Trust News February 2014

TRUSTV

OL

UM

E 8

N

O 1

FE

BR

UA

RY

20

14

NATIONAL TRUST

AUSTRALIAN JOURNEYS EBENEZER MISSION A CAPTIVATING CLIPPER THE FEILMAN LEGACY

5 10 12 20I N S I D E >

news Australia

In canoes and caravans,

on surfboards and in subways,

by stars and satellites,we have journeyed across this

wide brown land.

Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the Heritage Festival 2014. www.nationaltrustfestival.org.au

� e 2014 Festival is coming!

Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the

2014

HERITAGEFESTIVAL

APRIL – MAY Journeys

NTHF_Festival.indd 2 19/12/13 3:56 PM

In canoes and caravans,

on surfboards and in subways,

by stars and satellites,we have journeyed across this

wide brown land.

Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the Heritage Festival 2014. www.nationaltrustfestival.org.au

� e 2014 Festival is coming!

Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the

2014

HERITAGEFESTIVAL

APRIL – MAY Journeys

NTHF_Festival.indd 2 19/12/13 3:56 PM

3 TRUST NEWS AUSTRALIA FEBRUARY 2014

FEBRUARY – MARCH 2014

Greetings

Arrivals, departures, some thrilling voyages and journeys feature in the first edition for Trust News Australia for 2014.

Celebrate this year’s Heritage Festival with events and experiences.

The world’s oldest clipper City of Adelaide heads downunder in spectacular style, while reconciliation is realised as custodianship of Ebenezer Mission is returned to its traditional owners in Victoria.

Reuse and restoration provide some inspiring sustainable outcomes on both sides of the country and we remember Dr Margaret Feilman OBE, a force in heritage conservation and founding member of the National Trust movement in Western Australia.

Enjoy and a great year to you and yours,

Gina Pickering | Editor

ISSN: 1835-2316

Vol 8 No 1 2014

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 Environment.

National Trust of Australia (WA)ABN 83 697 381 616

PO Box 1162West Perth WA 6872

T: 08 9321 6088 F: 08 9324 1571W:www.ntwa.com.au

Editor: Gina [email protected]

T: 08 9321 6088

Advertising: For advertising rates, contact the Editor.

Design: Dessein Graphics

Cover: Dr Margaret Feilman National Trust of Australia (WA) founding member.22 June 1921 – 24 September 2013

© The West Australian

Next Issue: May 2014

Copy deadline:10 March 2014

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 Environment. The articles in

this magazine are subject to copyright. No article may be used without the consent

of the National Trust and the author.

my WO R D with editor Gina Pickering

Inside

4 A new Australian Heritage Strategy

5 2014 Heritage Festival - Journeys

10 Ebenezer Mission, Antwerp - The Return

11 2013 National History Challenge

12 Clipper Comes Home

14 Embodied energy at 57 Murray Street

16 Rare portraits return to Runnymede

17 Mansion makeover a sustainable winner

18 Open House Opens Doors

20 Vale Dr Margaret Feilman

22 Old Government House and its dormer windows

23 The Australian War Memorial – its inception and role

26 Worship on the move

27 Sculpture in the paddock

28 FAR FROM HOME: Adventures, Treks, Exiles, Migration

30 Rosy legacy at Saumarez Homestead

31 Those flying machines Aviation Centenaries in 2014

28

12

14

5

17

10

To find out more about Australian Heritage Week or to register your event, please visit www.heritage-week.govspace.gov.au This year Australian Heritage Week will run from Saturday 12 April to Sunday 20 April. Every town, city and community has something to celebrate. Events can include heritage walks, concerts in the park, community fairs and festivals, tours of historic buildings and places, and hands-on activities for children. Australian Heritage Week 2013 saw over 300 different activities held across Australia.

ABOVE Port Arthur Penitentiary. D Markovic

4TRUST NEWS AUSTRALIA FEBRUARY 2014

A new Australian Heritage StrategyGREG HUNT MP | MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT

The Coalition Government places a high value on our national heritage and we are working hard

to instil a new sense of pride and direction for the heritage sector.

Central to this commitment is the completion of a new

Australian Heritage Strategy.The Government has moved

quickly to prioritise the completion of the Heritage Strategy to ensure our extraordinary heritage is recognised and protected for future generations.

Heritage practitioners and experts across Australia have come forward with their ideas and suggestions for the strategy.

Their input, and that of others, will help inform the creation of a draft strategy, which we aim to make available for public comment during Heritage Week in April.

The strategy will provide a common framework and priorities for Australia’s heritage and will examine the Commonwealth’s role in heritage, opportunities to form partnerships and community engagement on heritage.

Heritage is central to the Government’s Plan for a Cleaner Environment and is a fundamental pillar of the Government’s vision for Australia based on Clean Air, Clean Water, Clean Land and Heritage Protection.

Our magnificent Indigenous, natural, early European and

contemporary heritage has helped shape our nation and enhances our sense of self. Our heritage is also a major contributor to Australia’s attraction as a tourist destination.

Other new measures to boost Australia’s heritage include an additional $1.4 million over three years for small scale community heritage projects for the conservation, protection and interpretation of local heritage.

Grants of up to $10,000 will be available to local heritage groups and historical societies, commencing in the 2014–15 financial year. This is in addition to the existing $4.4 million of funding for heritage projects nationally.

In line with our election commitment, we will also invest $1.5 million on vital restoration work at Port Arthur’s World Heritage-listed penitentiary building, one of Australia’s most significant heritage icons.

And the Government’s Green Army will play a key role in the protection of our heritage.

The Green Army is best known as an environmental project but it will also have a strong heritage focus.

Where it’s safe and appropriate for young people to work on the restoration of heritage buildings or heritage places, there is the potential for a Green Army project.

Trainees could be employed recreating a heritage garden, refurbishing a heritage building or establishing a heritage attraction. The aim is to conserve and enhance our heritage while building important heritage skills.

The Government will also provide extra financial support to the Federation of Australian Historical Societies to help its important work in supporting community heritage and historical groups.

And a further boost will be provided to the Australian Heritage Council to help it tackle the backlog of National Heritage List assessments that have built up over recent years.

This suite of measures will elevate the status of heritage across Australia and ensure that what is best from our history and culture is properly preserved, promoted and celebrated.

INFORMATION ABOUT THE HERITAGE

STRATEGY IS AVAILABLE AT www.environment.gov.au/topics/heritage/australian-heritage-strategy

PE R S PE C T I V E S

http://heritage-week.govspace.gov.au/

http://www.environment.gov.au/topics/heritage/australian-heritage-strategy

http://www.environment.gov.au/topics/heritage/australian-heritage-strategy


J O U R N E Y S

ALEXANDRA HILL | HERITAGE FESTIVAL NATIONAL COORDINATOR

Pack your suitcase, fill your rucksack and shove a jumbuck in your tuckerbag because you’re coming on a

journey! Join the National Trust in celebrating Australian journeys with the 2014 National Trust Heritage

Festival. With 1,500 fantastic events across Australia over April and May,

this is the greatest celebration of our unique stories as a nation of travelers.

Check the website at www.nationaltrustfestival.org.au

for the latest events and to find out what’s happening across the country but,

before you do that, here’s a tempting sample of what’s in store.

ACT 5 April – 21 April

Although our capital territory tells so many stories through its fabulous national collections and institutions, it also has some of our most interesting personal tales.

The National Trust (ACT) will be holding an Open Day to help celebrate the Centenary of the Yarralumla Nursery Centenary and its vital role developing Canberra’s unique character and identity as a garden city. This heritage-listed nursery was part of a larger nursery and arboretum comprising Weston Park and Westbourne Woods. For many Canberrans, their first contact was through the Free Plant Issue Scheme, which began in 1930. This had the effect of controlling the species planted, resulting in a unified plant palette in the city and preserving the ‘Garden City’ concept. There will be special tours through the nursery and displays, activities and refreshment in the park adjoining the nursery.

Other activities planned include walking tours and house inspections in some of Canberra’s oldest suburbs such as Ainslie, Narrabundah and Oaks Estate. There will be a guided tour of the ANU Classics Museum. Established in 1962, the ANU Classics Museum is one of Canberra’s cultural gems. The collection spans the Mediterranean and beyond. The objects are beautifully displayed since the Museum’s refurbishment. For the more energetic, there will be guided walks to the Yankee Hat Indigenous rock art site in Namadgi National Park.


J O U R N E Y S

NSW 12 April – 26 May

Our fantastic Heritage Festival celebrates 34 years as one of the longest running community festivals in NSW. The festival includes Heritage Week, ICOMOS world heritage day as well as Sorry Day, the 20th National Trust Heritage Awards and National Trust Day celebrations.

Talking of travelling, check out vehicles at the annual vintage machinery and miniature railway rally near Quirindi, as well as tramways and First Fleet Ships, steam trains and for the first year we are featuring the heritage car clubs events.

