If you wander along the John Street heritage precinct, you will come across a quaint monument with a large wagon wheel reminding you of when the horse was king on the Yerranderie Road.
The Camden Teamster’s Memorial is on John Street, Camden. The memorial is between Macaria, a Victorian gentleman’s townhouse, and Tiffins Cottage, an early Victorian cottage. (I Willis 2023)
Before, motorised transport teams of between 13 and 16 horses pulled wagons along the Yerranderie Road that were no more than a goat track in places, up and down steep inclines, through bushfires, floods and droughts.
The Teamsters Memorial, an item of public art, is a tribute to the memory of these horses, the men who worked with them, and the district’s industrial and mining heritage.
Australian Town & Country Journal 30 August 1911
What was a teamster?
These hard-bitten characters could handle a team of up to 16 horses pulling a wagon loaded with up to 15 tons of ore.
Wikipedia defines a teamster as someone who drives a team, usually of oxen, horses, or mules, pulling a wagon in Australia, sometimes called a bullocky. In 1912, the term carrier was used to describe the teamster.
These men, and they were only men, were skilled horsemen with a tough, dangerous job. Teamsters were out in all weather, working dawn to dusk, and some died on the job.
Photograph from The Australasian Journal (Melbourne) published 1 October 1932.
The Camden teamsters carried ore from the Yerranderie Myall gold & silver fields to the Camden railhead between 1900 and 1925.
At its height, Yerranderie had a population of around 3000 people, with 16 mines extracting silver and lesser amounts of gold and lead. Between 1900 and 1926, over £2 million of silver was extracted from the Yerranderie fields.
Royalty on the Yerranderie Road
In the early days of mining operations, the teamsters were at the height of their reign. They were the royalty of the district and commanded their authority over the mine owners at Yerranderie. Without their services to cart ore from Yerranderie to the Camden railhead, mining operations at Yerranderie stopped.
The teamster would load his wagon at Yerranderie, unload at the top of the Bluff (at Nattai) and go back for another load. On his return to the Bluff, he would reload the remainder and head to the Camden railhead. This process would take about five days.
One of the information boards on the side of the memorial (I Willis 2023)
The horse teams
The horse teams would be between 13 and 16 horses carting a flat-top wagon with a load of 13 to 16 tons of ore.
In 1908, there were 54 horse teams on the Yerranderie Road carting to the Camden railhead.
Bennetts of St Marys NSW built a common flat-top wagon type used by the teamsters.
The going rate for carting ore was £2/ton. (1908) The rate varied little across the years the Yerranderie fields were operational.
The high cost of cartage meant that only the highest grade ore could be sent for refining at Sulphide Corporation at Cockle Creek on Lake Macquarie via the Camden railhead.
Lower-grade ore remained at the Yerranderie mines as waste. Partial treatment of the ore was tried with varying success.
One of the information boards on the side of the memorial (I Willis, 2023)
There was a serious attempt by the mine owners to bypass the stranglehold of the teamsters from 1906. The mine owners tried to have the state government build a light tramway to the top of the Bluff and, at one stage, from Thirlmere to Yerranderie (1910). The NSW Government was never really interested in any of these proposals.
In 1904, the idea of using camels to cart ore was floated. The idea did not last long.
The authority of the teamsters started to wane in the pre-war years, and there were moves to unionise and fix cartage rates by the Australian Carrier’s Union (1913)
Others plying the Yerranderie Road
The Yerranderie teamsters were not the only ones plying the Yerranderie Road.
There was a daily mail coach that ran between Camden and Yerranderie. The passenger fare was 12/6 one-way from Yerranderie to Camden (1908), which had come down from a height of 30 shillings.
Camden News, 9 November 1911
Bullock teams occasionally appeared on the Yerranderie Road, carting cedar logs extracted from the Kowmung area of the Blue Mountains (1911).
Bullock team on the Yerranderie Road coming up The Bluff carrying bales of wool (Facebook)
A local ecology
The teamsters and the horse teams supported a local ecology of farmers growing hay, blacksmiths at The Oaks and Camden, breeding horses, wheelwrights, wagon makers, and many others.
The memorial
The memorial has a rear wagon wheel, a front axle and two hubs. These are mounted on a steel frame set in a concrete base. The wheels are timber construction with a steel rim. There are three metal information boards.
Construction was completed by Eric Henderson of Ungarie, formerly a teamster who worked for Cook & Co.
