The Camden cottage

October 4, 2019June 2, 2020 camdenhistorynotes2 Comments

Camden Edwardian cottages

It is with interest that I see that a local Camden real estate agent has used the term ‘Camden cottage’ on a sale poster for 21 Hill Street.

This is the first time I have seen the term ‘Camden cottage’ used in a commercial space before and it is an interesting development. The sign actually state ‘Classic Camden Cottage’.

Camden 21 Hill St Front IWillis 2019 lowres — Camden 21 Hill Street. The first time that I have seen the use of the term the ‘Camden Cottage’ used in a commercial space in the local area. This is a simple Edwardian style cottage that was a typical building style of the early 20th century in local area. (I Willis)

Maybe this is a recognition for the first time of a building style that was quite common in the local area in the early 20^th century.

Camden 21 Hill St Front WideView I Willis 2019 lowres — Camden 21 Hill Street. The use of the term ‘Camden cottage’ on the advertising sign is an important acknowledgement of this style of residential cottage in the local area. (I Willis)

The cottage is a simple timber Edwardian style cottage that can be found across the Macarthur region. It was a cut-back version of more sophisticated buildings styles that were evident in the wealthier suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne. The typical Queenslander Federation cottage is a sophisticated version of the same style of house.

Queensland House style Wikimedia 2005 JBrew lowres2 — Queenslander Housing Style with wide verandah. This is an elegant version of the Edwardian style of housing typical of the early 20th century in the Brisbane area. (Wikimedia, 2005, JBrew)

There are examples of this style in most of villages and hamlets across the local area and many isolated ones on local farms.

The name Edwardian is loosely attached to cottages and buildings erected during the reign of Edward VII from 1901 to 1910. This period covers the time after the Federation of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901 when the six self-governing colonies combined under a new constitution. They kept their own legislatures and combined to form a new nation.

The housing style was evidence of the new found confidence of the birth of a new nation that borrowed overseas trends and adopted them to suit local conditions. These style of houses were a statement of the individualism and the national character.

The Edwardian style of housing also includes a broad range of styles including Queen Anne, Federation, Arts and Crafts and Early Bungalow. These styles often tend to be asymmetrical with a projecting from gable, can be highly decorated with detailed work to gables, windows and verandahs. Edwardian style cottages often fit between 1900 and 1920, although the style extends beyond this period influencing the Interwar style housing.

Typical Edwardian colour schemes range from apricot walls, gables and barge boards, with white lattice panelling, red roofing and green coloured windows, steps, stumps, ant caps.

A number of Camden Edwardian cottages have a projecting from room with a decorated gable. A number of been restored while others have been demolished.

Edwardian country cottages are not unique to the Camden area. Toowoomba has a host of these type of homes and published the local council publishes extensive guides explaining the style of housing and what is required for their sympathetic restoration in the online publication The Toowoomba House (2000).

Examples of Edwardian style cottages, including in and around Camden, were an Australian version of English Edwardian houses. Houses were plainer in detail, some with lead lighting in the front windows. Australian architecture was a response to the landscape and climate and the building style tells us about the time and the people who built them, how they lived and other aspects of Camden’s cultural heritage.

Camden Melrose 69 John St FCWhiteman CIPP — Camden, Melrose Cottage, 69 John Street. It was owned by FC Whiteman owner of the general store in the early 20th century. Now demolished. (Camden Images)

In the most March 2014 edition of Camden History Joy Riley recalls the Edwardian cottages in John Street. She stated:

‘I lived at 66 John Street for the first 40 years of my life before moving to Elderslie with my husband Bruce Riley. The two rooms of 66 John Street were built by the first John Peat, Camden builder, to come to Camden. In the 1960s I had some carpet put down in my bedroom, the floor boards were so hard, as they only used tacks in those days to hold carpet, the carpet just kept curling up.’ She says, ‘The back of the house was built by my grandfather, William Dunk. They lived next door at 64 John Street. He also built the Methodist Church at Orangeville or Werombi.

A number of Camden Edwardian style timber cottages have a projecting room at the front of the cottage with a decorated gable, adjacent to a front verandah, with a hipped roof line.

This housing style is often characterised by a chimney that was a flue for a kitchen fuel stove and chip copper in an adjacent laundry. In some houses plaster cornices were common, sometimes there were ceiling roses, skirting and architraves. A number of been restored while unfortunately many others have been demolished.

Carinya Cottage, Stewart Street, Narellan. c.1890. Since demolished. (Camden Historical Society)

Some Camden Edwardian homes had walls of red brickwork, sometimes with painted render in part. While there are many examples in the local area of timber houses with square-edged or bull-nosed weatherboards. Sunshades over windows supported by timber brackets are also common across the local area.

Ben Linden at Narellan is an outstanding example of the Edwardian cottages across the local area.

Ben Linden Narellan J Kooyman 1997 (Camden Images) — Ben Linden, 311 Camden Valley Way, (Old Hume Highway, Great South Road) Narellan J Kooyman 1997 (Camden Images)

Yamba at Kirkham is another fine example of this style.

Yamba cottage — Yamba Cottage, 181 Camden Valley Way, (Old Hume Highway/Great South Road) Kirkham c. 1913 (Camden Images)

Camden has quite a number of Edwardian cottages in the town area, on surrounding farms and in local district villages. They are typical of the early twentieth century landscape in the local district.

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St John’s Church, a contested sacred site in the historic landscape of the Cowpastures

January 31, 2019September 16, 2023 camdenhistorynotes4 Comments

A sense of place and a contested narrative

St John’s church is a contested site where there is competition around the ownership of the dominant narrative surrounding a former horse paddock. The paddock in question lies between St John’s Anglican Church and the former Rectory, all part of the St John’s Church precinct.

Church authorities want to sell the horse paddock to fund a new worship centre.

There has been a chorus of objections from some in the Camden community over the potential sale. Community angst has been expressed at public meetings, protests, placards, and in articles in the press.

camden st johns church paddock 1907 cipp — Camden Rectory & Horse Paddock 1907 with Menangle Road on right-hand side of the image (Des & Pru Fowles/Camden Images)

The principal actors (stakeholders) who have taken up positions around the issue include churchgoers, non-churchgoers (residents, outsiders, ex-Camdenites, neighbours), the parish, local government, state government, and the Macarthur family.