The First and Second Fleet Memorial Gardens are remembering the first arrivals from England to Australia. Hear about some fascinating stories told by a direct descendant of a first fleeter and try to imagine what it must have been like to travel in those days. Throughout the festival at Wallabadah Keith Vincent Smith discusses Bungaree’s life, his circumnavigation of Australia with Matthew Flinders and other voyages. Also experience the exhibition Gamaragal: Aboriginal People of Manly and Northern Sydney which captures the world of the Indigenous fisher-hunter people of the Manly (Kayeemy) area through vivid portraits, paintings and rarely seen artefacts, from the skeleton of ‘Narrabeen Man’, ritually speared some 3700 years ago, to Mickey of Ulladulla’s planned corroboree at Clontarf for the Prince of Wales in 1868. It also includes the abductions of Arabanoo, Bennelong and Colebee and the spearing of Governor Phillip. 13 April, Manly.

58 French Canadians were exiled to New South Wales for their part in the uprisings in Lower Canada (Quebec). They were imprisoned at Longbottom Stockade, now the site of Concord Oval. Their presence along the Parramatta River is recalled by the names of Exile Bay, France Bay and Canada Bay. 24 April, Concord.

The National Trust Heritage Awards is the signature event for the National Trust Heritage Festival. In 2014 the Heritage Awards will celebrate its twentieth year recognising industry excellence. The luncheon will be held at the heritage listed Doltone House. 7 May, Jones Bay.

NT 11 April – 27 April

We are looking forward to another exciting Heritage Festival in the Territory this year. With so many death defying journeys and fascinating stories, it will be hard to not attend something in Alice Springs, Darwin and Katherine. Be enthralled from 11-17 April by the fearless adventurers who found themselves in Alice Springs. And it’s not just the journey of Japanese bombers that will be told in Darwin from 18-27 April, whilst a huge heritage weekend awaits on the 19-20 April in Katherine. Come up and join the festival as it stops in our frontier North.


J O U R N E Y S

QLD 18 April – 18 May

We’re looking forward to exciting events in Queensland from Cooktown in the north to Currumbin in the south.

Cooktown has been the focal point for many journeys, from Cook’s landing in 1770 to modern tourists seeking the unique charms this small town has to offer. Visit the James Cook Museum during the Heritage Festival and learn about the remarkable journeys that have contributed to the history of the region. Follow the stories of the thousands of miners who poured into the region in the 1870s in search of gold, learn about the melting pot of cultures this produced when the goldfields boasted the largest Chinese population in the colony and unlock the secret journeys many of the objects have taken from treasured personal possessions to museum display.

Bellevue Homestead, dating back to the 1870s, is a living reminder of the early days of Queensland settlement when large sheep and cattle properties dominated the pastoral scene in the Brisbane Valley. On Sundays during the Festival, Bellevue will offer informative tours focused on journeys taken – the routes of the explorers of the Brisbane River, the first settlers, the stock route and the original highway and the railway to and from Wivenhoe and Bellevue Stations, all illustrated by maps.

Abbey of the Roses at Warwick on the Darling Downs will offer morning teas to everyone and accommodation deals for National Trust members during the Heritage Festival. Dating back to 1891, this grand building was built for the Sisters of Mercy as a convent. The historic, three storey sandstone ‘grand old lady’ is a must see for visitors to the area. The Abbey still retains original stained glass windows, pressed metal ceilings in some rooms, high vaulted wooden ceilings in others, a chapel and two acres of gardens. Contact the Abbey website for prices, dates and check-in details.

Brisbane’s Living Heritage Network (BLHN) will offer tours that explore the Brisbane region’s culture, heritage and past, exploring the theme of ‘Journeys’ to Brisbane. BLHN and the National Trust of Queensland will present a seminar session as part of the Festival program. Heritage, history and museum professionals, students, volunteers are invited to attend, as well as those who are interested in learning more about heritage and museum management.

SA 18 April – 31 May

The National Trust of South Australia will host an exciting array of activities during the Heritage Festival, with forty six branches spreading as far away as Ceduna to Mt Gambier.

Events include horse drawn carriages to maritime stories, dry land farming to magnificent gardens, mining heritage to conservation parks, police stations and courtrooms to barbed wire collections, Sir Henry Ayers to Mary MacKillop.

One of the most popular events scheduled for the 2014 Australian Heritage Week in Adelaide will be a Heritage Debate at the Historic Rymill House. The National Trust supported event boasts a mix of ex-politicians, comedians, and creative, larger than life speakers promising a robust debate around the topic Does Heritage Really Matter? 5 April, Adelaide.


TAS 1 May – 31 May

The Tasmanian Heritage Festival again amazes. With a strong journeying thread running through all Tasmanian tales, it will be well worth a journey of your own to visit during May.

Bernard Lloyd wrote and directed The Tin Man short film based on the discovery of tin at Mt Bischoff near Waratah. Come to a rare screening at the Athenaeum Hall, home to the Mud, Mining & Mirt collection of John Robinson photographs. Friday 30 May, Waratah

Voyages of the Female Convict Ships is a day-long public seminar showcasing the research of the volunteer community group, the Female Convicts Research Centre. Presenters will discuss individual voyages and, more generally, the experiences of women and children who sailed on these ships to Van Diemen’s Land. Saturday 10 May, New Town.

Stitched and layered works will showcase original and diverse interpretations of contemporary textile art from Australia’s leading and emerging quilt artists during Australia Wide Three. Ozquilt Network is Australia’s National organisation of art quilters, founded in 1998 to promote contemporary quilt making in Australia. A professional selected exhibition of members’ work, Australia Wide Three will excite viewers with the infinite possibilities of “the quilt” in art. Throughout May, Burnie.

J O U R N E Y S

VIC 18 April – 18 May

By bicycle, bus, boat and by foot, this year the National Trust Victoria is going on Tour! We are looking forward to a fantastic four weeks of events, tours and activities celebrating the Journeys that are representative of all Victorians. Jump on Board!

Heide: Yingabeal to Birrarung. Travel a songline route from the Aboriginal scar tree at Heide to the Yarra River with Uncle Bill Nicholson, Wurundjeri elder, Dr Jim Poulter, author and historian, and Dugald Noyes, Heide head gardener. Learn about the making of a canoe and travel a songline route from Yingabeal to the recently restored indigenous remnant conservation zone listening to stories of the Wurundjeri. 8 May, Templestowe

Dr Fred Cahir recounts true stories of Journeys with Aboriginal Guides during the Victorian gold rush during Are We There Yet? At a time when vast areas of Victoria remained trackless and travellers found it difficult to trace out a comparatively frequented road, let alone take on the dangerous task of setting out on a new path, Aboriginal guides often came to their rescue. Fred Cahir’s illustrated presentation sets out to reveal the role and significance of Aboriginal guides and their journeys showing new goldfields, rescuing, providing food, liaising, warning, trading and naming features in the landscape. 4 May, Chewton.

Join the Port of Echuca to celebrate the unique history of the Paddle-steamer Capital of Australia at the Port of Echuca Heritage Weekend. The heyday of paddle steamers and river trade has left a historic legacy to Echuca – enjoy a long weekend of festivities

including the Port of Echuca’s museum, historic buildings, equipment displays, demonstrations, and of course cruises on authentic paddle steamers! 18 – 22 April, Echuca


J O U R N E Y S

WA 18 April – 18 May

From foreign wars to gold exploration and bride ships, the Western Australian Heritage Festival again dazzles with the breadth and idiosyncrasy of its events!

Hannans North is partnering with the Eastern Goldfields Historical Society and Tjuma Pulka Radio to create the Hannans North Goldrush Festival which will include gold panning, dry blowing and metal detecting demonstrations and lessons, a goldrush photographic exhibition, an ochre mining and painting exhibition. Be part of an oral history project, capturing the stories of local peoples’ experiences of mining, from bush lore and prospecting to working the Golden Mile. The project will run in Kalgoorlie for the whole month of the Heritage Festival and there will be recording stations at Hannans North and Tjuma Pulka radio.

The Australian War Memorial’s latest travelling exhibition, Nurses: from Zululand to Afghanistan, explores the involvement of nurses from the first known Australian in the Zulu War of 1879, to the experiences of the male and female nurses serving in recent conflicts and peacekeeping operations. Using the Memorial’s rich collection, the exhibition will highlight the personal stories of army, air force and navy nurses who have served overseas, the difficulties and challenges they faced, and their

determination to care for the sick and wounded come what may. Throughout April, Wanneroo

Bride ships in all but name: Miss Monk and the servant girls. Come and learn about the ships that brought several thousand young women out to Western Australia from the 1850s to the early 1900s and why they became known as bride ships. State Library of Western Australia. 23 April, Perth.

A LIGHT IN THE WINDOW, HARPER’S MANSION BERRIMA – THE PLACE AND ITS PEOPLE

AUTHOR: ANN BEAUMONT

PUBLISHER: NATIONAL TRUST OF AUSTRALIA (NSW)

REVIEWER: ANGELA LE SUEUR

When the National Trust (NSW) acquired

Harper’s Mansion, Berrima, in 1978 the

house needed extensive restoration, and the true story of its

origin had been lost.

In a recent Trust publication, A Light in the Window, Harper’s

Mansion Berrima – the Place and its People, historian Ann

Beaumont sets the record straight and debunks earlier histories

that claim the house was built by the surveyor William Harper.

Harper and fellow surveyor Henry Dangar were working in the

Sutton Forest district in the early 1820s but Harper retired from

the Surveyor-General’s Department in 1826 through ill health. By

1831, when Berrima was created, he was blind, partially paralysed

and living at his home in the Hunter Valley where he died in 1836.