The memorial was opened in 1977 by 95-year-old Mrs Jean McCubbin, the widow of a former teamster.
The opening of the Teamster’s Memorial in 1977. (Camden News 24 April 1977)
The memorial plaque commemorating the opening in 1977 (I Willis 2023)
The memorial was restored in 1995 and 2003.
Wheelwright Neil Johnston working on the wagon wheel from the memorial in the 2003 restoration project. (CHS)
The mythology of the horse team
The memorial is a wonderful, evocative reminder of times in the district when the horse was king.
A teamster and horse team on the ascent out of Burragorang Valley on the Yerranderie Road. The horse team is pulling a loaded flat-top wagon with silver ore. At the rear of the horse team is a passenger coach. (early 20th century, WHC&M)
Updated 29 December 2023. Originally posted on 21 December 2023 as ‘Camden Teamsters Memorial, when the horse was king on the Yerranderie Road’.
In July 1923, the first sod was turned at North Sydney, marking the commencement of the construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
The crowd at the turning of the first sod for the construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge in North Sydney in 1922 (SRNSW)
When construction started after the speeches and ceremonies, there was the destruction of over 500 houses in the North Sydney area. Neighbourhoods in Waverton and Milsons Point were destroyed.
Harold Cazneaux ‘The Old and the New’ 1920s NGA. This image shows some of the destruction of the houses necessary for the bridge’s construction.
Commissioning the bridge
When the bridge was commissioned in the early 1920s, it was the largest construction project ever undertaken in Australia. It was a bold concept and design and captured the Sydney imagination. It joined two parts of the emerging city and crossed the picturesque Port Jackson waterway.
The Sydney Harbour Bridge at night in 1961 (SRNSW)
Historian Peter Spearritt’s The Sydney Harbour Bridge A Lifestates that the idea of linking Dawes Point with the North Shore was first proposed in 1815 by ex-convict and government architect Francis Greenway. The first bridge sketch appeared in 1857 when the NSW Commissioner of Roads and Bridges, WC Bennett, proposed a pontoon. Other ideas included a tunnel under the harbour. Meanwhile, ferries plied between both sides of the harbour carrying millions of passengers yearly.
JE Bradfield
In the 1890s, a Sydney University-educated Queenslander joined the NSW Department of Public Works. He was engineer JE Bradfield. He was an enthusiastic bridge supporter and profoundly impacted the bridge story and the Sydney transport system.
Linking Sydney and North Sydney became political in the 1880s. Between 1880 and 1909, it was the subject of two Royal Commissions and advisory board reports.
JE Bradfield c1920s HC Krullti (NLA-136648686-1)
Bradfield put his first proposal for a Sydney Harbour Bridge in 1909. After a study trip to North America and England, his ideas were incorporated into the 1922 enabling legislation, theSydney Harbour Bridge Act1922 (NSW), passed by the New South Wales parliament.
In 1922 tenders were invited for both an arch and a cantilever-designed bridge, with English engineering firm Dorman, Long and Co winning the tender for their arch design. The bridge was to cost over £4 million.
Before construction began, hundreds of houses and businesses were demolished. Tenants were evicted while landlords received compensation. Construction started in 1923, and excavations began in 1925.
Nation-building project
There was great public interest during the construction of this nation-building project, with daily updates in the Sydney press and further afield. The construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge was the great engineering wonder of its day.
The Sydney Harbour Bridge under construction in 1930 (SRNSW)
The two arches, one each from either side of the harbour, grew in height and were visible all over Sydney. The arches were eventually joined in 1930. The bridge deck was completed by the end of the following year.
Bridge Opening
The notoriety of the bridge was assured when Francis De Groot, from the New Guard, stole the moment and cut the ribbon with his sword at the official bridge opening in 1932. Just as NSW Premier Jack Lang was going to cut the ribbon de Groot rode through on a borrowed horse and captured all the glory – for that moment, anyway.
Francis De Goot at the opening 1932 newspaper clipping (Pylon Lookout)
Postage stamp, Australia, 1932 – Sydney Harbour Bridge (Australia Post)
At the time and later, the bridge was celebrated in song, poetry, stories, novels, postcards, paintings, photography, cartoons, commemorative booklets, biscuit tins, jigsaws, teapots, coffee cups, salt & pepper shakers, calendars, tea towels, cake icing, construction kits, pamphlets, brochures, newspaper supplements and even a bottle stopper.