The former horse paddock looks like an unassuming vacant block of land in central Camden. So why has there been so much community angst about its possible sale?

camden st johns fjoss image 7 (5) — St Johns Anglican Church showing a former horse paddock in front of the church (2018 C Cowell)

The simple answer is that the community ascribes representations of a church beyond the building being a place of worship. Yet this raises a paradox for the owners of these religious sites. Generally speaking, different faiths put worship and the spiritual interests of their followers ahead of their property portfolio.

This paradox has created angst in some communities when the owners of religious buildings and sites want to sell them, for example, in Tasmania in 2018 or other examples discussed by Graeme Davison.

Unraveling a paradox

Historian Graeme Davison, in his book The Use and Abuse of Australian History, has highlighted the different representations that communities have ascribed to local churches. They have included:

a symbol of the continuity and community rather than a relic of their faith;
a local shrine where the sense of family and local piety are given tangible form;
‘a metaphor of the postmodern condition’;
a ‘kind of absent present, a site now unoccupied but irreplaceable and unable to be rebuilt;
a transcendence and spiritual continuity in a post-Christian society. (pp. 146-161)

So the question here is, are any of Davison’s representations applicable to Camden’s St John’s Church?

camden st_johns_church02 — St Johns Anglican Church Camden 2018 (I Willis)

Cultural landscape

St John’s church is the centre of Camden’s cultural landscape, its cultural heritage and the narrative around the Camden story. I wrote in the Sydney Journal in 2008 that

St John’s church is the basis of the town’s iconic imagery and rural mythology and remains the symbolic heart of Camden.

In 2012, I extended this and said that community icons, including St John’s,

have become metaphors for the continuity of values and traditions that are embedded in the landscapes of place.

In this dispute, the actors, as others have done,

have used history and heritage, assisted by geography and aesthetics, to produce a narrative that aims to preserve landscape identity.

The actors in the dispute want to preserve the landscape identity of the area by preserving the church precinct, including the horse paddock.

A world long gone

The church precinct is a metaphor for a world long gone, an example of the past in the present. In Davison’s eyes ‘a symbol of continuity and community’.

St John’s Anglican Church is part of an English-style landscape identity, that is, Camden’s Englishness. This is not new and was first recognised in 1828 by Englishman John Hawdon.

Hawdon saw a familiar landscape and called it a ‘little England’. A type of English exceptionalism.

The colonial oligarchs had re-created an English-style landscape in the Cowpastures that mirrored ‘home’ in England. The English took control of territory in a settler society.

The local Indigenous Dharawal people were dispossessed and displaced by the English through the allocation of land grants in the area.

The English subdued the frontier with violence as they did other parts of the imperial world.

The Hawdon allegory was present when the town was established by the Macarthur family as a private venture on Camden Park Estate in 1840. The construction and foundation of St John’s church was part of the process of the building of the new town.

The first pictorial representation of this was used in Andrew Garran’s 1886 Picturesque Atlas of Australasia, where there is

an enduring image within the socially constructed concept of Camden’s rurality has been the unparalleled vista of the Camden village from the Macarthur’s hilltop Georgian mansion. (Image below) The romantic image portrayed an idyllic English pastoral scene of an ordered farming landscape, a hive of industrious activity in a tamed wilderness which stressed the scientific and the poetic.

camden park 1886 garran — Engraving showing vista of Camden village from Camden Park House. The aspect is northeast with Cawdor centre distance and St John’s church right-hand distance. (Andrew Garran’s 1886 *Picturesque Atlas of Australasia)*

The hilltop location of the church was no accident. St John’s church is ‘the moral heart’ of English-style ‘idyllic representations as the

‘citadel on the hill’ at the centre of the ‘village’. It acts as a metaphor for order, stability, conservatism and a continuity of values of Camden’s Anglophile past. The Nepean River floodplain keeps Sydney’s rural-urban fringe at bay by being the ‘moat around the village’ which occasionally was the site of a torrent of floodwater.

The hilltop location has spiritual significance with Biblical references to love, peace and righteousness.

A sense of place

St John’s church has had a central role in the construction of place and community identity in the town.

camden_johnst_chs0083 — St John’s Anglican Church in its hilltop location at the top of John Street Camden. This image is by Charles Kerry in the 1890s (Camden Images)

The church and its hilltop location are an enduring colonial legacy and a representation of the power of the colonial gentry, particularly the position of Camden Park Estate and the Macarthur family within the narrative of the Camden story.

Camden Park 1906 (Camden Images) — Camden Park House and Garden in 1906 is the home of the Macarthur family. It is still occupied by the Macarthur family and is open for inspection in spring every year. (Camden Images)

Many Camden folk feel a sense of belonging to the church expressed by memory, nostalgia, customs, commemorations, traditions, celebrations, values, beliefs and lifestyles.

The community feel that the church belongs to them as much as it belongs to the churchgoers within the church community.

Belonging is central to placeness. It is home and a site where there is a sense of acceptance, safety and security. Home as a place is an important source of stability.

An extension of this is the role of the church as a loved place in terms laid out by Peter Read in his book, Returning to Nothing, The Meaning of Lost Places. As Veronica Strang writes in Read’s book:

it plain that the feelings engendered by the loss of place can be equated with those experienced in the loss of a close relative, friend or partner. This straightforward analogy helps to make visible the symbolic role of place in enabling human beings to confront issues of mortality.

camden st johns vista from mac pk 1910 postcard camden images — Vista of St John’s Church from Macarthur Park in 1910. Postcard. (Camden Images)

The church buildings and precinct are a shrine to a lost past and are considered by many to be sacred land. The sale of the former horse paddock has caused a degree of community grief over the potential loss of sacred land.

St John’s church is an important architectural statement in the town centre and is one of Australia’s earliest Gothic-style churches.

So what does all this mean?

The place of St John’s church in the Camden community is a complex one. The story has many layers and means different things to different people, both churchgoers and non-churchgoers.

The church is a much-loved place, and the threatened loss of part of the church precinct generates feelings of grief and loss by many in the community.