Throughout the twentieth century the story of William

Harper and Harper’s Mansion became ‘fact’ and was published

in several histories and in many newspaper articles. In the 1980s

research by local historians discovered the house had actually

been built by James Harper, the son of convicts William Harper

and Margaret Morgan. The couple married at Parramatta in 1803

and their only child, James, was born there in in 1805. He was

educated at Parramatta and could read and write.

Ms Beaumont has built on these earlier findings and has

written a lively narrative that brings to life the story of James

Harper and his convict wife Mary Robinson, and the people

associated with Harper’s Mansion for 180 years.

James Harper bought his first parcel of land in Berrima 1832

on which he built the Surveyor-General Inn in 1834, becoming

the licensee in 1835. In 1834 he purchased the 100 acres on which

he built what is now Harper’s Mansion which was most likely

constructed in 1835-36.

The Catholic Church leased the house from 1847 for use as

a presbytery. Beaumont has researched the sixteen priests, two

archbishops and a cardinal who stayed in the house over the

years. The church sold the property in 1970.

When the Trust rescued it, and the remaining

two acres in 1978, it was in poor condition but

structurally sound. It was restored over a seven

year period and opened to the public in 1985.

Today the house, the heritage style garden

and maze are open at weekends, most public

holidays and by appointment.

TO BUY A COPY OF A Light in the Window visit www.harpersmansion.com.au Proceeds will help fund an archalelogical dig of the 1830s kitchen.

RIGHT Harper’s Mansion today showing its famous maze. NTNSWTOP The first Bishop of Goulburn, William Lanigan, was parish priest at Berrima and lived in the presbytery from 1861-1867. NTNSW

Between the lines

http://www.harpersmansion.com.au


TOP TO BOTTOM Ebenezer Mission Church. M Gellert. Jandamarra Lauricella (right) and friends. M Gellert. Janine Coombs, Chair of Barengi Gadjin Land Council, and Jennifer Beer with the title deed for Ebenezer Mission. M Gellert. (L-R) Edna Watson with The Hon Hugh Delahunty MP and Janine Coombs at the handover ceremony. M Gellert. (L-R) Martin Purslow CEO National Trust (Vic), The Hon Jeanette Powell MP, Janine Coombs, Dr Graeme L Blackman OAM, Chair National Trust (Vic) and The Hon Hugh Delahunty MP plant a commemorative tree to mark the event. M Gellert. (L-R ) The Hon Hugh Delahunty MP and Martin Purslow (back) with The Hon Jeanette Powell MP, Dr Graeme L Blackman OAM and Janine Coombs (front) witnessing the transfer of title.

C ATA LY S T

Ebenezer Mission, Antwerp - The Return

PAUL ROSER | SENIOR MANAGER ADVOCACY & CONSERVATION AND

ALEXANDRA HILL | PROJECT MANAGER TRUST DEVELOPMENT NATIONAL TRUST (VIC)

For the first time in its history the National Trust in Victoria has handed

back one of its places to the Traditional Owners.

After 45 years of custodianship the Trust has passed over the

remaining interest in the Ebenezer Mission Station to the Traditional Owners, the Barengi Gadjin Land Council Aboriginal Corporation.

The handover by Trust Chairman Dr Graeme L Blackman OAM to Barengi Gadjin Chair Janine Coombs was performed in the presence of The Hon Jeanette Powell MP, Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, and The Hon Hugh Delahunty MP, local Member for Lowan. Elders Kevin Coombs OAM, Jennifer Beer, Gloria Clarke, Joanne Harrison and Brendan Marks, representing their families, welcomed state government and National Trust representatives and community members to their country.

Traditional dancing, a smoking ceremony and a tree planting were all part of the celebratory events. The Ebenezer Mission Station, situated by the Wimmera River 360km north-west of Melbourne, was established in 1859 by Moravian missionaries as the Lake Hindmarsh Aboriginal Reserve. At its peak more than a hundred people lived and worked in more than 20 buildings at the Mission, which operated to convert Aboriginal people to Christianity and to provide education in the

setting of a self-sustainable and utopian rural community.

The Mission closed in 1900 and part of the site containing the 1870s church and cemetery (including hundreds of unmarked burials and just a dozen marked graves) was returned to the Lands Department in 1904. Other Mission land containing buildings became freehold property and was used for farming and most of the buildings were demolished.

The National Trust’s involvement with Ebenezer Mission began in 1961 when a letter was received from the Horsham District Historical Society expressing concern for the future of the ruinous surviving Mission buildings. National Trust then President, Rodney Davidson, first inspected the site in 1966 with the Trust’s honorary architect John Murphy and Councillors and staff from the Shire of Dimboola. The church and cemetery was at that stage managed by a local committee of management. Subsequently the neighbouring landowner Mr Bond agreed to transfer part of his land (containing other surviving Mission buildings) to the Trust so that by 1971 the Trust was managing the entire site. The site was fenced, was provided power and a sealed access road, the church was restored including a new roof and landscape


ABOVE Sophie Ambler receiving the National History Challenge Award from National Trusts Australia CEO John Metcalfe. NTA

planting was undertaken. Funds were partly raised from the auction of the contents of Dame Mabel Brookes’ home.

In the mid-1970s the condition of the gravestones was noted as being in a bad state of repair but no action was taken. As part of the hand-over the Trust has restored the cemetery graves at Ebenezer. Stonemason James McCaulay spent two weeks working to a conservation management plan.

Some of the headstones and monuments required only a gentle cleaning and reinstatement of missing lead lettering. Others were more significantly damaged, and have been restored sympathetically and to a high standard with additional technical advice from Heritage Victoria.

The National Trust managed the entire site until 1991, when the church was handed over to the Goolum Goolum Aboriginal Co-operative to manage. Trust management of the remaining (freehold) section continued until the handover on 5 December 2013.

In 2011 the National Trust launched the Wimmera and Region Branch and started a significant relationship with the Barengi Gadjin Land Council Aboriginal Corporation. The development of a Memorandum of Understanding, the Trust’s first in Victoria with an Aboriginal group, helped trigger a formal commitment to reconciliation and eventual adoption of a Reconciliation Action Plan by the Board.

The Barengi Gadjin Land Council Aboriginal Corporation is the Traditional Owner, Registered Aboriginal Party and Native Title holder of the area. The Cameron, Coombs, Harrison, Kennedy, Marks, Pepper and Robinson descendent families have a strong connection to the site which was inhabited by their ancestors, during and prior to the Mission when the site was an important meeting place.

The families connected by the Mission also include descendents of the Moravian Revd. Paul Bogisch, who is buried at Ebenezer together with his wife Amalie.

C ATA LY S T

2013 National

History ChallengeDR PETER DOWLING | NATIONAL HERITAGE

OFFICER, NATIONAL TRUST OF AUSTRALIA

The National History Challenge is an annual contest

that encourages school students to use research and

inquiry based learning to discover more about the

past. The National Trusts of Australia have been a

sponsor for this contest for several years.

In the Challenge the students are the historians. They can investigate their community, explore their own and

their family’s past and explore ideas throughout history. The Challenge encourages inquiry-based learning, the use of primary and secondary sources and offers a variety of presentation styles that can cater to individual learning styles. It rewards students with generous cash prizes, certificates and travel opportunities.

As a sponsor for the national entrants the National Trusts of Australia have a particular theme for the Challenge, Australia’s Heritage. Students are asked to research an event, person, or theme, which relates to the development of Australian heritage.

This year’s winner was Sophie Ambler from Clarence High School, Tasmania. Sophie produced a documentary, The Legend Behind the Man in the Square. The man in the square is a statue of John Franklin, explorer and Lieutenant Governor of Tasmania. The legend that Sophie so eloquently presented was how his wife, Jane Franklin, manipulated and defended his reputation after his death. Single handedly Jane Franklin had turned her husband from a failure into a noble hero.

In awarding her prize the judges wrote:This was an outstanding entry in that primary and

secondary sources were carefully woven with historical analysis and careful exploration and decision about the theme of legend that was applied to both Jane and John Franklin by the student.

We congratulate Sophie for her determined work and her achievement in being a national winner in the Challenge.


1. City of Adelaide at Irvine, Scotland 2009. B MacDonald2. Preparations for her 24th voyage to Port Adelaide. P Roberts3. On a Dutch barge awaiting transportation to Rotterdam. P Roberts

Clipper Comes HomeCRAIG WHYTE | MEMBER NATIONAL TRUST (SA)

The world’s oldest clipper is coming home to Adelaide after an absence of 136 years. Between 1864 and

1886 the City of Adelaide made twenty-three voyages from England to South Australia. Her twenty-fourth

will be her last, the final voyage of one of the world’s few remaining 19th century migrant ships.

C O N N E C T I O N S

FINAL SAIL

back to Australia

1

32


4. Leaving Irvine Harbour. P Roberts5. The voyage begin. Cees de Borst6. Painting of City of Adelaide by John Alcott 1938. All images supplied by CSCOAL


Built in1864 in Sunderland, England, and named for her role, the City of Adelaide began transporting settlers to the colony

just 28 years after its formal establishment. At least 889 immigrants sailed on her and it is estimated that more than a quarter of a million Australians are descended from her passengers. She made more voyages on the route than any other vessel and remains a potent ‘living’ emblem of early South Australian migration.

