ULLADULLA
Glendonites.
Glendonites, glacial erratics, and marine fossils occur at Waden Head, about
1.5 km east of Ulladulla.
VINEYARDS
Bringelly
Shale quarry. Austral Bricks. Believed inactive. Reserve 7.8
Mt.
WAHROONGA
Fox
Valley. Low angle thrust in Hawkesbury Sandstone.
WALLACIA
Nortons
Basin - The Nortons Basin diatreme is elongated E-W and transverse to the
Lapstone Moncline zone. A narrow strip of Hawkesbury Sandstone may
separate eastern portion from the main portion near the junction of the Nepean
and Warragamba Rivers. Basalt is reported in the eastern part of the
breccia but exactly where is uncertain (Noreen Clark, pers. comm.) and no basalt
was found by the author (JGB) on a quick visit. In the main western
portion basalt has been mapped as dykes within the breccia. Carbonised
trees are reported to occur in the breccia (pers. comm. Br. Moy Hitchens,
Christian Brothers, Winbourne). Blocks of various sorts are present in the
western breccia, including Triassic blocks with coally shale similar as the unit
that is known above the Minchinbury Sandstone elsewhere in Mulgoa.
Nolan's
soil pit, Nepean River - A soil pit noted as being adjacent to K.H.
Dixon's. Worked intermittently by two to three men, 1972-1976, on land
owned by I. Fowler (MR4082). Nolan Quarrying & Mining Co. Pty
Ltd (seat of operations was at Kemps Creek).
Silverdale
Hill sandstone quarry - Nolan's sandstone quarry.
Locality also referred to as Warragamba, and
once as Ferndale. A lease on Water Board land where sandstone has long
been ripped
and crushed with a portable crushing plant. Commenced possibly in 1973
and operated by Nolan Quarrying & Mining Co. Pty Ltd
(MR4082). By 1974 the production capacity had risen, up to 1000
tons per day. Production in 1975 was noted to be "meeting
some of Walker requirements" and men employees increased from three to
four. There was a conflicting claim on the land by McClelland.
Demand ran strong in 1976-1977, with the material being much used for road
base. By 1979 it was experimenting with totally crushing the sandstone
to produce sand. That was ambitious at the time,
and soon afterwards the crusher was broken down. In late 1980 the
ripping in the quarry encountered a shale layer.
The
name and address of the operation (2005): Nolan Quarrying &
Mining Co, 2595 Silverdale Road, Wallacia, Lot D DP 339526.
Nolan Quarrying & Mining Co. Pty Ltd
was wound up by creditor-supported Deed of Company Arrangement by appointed
voluntary administrator Woodgate and Company, and the quarry assets passed to
the Hi-Quality Group, with the head office
remaining at Cnr Mamre Rd and Elizabeth Drive, Kemps Creek. The Wallacia
quarry continues to operate and promotes its products as "some of the
hardest and reliable sandstone within the Sydney Basin". The
Wallacia Quarry products include: <40 mm and <75mm crushed
sandstone, >80cm armour rock, gabbion, sandstone boulders, and bedding sand
(crushed sandstone).
WARRAGAMBA
Warragamba
Dam stands as a major engineering feat of the mid 20th Century. In
recent years the Warragamba Dam area was closed to public visitation, due to
upgrading works (discussed below). However the visitors centre,
enlarged and improved with more displays about dams and catchments, and the
history and future of Sydney’s water supply, was scheduled to re-open in
mid-2010. Long a popular picnic spot for Sydneysiders, access to
the public became restricted since 1999 because of upgrade work. The
area re-opened to the public in November 2009.
Another
popular view of Lake Burragorang is also available at Burragorang
Lookout which is situated on the edge of a cliff at the gorge via
Nattai. Many visitors to Warragamba also go there and it is
approximately a further 40 minutes by car from the dam. For
the dam area itself a guide may be downloaded:
Warragamba
Dam Grounds self guided walk - (http://www.sca.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/12876/A4-Warragamba-walk-map.pdf)
(141.4
Kb)
Another
former local tourist attraction had been a Lion Park which was built near
Warragamba in 1968 - the "African Lion Safari". For a
time this attracted hundreds of thousands of visitors each year.
