstanding universal value as a rare surviving manifestation of the international exhibition phenomenon of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and national value as the venue for the first federal parliament of Australia.

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UNESCO World Heritage Committee, 2004, Justification for Inscription, Royal Exhibition Building and Carlton Gardens, http://whc. unesco.org/en/list/1131, accessed 2 September 2013.

TRUST NEWS AUSTRALIA NOVEMBER 2013

N AT I O N A L T RU S T WAY

Holiday Tours

Since 1978 the National Trust Tours Committee has organised Australian and overseas tours to meet the interests of our members. Tours are carefully planned, researched and personally led by one of the voluntary members of the Committee, with detailed background notes provided. Numbers are strictly limited and one of the rewarding bonuses has been the number of friendships made and maintained among people who travel with a common interest.

NORTHERN ITALY: LAKES, MOUNTAINS & THE RIVIERA 15 - 27 September, 2014 The 2013 tour is fully booked so a repeat is planned for September 2014, tailor-made for National Trust members in conjunction with Ugo and Barbara Mariotti, who have been conducting enjoyable Trust tours in Italy over the past 10 years.

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Unpack only twice as we stay in centrally located hotels first in Como, set in an idyllic landscape of mountains on the lake of the same name, then in the resort of Santa Margherita Ligure in the heart of the Italian Riviera. Visit the spectacular gardens of Villa Carlotta and Villa Melzi, Bellagio, the Swiss town of Lugano and the gloriously decorated Certosa di Pavia. Leisurely daily excursions on the Riviera include Portofino, the famous villages of the ‘Cinque Terre’ coastline and the heritage listed small port of Porto Venere. A day tour to Lucca, one of the most beautiful towns in northern Tuscany, is also included.

fun way to get around: Norfolk Island

NORFOLK ISLAND March 31 - April 7, 2014 Due to the success of the National Trust Tour to Norfolk Island this year we have planned another tour in 2014.

The island is rich in history and is breathtakingly beautiful, with warm and friendly islanders. Staying at the Governors Lodge Resort you will visit the beautiful Georgian buildings of Kingston, an important heritage site. They were built by the convicts of the Second Settlement and are being lovingly restored. You will attend a Mutiny on the Bounty Show, a dramatic production involving scores of islanders, many of whom are direct descendants of Fletcher Christian and Matthew Quintal. There is so much to see and do on this picturesque island, including dining on fresh fish and traditional food.

avid Smith, Expressions of interest: D Travelscene on Capri P: 1800 679 066 License No: TA1091 Leader: Loma Priddle T: 02 9412 2875 BELOW Fall

in love with the villages of Lake Como.

Expressions of interest: D avid Smith, Travelscene on Capri P: 1800 679 066 License No: TA1091 Leader: Lorraine Collins T: 0439 947 479

SOUTH WEST OF ENGLAND TOUR June 20 - July 5, 2014 This exciting new tour to Somerset, Devon and Cornwall is tailor-made for National Trust members. The itinerary includes wonderful gardens, National Trust properties, seaside and moorland villages, medieval market towns and historic sites. Highlights include Salisbury, Montacute House, Valley of the Rocks, Tarr Steps, the steam train to Minehead, Penzance, Glendurgan Gardens, Chysauster Ancient Village, the Lost Gardens of Heligan, Merrivale Bronze Village, Otterton Mill and the Seaton Tramway. Travel in a small group at a relaxed pace spending multiple nights in distinguished, historic accommodation. Early bookings are highly recommended.

Expressions of interest: David Smith, Travelscene on Capri P: 1800 679 066 License No: TA1091 Leader: Loma Priddle T: 02 9412 2875 LEFT The

TRUST NEWS AUSTRALIA NOVEMBER 2013

16th century Montacute House, Yeovil, Somerset

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N AT I O N A L T RU S T WAY

ABOVE Historic

Holiday Tours

Williamsburg, Virginia

SOUTHERN STATES OF THE USA September 21 - October 2 2014 Following the success of the National Trust Tour to New England (USA) in October 2012, a tour of the Southern States is planned for 2014.

A visit to cities in Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia transports you to yesteryear’s days of gracious living.

From historic sites in Georgia, travel to antebellum sites in South Carolina and colonial Virginia. Relish the gracious elegance of southern living in the rarefied world of plantations, 19th century mansions, magnolia gardens and enormous live oaks hung with Spanish moss.

Boutique Garden Cruises & Tours 2014 Private Small Ship botanical cruises for people who share a love of gardens

Visit Savannah’s beautiful historic district including its lovely squares, River Street and City Market. See Charleston’s ‘Museum Mile’ which features the richest concentration of cultural sites open to visitors. See Colonial Williamsburg which has been restored to its 18th century glory and inhabited by interpreters living its 18th century lifestyle. There is much to discover about the colonial times today. Monticello was the family home of Thomas Jefferson, the Founding Father responsible for the Declaration of Independence and the third President of the United States. A tour of this antebellum house, considered the finest example of this period, and the historic gardens and plantations is included in the tour.

Loire Valley, Seine River & Chelsea Flower Show Departing 11 May 2014 16 Days including a 7 night cruise aboard the luxurious MS AmALegro river ship on the Seine River. Hosted by Botanica’s founder & co-owner, Judy Vanrenen, you will explore the incredible Loire Valley before discovering the beautiful gardens and landscapes along the romantic Seine River.

4 London England

BTLV5 & BTDSC12C

Rouen Les Andelys Giverny (Monet’s Garden) Vernon 7 MS AMALEGRO Conflans Malmaison Paris France

Honfleur Normand mandy Bayeaux

avid Smith, Expressions of interest: D Travelscene on Capri P: 1800 679 066 License No: TA1091 Leader: Lorraine Collins T: 0439 947 479

Meet Monty Don. Enjoy a hosted cocktail party and lecture by Monty Don.

Loire Valley

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Call Botanica on 1300 305 202 for your free brochure Visit www.botanica.travel

Australian Pacific Touring Pty Ltd ABNCoach 44 004 684 619 Lic. No. 30112 MKT12305 4

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TRUST NEWS AUSTRALIA NOVEMBER 2013