Since she last sailed to Australia, the City has experienced fluctuating fortunes. Stints shipping coal from Tyneside to Dover and carrying North American timber to Britain (she is the last survivor of that trade) preceded a spell as a hospital ship. In 1923 she was purchased by the British Admiralty, renamed Carrick and

sent to the Clyde where she remained as a training ship and, ultimately, Naval Reserves club, for nearly 70 years.

By the early 1990s the City was the last 19th century sailing ship still capable of floating, but the challenges of maintaining her were mounting. She was moved to Irvine, North Ayrshire, where preservation work at the Scottish Maritime Museum gave her a fighting chance. However, in 2000, the lack of long-term funding or a permanent home finally forced the Museum to apply for removal of her ‘A’ class heritage listing to permit demolition.

So began the fight for her survival. Groups from South Australia and Sunderland attended a 2001 conference convened by the Duke of Edinburgh, and rival bids developed over the following years. In August 2010, Fiona Hyslop, Scottish Minister for cultural affairs, announced that the clipper would not be dismantled, and that South Australia’s Clipper Ship ‘City of Adelaide’ Ltd (CSCOAL) was the preferred bidder.

At the time of writing, the City of Adelaide’s voyage was underway. She is riding piggyback on a German freighter bound for Port Adelaide.

The success of the South Australian bid is the culmination of an extraordinary community effort, with devoted individuals and donor companies combining to convince decision-makers that she has a thriving future in the interpretation of the migration that helped build modern Australia.

*Clipper Ship ‘City of Adelaide’ Ltd

4

6

5


TOP 57 Murray Street. G BickfordBELOW Elaborate ventilation is a feature of 57 Murray Street. G BickfordLEFT TO RIGHT INSERTS Original fixtures support understanding of the building. Finessing the Hillson Beasley design staircase. G Bickford

Embodied energy at 57 Murray Street GINA PICKERING | EDITOR

Embodied energy is a measure of sustainability associated with heritage reuse.

Architects are comfortable using the term as they assess and complete often complex projects.

Embodied energy also brings with it a deep human resonance that lingers in the daily presence

in a place over time. Additional values are embedded through both intention and duration

of all who work on the project.

I N N OVAT I O N


TOP LEFT Caroline Stokes, Heritage Architect with the National Trust of Australia (WA). G BickfordCENTRE LEFT Ceiling detail. G BickfordRIGHT Entry of 57 Murray Street. G Bickford

I N N OVAT I O N

57 Murray Street’s Donnybrook stone facade glows with new warmth in Perth’s evening light.

The place has historic significance as it represents the administration of the Western Australian state government from 1912 to the 1990s, particularly through long connections with the Public Health and Medical Department and Department of Aborigines and Fisheries.

One of the National Trust of Australia (WA)’s largest

heritage conservation commitments came to a close

with delicate and final finessing. National Trust of

Australia (WA) Heritage Architect Caroline Stokes has

been at the helm of the $4.7million project for the past

year. She says the latest restoration work at Murray has

let the building sing.

“Along the way we have asked ourselves what can be

achieved. There is room to be creative and innovative

while the detail of the work unfolds,” Ms Stokes said.

The Hillson Beasley design includes an impressive

and significant staircase which is foundational to the

aesthetic of the building and a focal point of the restorative

expertise. It’s a showcase in more ways than one.

Ms Stokes said one of the most

exciting elements of the project

has been the depth of expertise

the heritage professions have

brought to it.

As the works neared

completion, French polishers

revealed rich jarrah and cedar

highlights. The old timber brought new experience to

apprentices and old hands. Conservation specialists

Master painters Van Diddens and John Rose furniture

restorer worked together to enhance the stunning

central access for another generation.

57 Murray Street has delivered surprises for its

heritage architect and her team along the way.

“Discovering the spectacular ceilings and revealing

original intact detail has been one of the highlights.

Good ventilation was an essential element of the

building’s design and reflects a priority of health at the

time of construction. In 2014, these details are a vital

component in understanding 57 Murray Street,” Ms

Stokes said.

While the tangible work reaches its conclusion, the

intangible work connected to 57 Murray Street is taking

shape. Dr Criena Fitzgerald has been commissioned

to undertake a series of oral histories, with former

Public Health Department employees. The work is

funded through a Your Community Heritage Grant

(Commonwealth Department of Environment). While

much can be learnt from the official records, memories

from those who once worked in the building provide

evocative and often intimate information about the day

to day happenings of the place.

57 Murray Street is significant for many reasons

including its association with health theory, Western

Australia’s attempt to control disease and the systematic

oppression of Aboriginal people by successive State

government ministers, departments and individuals,

most notably AO Neville.A number of fixtures have been left in situ as part

of the interpretation of 57 Murray Street. These include an old fire fighting hose reel and one of the many hand basins that sprinkled the laboratories and verandas of the building. Quotes from oral histories and other testimonies placed beside these fixtures can bring them to life and create a tiny window into another world.

One of the challenges and responsibilities of any heritage project is managing the budget. In this case it is substantial and includes a loan from the WA State Government that the National Trust is required to repay as part of an agreement.

57 Murray Street embodies a new found energy in 2014. The National Trust of Australia (WA) is in the process of reviewing those who have responded to the public expressions of interest for leasing the place. It is anticipated the Trust will choose a preferred party early this year.


ABOVE Portrait of Francis Russell Nixon by George Richmond. NTTasABOVE RIGHT Portrait of Anna Maria Nixon by by George Richmond. NTTas


Rare portraits return to Runnymede

KEITH ADKINS | UNIVERSITY OF TASMANIA

Two portraits by the celebrated 19th century portraitist

George Richmond (1809-1896), have returned to their former

Tasmanian home of Runnymede as a result of the generosity

of members of the Nixon family in England.

Francis Russell Nixon (1803-1879) was consecrated Bishop

of Tasmania in an impressive and solemn ceremony held for five newly appointed colonial bishops held in Westminster Abbey, on 24 September 1842. The other bishops included Barbados, Gibraltar, Antigua, and Guiana. In the absence of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the ceremony was conducted by the bishops of London, Winchester and Rochester. The following year Bishop Nixon left for Tasmania accompanied by his second wife Anna Maria and their children.

The Richmond portraits of the Bishop and Anna Maria Nixon were undertaken in the year of their departure for Tasmania. The artist’s diaries reveal that he drew both portraits in 1843 at a cost of £15.15 each, and that he made a copy of the Bishop’s portrait as a present for Nixon’s good friend the Rev. Edward Coleridge (1800-1883), Vicar of St. Margaret’s Church, Mapledurham, Oxfordshire and schoolmaster at Eton College.

George Richmond’s diaries list some 2500 works. His biographer, Raymond Lister, had this to say:

“His portraits are superb, and he deserved his success in this sphere. Perhaps he did occasionally flatter a little, but even if he did... there is always the impression, on looking at a Richmond portrait, that one is in the presence of the sitter, surely a prime requirement in a portrait.”1

In England, the Bishop’s portrait was the subject of two stipple engravings, one by H. Robinson and one by George Brown. The prints are alike in that each is clearly based upon the Richmond portrait and each carries the facsimile of the Bishop’s signature F. R. Tasmania below the image.

Bishop Nixon played a central role in the colony’s early art exhibitions, as a leading committee member and one from whose private collection many works were loaned. The first exhibition, for which a catalogue has survived, opened in Hobart at the Legislative Council Chambers during January 1845.

The following year an exhibition of paintings, engravings, and watercolour drawings was held at Robin Vaughan Hood’s New Exhibition Room, Hobart. Included among the Bishop’s loans for the 1846 exhibition was his portrait by George Richmond. Anna Maria’s companion portrait does not appear to have been exhibited during her time in the colony.

In Hobart, in 1846, the Bishop’s portrait was the subject of a lithograph by John Skinner Prout, with the intention of offering prints for public subscription.

Following the Bishop’s death in 1879 the portraits passed to his and Anna Maria’s descendants, with whom they have remained until now. These well–travelled portraits hung for a time in Buenos Aires, on the walls of a Nixon family home, before returning to England with the present donor in the 1970s. Today, once again, they are to be hung at Runnymede in Hobart. 1 Raymond Lister, George Richmond:

A Critical Biography, London, Garton, 1981, p.139.


ABOVE Rippon Lea introduces solar sustainability to a heritage landscape. NTVic INSERTS L-R New solar panels at Rippon Lea cover thirty percent of the roof. NTVic Italianate-style Terracotta roofing reinstated at Rippon Lea. NTVic


Mansion makeover a sustainable winnerSHARRON CLARK | MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER NATIONAL TRUST (VIC)

Rippon Lea’s $1.3million makeover has reinstated the Melbourne mansion’s striking facade

and revived the original terracotta tile pattern with a spectacular roof renovation.

The work commenced in March last year and was inspired by

a number of 1880s photographs discovered in the State Library of Victoria depicting the original roofing detail. The orange terracotta replaces the cement pre-cast tiles added from the 1950s.

National Trust of Australia (Vic) CEO Martin Purslow said the cement tiles had a heavy presence and caused problems with water ingress over the years.