The legacy of the English landscape identity from the early 19^th century and the establishment of the Cowpastures is very real and still has a strong presence in the community’s identity and sense of place. The English-style Gothic church is a metaphor for Hawdon’s ‘Little England’ allegory.

The Cowpastures was the fourth location of European settlement in Australia, and the local area still has a strong Anglo-demographic profile.

These factors contribute to re-enforcing the iconic imagery projected by St John’s church combined with the story of a settler society and its legacy in a contested landscape.

Check out this publication to read more about the Camden district.

Cover Pictorial History Camden District Ian Willis 2015 — Front Cover of Ian Willis’s Pictorial History of Camden and District (Kingsclear, 2015)

Updated on 16 September 2023. Originally posted on 31 January 2019 as ‘A contested sacred site in the historic landscape of the Cowpastures’

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Gardens: a special place

October 31, 2018January 15, 2019 camdenhistorynotes

The many faceted aspects of gardens

Gardens are practical, places of beauty, peaceful, have a pleasing aesthetic and are popular with people. Gardens across the Macarthur region certainly fulfil these elements.

Author Robert Harrison maintains that

The gardens that have graced this mortal Eden of ours are the best evidence of humanity’s reason for being on Earth. History without gardens would be a wasteland.

Humans have long turned to gardens—both real and imaginary—for sanctuary from the frenzy and tumult that surrounds them.

Harrison maintains that people wander through many types of gardens:

Real, mythical, historical, literary.

Camden Park House 2018 Flynns LForbes — The display of spring wisteria in the gardens at Camden Park House. The gardens are open in spring every year and are a magnificent display of vibrant colours. The gardens are part of the September Open Weekend at the property which provides one of the important intact colonial Victorian gardens in Australia. This image was taken by Lyn Forbes on the 2018 Open Weekend. (L Forbes, 2018)

Many say that gardens and connectedness to nature contribute to wellness

Wellness and wellbeing

Wellness is an area of growing public interest and is one the most popular sections of bookshops. A simple Google search of wellness reveals over 700 million search results.

The Wellness Institute says that wellness is:

a conscious, self-directed and evolving process of achieving full potential.

Why is wellness important?

The University of California Davis Student Health and Counselling Services states that wellness is important because:

it is important for everyone to achieve optimal wellness in order to subdue stress, reduce the risk of illness and ensure positive interactions.

The UCD states that there are eight areas to wellness: emotional; environmental; financial; intellectual; occupational; physical; social; spiritual.

Gardening and horticultural therapy or ecotherapy contributes to wellness through physical, psychological and social wellbeing.

Studies have shown that being connected to nature is linked to well-being. Gardening is a connection with nature. Some see it as a form of biophilia.

Biophilia

The hypothesis of biophilia says that people are connected to nature. The degree that nature is part of a person’s identity is ‘nature connectedness’.

The term biophilia was introduced by Edward O Wilson in his 1984 book Biophilia where he defined it as ‘”the urge to affiliate with other forms of life”.^[3]

These ideas are not new and in ancient Greek mythology Gaia is the ancestral mother of all life and the personification of the Earth: the primal Mother Earth goddess.

In 1979 James Lovelock, in Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth; his Gaia hypothesis which sees the Earth as a self-supporting organism.

Gardening has many of these elements and a direct connection to the earth.

A selection of gardens in the Macarthur region

Camden community garden

One active gardener maintains that this garden provides

therapy time, social interaction with other like-minded people and the satisfaction of growing your own produce. It is very peaceful down there and there is something about digging in the earth. It is fulfilling and a sense of joy seeing something grow from seed. There’s nothing like being able to pick and eat your own produce. The wide variety of colours of the flowers and vegetables in the garden builds mindfulness.

Macarthur Park and garden

TripAdvisor

This is a park with varied places to wander through and enjoy, roses in abundance, opportunities for parties, weddings or friends, and 2 palm trees at one of the gates planted by Elizabeth Macarthur to add to the history!! Very pleasurable. (Val S, Camden)

A two minute stroll from the gorgeous township of Camden and you’ll find this little hidden gem. Beautifully maintained gardens in a tranquil setting make this spot just perfect for a short retreat from the rest of the world. no bustle, no shops no noise (except the occasional church bells), just peace and tranquility. (PThommo101, Camden)

I just loved the park with its wonderful rose garden and beautiful arbor. I was there to do a photo shoot and this park never fails to impress with its beautiful shadows and views (CamdenNSW)

Camden Mac Park — Camden’s Macarthur Park endowed to the residents of Camden by Sibella Macarthur Onslow in the early 20th century (I Willis, 2016)

The Australian Botanic Garden, Mount Annan

The Australian Plant Bank

TripAdvisor

A beautiful, restful place to take a Sunday stroll. Any time of the year there is always something on offer, but spring time is especially lovely. (Sue H, Sydney)

It was wonderful to spend time here at the beginning of spring, (Matt H, Penang, Malaysia)

What a beautiful place for a picnic….the grounds are extensive and have an impressive display of Australian native plants….wattles, grevillea ,bottlebrush and eucalypts, to name but a few. (Lynpatch29, Sydney)

I was very impressed it is beautiful (Camden NSW)

A tranquil space for a walk among native plants. Your head is back in a good space. (Susie994, Canberra)

mt_annan_botanic_garden2 — The Australian Botanic Gardens at Mount Annan showing a bed of paper daisies 2016 (ABG)

Sculpture Garden Western Sydney University Campbelltown

Maybe it is the walking around the picturesque landscape provided by the WSU grounds staff and gardeners. Maybe it is the landscape gardening and native vegetation set off by the water features. Maybe it is the quiet and solitude in the middle of a busy Campbelltown.

Whatever it is in the sculpture garden, whether provided by the permanent WSU sculpture collection or the exhibition works, the site has a positive serenity that is hard to escape. It certainly attracts the staff and students.

The exhibition makes up part of the programme linked to the WSU Art Collection. Take yourself on a virtual tour of the WSU Art Collection.