The cover of the Pan Giant edition (1960) of Dymphana Cusack and Florence James’s romantic novel Come in Spinner (DoS)
The bridge story was recorded by photographers Harold Cazneaux, Henri Mallard and Frank Hurley, while artists Grace Cossington, Ure Smith, and Margaret Preston put a different slant on the story.
Harold Cazneaux – Arch of Steel 1947 (NGA)
Pylon Lookout
Bridge visitors could go up the Pylon Lookout from 1934. A 1950 advertisement proclaimed:
See Sydney from the Harbour Bridge Pylon Lookout. The highlight of a trip to Sydney is your visit to the Pylon Lookout. The Pylon Lookout has dozens of attractions to interest youngsters, school-children, youths and adults. Among the many features are…unusual souvenirs…See ’The Magic Picture’ – only one in the world – amusing, historical… Open every day 9.30am to 6pm.
The pylon lookout has been marked on this image by Lorenze Rychner (2018)
Few visitors realize the bridge can be crossed on foot in about 20 minutes and that the southeastern pylon is open to the public, rewarding a fairly short climb up a flight of stairs with wonderful, 360-degree views from a viewing platform. I’ve taken many visitors up there, and nobody has yet been less than enthralled.
Once inside the pylon, whether on the way up or down, one can study the fascinating displays showing how and when the bridge was constructed, what life was like for those who built it and what impact the bridge had on life in Sydney.
One of the crazy brave, and illegal activities taken up by young, energetic Sydneysiders as a rite of passage was to climb the bridge at night in the 1960s and 1970s. After scaling the man-proof fence and climbing up the inside on one of the girders, the young adventurers could walk up and along the top of the bridge arch. The result was a magnificent view of the Sydney night-time city skyline. Eventually, the BridgeClimb was opened in 1998, and everyone could legally take in the views.
Specs
One of the most unusual things linked to the harbour bridge is the official unit of measurement – one Sydharb. It is used to measure volume and is equivalent to 500 gigalitres and is the volume of water in Sydney Harbour.
An aerial view of Sydney Harbour with the bridge in 2009 (Wikimedia)
And just for the pedants and the record, the bridge was opened in 1932. It contains 6 million hand-driven rivets. The bridge toll was 6d. for a car, and for a horse and rider 3d.
The bridge is the world’s longest steel arch bridge. It is 1149 metres long, height 141 metres, width 49 metres, 134 metres above sea level and 16 men died during its construction. It took 272,000 litres of paint to give the bridge its first three coats, and the four pylons are only for decoration. (australia.gov.au)
Watch a video on the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Made by the Cinema Branch 1933. Directed by Lyn T Maplestone. Officially opened on 19 March 1932, the Sydney Harbour Bridge was a massive engineering undertaking that transformed the city. This short film documents the construction of one of the world’s great landmarks in its various stages. It provides a fascinating glimpse of life around Sydney Harbour and Circular Quay in the twenties and thirties. The Cinema Branch regularly filmed events of special interest to the nation. There were at least 3 different films on the progress of the bridge. Sydney’s Harbour Bridge was filmed over several years and edited to celebrate the opening.
Video on the construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge
Produced by the Sydney Division of the Institution of Engineers Australia on the 75th Anniversary of the Sydney Harbour Bridge (2007) Production by the Audio Visual Unit, UNSW.
Iconic status
The bridge has achieved iconic status and has transcended from being a symbol of Australian nationalism in the 1930s to a Sydney and Australian brand instantly recognisable the world over.
On the Camden Town Centre edges are two white concrete posts with numbers and letters. What are they, and what do the letters mean?
These white concrete posts are mileposts from when the Hume Highway ran up the centre of Camden along Argyle Street. The letters indicate destinations and the numbers are distance in miles. These items are part of Camden’s engineering heritage.
A concrete milepost on the southern end of the Camden Town Centre on the road verge of the former Hume Highway, now the Old Hume Highway. (I Willis, 2021)
The letters: M is Mittagong, S is Sydney, L is Liverpool, and C is Camden. The distance is a mile: an imperial unit of measure from before the time of metric measurement. The mile here is a statute mile which is 5280 feet or 1.609 km, as opposed to a nautical mile used in air and sea transport and is different.
