Maureen Donnellon, Secretary, Birchip Historical Society, The Buloke Times
Zone meetings of Historical Societies are always important gatherings held twice a year to hear from the 20 groups who comprise the Midland Zone.
Some groups were there in person, others sent reports and all of us benefitted from hearing of the activities and problems solved by museum caretakers from Donald, Charlton, Nullawil, Birchip, Swan Hill, Pyramid Hill, Dunolly, Wedderburn, Carisbrook, Maryborough, St Arnaud, Wycheproof as well as snippets of news from Lake Boga, East Loddon, Kerang, Cohuna, Kerang, Boort, Serpentine, Inglewood and Barham/Koondrook. Our area is very wide.
Our special guests included Michael Menzies, Zone President from Geelong, Helen Curkpatrick from Horsham and Rosalie Triolo from the Royal Historical Society of Victoria from Melbourne. All three were present for a special award segment for Birchip Historical Society Archivist, Elaine McCallum.
Our day began with greetings and setting out of the amazing local history books for sale from towns, then lunch to which several members of Elaine McCallum’s family were invited, unbeknown to Elaine.
Following our meal Dorothy Reid, Birchip vice-president, welcomed all and the presentation of Elaine’s special Award of Merit took place with Rosalie reading the citation and presenting the award before photos were taken.
Elaine’s “Award of Merit”
Elaine became involved in 1992 when she returned to Birchip to care for her mother and began typing up the history of the railways begun by our first president, Rob Sanders, who died before all the documents could be typed up. Once she finished that, she typed up all the material collected by the late Cr. George Gould for his book on the Shire for the Centenary in 1995, while he was undergoing dialysis.
In 1994 she became archivist and has continued in that capacity ever since – indexing newspapers for various computer systems, cataloguing and cleaning artefacts, labelling, filing and displaying, researching and sorting, supervising people on work for the dole programs, working with students on research work and attending to all the tasks involved with research and preservation of photos, newspapers, files and artefacts.
Much research is done for sporting reunions as well as family research and Elaine has given countless hours of her time as a volunteer, a very worthy recipient of her award. This is the highest award given by the RHSV.
Michael Menzies and Helen Curkpatrick had also received similar awards earlier at other functions, and then we heard that Rosalie had received an OAM for her work for research and history too.
Historical societies and the preservation of the past in documents, photos, flora and fauna, and our farming heritage of our areas are certainly far from dead if our museums have anything to do with it. Volunteerism is alive and well in all our towns.
The meeting began with reports read from all group representatives and those emailed in from groups unable to attend, some involved in AGM meetings, a book launch, football presentation days and other commitments.
Items of interest
All groups had items of interest which ranged from restoring railway carriages, producing books on their areas, digitising photos through grants, moving into acquired or donated buildings, restoring barns for displays.
Nullawil, our close neighbour branch, has a member who is literally moving an old horse stables, post by post from its original site to the historic homestead grounds, Auchmore, to join the other 22 buildings and sheds. It is planned to be 30 feet by 90 feet. I think, as historians tend to talk in old measurements. They are also very proud of a Ronaldson and Tippett engine they have acquired which will likely be added to the stables with chaff cutter and other horse paraphernalia. They were recently visited by a 97-year-old former teacher Mrs Valda Hately, who taught at Nullawil West and Culgoa and walked through the Tyrell Creek to get to schools. Their members were resplendent in their new royal blue shirts with white monograms. Not many museums are bigger than the town they are in, but I think Nullawil is close to that. They have two church display buildings now too and have recently had a baptism.
Charlton has had a very successful “Keeping the Faith” Exhibition which showcased the history of the churches and the faith of their area. Their secretary, Caroline Olive, was also awarded a life membership of their Golden Grains museum for her amazing work and production of several books of history of Charlton organisations.
Maryborough celebrated several anniversaries this year with the completion of the railway station 150 years, 170 years of the naming of the town, 130 years of Worsely Cottage, their heritage home which has had a lot of restoration work done due to the weather and old age. Everything had to be moved out, cleaned and restored for new displays.
Pyramid Hill have had several groups travel by train to their museum, some were from Stargazers, an astronomy group while others were school students.
St. Arnaud, very lucky to receive a bequest for $100,000 to buy a house, shop or a building to aid their work. They decided on a Colorbond shed for wagons and machinery. They are still reeling from a vehicle which crashed into their archives building causing a lot of damage and found their insurance was too low to cover a lot. They also had published interesting booklets on lots of the mines around St. Arnaud and have a mining trail around the Woolpack Hotel.