‘’They were a very dark grey and made the house look heavy, but when Sir Frederick Sargood built it,

he built it in Italianate-style similar to buildings in Venice. Rippon Lea was made to have a terracotta roof. The bright orange makes the whole house look lighter and its design makes sense,” Mr Purslow said.

As well as improving the look of the building and fixing draining issues, the new roof also provides a very practical solution for the future sustainability of the building and features solar tiles in the construction - an Australian first for a National Trust property.

“The solar tiles cover thirty

percent of the roof’s inner valley, with the outer valley obscuring them. It is about being imaginative and innovative in the ways we look after our historic buildings, so they are cared for well into the future,’’ he said.

Over 500 National Trust members and members of the public have also ensured their place in Rippon Lea’s history with their signed tiles making up a proportion of the new roof.

Rippon Lea House and Gardens is open daily from 10am – 5pm throughout the summer months.


BACKGROUND National Bank Brisbane. D Anderson.INSERT Tours at 57 Murray Street, Perth followed the path taken by members of the Aboriginal community and those who suffered from disease. K Rowley


Open House Opens DoorsSUE FINNIGAN | NATIONAL TRUST (QLD)

An increasing number of Australians are peeking behind closed doors at annual Open House events

throughout Australia. The Open House movement began in London in 1992. It was established with the

aim of fostering a better understanding of architecture and the built environment.

Founder Victoria Thornton set out to make London’s buildings accessible to all, in

the belief that direct experience is the most effective way to learn about, understand and argue for quality in the built environment. The concept has become so successful, it has spread to more than 20 cities worldwide. The Open House Worldwide Family includes New York, Dublin, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Helsinki, Galway, Barcelona, Slovenia, Chicago, Rome, Lisbon, Thessaloniki, Limerick, Buenos Aires, with Gdansk-Sopot-Gdynia, Athens, San Diego and Vienna joining in 2014.


ABOVE Open House Melbourne was embraced on social media by visitors. NTVicRIGHT ABC Building South Bank Brisbane. I Bornaghi


Open House Melbourne has contributed to the development of a new heritage audience, already championed by the National Trust. In 2008 the first Open House Melbourne event opened eight buildings on one day and saw an enormous 30,000 visits to the sites. In 2013 the event provided access to 107 buildings in the Cities of Melbourne, Stonnington and Port Phillip and attracted 126,000 visitors. Over 7,000 visited National Trust properties, including the Trust’s Melbourne headquarters at Tasma Terrace, the Portable Iron Houses, Como House and Gardens, LaTrobe’s Cottage and Clarendon Terrace. The National Trust in Victoria has a strong technology focus, and younger audiences attracted to Trust properties by the Open House weekend program, created a perfect social media storm. Live engagement on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook meant that attendees at National Trust properties actively promoted Trust sites to their followers, and facilitating entry through up-to-the-minute information on queue lines and tour times. Open House Melbourne 2014 is on 26 and 27 July.

Rare access was provided to former Public Health and Medical Department Offices at 57 Murray Street as part of Open House Perth on the first weekend in November 2013. Archaeological finds discovered under the floorboards were also on display to the public.

Visitors heard about a history of control and surveillance connected with the building including policies and practices developed on site including control of Tuberculosis and the removal of Aboriginal children from their parents. More than 60 destinations

in Perth opened their doors to the public as part of Open House Perth which show cases architecture, social history, sustainability and art.

Over the weekend of 12 and 13 October 2013, organisers of the fourth annual Brisbane Open House invited residents and visitors to again ‘unlock their city’ by attending this free-of-charge event. Founded by the Office of the Queensland Government Architect in the Department of Housing and Public Works, the Brisbane Development Association and the National Trust of Queensland, Brisbane Open House is the result of a unique partnership between government, the corporate and community sectors. In 2013, Brisbane Open House continued to evolve with more than 52,000 visits over two days to 71 buildings in the CBD and surrounding suburbs.

In regional Queensland, the inaugural Toowoomba Open House was staged on Sunday 6 October. Coordinated by an enthusiastic local committee with support from Brisbane Open House, the event attracted almost 3,000 visits through 17 buildings. Maryborough also got involved achieving a great result of more than 10,000 visits across 26

buildings on Saturday 26 October 2013. Maryborough Open House will take place on 27 September this year.

Open House Adelaide is run by History SA as an annual two-day event to showcase Adelaide’s built form, from heritage buildings to the latest in sustainable design. History SA presents the program in partnership with Open House Worldwide and is assisted by an advisory group of industry professionals.

National Trust properties such as Ayers House are open to the public on this weekend in May each year. Open House Adelaide will be held 3 and 4 May this year.

The cultural importance of these events continues to grow, thanks to strong business, government and community support and an increasing number of open b u i l d i n g s , visitors and v o l u n t e e r s each year.


ABOVE Dr Margaret Feilman at work. © The West Australian. Dr Margaret Feilman received her Honarary Life Membership with the National Trust (WA) in 2009 from Dr Ken Michael, former Governor of Western Australia. NTWA

N OW and T H E N

Vale Dr Margaret Feilman 22 June 1921 – 24 September 2013

GINA PICKERING | EDITOR

Dr Margaret Feilman OBE has been described as many

things: a gift, a trailblazer, a force in heritage conservation

who made an outstanding contribution to architecture

and town planning. Qualities of courage, passion,

creativity, stubbornness and a string of firsts are

associated with her name. Margaret Feilman grew up in

Western Australia’s south-west. She was a founding

member of the National Trust of Australia (WA) and

Chair from 1981-1990. Her legacy to heritage and the

State of Western Australia is substantial including the planning

of the town of Kwinana and later the residential development of

Ellenbrook. A memorial service to commemorate her life was

held on 26 October 2013 at Perth College in Mount Lawley,

Western Australia. Those who knew her and wrote about her

have contributed a great many valuable words over recent

years. They provide an insight into an extraordinary woman

who brought talent to an extraordinary life.

Selected achievements:1938 The first female architectural cadet in the Public Works Department

1950 A founding member of the Western Australian Town Planning Institute

1950 Established the office of Margaret A. Feilman, Architect and Town Planner (the only such practice in Western Australia)

1952 The design and development of Medina New Town of Kwinana

1959 Founding member of the National Trust of Australia (WA)

1981 Awarded an OBE in recognition if her services to architecture and conservation

1989 Awarded the first Honorary Doctor of Architecture at the University of Western Australia in recognition of her contributions to the total environment.

Life Fellow of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects, a Paul Harris Fellow of Rotary International and the recipient of the inaugural William Bold Medallist. Awarded an Honorary Life Membership with the National Trust of Australia (WA) in 2009.

The first meeting ‘to consider the

organisation of the National Trust in Western Australia was chaired by Leslie Craig.

Held in Feilman’s office at 10 Ord Street in West Perth. They decided that the name of the new body should be The National Trust of Australia (Western Australia)... and elected Feilman as its Chair.

Andrea Witcomb and Kate Gregory,

From the Barracks to the Burrup,

2010, p62.


N OW and T H E N

He r l o v e o f t h e environment stemmed

from playing in the forests around Dwellingup and Jarrahdale as a child. Her drive, perseverance and strength were apparent from a young age. A scholarship student at Perth College, from 1934 until 1937, she was named Dux in her final year of secondary schooling and finishing a year ahead of schedule, Margaret was too young to attend the University of Western Australia and was articled to the WA Government’s Principal Architect, in 1937 becoming the first female architectural cadet the state had acquired.

As the first fully-qualified Town Planning Consultant in the state and, as a qualified Architect as well, she was at the forefront of her profession and set an example for the emergence, post-war, of young women seeking careers in Western Australia’s development.

Through her firm, Margaret provided architectural services to schools, hostels, homes for the aged, local government and institutional buildings, and shopping centres. She also carried out survey work in historic towns.

Jenny Ethell,

Principal of Perth College.

Excerpt from a Eulogy,

17 October 2013.

Margaret was appointed to lead the planning for the new town of Kwinana, on land south of Perth adjacent to a new port and industrial

facility on Cockburn Sound, to support and house 25,000 local workers. Kwinana embodied not only what she had learned in Britain but also

incorporated her strongly-held cultural values through aesthetic, social, and environmental themes.

Her understanding of the environment dominated the shaping of the suburb. Margaret walked the bush and ridges of Kwinana before planning began and, following her careful observations, the major natural features were retained, new planning principles were adopted, and she convinced state Cabinet that, if the town was situated further north, it would be affected by fumes carried from the oil refinery by the prevailing winds. Her name became synonymous with the development, now an important part of West Australian history.

Jenny Ethell, Principal of Perth College.

Excerpt from a Eulogy, 17 October 2013.

Noting the lack of government interest or infrastructure for heritage preservation, she began to think that there was a need for a National Trust in Western Australia. Such an institution could be a watchdog, helping to raise awareness around heritage issues and seeking to moderate the modernising influence where it became too strident. Realising only too well that such an association had to be led by figures with a respectable and even eminent public standing, that it needed good networks into government as well as discipline-based expertise, she set about gathering a group of like-minded people around her with the object of Founding a National Trust. Importantly, she realised that this association had to be independent from government and thus she did not, like the Western Australian Historical Society had done in 1955, approach the government to set it up.