The English mile
Mileposts dated back to the Roman Empire and were placed alongside the Roman roads. Distances were measured from the city of Rome. The mile originated from the Roman mille passus, or “thousand paces,” which measured 5,000 Roman feet.
The first mileposts along English roads appeared in 1593 and were standardised in England under the reign of Elizabeth I. The English mile was a different length from the Scottish mile and the Irish mile. These measures were not standardised in the British Commonwealth and the US until 1959. (Sydney Morning Herald, 22 August 1935. https://www.britannica.com/science/mile)
In the colony of New South Wales, the first sandstone milestones were located on the Parramatta, Liverpool and South Head Roads from 1816 on the instructions of Governor Macquarie. Milestones provided accurate reference marks along with the expanding public road system for travellers on coaches. (Crofts and Crofts, 2013)
Macquarie Obelisk
In the colonial period, Governor Macquarie’s Obelisk of Distances was erected in 1818 as the official starting point for all distances in NSW. It was located in what was then the centre of Sydney and is now Macquarie Place. The monument was also ‘a symbolic peg’ as the furthest extent of the British Empire in the early 1800s.
Obelisk of Distances in Macquarie Place Sydney was designed by Francis Greenway and built-in 1818 under the orders of Governor Macquarie c1926 (SLNSW)
The placement of milestones in colonial NSW set a precedent. They were placed along the left-hand or southern side of the roadway, with the destination facing Sydney. The posts were meant to be seen by travellers coming from either direction to measure their distance from Sydney for the benefit of stagecoach drivers. They also ensured the driver was on the correct road, as many were bush tracks. (Crofts and Crofts, 2013)
Concrete mileposts
The two concrete mileposts in Camden were part of the road improvements by the NSW Department of Main Roads in 1934.
The decision to implement a programme of mileposting followed the first annual conference of state road authorities in February 1934 held in Melbourne. The meeting decided to adopt uniform national procedures for mileposting and road warning signs for roadworks, among other matters. It was felt that uniformity of services would help interstate travellers. (DMR, 1934)
A concrete milepost on the northern entry to the Camden Town Centre on the roadside verge of the former Hume Highway ran along Argyle Street Camden. (I Willis, 2021)
In 1934 the department allocated £134 to the program in the Sydney area. (DMR, 1934)
The DMR Main Roads magazine stated that
In the days before the advent of the motor vehicle, when travel by road was slow and was done on foot, on horseback, or in horse-drawn carriage, few things gave greater service, or were more eagerly looked for, than the mileposts. (DMR, 1934a)
According to the Department of Main Roads, mileposting before 1934 provided signs that gave directions and the distance of important towns. Mileposts had lost their importance to the traveller because the car speedometer gave ‘progressive mileage’ stated a departmental report. (DMR, 1934a)
Road maintenance
Mileposting in 1934 was implemented with one specific aim.
The purpose of the mileposts now is to provide a convenient system of reference marks along the road for the use of those whose responsibility is to maintain the roads in a proper state. (DMR, 1934a)
The stated purpose was for the milepost to be a reference point along the road to give a precise position for any roadwork needed. Information to travellers was only secondary. (DMR, 1934a)
Mileposting to 1934 had been haphazard, with much work generated at a local level and many gaps. Road maintenance was a secondary consideration, with information for travellers paramount. Much work was ‘incomplete’. Groups of mileposts were only based around important towns, sometimes following main roads and sometimes not. (DMR, 1934a)
The 1934 mileposting project was partly triggered by the 1928 classification of all roads in NSW into state highways, trunk roads and ordinary roads.
The 1928 changes saw The Great Southern Road through Camden renamed the Hume Highway in 1928. The 1929 Razorback Deviation shifted the highway to the east, away from the former Great South Road (now Cawdor Road). (DMR, 1934a)
Different types of mileposts were used in 1934 for different purposes. Concrete posts were used in Sydney and country towns like Camden, and timber posts were used elsewhere.
Specifications and drawings for mileposts as outlined in the Department of Main Roads journal Main Roads (May 1934), where the DMR mileposting project was detailed for all roads in NSW (Main Roads 1934a)
There was a strict protocol for the letters and numbers on the posts, with letters and numbers incised and painted black and distances measured from the post office, sometimes not. Posts were placed on the left-hand side of roadways leading from Sydney or the coast, as they were in colonial times.
Posts were located with a clear view from the roadway of 200 feet with specific instructions on distances from roadways and locations for cuttings and embankments. On bridges, the mileposts were clamped to the handrails.