As I once lived at St. Arnaud North and my dad was the one teacher at the school, while Mum was post mistress at the post office attached to the school residence, I am very interested in checking it out, as when a very small girl, I can remember the old fossickers coming to collect their mail and bread each week, which was delivered from St. Arnaud.
Swan Hill had conducted a town walk, highlighting the early buildings and a Lake Boga Cemetery walk, also had several guest speakers, one of whom spoke about Bangka Island and the Vyner Brooke tragedies of WW2.
Wedderburn reported that their Loddon Shire had purchased the old Court House and Police Station for them so a lot of moving ahead. They are also producing two plaques for their Soldiers’ Memorial Park. One is to commemorate all of the horses sent to WW1 from the district and the second to acknowledge Sergeant Colin Cameron, who single handedly fended off Japanese soldiers to allow his men to escape while he gave his life.
Cohuna have recently added new extensions to their building which will be opened next year for their 150th anniversary of the town and 55th birthday of their society. They have an avid collector of AFL memorabilia who now has a whole room full of interesting souvenirs which attracts many visitors.
Goldfields (Dunolly) reported they have produced a book for the 150th anniversary of their Railway to Dunolly. They have also erected signs at their 1874 cork tree and the Havelock Avenue of Honour, which they have now found out is the first Avenue of Honour planted in Australia. They also held a popular tour this year of Dunolly’s Murder Sites.
Donald have had interesting speakers at all their meetings, including Jim Petrie a stone mason, Peter Barbetti recalling his days as an engine driver of the trains, Sam Goldsmith on organising festivals and the work involved, and Brian Brasier on the lead up to the 1924 football grand final. Members travelled to Corack to view the Sands memorial and a walk around the railway area to research the railway houses along Walker Street. A new signboard will be erected to commemorate the Meyer family and the pioneers Johann August and Charlotte and their part in the development of the Donald district. Lots of family research and the Pole family reunion have been other pursuits.
They have also assisted Swanwater West Cemetery Trust with pioneer deaths and burials for their archives. Others have come looking for information on rural schools and books have been able to be sold to help them. A recent visitor told how her parents met at Donald and later returned for their honeymoon and called their eldest child “Donald”.
Wycheproof had no members present, or report, but two of us had been to their incredible museum now housed in the former State School building and urged others to go see and be amazed, too, at the sheer scale and size of the beautifully set out and labelled display.
Birchip who hosted the Zone meeting, reported that members had been working with school students on the early schools, the town in its early days and articles for the school magazine on fires, Debutante Balls and the centenary of the brick school buildings of the Higher Elementary School built in 1924. Very happy to have Campbell’s Tank memorial back in place after it was vandalised, and the model Phelps plough and Phelps memorial restored to the main street median strip. They are also working with the RSL to help with projects for the town and their archivist has continued to put articles in the “Buloke Times” each week for 100 Years Ago while articles on the important trees and the early school buildings have also been published in the “Times”.
General business followed with reminders about Annual History Month in October when some plan displays, the new proposed name of the Zone which is proposed to be the North Central Zone, with adjoining area to be the Wimmera Mallee Zone. An important Zoom seminar by Rosemary Cameron is available on 18th October for members who are unable to attend seminars in Melbourne.
Charlton have their Art Show plus their Garden Walk 12th/13th October, a good chance to see their historic features too. There are Show and Shines of all sorts of vehicles in Birchip 21st September, Flower Show in Birchip on 18th October, and all are supported by many of our volunteers at this meeting .
Members were advised to check their constitutions and documents regarding donations and sponsorship and to make sure that accepting money does not mean they are then being used to promote schemes which may not be supported by all their members and have repercussions for their communities such as those being offered at present by foreign owned companies to gain “support” through advertising campaign posters.
The RHSV theme for 2025 is to be “unearthed” and we have been urged to work with our local Cemetery Trusts and Genealogical Groups to help each other with information. The 2025 big all Zones meeting will be held in Geelong at the National Wool Museum, 5th and 6th April. We were asked to send in reports of interesting stories to Craige Proctor, our magazine editor, who does a wonderful job correlating all the reports and stories.
Thanks was expressed to our local newspapers for their willing inclusion of all our articles, photos and the interest in supporting our history. Afternoon tea was enjoyed and many visitors spent time in our Birchip museum and touring our town, admiring the returned artefacts and street art. Although we were unable to attend the presentation day for the football, netball and hockey, it was satisfying to know that many of the facts presented were supplied by our museum which holds files from all sports and is invaluable in providing the history for reunions and awards.
History past, present and to come will have a home in our 110-year-old museum, but needs more members to help preserve it.
Congratulations Elaine for the work and example you have set.
This article appeared in The Buloke Times, 24 September 2024.