Andrea Witcomb and Kate Gregory,

From the Barracks to the Burrup, 2010, p53.

Put simply, Margaret’s intellect was outstanding and her gift in being able to see the holistic relationship between the built form and landscape

of heritage places was rare. People refer to heritage as places and things that are valued enough today to leave for future generations. I cannot stress enough what Margaret did for this State by ensuring throughout her professional life that Western Australia’s unique heritage (historic, natural and Aboriginal) was conserved so that both present and future generations did have the opportunity to appreciate their heritage.

I can still remember even in her final days of reasonable health when Margaret was adamant the National Trust ensure the swan coastal plain and what we refer to as the hills, were protected from inappropriate development. She took great delight in mapping out a plan to “beat” the system. It just highlights her incredible mind and how determined she was.

Tom Perrigo, CEO National Trust of Australia (WA), memorial service.

I spent a few hours with Dr Margaret Feilman at her Crawley home in October 2011. It was to be the first and last time. She was energetic and

vibrant. Delighted to introduce her extensive art collection and even more excited to show off her beautiful garden. The National Trust was exploring the potential to record a new oral history and create a documentary on her life. The morning was a short and delightful privilege.

Gina Pickering, Editor.

ABOVE Dr Margaret Feilman with Dr Kate Gregory in the garden of her Crawley home in 2011. G Pickering


P L AC E S

ABOVE LEFT Old Government House, Parramatta. The southern pavilion can be seen on the left. C ShainABOVE RIGHT The southern pavilion of Old Government House, showing the three reinstated dormer windows. C Lucas, Stapleton & Partners

Old Government House and its dormer windowsCLIVE LUCAS | PRINCIPAL, LUCAS, STAPLETON AND PARTNERS

A decade ago, Old Government House in Parramatta underwent a major process of conservation,

with interpretation to 1821 reflecting the Macquarie era. At that time, budgetary constraints prevented

the Trust from undertaking a number of specific projects. Notable among these was the reconstruction

of the servants’ attics above the south pavilion, and their three dormer windows. Funding through

the Commonwealth Government’s Your Community Heritage Program has made their

reconstruction possible in 2013.

All the inventories dating from various colonial governorships

mention the attics, and a plan drawn by John Watts, Macquarie’s Aide-de-Camp/Architect, suggests there were three rooms under the roof. The Macquarie Inventory of March 1821 called it a ‘Servants Bed Room’ containing ‘2 Common Stump Bedsteads’ and ‘2 Small Wool Mattresses’. The August 1831 Darling Inventory refers to the ‘Servants Room over the Larder’, while the February 1855 Denison Inventory refers to the ‘Men Servants Room’, and ‘3 Camp Bedsteads’.

In the 1850s circumstances changed for Australia’s oldest public residence and its households. Sir Charles FitzRoy was the last governor to live in Old Government House. Following the tragic death in 1847 of his wife, in a carriage accident on the front drive, he abandoned the property and it fell from favour. His successor, Sir William Denison, thought he might

have use for it – but the British colonial administration would not sanction the expenditure. On his visit to Parramatta in 1855, Denison found that ‘The house is in a miserable state of repair, as are all the buildings about it.’

Colonial Architect Edmund Blacket’s 1850 report, written in conjunction with the local architect James Houison, mentions rotting timber, white ants and a nest ’10 feet in circumference’ over His Excellency’s bedroom. It was a damning report and the governors never lived there again.

Repairs of sorts were carried out and by the 1860s the property was leased.

Seeing the dormers is the most important clue to what they were like. While many colonial houses had rooms under the roof, they were never seen at the front as the presence and needs of servants were not meant to be acknowledged.

A watercolour by Charles

Rodius dated November 1838 shows the dormer in the southern slope of the pavilion roof, and HG Lloyd’s watercolour of January 1858 clearly shows two dormers still extant in the western slope of the roof above the kitchen. From this evidence, the three dormers have been reconstructed using a window pane size of 9 x 7 inches, a size commonly used for attic windows during the colonial period. As part of the works, garden fencing commenced in 2007 with construction of the main carriage gates has been completed, along with reconstruction of the carriage circle in front of the house. All part of the ‘below stairs’ life at Old Government House, these projects all help to bring this important aspect of the property back into focus.

Clive Lucas, Stapleton & Partners, acted as consultants

to NSW Public Works to replace the dormer windows.


ABOVE The Australian War Memorial combines a shrine, world class museum and extensive archive. L Davie

N OW and T H E N

The Australian War Memorial – its

inception and roleDR PETER DOWLING | NATIONAL HERITAGE OFFICER

NATIONAL TRUSTS OF AUSTRALIA

Every country after this war will have its war museums and galleries, and its library of records rendered

sacred by the millions of gallant precious lives laid down in their making. (Charles Bean 1917)1

At 11 a.m. on the clear morning of November 11, 1941, the

Prime Minister of Australia, John Curtin, the Governor General, Lord Gowrie, and a host of dignitaries stood solemnly on a flag bedecked dais directly in

front of a new Canberra building. They were about to officially open the Australian War Memorial. The Canberra Time journalist, seemingly overwhelmed by the immensity of the occasion declared:

At this hour, beneath a cerulean dome innocent of cloud began the opening ceremony of the Australian War memorial, itself born of an idea in the din of battle and as yet an incomplete record of the greatest human tragedies of


ABOVE The Australian War Memorial aims to assist Australians in understanding the Australian war experience and its enduring impact on Australian society. L Davie

N OW and T H E N

this century. The graceful lines of the shrine dedicated to a nation’s heroic dead glistened in the bright warmth of glorious Canberra sunshine, its stately proportions adorning the transformed talus of the dominant eminence in an amphitheatre of hills at whose feet rested the rising national capital, a city at peace with nature in a world at war.2

Sheep grazed quietly on the nearby slopes behind the dais.3

At the appropriate juncture in the ceremony the Governor-General reached down, flicked a switch and the bronze doors of the Memorial swung open to all.

Also on the dais that morning was Charles Bean, Australia’s official war historian. Bean had witnessed first-hand the ferocious battles and their human costs at Gallipoli in 1915 and those several magnitude worse in the following years on the Western Front. He began to form the idea of a national war memorial following the battle of Pozières in 1916 often remembered by the Australians for its terrible artillery bombardments. Over a period of 42 days Australians made 19 attacks on the German lines suffering casualties totalled at a staggering 23,000 men, of whom 6,800 were killed. Bean wrote after the war in his official history:

The Pozières bombardments had ripped from their souls the protective coverings of convention…’4

The seed of Bean’s vision of a national war memorial was, however, likely engendered when, as a young boy, he was deeply impressed when visiting the Waterloo battlefield.5

Bean strongly believed that the spirit of those who did not return from the Great War would be present in their records; their

diaries, letters home, the relics of their lives in the AIF and the battles they were involved in.6

He also realised that the graves of fallen soldiers were far away for the mothers, fathers, wives and siblings who could only mourn from the other side of the world. There was little chance for most of them, he thought, of ever being able to travel to the battlefields to see the graves of their loved ones or the places where they were killed.7

It was an isolated and unfulfilled grief. A memorial notice placed by ‘sorrowing parents, brother and sister’ in the Melbourne Argus on Anzac Day 1923 ended with:

If only I could see your grave,I would die happy’. 8

In the trenches of the Western Front, Bean had noticed that the Australian soldiers were avid collectors of battlefield souvenirs and relics. He envisaged a memorial museum in Australia with galleries where such relics could be displayed. He also realised that the official and personal records of the war were strongly significant in the telling of the conflict to Australia. He saw a museum where they could be stored and accessed. But most

importantly, he saw the intended museum as a memorial with a hall of remembrance in which the grieving families and the visitors could ‘feel the presence of the dead’.9

Someone who wasn’t on the dais that November day, but was serving as head of the Military History Section of the Second AIF in the Middle East, was Lieutenant-Colonel John Treloar. John Linton Treloar joined the AIF at age nineteen and served at Gallipoli as a staff sergeant until he was evacuated back to Australia with typhoid fever. He returned to the conflict first serving in Egypt with the Australian Flying Corps, then in France at the 1st Anzac Corps Headquarters.10

In May 1917 Treloar, with the rank of Captain, was selected to organize the Australian War Records Section, which had been set up at the prompting of Charles Bean. Over the period of the war approximately 25,000 objects, as well as paper records, photographs, film, publications and works of art were collected and brought back to Australia. This was the beginning of the Australian War Memorial. After the war, with his staff of ex-diggers, Treloar classified the war


N OW and T H E N

documents under thirty-six subjects, each further divided into five sections. The result of his work, which concluded in 1932, was an archival record of remarkable detail and accessibility11 and which forms the basis of present day research.

Following the urgings of Bean and Treloar, together with many other influential people and former diggers, an Australian War Museum committee was established in 1919 and Henry Gullet was appointed first Director. Gullet, another strong supporter of the War Memorial, had briefly commanded a sub-section of the War Records in Egypt but became the war correspondent to the AIF in Egypt. In 1920, Gullet relinquished the Directorship of the committee to head up the Australian Immigration Bureau and Treloar was appointed in his place.