In mid-1934, the NRMA suggested the mileposts on the different highways should be painted in various colours. (Kiama Reporter and Illawarra Journal, 20 June 1934) The suggestion was not taken up.
One supplier of the concrete mileposts was the Hume Pipe Coy (Aust) Ltd. (Main Roads, August 1938)
Wooden Mileposts
In the Camden area, the Camden Heritage Inventory states there were wooden mileposts along Cawdor Road, formerly The Great South Road. They pre-date the concrete mileposts.
Timber milepost c1927 on the verge of The Great South Road, now Cawdor Road. (2021 I Willis)
In a 2002 survey for the Heritage Inventory, the three Cawdor Road timber mileposts were intact.
The posts were local hardwood cut by a sawmill in Edward Street in the late 1920s and delivered to The Great South Road (Cawdor Road) site by Camden teamster Les Nixon. (NSWSHI)
In a recent search, I could only locate one intact timber milepost in fairly poor condition.
This timber milepost c.1929-1934 is located on the former Hume Highway at South Camden, now Remembrance Drive. This milepost is located on the 1929 Hume Highway Razorback deviation that moved the main road from the Great South Road, now Cawdor Road. (I Willis, 2021)
This timber milepost c.1929-1934 is located on the former Hume Highway at South Camden, now Remembrance Drive. This milepost is not on the Wollondilly Shire Council heritage inventory. The milepost is on the roadside verge adjacent to the Camden Valley Inn. (I Willis, 2021)
References
CROFTS, R. & CROFTS, S. 2013. Discovering Australia’s Historical Milemarkers and Boundary Stones, Sydney, Roberts and Sandra Crofts.
DMR 1934. Department of Main Roads Ninth Annual Report for the year ending 30th June 1934. Sydney: NSW Legislative Assembly.
DMR 1934a. The Mileposting on Main Roads. Main Roads, 5.
Updated on 15 August 2023. Originally posted on 13 November 2021 as ‘Capturing the distance of the past’.
Walking over the Cowpastures bridge, you have a vista of the tranquil water of the Nepean River impounded behind the Camden weir. The tranquillity belies the raging torrent that can cover the bridge at flood times.
Plaque located in the Rotary Cowpasture Reserve in Argyle Street Camden adjacent to the Cowpasture Bridge commemorating the opening of the reconstructed bridge after the 1975 flood (I Willis 2021)
On the bridge’s western end is a small park where a plaque celebrates the 1976 reconstruction of the bridge. A flood had turned the timber bridge deck into a twisted mess twelve months earlier.
The plaque states:
Cowpasture Bridge
Originally opened in 1901 this bridge was extensively damaged by flood in June 1975.
Following repair it was re-opened by The Hon J JC Bruxner MLA, Minister for Transport and Highways, 9th April 1976.
Ald RB Ferguson, Mayor. Camden Municipal Council.
REA Rofe Esq. MLA, Member for State Electorate of Nepean.
AF Schmidt Esq., Commissioner for Main Roads, New South Wales.
Plaque, Argyle Street, Camden.
The twisted Cowpasture bridge timber deck after the 1975 flood closed access across the river for many months. (Camden Images)
Choke-point
The low-level Cowpasture bridge is a pinch point for moving goods and people across the river. Its closure at flood times has created a choke-point that disrupts daily life. Other low-level bridges in the local area at Menangle, Cobbitty, and Macquarie Grove Road have suffered the same problem.
The eastern approach to the Cowpastures Bridge on Camden Valley Way with signage for the Cowpasture Bridge in the early morning (I Willis, 2017)
The access issue was only solved with the opening of the high-level Macarthur Bridge in 1973. The bridge is an essential example of Camden’s engineering heritage and was built as part of the local region’s NSW Askin Governments New Cities structure plan.
Economic importance of access
Access to the southern side of the Nepean River has been an issue since European settlement and the discovery of Wild Cattle in 1795. Governor Hunter named the Cowpastures in 1796, and it became a restricted reserve in 1803 to stop cattle poaching.
The issue of access across the river was illustrated in 1810 when a party led by Governor Macquarie visited the area. Macquarie wrote in his journal on 16 November 1810:
There being very little Water in the River at this time, we crossed it at the usual Ford in our Carriage with great ease and safety.