Campbelltown WSU Sculptures 2018 — The sculpture garden in the grounds of Western Sydney University Campbelltown are one of the best kept secrets of the Macarthur region. It is great to see the display of public art and there a host of display pieces to hold the interest of any art nerd. (IWillis)

Camden Park House & Garden

Japanese Garden at Campbelltown Arts Centre

The Japanese Gardens are a special gift from Koshigaya, Campbelltown’s Sister City in Japan, and are located in the grounds of the Campbelltown Arts Centre.

The Campbelltown Japanese Gardens celebrate the sister city relationship between Campbelltown and Koshigaya. The gardens were presented to Campbelltown by the citizens of Koshigaya on 10 April, 1988.

The Gardens symbolise the beliefs and religion of both Shinto, the indigenous religion of Japan, and Zen Buddhism.

The Campbelltown Japanese Gardens feature a traditional waterfall, koi pond, timber bridge, stonework pathways, lush plantings and a 16th Century designed teahouse, hand crafted by Japanese craftsmen.

The aim of the garden is to obtain quiet solitude. The design represents elegant simplicity, lending itself to contemplation and heightened awareness. (Campbelltown Arts Centre)

Campbelltown Arts Centre Japanese Garden3 2018 CAC — The Japanese Garden at the Campbelltown Arts Centre. The garden illustrates the ‘peaceful surrounds and tranquility of the traditional Japanese plants, designs and craftsmanship’. (CAC)

Picton Botanical Gardens

Picton Botanic Garden 2017 Pinterest — The Picton Botanical Gardens 2017. The gardens were established in 1986 and covers 4.1 ha and has 90% native Australian plantings. (Pinterest)

Tripadvisor

The gardens are beautiful. (TamJel, North Sydney)

Well presented, peaceful park just what the doctor ordered.. (Gasmi, Sydney)

Purely by chance, I saw a signpost for the Picton Botanical Gardens. I drove down Regreme Road and discovered a beautiful, peaceful space adjacent to the oval. (Jennifer C, Belconnen, ACT)

Macarthur Centre for Sustainable Living

Mac Centres for Sust Living 2017 Mount Annan — The Macarthur Centre for Sustainable Living garden ‘The Centre is a not-for-profit, community-driven organisation supported by local Macarthur Councils and the Royal Botanic Gardens & Domain Trust. MCSL is primarily an educational facility and model for sustainable technology’ (2017 MCSL)

Camden RSL Memorial Rose Garden

Camden RSL Memorial Rose Gdn 2017 CRSL — The Camden RSL Memorial Rose Garden is the site of the annual Anzac Day Dawn Service in Camden. It attracts thousands of people each year and is a site of memory and commemoration. The extensive rose garden has a memorial obelisk located in front of a columbarium. (CRSL, 2017)

Rotary Cowpasture Reserve Garden

Camden Cowpasture Reserve Spring Flowers 2018 — The Camden Rotary Cowpasture Reserve garden in spring 2018. The reserve wall was opened and dedicated on 19 February 1995 by Rear Admiral Peter Sinclair Governor NSW. The monument celebrates the Rotary Centenary and the service that Camden Rotary has provided to the community since 1947. (2018 I Willis)

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Carinya homestead, part of lost Camden

April 24, 2018May 10, 2024 camdenhistorynotes

Camden Council votes to demolish homestead

A 2010 meeting of Camden Council on Sydney’s southern outskirts voted five to four to demolish a simple 1890 Federation farm cottage known as Carinya at Harrington Park. The owner, Nepean Pastoral Company, wants to develop a 97-residential lot subdivision on the farm site.

The decision illustrates a wider malaise that has enveloped heritage in this state — a worrying trend that is seeing our past disappear.

Demolition of Carinya

Camden Council’s decision to approve Carinya’s demolition was based on reports written by heritage consultants Urbis. Urbis stated that while the cottage was intact and in reasonable condition, it was not of local significance. In their view, Federation cottages, while rare in the Narellan area, are not rare in the Camden local government area (LGA). Secondly, Carinya has little associative value with the Cross and Paxton families who lived there.

Many people agree with these conclusions. In the past, Carinya was overlooked in heritage surveys of the Camden LGA and was not included on any local lists of historic houses. While not a reason for demolition, it is a contributing factor.

Jonathon Chancellor noted recently in a story on the fight to save the Tilba residence in Burwood Heights that many councils had “neglectful heritage lists” and included Camden.

Even more damming, ”heritage listing at the local level does not provide much protection at all”, wrote Graeme Aplin, from Macquarie University, in Australian Quarterly (May-June 2009).

”What we have witnessed over the last five years is the systematic dismantling of heritage protection,” stated Sylvia Hale, Greens spokeswoman on planning (”Heritage at risk”, National Trust Magazine, February-April 2010).

More than this, the imminent loss of Carinya reflects wider problems in heritage affairs across New South Wales. There is a blatant disregard for the importance of simple cottages of historic value, especially at a local level. They represent the lives of ordinary folk. Simple salt of the earth people who struggled to make a living from the soil.

The story of Carinya fits within the Australian Historic Themes identified by the Australian Government (Australian Heritage Commission 2001). These are common national standards for the identification and conservation of heritage places. Yet, this does not qualify Carinya for recognition of local significance.

Even examples of Australia’s important early colonial houses on Sydney’s urban fringe, which are of national significance, such as Oran Park House and Maryland, suffer from the authorities’ indecision and dithering.

Conflict of interest in heritage

Some heritage consultants have a real, or at least a perceived, conflict of interest in the assessment process. Consultants are guns for hire. There needs to be a separation of roles in the assessment process of historic houses. An independent third party should conduct the judgment concerning the significance assessment. Heritage consultants should not be judge, jury, and hangman. There is a need for due diligence.

The assessment process needs the expertise of professional historians to examine the appropriate historical evidence. There were no historians engaged in the assessment process of Carinya. Urbis has largely relied on a cursory examination of documents at the local library and museum.

Carinya Cottage B&W — Carinya Cottage c.1890 is a simple Edwardian brick farm cottage at Harrington Park demolished in 2010 (Camden Historical Society)

Council planning and development officers are under incredible pressure to make timely decisions on development applications. This particularly applies to the Camden LGA, Sydney’s designated growth area.

Council officers and their elected councillors rely on reports written by heritage consultants. Officers and councillors may have had little or no specific training assessing heritage significance, local or otherwise. They are not experts in history and heritage.