Cabinet gave the approval in 1923 for a building to house the collections and to commemorate those who had served. With great frustration Treloar oversaw the slow rise of the building. A crippling economic depression delayed construction and the advent of another world war caused the Memorial’s Board concerns on how to incorporate this new war into the memorial. But by 1941 in the midst of the Second World War the building, if not the landscaping, was nearing completion and the formal opening was planned for November 11th.

Today, the Australian War Memorial is both a shrine to those who have served in Australia’s conflicts and a museum where we can learn and understand the cost of war and its tragedy but also the achievements of those who served. That is how Charles Bean and John Treloar wanted it to be and that is how it works so well today.1 Bean, C.E.W., 1917 ‘Australian Records Preserved as Sacred

Things’, Swan Hill Guardian and Lake Boga Advocate, Monday, 10 December, 1917.

2 Canberra Times 12 November, 1941.

3 ibid

4 Bean, C.E.W. 1982 The A.I.F. in France. The Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-1918 Vol 3. University of Queensland Press, St. Lucia. p.870.

5 Australian War Memorial http://www.awm.gov.au/about/charles-bean/ (Accessed 26-11-13).

6 C.E.W. Bean, 1917, op cit.

7 McKernan, M. 1991, Here is Their Spirit. A History of the Australian War Memorial 1917-1990, University of Queensland Press St. Lucia.

8 Melbourne Argus, 25 April, 1923, In Memorium, p.1.

9 McKernan op cit.

10 Treloar, J.L. 1993 An Anzac Diary, (with notes by A. Treloar), Alan Treloar, Armidale, Australia.

11 Treloar, John, Linton (1894-1952), Australian Dictionary of Biography, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/treloar-john-linton-8846 (Accessed 30-11-13).

BOLD PALATES- AUSTRALIA’S GASTRONOMIC HERITAGE

AUTHOR: PROFESSOR BARBARA SANTICH

REVIEWER: DR DARREN PEACOCK, NATIONAL TRUST OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA

PUBLISHER: WAKEFIELD PRESS. ISBN: 9781743050941.

In the era of the celebrity chefs and televised cook-offs, Barbara

Santich’s Bold Palates offers a timely analysis of the close connections

between culture, cooking and cuisine that make up our gastronomic

heritage.

Santich, author of six previous books, is an internationally

recognised authority on food history and a professor at the University

of Adelaide. Bold Palates is a fascinating and insightful survey of

Australian cooking and eating from colonial times to the present

day. From the struggle to identify the uniquely Australian dish, to the

evolution of outdoor eating and the assimilation of diverse cultural

influences from Europe and Asia, Santich takes us on a memorable

journey through the campfires, dining tables, picnics and barbeques

that have shaped Australian palates, cuisine and culture. Bold Palates

admirably demonstrates the adage that we are what we eat, both

individually and as a nation.

Over eight chapters, the voices of cooks and diners past are

brought vividly to life through the use of quotations from newspapers,

literature and popular culture. Santich makes extensive use of library

collections in this generously illustrated work, including artworks,

photographs and advertising materials. The images alone tell the

amazing story of shifting cultural identities and aspirations expressed

in the ways we cook and eat. There are also a good number of

historical menus included and original recipes ranging from mutton

pie to mango chutney and pumpkin scones.

As in all good social history, Santich’s greatest achievement lies in

the way Bold Palates uncovers the many layers of cultural, social and

economic influence shaping what we take for granted in our cooking

and eating practices. The most familiar and seemingly ‘traditional’

things such as the barbeque are explored as complex and evolving

social constructions. From the bush campfire to the chop picnic, to

today’s stainless steel outdoor kitchens, we can see its progression as

an expression of shifting national values and identities.

Bold Palates packs in a huge amount of information but maintains

a lively and highly readable style throughout. Thanks to Santich’s

meticulous research, we are all able to appreciate more fully the rich

history of what we find on our plates and how it came to be there.

The book normally retails for $49.95 plus postage but National

Trust members anywhere in Australia can receive a 20% discount on

orders made online via Wakefield Press www.wakefieldpress.com.

au using the code word Trust. Discount offer valid to February 2015.

Between the lines

http://www.awm.gov.au/about/charles-bean/

http://www.awm.gov.au/about/charles-bean/

http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/treloar-john-linton-8846

http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/treloar-john-linton-8846

http://www.wakefieldpress.com.au

http://www.wakefieldpress.com.au


ABOVE A long haul for Old Timbrebongie Church. NTNSWINSERT Fully settled in at Dundullimal Homestead. NTNSW

N OW and T H E N

Worship on the moveANGELA LE SUEUR | NATIONAL TRUST (NSW)

Last November, Old Timbrebongie Church opened its doors for the first wedding in many decades

following the move to its new home at Dundullimal Homestead, Dubbo.

The 1840s Homestead built as the head station of a 6,5000ha

squatting run was opened to the public by the National Trust in 1988 and, since then, has become an important focus for the Dubbo community. Steeped in history, and with facilities to encourage entertainment and learning, Dundullimal lacked only one thing: the celebratory and spiritual dimension of a church.

As a large rural property with a necessary tradition of self-sufficiency, Dundullimal once had its own on-site church. Following the age-old Australian practice of moving buildings to accommodate changing needs, the original church was relocated further north some decades ago.

When former Dundullimal volunteer Rae Ayling ‘discovered’ the Old Timbrebongie Church in 2012, safe but in the changed role of museum exhibit, it seemed like a gift from the gods. The church belonged to the same era as

Dundullimal and Rae couldn’t wait to put the idea to the Trust to move it to the Homestead. Moreover, the old church had its own colourful and itinerant history, including its links to Australia’s only saint, Saint Mary MacKillop.

The church is thought to be the original Timbrebongie Roman Catholic Church, owned for 70 years by Duncan MacKillop, Saint Mary MacKillop’s uncle. For many years it fulfilled an important role for the MacKillop family as well as other families in the region. Constructed from solid planks of cypress pine in the batten &

board style, the 9.3 x 4.7 metre (approximately 30 x 15 feet) place of worship is thought to have been built in the early 1870s.There is a record of a Colin Crisp Lode holding a service in 1872, and notice of a wedding in 1877.

It took its name from the settlement which grew around the Timbrebongie Inn, an important changing station for Cobb & Co coaches en route between Bathurst and Bourke. The advent of the railway gave rise to new population centres such as Narromine, but it sounded a slow and sure death knell for townships like Timbrebongie, which found themselves literally off the beaten track. The church was relocated and in 1888 was officially opened as a Presbyterian place of worship.

Despite its use by many denominations, the church’s congregations again diminished and around 1910 it was moved to a high point on the riverbank of Buddah, Duncan MacKillop’s

DUNDULLIMAL

... the perfect resting place


ABOVE The first wedding to be held in Old Timbrebongie Church at Dundullimal, November 2013. Charmaine Wray Photography

property on the Old Warren Road, Narromine. There it was used for numerous baptisms and weddings, including the christening of Jean and Robert MacKillop, and the wedding of Peggy MacKillop to John Bowley in 1955. Robert MacKillop recalls that the glass window above the door of the church was installed during its years at Buddah.

On 30 October 1977 the last service at Buddah was held. In February 1980 the church was again moved, this time on the back of a truck to Kulai Caravan Park (renamed ‘Rose Gardens Tourist Park’) to be part of a museum. Its contents were sold, but many remained in the possession of the MacKillop family where they were treasured and recently reinstated in the church in its new home.

Inside the church is a cross made by Robert MacKillop, a pulpit, font with an inscription, pews, a suitcase organ, hymnal and a poem written by a member of a past congregation.

In April 2013, thanks to a NSW Government grant of $20,000, the National Trust was able to move the church to its new, and hopefully final, resting place. Great care was taken to research a site at Dundullimal which would provide a perfect setting for the church without obstructing vistas and views of the Homestead.

Now fully ‘settled in’, the church is bringing a new dimension to the property, as well as creating new ways of raising much needed funds for its conservation.

SOURCES INCLUDE: Dundullimal, Obley Road, Dubbo: Heritage Impact Statement, March 2011 Old Timbrebongie/Buddah Church: notes from Suzanne Gratton, Dudullimal Manager

Sculpture in the paddockANGELA LE SUEUR | NATIONAL TRUST NSW

Last October saw the rural grounds of the National Trust’s

Cooma Cottage, Yass, playing host to an arts event to rival

Sydney’s ‘Sculpture by the Sea’. ‘Sculpture in the Paddock’ was

developed for the first time this year, as part of YASSarts, an arts

and culture initiative created some years ago by artist Kim

Nelson. Nelson was named Yass Valley citizen of the year in the

2013 Australia Day Honours for this and other contributions to

the Yass community.

Kim Nelson is no stranger to Cooma Cottage, having lived there for eleven years as its inaugural manager/curator. When

sculptors Al Phemister and Duncan Waugh discussed the idea of organising a rural version of Sculpture by the Sea in early 2013, Nelson felt straight away that the rolling hills and visual curtilage of Cooma Cottage, deep in historic sheep-grazing territory, would be a perfect site. Throughout the Festival the paddocks thronged with adults and children inspired by sculptures ranging from the super-quirky - including interpretations of the farming and domestic animals which are part of Cooma’s heritage, to the thought-provoking and the abstract. Artists featured included sculptors of national significance including Michael le Grand, Phil Spelman, David Jensz, Lee Tunks and Mike McGregor.