A bridge at last – ‘a paltry affair’
As the colonial frontier moved beyond the Cowpastures, there was increased traffic across the Nepean River, sometimes reported as the Cowpastures River. (SMH, 2 October 1861). The frontier conflicts between Europeans and Indigenous people calmed on the Cowpastures after the 1816 massacre. (Karskens, 2015) The process of settler colonialism and its insatiable appetite for territory increased traffic through the Cowpastures in the 1820s.
The river crossing required a more permanent solution for the increased traffic along the Great South Road. The first Cowpasture bridge was built in 1826, and then new bridges followed in 1861, 1900 and 1976. Each tried to solve the same access problem (SMH, 2 October 1861).
This sketch of the 1826 Cowpasture Bridge was attributed to Thomas Wore of Harrington Grove in 1842. St John’s Church is on the hill consecrated in 1849. Historic Sketch Discovered: Camden Village in 1842, The Sydney Morning Herald, Saturday, 10 June 1933, p.9 (illustrated is a previously unpublished sketch of an almost identical drawing to (Cowpastures) Bridge & Village of Camden.) http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/page/1151602
A low-level bridge was first raised in 1823 when Surveyor-General John Oxley of Kirkham objected to a bridge at Bird’s Eye Corner river crossing (Menangle). The final decision was to build a crossing halfway between the Belgenny Crossing and Oxley’s Macquarie Grove. (Villy, 62-63)
Work began on the low-level Cowpasture bridge in 1824 and finished in 1826. Construction was supervised by convict Samuel Wainwright and built below the crown of the riverbank. There was no shortage of sceptics, and a band of local ‘gentlemen’ thought the bridge would collapse in the 1826 flood. (Villy, 62-63) They were wrong.
A convict was stationed at the bridge as a caretaker to remove the bridge rails in flood. In 1827 a toll was introduced on the bridge, with the right-to-collect sold for £70. Crossing the bridge on a Sunday was forbidden; offenders were fined and cattle impounded. (Starr, 16-17)
Repairs were carried out on the bridge after floods in 1835 (Starr: 17), and in the 1840s ‘landowners, carriers and mail contractors’ complained. They were concerned that the bridge was submerged by floodwater ‘on every occasion’ and in a recent deluge, ‘the Bridge was sixteen feet underwater and the neighbouring flats, a complete sea for miles’. (Starr: 17)
Several memoirs described the bridge as ‘a very a paltry affair’ (Starr: 23) and a ‘primitive structure’ (Sydney Mail, 5 February 1913).
In 1852 a portion of the bridge washed away, and there were terrible floods in February and April 1860. There was a need to replace the ‘dilapidated’ bridge. (SMH, 2 October 1861)
The timber truss Camden Bridge across the Nepean River with Thompson’s Woollen Mill on the right of the image in 1861. (Camden Images)
Tenders were called in early-1860 for a new five-span timber truss bridge (NSW Government Gazette, 6 April 1860), and it was under construction by September. The construction tender was won by Campbelltown building contractors Cobb and Bocking (SMH, 21 September 1860; SMH, 2 October 1861), who also built the low-level timber truss bridge at Menangle in 1855. (RMSHC, 2019; Liston, 85)
A grand affair
There was much fanfare at the new bridge opening on Monday, 30 September 1861, at 3 pm. There was conjecture about the crowd size. The Empire claimed a crowd of 50 people, while the Sydney Morning Herald boasted 200 present. (Empire, 3 October 1861; SMH 2 October 1861).
Whatever the crowd, there were a host of speeches and Mrs Bleecke, the wife of Camden doctor Dr Bleecke, christened the new bridge the ‘Camden bridge’ by breaking a bottle of Camden wine on the timbers. Then, the crowd let out three loud hearty cheers (SMH 2 October 1861).
At the end of the official proceedings, the men, 40 in number, adjourned to the Camden Inn, owned by Mr Galvin, for a ‘first-rate’ sit-down lunch. The meal was accompanied by a host of speeches and much imbibement. Many toasts started with ‘The Queen’ and ‘Prince Albert’. The ladies were left ‘to amuse themselves as best they could until the evening’ (SMH 2 October 1861).
The festivities at lunch were followed in the evening by a ‘grand’ ball held at Mr Thompson’s woollen mill. The floor had been cleared on orders of Mr Thompson, and the space was decorated with ‘evergreens’ and ‘flowers’ and brilliantly lit by kerosene lamps. (SMH 2 October 1861)
According to the Sydney press, the Camden populace had ‘seldom’ seen an event like it. One hundred thirty-four people attended the ball. Festivities on into the night with a ‘great profusion’ of food and dancing, winding up at 4 am the following day. Locals declared they ‘had never spent a happier or pleasanter day’ (SMH 2 October 1861).