One of the casualties in the assessment process is the thorough and considered assessment of historic houses.

Loss of interest in heritage

The current political climate in NSW is not conducive to the protection of historic houses. Heritage is not a high priority. Crowded Sydney and a shortfall in housing stock are political priorities. For this, read new estates on the urban fringe, like the approved Carinya farm subdivision.

The developers of Carinya Farm Housing Estate are selling a dream that is just that—a dream. The new estates create a bland, homogenised suburban streetscape with little charm or character.

The Carinya farm sub-division is part of Sydney’s urbanisation, an octopus that devours everything in its path—including ethical standards, community identity, sense of place, and apparently local heritage and history.

The destruction of simple, charming 19th-century cottages is unnecessary. There is a demand from house buyers who want to live in historic cottages. These buyers restore the cottages to their former glory.

What have we come to in the new century? We have certainly not come to appreciate our past, our inheritance.

Learn more

Heritage and urban planning

Updated 10 May 2024. Originally posted on this blog on 24 April 2018 as ‘The lost world of Carinya’

Originally published in the Sydney Morning Herald online as Heritage: a dismal state of affairs 16 April 2010

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Mid-20th Century Modernism in Elderslie

April 20, 2018 camdenhistorynotes2 Comments

Modernism was a transnational force that embraced the Camden community.

The lands releases in the Camden suburb of Elderslie in 1960s have produced a number of houses that have expressed mid-20th century modernism. The house designs were taken from the book of project homes of the day and were quite progressive.

Elderslie 64 Macarthur Road 2010 IWillis — The Hennings house built at the beginning of the 1960s by a local businesman at 64 Macarthur Road. It occupied a prominent position and was influenced by the American West Coast Ranch style of housing. The house was demolished in 2011. (I Willis, 2010)

Australian architects including Robin Boyd were expressing Australian modernism. These architects were commissioned by housing developers like Lend Lease to design their housing estates. One such development was the Lend Lease Appletree Estate at Glen Waverley in Melbourne. Another Lend Lease land release and group of show homes were at their 1962 Kingsdene Estate in Carlingford,

The Elderslie homes were built by the miners who worked in the Burragorang Valley and they wanted new modern houses. They generated the wealth that funded the urban growth of the Camden suburbs of Elderslie and South Camden.

Elderslie was one of the original land grants to John Oxley in 1816. The area has been dominated by farming, particularly orchards and vineyards.

Elderslie examples of 1960s modernism include houses in Luker Street characterised by low-pitched rooves, open planned but restrained design, with lots of natural light streaming in full length glass panels adjacent to natural timbers and stone. There are also ranch style houses in River Road with open planning and wide frontages to the street, some architect designed.

Wrought iron work, Elderslie NSW 1960s (I Willis) — House in Macarthur Road Elderslie showing wrought iron work popular in the 1960s. A number of houses were built in this style based on the mining boom from the Burragorang Valley coal mines. (I Willis, 2010)

These houses are all located in and amongst Federations style farming houses of the Edwardian period. The Federation style houses were on large blocks of land that were sub-divided during the 1960s.

The now demolished Henning’s house in Macarthur Road (image) is an example of open planned ranch style. Other modernist designs are the blocks of flats in Purcell Street, with use of decorative wrought iron railings.

Sunset Avenue in Elderslie was a new land release with a mix of 1960s modern low-pitched roof open planned houses interspersed with New South Wales Housing Commission fibro construction homes.

Other land releases of the 1960s were the New South Wales Housing Commission 1960s fibro houses some of which are located in Burrawong Road and Somerset Street.

Elderslie Fibro Cottages — Modern fibro cottages in Burrawong Crescent Elderslie built around the 1960s. (I Willis, 2005)

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GLAM, trusted sources and the local museum

April 16, 2018 camdenhistorynotes

In these days of fake news and social media hype people have lost trust in many public institutions. Social media is king and the prominence of news can be driven by clicks and algorithms.

Trust is difficult concept to define and measure. It is a fragile belief that people and institutions can be relied upon to be ethical and responsible. Trust is critical in the effective functioning of a democracy.

It is more important than ever that there are sources that are trustworthy and produce credible evidence-based information, particularly around scientific and cultural issues.

Dr. David J. Skorton is the 13th Secretary of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington DC states in reference to recent controversies:

More and more, the trustworthiness of information is based on the perceived trustworthiness of the source. Libraries and museums are considered honest purveyors of information and places for conversation on issues of local and national significance. Today’s museums are dynamic learning hubs, using the power of art and artifacts to engage, teach and inspire. Museums touch lives and transform the way people see the world and each other.

One group of trusted institutions are museums, galleries and libraries, and within these are local community and folk museums, pioneer villages and house museums. They are genuinely authentic.

camden-library museum — Camden Library Museum in John Street Camden. The Camden Museum is a volunteer-run local social history museum that tells the story of the Cowpastures and Camden Districts. It has a significant collection of local artefacts and objects, archives and image collection. (I Willis, 2016)

The landscape of local museums is one of the characteristics of rural and regional Australia. These local museums are managed and conducted by a host of local community organisations. According to the National Museum of Australia there are over 1,000 local and provincial museums across Australia.

Local museums tell local truths and are trusted sources of local stories and histories. Local museums are stores of memory that are built on nostalgia and contribute to well-being of the community. They are sites of volunteerism and strengthening of community. They promote local tourism, local employment, skill enhancement and training opportunities for local people.

Aust Day 2018 Museum Open Frances&Harry — Two local sages on Australia Day 2018 at the Camden Museum. Frances and Harry are two larger than life local characters who are well known local identities. They have spent their life devoted to their community. They have a vast trove of local stories and knowledge that they willing share with others. (I Willis)

Centred on local history local museums are not fake. They are are honest and straightforward. What you see is what you get.

The local museum tells local stories about local identities and local events, and are driven by local patriotism, parochialism and localism. They celebrate local traditions, myths and commemorations.

The local museum can vary from world class to cringingly kitsch, from antiquarian and to professional. Individuals create them from ‘mad ambition’ and shear enthusiasm.