The event gained much media coverage for YASSarts and the National Trust property, including a feature on ABC TV’s 7.30 ACT and nationwide coverage on ABC 2.

ABOVE Tiernan and Oliver Roberts pose with ‘Kern’ by sculptor Al Phemister. M CassidyBELOW Sculpture in the Paddock, at Cooma Cottage. Kim Nelson wears purple shirt. M Cassidy


ABOVE Message sticks deliver a captivating focus at this year’s Zest Fest. CHEINSERT Artist Mauretta Drage back in the heart of Nhanda Country. CHE

FAR FROM HOME: Adventures, Treks, Exiles, Migration

ERIKA VON KASCHKE | ARC CENTRE FOR THE HISTORY OF EMOTIONS (1100-1800)

Mauretta Drage lives “far from home” in Broome, many kilometres from her family and the Nhanda

country where she grew up. Mauretta’s installation of over 300 message sticks collectively hung on the

beach in Kalbarri, Western Australia not only brought her back home to the heart of Nhanda country, it set

the scene for a spectacular “Welcome to Country” for those attending the 2013 Zest Festival.

G LO B A L

http://www.historyofemotions.org.au/news-media/media-releases/the-rhythm-of-life-ches-school-music-workshops-for-zest-festival-2013.aspx


TOP Festival goers were treated to an aerial performance. CHEBOTTOM LEFT AND RIGHT The Zest Fest involves local community in dance, story and understanding emotional connections with the WA Coast. CHE Mid West Horse Trekkers organised a series of treks from Kalbarri’s Big River Ranch. CHE

Over the weekend of 21-22 September, the Australian

Research Council Centre for the History of Emotions (CHE) partnered with the Western Australian coastal town of Kalbarri to look at the historical connection with other nations along the Dutch East India Trading Company’s (VOC) trading route.

This year’s theme, Far From Home: Adventures, Treks, Exiles, Migration, focused on South Africa, and Cape Town in particular, and

its emotional connections to the VOC and Western Australia (WA). The meaning of home was explored along with the power of travel to forge bonds and relationships over vast distances.

In 2013, Festival-goers had the opportunity to discover WA’s history and connections to South Africa through exhibitions, films, digital storytelling, performances, music, South African food, school displays, markets, the horse trek, great race and bush walks.

Last year, the Kalbarri Development Association and the Shire of Northampton in association with CHE created the Zest Festival in recognition of the 300-year commemoration of the Zuytdorp shipwreck. That event was the beginning of a new cultural journey for Kalbarri and its visitors.

“Memories and emotions are intangible, yet a physical place and objects can embody these. In this exhibition, we learned how messages have been communicated in the past, and how physical objects placed in the landscape have left messages for us today,” CHE Chief Investigator Susan Broomhall said.

Visitors were invited to experience the world and emotions through an interactive exhibition that explored the power of stories, objects and the senses to hold memories and emotions of home, places, people, times and changes.

Rebecca Millar, Zest Festival Director, said the weekend was a celebration of experiences and creative ventures inspired by the Zest Fest during the past year.

“We invited community members to present an object, artwork, story or anything that holds meaning about being far

from home to them, and to provide a story about why this chosen item connected them to home. The object could have been anything - a letter, a traditional meal recipe, a treasured memento, a musical instrument, a song – it was the story that made the choice meaningful”, Ms Millar said.

There was certainly no shortage of food at Zest.

Voyager Estate showcased the Cape Malay-inspired dishes paired with a selection of its wines, while the Durack Institute of Technology designed a menu to tantalise the taste buds of guests with delicious South African cuisine.

Internationally acclaimed opera singer Michael Halliwell, along with Jane Davidson (CHE Deputy Director and Performance Program Leader) and Perth Baroque (CHE associate artists), brought musical treats to the festival with items ranging from music of the chamber to that of the street, and included a presentation on sea shanties.

According to CHE Director Professor Philippa Maddern the 2013 Zest Festival encapsulated the highly emotive experiences of many new Australians over recent centuries.

“This immigrant nation began in the days those Dutch and South African survivors of the Zuytdorp shipwreck struggled ashore, and so many of us still live with deep nostalgia for far distant lands. In exploring this immigrant past and the significant meetings with Indigenous Australians, the Zest Festival allows us to value the emotional worlds of all Australians now and into the future”.

G LO B A L HISTORICAL CONNECTIONS and experiences


TOP LEFT Map of Saumarez showing the planned rose garden on the former orchard site. P ChambersRIGHT TOP TO BOTTOM (L to R) Helen Nancarrow (AGHS), Les Davis Saumarez Manager and Jillian Oppenheimer National Trust (NSW) with Miss Catherine MacLean Centre. AGHS AGHS members, Ian Telford and John Maurer begin the task of moving many hundreds of roses. AGHS AGHS member and designer of the rose garden, Ian Telford. AGHS

Rosy legacy at Saumarez Homestead LYNNE WALKER | AUSTRALIAN GARDEN HISTORY SOCIETY

A significant public garden is taking shape in Armidale, New South Wales, largely

due to the generosity of a local rosearian, and partly to the enthusiasm of

National Trust and Australian Garden History Society (AGHS) members.

Veteran rose collector Catherine MacLean is donating her

extensive rose collection of many hundreds of roses to a garden under construction on the site of the old orchard at Saumarez.

The roses have been collected over the years and tended with loving care by Miss MacLean in her small suburban block in the heart of Armidale. When asked by a local AGHS member what would be the fate of such a significant collection when she could no longer tend them, Miss MacLean replied that she thought they would be bulldozed. So the search was on to find a secure venue where members of the public could enjoy the substantial collection which graphically illustrates the history of the rose over the centuries.

AGHS members approached

Saumarez Homestead Manager Les Davis who was quick to realise the potential of the proposed garden and the National Trust local committee applied for planning permission.

Meanwhile local AGHS member and recognised botanist Ian Telford drew up a plan for the site with the beds designed to showcase the roses.

The project has received advice and support from the Sydney branch of Heritage Roses in Australia Incorporated, while preparation of the site began with help from Ducats and the Armidale Dumaresq Council.

Members of the AGHS local branch committed to establishing the garden, transferring the roses, and to maintaining the garden. A smaller group of AGHS members,

known as “Miss MacLean’s Rosebuds”, began confirming identification of the roses and preparing them to be moved.

Funding for the garden is in its early stages while the “rosebuds” under Miss Maclean’s guidance will be cataloguing and preparing the remainder of her collection for moving next year.

It is hoped that the Saumarez Rose Garden will become part of a rose trail, including Parramatta, the Hunter Valley Gardens and the Toowoomba state rose garden.

P L AC E S


A N N I V E R S A RY

ABOVE Harry Hawker at Caulfield Racecourse - 6 February 1914. Australian Aircraft Restoration Group INSERT The Historic Southern Tarmac at Point Cook. Australian Aircraft Restoration Group

the johnston collection

house tour

DaviD Mcallister

rearrangesMr JohNstoN’s

collectioNThe annual William Johnston and his collection house-museum tour

Friday 14 March 2014 – Friday 27 June 2014

lectures

an extensive and varied series

FrieNDs enjoy the benefits

IndIvIdual & group bookIngs avaIlable on:

www.johnstoncollection.org +61 3 9416 2515

[email protected] us on

the Johnston collection is an independent not-for-profit museum

riGht | William Johnston (1911-1986) in Highland

costume, aged 5

Those flying machines Aviation Centenaries in 2014MARK PILKINGTON | AUSTRALIAN AIRCRAFT RESTORATION GROUP

This year Australia celebrates a number of Aviation Centenaries.

Harry Hawker — January 1914 – First Australian Test Pilot

On 13 January 1914 Harry Hawker and mechanic Harry Kauper flew to Australia from the UK where Hawker was chief test pilot for the Sopwith Company. They brought with them a two seat Sopwith Tabloid. The fore-runner of the famous Sopwith WW1 fighters, it was one of the most advanced designs in the world. Other aircraft in Australia at the time consisted of nothing more than “Flying Machines”.

Hawker grew up in Moorabbin in Victoria, and worked at the motor garage of Hall and Warden from the age of 11 helping build engines, and later qualified as a mechanic with Tarrant Motors.

He established a number of UK and world record flights and became Sopwith’s chief test pilot.He pioneered high altitude flights, and performing aerial loops, as well as assisting in aircraft designs such as the Sopwith Tabloid.

Point Cook – March 1914 – First military flight in Australia

On 22 October 1912 approval was granted for the formation of a Flying Corps in Australia and orders were place for the first “Flying Machines”, consisting of two Royal Aircraft Factory BE2, a two seat tractor biplane and two British built Deperdussin single seat tractor monoplanes.

Early in 1912 Captain Oswald Watt began inspecting a number of possible landing areas and submitted a report recommending that the school should be situated near the Royal Military College, at Duntroon in Canberra.

Eventually 734 Acres of grazing land were purchased near Werribee at Point Cook. On March 7, 1913 the Government announced the formation of the Central Flying School and Aviation Corps at Point Cook, and it became the birthplace of Australian Military Aviation.

Trust News February 2014

Documents

Transcript of Trust News February 2014