The railway to Camden
In 1882 when the railway line was built between Campbelltown and Camden, the track was laid across the timber bridge deck. This reduced the width of the roadway to 15 feet, and traffic had to stop when a train needed to cross the bridge. (Camden News, 27 June 1901)
According to the Camden press, passengers were regularly notified at Redfern Station (now known as Central Station) with a sign saying ‘traffic to Camden stopped at Camden bridge’ due to frequent flooding. The bridge’s timber deck was ‘well below the banks of the river’. (Camden News, 27 June 1901)
The existing 1860 timber truss bridge was constructed for light road traffic and continually posed problems for the railway. Only the lightest railway locomotives could use the bridge, and the heavy grades of the branch line at Kenny Hill meant that the train was restricted to a few cars. (Camden News, 27 June 1901).
In 1900 a new steel girder bridge was constructed to take the weight of two locomotives. The specifications for the bridge are:
five steel girder spans each of 45 feet on concrete piers;
178 feet of timbers beam spans;
making a total length of 403 feet;
the bridge deck was seven feet higher than the 1860 timber truss bridge deck;
construction was supervised by the Bridge Branch of the NSW Public Works Department;
Flood time was an exciting time for rail passengers going to Camden. When the bridge closed, railway passengers got an exhilarating boat ride across the flooded Nepean River. The train would stop at Elderslie Railway Station, climbing aboard the railway rowing boat. Passengers would take their lives in their hands and be ferried across the flooded river by the boatman. The rowing boat was given to the Camden Municipal Council in 1889 (Pictorial History Camden: 87)
This image shows the new 1900 Camden Bridge with concrete piers and steel girders, which replaced the 1860 timber truss bridge. (SLNSW) The bridge was opened in June 1901 by the NSW Minister for Works, the Hon EW O’Sullivan, assisted by the Member for Camden, the Hon John Kidd, at a ceremony at Camden Railway Station. (Camden News, 20 June 1901) This was followed by an official lunch at the Camden School of Arts for around 70 guests who purchased tickets. (Camden News, 13 June 1901)
Flooded Cowpasture Bridge in 2022
This photograph shows the Cowpasture Bridge under floodwater on 3 March 2022 on the eastern approaches along Camden Valley Way. The height of the Nepean River at the Camden Weir just downstream from the Cowpasture Bridge reached a peak this morning (3/3/22) of 10.01 metres at 9.42am, and the river level was falling at the time this photograph was taken. The Bureau of Meteorology’s river heights are classified by the Bureau of Meteorology as: 6.8 metres is minor flooding; 8.30 metres is moderate; 13.00 metres is major flooding. The river level at the Camden Weir in the days leading up to this photograph ranged from 1.8 metres on 27/2/22 to 2.3 metres on 2/3/22. (I Willis 2022)
This image was taken at the intersection of Camden Valley Way and Macarthur Road on the northern end of the Cowpasture Bridge, which was inundated by the Nepean River. The time was Tuesday, 9 March 2022, at 9.00am, when the height of the Nepean River at Camden Weir was 11.9 metres and classified as a major flood. (I Willis, 2022)
This image was taken at the corner of Camden Valley Way and Macarthur Road, towards the Cowpasture Bridge, on Thursday, 7 April 2022, at around 9.00pm. The Nepean River rose to a maximum of 12.21 metres at the Camden Weir mid-evening. The river rose quickly on Thursday, and the Cowpasture Bridge was closed at 12.30pm on Thursday, 7/4/22. The bridge was re-opened to traffic on Friday afternoon after the river had dropped below the level of the bridge decking. (I Willis, 2022)
Updated 28 April 2023, 9 April 2022, 3 March 2022, 19 November 2021; Originally posted as ‘Access Denied, flooding at the Cowpasture Bridge’ on 22 October 2021.
One of the largest tourist attractions in the local area in the mid-20th century was a local milking marvel known as the Rotolactor.
Truly a scientific wonder, the Rotolactor captured people’s imagination at a time when scientific marvels instilled excitement in the general public.
In these days of post-modernism and fake news, this excitement seems hard to understand.