For all their foibles they can build trust within a community. The local museum can help to build resilience through strengthening community identity and a sense of place. Local museums are a trusted local institutions, contribute to a dynamic democracy and active citizenship.

This post was originally published on the ISAA blog.

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Camden Reflects on Anzac Day 2017

April 25, 2017April 19, 2018 camdenhistorynotes

Photo Essay of Camden Anzac Day 2017

IMG_7272[1] — Camden Anzac Day 2017 with sign of knitted poppies made by local folk (I Willis)

Camden Anzac Day 2017 window shopfront display in Argyle Street Camden (I Willis)

Camden Anzac Day 2017 cenotaph in Camden Bicentennial Park with wreaths (I Willis)

Camden Anzac Day 2017 wall of poppies at Camden RSL Memorial Rose Garden in Cawdor Road (I Willis)

Camden Anzac Day 2017 cenotaph in Camden RSL Memorial Rose Garden in Cawdor Road (I Willis)

Camden Anzac Day 2017 cenotaph in Macarthur Park Camden erected in 1922 by public subscription (I Willis)

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Richlands, an outpost of a colonial farming empire

April 20, 2017March 5, 2021 camdenhistorynotes3 Comments

A farming outpost of empire

Richlands Georgian style homestead built in the 1840s on the 2016 open day (I Willis)

The Richlands estate, north of Goulburn in the NSW Southern Tablelands, was an important part of the Macarthur family pastoral empire for nearly 100 years. The Richlands estate acted as an outstation about one days ride west of Camden Park estate. The property reached its hiatus in the 1840s when its extent reached around 38,000 acres including the private village of Taralga.

James Macarthur managed the Richlands estate with his brother William Macarthur from Camden Park. (Belgenny Farm)

James and William Macarthur initially took up adjacent land grants of around 2000 acres between Taralga Creek and Burra Lake in 1822. The area had been traversed by a party led by Charles Throsby in 1819 looking for an alternative route to Bathurst other than the arduous route across the Blue Mountains. Throsby and company journeyed from the Moss Vale area, crossing the Wollondilly River then the Cookbundoon Ranges near Tarlo, turning north are eventually arriving at Bathurst.

Opening up the Southern Tablelands

Reports of these areas encouraged pastoralists to take up land, one of the first was Hannibal Macarthur, John Macartur’s nephew, at Arthursleigh on the Wollondilly. In a speculative venture in 1822 James Macarthur and partners Lachlan MacAlister and John Hillas, overseer with William Macarthur, moved a mob of cattle over the Cookbundoons and left them in charge an assigned convict Thomas Taylor at Tarlo. Hillas and MacAlister also took up a grants adjacent to the Macarthur holdings.

On the death of John Macarthur in 1834 the Richlands estate passed to Edward Macarthur, a career British soldier, while managed by James and William Macarthur on his behalf.

Governed by absentee landlords

While the Richlands estate was governed by absentee landlords the real story is of those who formed the microcosm of society on the estate. They included convicts, managers, tenant farmers, servants and the Burra Burra people, who were dispossessed and displaced from their country.

Fledgling settlement of Taralga

For the twenty years of the Richlands estate it was managed from the fledgling settlement of Taralga on the southern edge of the property. There was a central store and a number of skilled tradesmen, convicts and their overseers were based in the village from the 1820s.

Taralga village main street 2000s. The initial management of the Richlands estate was conducted from the village in the 1820s until it was shifted to the new hilltop homestead built in the 1840s. The village is one of number of private towns that the Macarthur family established in colonial NSW. ULSC

Rural empire of 38,000 acres

James and William Macarthur acquired land by grant and purchase north and south of the hamlet of Taralga including 600 acres from Thomas Howe of Glenlee in the Cowpastures in 1837. The diary of Emily Macarthur’s, James’ wife, showed that William made six-monthly visits to Richlands from 1840. Lieutenant Colonel Edward Macarthur visited Richlands in 1851 after being posted to Sydney as deputy adjutant general.

Edward Macarthur (1789-1872), who inherited the Richlands estate on the death of his father John Macarthur in 1834. ( Richard Daintree and Antoine Fauchery, c1858)

Strategic hilltop

Work began to move the management of the estate from the village to the hilltop overlooking Burra Lake and Guineacor to the east. Hilltop locations for homesteads were common throughout the Cowpastures and as they were of other Macarthur properties. This practice followed Laudon principles and provided a defendable strategic location on the estate.

Richlands Georgian style homestead on hilltop location built in the 1840s on 2016 open day (I Willis)

William Campbell was appointed superintendent in 1839 and work began on stone offices on the farm hilltop site, along with underground grain silos, convict accommodation and outbuildings. Work was completed by 1844 when Thomas and Martha Denning occupied the house forming a small quadrangle. Denning was appointed overseer (farm manager).

Georgian-style residence

Work on a new on a Georgian-style residence began in 1845 for new English estate manager George Martyr, who took up the position after his arrival in the colony in 1848 after marrying Alicia in Sydney.

Martyr took an active interest in community affairs serving on Goulburn Council and supervising construction of the Catholic Church in the village. A qualified surveyor from Greenwich, Martyr surveyed the village of Taralga and the Macarthurs offered village lots for sale from 1847. George and Alicia raised six children on Richlands.

Richlands Georgian style homestead built for estate manager George Martr and his family in the 1840s on the 2016 open day (I Willis)

The property was eventually resumed by the New South Wales Government in 1908, broken up for closer settlement and sold in 30 smaller lots in 1910.

Notes

Peter Freeman Pty Ltd, Richlands-Taralga, Conservation Management Plan, Richlands Conservation Management Plan, 1997.

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Showtime in Camden 2014

March 22, 2017March 25, 2023 camdenhistorynotes5 Comments

The show is a popular annual rural festival

The annual festival of farming returns to the Camden Showground at the end of March again. The show has been the most crucial country festival in the district for over 100 years. In 2019 the show attracted over 40,000 visitors and was a huge success.

In the early days, it was a celebration of agricultural modernism. By the inter-war period, it had matured into a permanent part of the local landscape.

The Second World War and the poor state of the show’s finances saw the show disappear for the duration of the conflict. It is now more vital than ever and not to be missed.