Menangle Rotolactor in the 1950s Postcard (Camden Images)
What was the Rotolactor?
The Rotolactor was an automated circular milking machine with a rotating platform introduced into the Camden Park operation in 1952 by Edward Macarthur Onslow from the USA.
Part of agricultural modernism, the Rotolactor was installed by the Macarthur family on their colonial property of Camden Park Estate to improve their dairying operations in the mid-20th century.
The idea of a rotating milking platform was American and first introduced in New Jersey in the mid-1920s.
Camden Belgenny Farm Rotolactor Model 2 model in 2018 (I Willis)
The 1940s manager of Camden Park, Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Macarthur Onslow, inspected an American Rotolactor while overseas on a business trip and returned to Australia full of enthusiasm to build one at Camden Park.
The Menangle Rotolactor was the first in Australia and only the third of its kind in the world.
Camden Belgenny Farm Rotolactor Model 3 display in 2018 (I Willis)
The rotating dairy could milk 1,000 cows twice a day. It held 50 cows at a time and was fed at as they were milked. The platform rotated about every 12 minutes.
The Rotolactor was a huge tourist attraction for Menangle village and provided many local jobs.
In 1953 it was attracting 600 visitors on a weekend, with up to 2000 visitors a week at its peak. (The Land, 27 March 1953)
The structure plan did recognise the importance of the Rotolactor and the cultural heritage of the Menangle village. (The State Planning Authority of New South Wales, 1973, p. 84)
These events, combined with declining farming profits, encouraged the Macarthur family to sell out of Camden Park including the Rotolactor and the private village of Menangle.
The Rotolactor continued operations until 1977 and then remained unused for several years. It was then purchased by Halfpenny dairy interests from Menangle, who operated the facility until it finally closed in 1983. (Walsh 2016, pp.91-94)
Community festival celebrates the Rotolactor
In 2017 the Menangle Community Association organised a festival to celebrate the history of the Rotolactor. It was called the Menangle Milk-Shake Up and was a huge success.
Menangle Milk Shake Up Community Festival, organised by the Menangle Community Association in 2017 (MCA)
The Festival exceeded all the expectations of the organisers from the Menangle Community Association when it attracted over 5000 people to the village from all over Australia. (Wollondilly Advertiser, 18 September 2017)
A true country event like in the old days. So many visitors came dressed up in their original 50s clothes, and all those wonderful well selected stall holders. It was pure joy.
Despite these sentiments, the event just covered costs (Wollondilly Advertiser, 5 April 2018)
The festival’s success demonstrated to local development interests that Rotolactor nostalgia could be marketized and had considerable commercial potential.
The Menangle Community Association attempted to lift the memory of the Rotolator and use it as a weapon to protect the village from the forces of urban development and neo-liberalism
Menangle land developers also used the festival’s success to further their interests.
Developer Halfpenny made numerous public statements supporting the restoration of the Rotolactor as a function centre and celebrating its past. (The Sydney Morning Herald, 22 December 2017).
Menangle Rotolactor in a derelict condition in 2016 (Image by Karen)
The newspaper article announced that the site’s owner, local developer Ernest Dupre of Souwest Developments, has pledged to build a micro-brewery, distillery, two restaurants, a farmers market, a children’s farm, a vegetable garden, and a hotel with 30 rooms.
In 2017 the state government planning panel approved the re-zoning of the site for 350 houses and a tourist precinct. Housing construction will be completed by Mirvac.
Mr Dupre stated that he wanted to turn the derelict Rotolactor into a function with the adjoining Creamery building as a brewery next to the Menangle Railway Station.
He expected the development to cost $15 million and take two years. The plan includes an outdoor concert theatre for 8000 people and a lemon grove.
Facebook Comments 6 August 2021
Reply as Camden History Notes
Bev WatersonRemember it well. My parents would take us there quite regularly.
Elizabeth SearleJD Gorey, The pilot was asking about this during our trip to the farm. He may be interested in the article Originally posted 19 July 2019. Updated 6 April 2021.
Craige Cole I remember travelling from our family dairy farm on the far south coast to visit the Rotalactor in the late 60s and recall the total awe of my parents. I know that visit was the catalyst for us installing a new more efficient dairy setup.
Caroline TavendaleCraige Cole our friends own a dairy farm in Rochester, Victoria. They have rotolactor dairy, installed it about 3 years ago.
Camden History Notes 
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