Histories of the Camden Show

There have been two histories produced of the Camden Show. The first was on the show’s centenary in 1986 and written by local identity Dick Nixon from the Camden Historical Society.

Cover Dick Nixon’s Camden Show History was produced on the centenary in 1986. (I Willis)

The second history of the Camden Show was written by Neville Clissold on the 125 anniversary of the show in 2011.

Cover of the 125-anniversary edition of the Camden Show written by Neville Clissold. (I Willis)

Camden Show 1890s

The early years of the Camden Show were big community events when everyone came to town.

Panorama of the Camden Show in the 1890s. One of the most significant changes in the grandstand on the opposite side of the show ring that burnt down in the early 20th century. A new grandstand was built on the left-hand side of the ring in this image. The current show pavilion is on the opposite side of the show ring. St John’s church is centre rear of the hill, and there is an absence of trees that now mark this same view from behind the current sports club. (Camden Images)

Guess who you meet at the show?

The NSW Premier

It is amazing who you bump into at the Camden Show. Historical society volunteers John Wrigley OAM, Bettie Small PHF and Len Channell, with Peter Hayward in the background, greeted the Premier of New South Wales, the Hon. Barry O’Farrell, the Member for Camden, Mr Chris Patterson, MP, and Camden Mayor, Clr Lara Symkowiak.

The dignitaries just walked into the pavilion to look at the arts and crafts put in by competitors and who they should meet but the enthusiastic members of the historical society. The encounter didn’t phase society members; they took it all in their stride. Usually, volunteers just meet friends they have not seen since last year’s show. Meeting the NSW Premier was a real surprise.

The historical society has been fortunate to have a stall in the show pavilion for many years. It has been located in amongst the cakes, flowers, sewing, knitting and other rural crafts. The stall sells the latest publications, takes new memberships and renewals, and answers many local history questions.

Camden Show with the Camden Historical Society stall amongst the arts and crafts displays. Special guests Mr OFarrell Premier NSW and Member for Camden Mr C Patterson and Mayor L Symkowiak. Camden Historical Society John Wrigley OAM, Bettie Small and Len Channell, with Peter Hayward (I Willis, 2014)

Mud and Slush in 2014

The 2014 Camden Show featured mud and storms as a special event. It rained on Friday afternoon with a thunderstorm that arrived around 4.00 pm from the southwest. It caught many people unaware and created a mud bath in many parts of the showground. It dumped about 15 mm in about an hour.

On Saturday morning, show officials were putting down woodchips over the worst patches and straw on other patches. Patrons who wore boots were well prepared to walk around in the mud. On Saturday, there was a steady rain from about 4.00 pm with a short storm that came in over the Burragorang Valley and Southern Highlands and provided drizzle around right through the fireworks.

Camden Show in 2014 on Saturday morning after a heavy rain shower on Friday afternoon. (I Willis, 2014)

2014 Camden Show

The 2014 Camden Show was the usual lively affair, and this showground map illustrates the range of events and activities.

2014 Camden Show schedule of events flyer (Camden Show Society)

2014 Camden Show programme schedule of events flyer (Camden Show Society)

Show Merchandise 2013

This is the price list for show merchandise in 2013. Did you buy your tie?

Merchandise available for sale at the 2013 Camden Show (Camden Show Society)

Camden Showgirl

The Showgirl competition is, in many ways, an anachronism from the past. It has survived for over 45 years under the onslaught of feminism, post-modernism, globalization and urbanisation. A worthy feat indeed.

The competition is still popular, and the local press is always a strong supporter. Showtime, the show ball and Miss Showgirl are representatives of notions around Camden’s rurality.

People use the competition as a lens through which they can view the past, including the young women who enter it. In 2008 Showgirl Lauren Elkins ‘was keen’, she said, ‘to get into the thick of promoting the town and its rural heritage’.

Camden people yearned for a past when the primary role of the town was to service the surrounding farmers and their needs. Miss Showgirl is part of the invocation of rural nostalgia.

Miss Camden Showgirl (1962-1978)

1962 Helen Crace
1963 Helen Crace
1964 Sue Mason
1965 Barbara Duck
1966 Dawn Dowle
1967 Jenny Rock
1968 Heather Mills
1969 Michelle Chambers

1970 Joyce Boardman
1971 Anne Macarthur-Stanham
1972 Kerri Webb
1973 Anne Fahey
1974 Sue Faber
1975 Janelle Hore
1976 Jenny Barnaby
1977 Patsy Anne Daley

1978 Julie Wallace

Camden Showgirl (1979-2014)

1979 Sandra Olieric

1980 Fiona Wilson
1981 Louise Longley
1982 Melissa Clowes
1983 Illa Eagles
1984 Leanne Reily
1985 Rebecca Py
1986 Jenny Rawlinson

1987 Jayne Manns

1988 Monique Mate
1989 Linda Drinnan
1990 Tai Green
1991 Toni Leeman
1992 Susan Lees
1993 Belinda Bettington
1994 Miffy Haynes
1995 Danielle Halfpenny
1996 Jenianne Garvin
1997 Michelle Dries

1998 Belinda Holyoake
1999 Lyndall Reeves
2000 Katie Rogers
2001 Kristy Stewart
2002 Margaret Roser
2003 Sally Watson
2004 Danielle Haack
2005 Arna Daley
2006 Victoria Travers
2007 Sarah Myers
2008 Fiona Boardman
2009 Lauren Elkins
2010 Adrianna Mihajlovic
2011 Hilary Scott

2012 April Browne

2013 Isabel Head

2014 Jacinda Webster

RAS Young Woman of the Year (2019+)

In 2019 the Royal Agricultural Society re-branded the RAS Showgirl Competition as the RAS Young Woman of the Year. The first Camden Show, Young Woman of the Year, was awarded as the Camden Show 2023 Young Woman of the Year.

A display on the history of the Camden Show with various items, including ribbons, newspaper publicity and trophies. These items indicate the breadth of awards used to acknowledge excellence at the show. All part of the temporary display created by Jason Sharpe at the 2021 Camden Show sponsors’ event. (I Willis)

Updated 22 March 2023. Originally posted 17 March 2017.

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St John’s Church Camden, the soul of a country town

March 16, 2017May 13, 2023 camdenhistorynotes4 Comments

The emotional heart of the town

On the hill overlooking the Camden town centre is a church building representing the community’s historic, moral and emotional heart, its sense of place. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the church represents the town’s soul, built below it on the Nepean River floodplain in the mid-19^th century.

A metaphor for the order and stability

The church is a metaphor for the order and stability it represented in the wilds of the colonial frontier. It was at the centre of the original proposal for the English-style village of Camden in the 1830s, along with a courthouse and a gaol.

For the Macarthurs of Camden Park estate, the church was the centre of their moral and spiritual conservatism. As part of similar early 19th English estate villages, the church represented the stability and order Macarthur required of the new community on their estate. More than this, the church was a central part of the landscape vistas of the village from Camden Park House.

James Macarthur’s view of the world

According to Alan Atkinson, the church represented James Macarthur’s religious view of the world where faith emanated from the ‘joint initiative of all classes’. Macarthur maintained that ‘collective and mutual dependence’ was an essential part of the ‘Christian spirit’ that would be a ‘symbol of for their reliance on each other’. [i]

The church cause was promoted by James and William Macarthur, and they appealed to neighbours and employees for a fund to construct the church. By 1835 the Macarthurs subscribed £500 of a total of £644 from estate workers and neighbours.

The church’s building coincided with Governor Bourke’s Church Act of 1836 which offered a subsidy for building churches in the New South Wales colony. Macarthur applied for a subsidy of £1000 of the total cost of £2500.[ii]

St John’s Church Camden around 1900 (Camden Images)

The church was constructed with local bricks and timbers and was consecrated in 1849. Hector Abrahams states that St John’s church:

In its architectural innovation and picturesque placement in a controlled landscape, it is among the most important parish churches in Australia.[iii]

Camden religious precinct

The church and its grounds are in a religious precinct that includes the rectory and stables (1859), church hall (1906), and a cemetery. While the church was initially proposed in a ‘classical’ style, it was eventually constructed in the Gothic Revival style, which became popular in Sydney then. Sydney architect Hector Abrahams maintains that St Johns was the first Gothic Revival church in the colony of New South Wales when it finished in 1844.

Gothic revival

Gothic revival looked back to the glory of the medieval period, in contrast to neo-classical styles, which were popular at the time. To its supporters, Gothic architecture was representative of Christian values that were being destroyed by the Industrial Revolution. Gothic architecture was aligned with the conservatism of the Macarthurs rather than the republicanism of the French and American revolutionary wars and neoclassicism. Its popularity was partly driven in the colony of New South Wales by the rebuilding of the British Houses of Parliament in 1834, which evoked a romantic age.

St John’s Church at the top of John Street overlooking the village of Camden around 1895 C Kerry (Camden Images)

Camden’s Englishness

Over the subsequent decades, St John’s church has represented Camden’s Englishness. Probably the first reference to St John’s church and its Englishness was in the Anglican newspaper, the Sydney Guardian when it stated

it’s graceful and really well proportioned spire presents a cheering object to the up country traveller, as it breaks the dull outline of bush hill carrying the mind back to scenes well remembered and deeply loved by all English hearted folk (Sydney Guardian quoted in Clive Lucas Stapleton & Partners, St. John’s Anglican Church Precinct Menangle Road, Camden Conservation Management Plan, 2004, Sydney, p.44)

In 1926 the church was at the forefront of the mind of Eldred Dyer, who wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald that Camden was reminiscent of English parish church towns. He wrote that as he stepped out and walked around the town centre, he lifted his:

eyes to the old church as it stands in beauty on its hill, and In a flash you are transported to some old English church town. In a moment, if you have understanding, you and in a flash you are transported to some old English church town.[iv]

To a travel writer for the Sydney Mail in 1926, the church was the dominant English-style landscape feature on a road trip through the area:.

the shapely and lofty steeple of its church raising itself above the copse of frees on the hilltop and giving the little township a quaintly European aspect.[v]

From its inception, the church has become central to all representations of the Camden township and what it means to be born and bred in the district. The church is the fundamental icon is the community’s sense of place and identity.

Vista of St John’s Church from the Nepean River Floodplain 1910 Postcard (Camden Images)

Church symbolism

The church symbolism is central in tourism literature, business promotions, stories of the town, its history, and other representations of the district.

The church continues to dominate the town centre skyline and the minds and hearts of all Camden folk. Here hoping that this continues for another century.

Notes

[i] Atkinson, Alan. Camden / Alan Atkinson Australian Scholarly Publishing North Melbourne, Vic 2008 http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/fy0904/2008431682.html pp.30-32

[ii] Atkinson, Alan. Camden / Alan Atkinson Australian Scholarly Publishing North Melbourne, Vic 2008 http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/fy0904/2008431682.html pp.30-32

[iii] Hector Abrahams, Christian church architecture, Dictionary of Sydney, 2010, http://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/christian_church_architecture, viewed 16 March 2017

[iv] Sydney Morning Herald (NSW: 1842 – 1954), Saturday 28 August 1926, page 9

[v] Sydney Mail (NSW: 1912 – 1938), Wednesday 11 August 1926, page 46

Camden’s St John’s Church and cemetery are located on the ridge overlooking the town centre (I Willis, 2021)

Updated on 13 May 2023. Originally posted on 16 March 2017.

Camden Edwardian cottages

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The many faceted aspects of gardens

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A selection of gardens in the Macarthur region

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Camden Council votes to demolish homestead

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Loss of interest in heritage

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Photo Essay of Camden Anzac Day 2017

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A farming outpost of empire

Opening up the Southern Tablelands

Governed by absentee landlords

Fledgling settlement of Taralga

Rural empire of 38,000 acres

Strategic hilltop

Georgian-style residence

Notes

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The show is a popular annual rural festival

Histories of the Camden Show

Camden Show 1890s

Guess who you meet at the show?

The NSW Premier

Mud and Slush in 2014

2014 Camden Show

Show Merchandise 2013

Camden Showgirl

RAS Young Woman of the Year (2019+)

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The emotional heart of the town

A metaphor for the order and stability

James Macarthur’s view of the world

Camden religious precinct

Gothic revival

Camden’s Englishness

Church symbolism

Notes

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