It was closed to the public in 1991 but remained a centre for keeping circus
animals. Several lionesses which escaped in 1995 were of concern
to the nearby villages of Warragamba and Silverdale and one of the lionesses
killed a dog. A bear which had previously escaped had been shot by
residents. Water buffalo which escaped from the park are said to still
be living wild in the surrounding bushland.
Warragama
is one of the world's largest domestic water supply dams and supplies
Australia's premier city, Sydney. Warragamba contributes the
lion's share, about 80 per cent, of the water supply for nearly four million
people in the Sydney region. This greater Sydney region is the
nation’s most densely populated area.
Warragamba
is a dam and a mighty important place for the millions of people living in the
Sydney region - it supplies them and their pets with life's vital water to
drink, to wash/bathe/shower in. It fills their swimming pools, waters
their gardens and washes their cars; not to mention supplying the myriad needs
on innumerable industries in the region. As the population
grows, and grows, this is all a very heavy demand planced on the metropolis'
main water supply.
Some
people assume that the dam is on the Nepean River, but it is not.
It certainly lies close to the Nepean but is just upstream of the mouth of the
Warragamba River where that joins the Nepean southwest of Wallacia, and on a
gorge-like straight section of that river. The dam forms
Lake Burragorang and that in turn is filled by rainwater run-off from a
catchment area of over nine thousand square kilometres. The catchment
area extends from south of Goulburn, north to Lithgow, east to Wollondilly and
Mittagong, and west to part of the Crookwell local government area.
Major rivers that feed the dam are the are the Wollondilly, Coxs, Kowmung,
Wingecarribee and Nattai Rivers.
Although
not literally on the Nepean itself, it is not all too silly to consider the
Warragamba location a vital 'part' of the Nepean-Hawkesbury story.
There
are two major reasons for that. One is because the
Warragamba/Wollondilly River trend is part of the geological theory of the
GREAT LOST RIVER (pre-cursor of the Nepean-Hawkesbury system).
Back into the Tertiary period, as far back as 45 million years ago this river,
Sydney region's largest, has probably been in continuous/semi-continous flow
.... making it the oldest 'living'/moving entity that we know of as still
existing to this day. The second region, in the popular
mind, why Warragamba and the Hawkesbury River are closely connected is to do
with flooding. Sydney began as an English colony to dispose
of convicts to. At first the soil was pretty terrible/poor and for
a time the colonial authorities wondered if the colony could survive or grow
to self-reliance. But then the Hawkesbury and Nepean
Rivers were discovered (later found to be the one river) and their rich
friable soil floodplains became Sydney's breadbasket. The
big drawback however was flooding. Devastating floods, of up
to forty feet water rise, came periodically down this river and ensured that
any house built close on its banks would not survive. But
that is past history and the Hawkesbury floods have not occurred for a long
time now. Many say that building the dam protected the
Hawkesbury-Nepean Valley from flooding. This is something of
a half-truth or over-simplification. A dam, after initial filling,
does not stop floods as the flood waters just pass over it.
Rather the change has come about through a combination of the dam, vastly
increased human water usage, and perhaps climate change too. If
water use means the dam is rarely full then it can arrest smaller floods
within its storage capacity.
At
the very least the dam can slow down floodwaters. In the 1961
flood - the worst since the dam was built - waters from the Warragamba River
were reduced by a quarter of what the flood water flow might have been had the
dam not been there, and the dam delayed the flood reaching downstream by at
least several hours. The central drum gate and four radial gates
open automatically when the dam reaches and passes full storage level by about
80mm. The central gate begins opening first, and if the water continues
rising then the four radial gates will start opening at 230mm above full
storage level. An auxiliary spillway was built in 2002 but this would
only come into play during extreme floods.
Why
the auxilliary spillway was built was because a 1985 study estimated that a
severe flood that ‘overtopped’ the dam might cause sections of the wall
would collapse, releasing most of the stored water. If such a
thing happened the population centres of Penrith, Emu Plains, Richmond and
Windsor could once again experience very serious flooding as experienced in
the 1800s. A modern dambreak at Warragambe during a flood could
innundate around 4,000 houses and irreparably damage 6,400 more, leaving over
20,000 people homeless and causing an estimated $4.5 billion damage, the study
concluded. After the 1985 study the dam wall was raised a further five
metres and strengthened by installing post-tensioned steel cables to more
effectively tie the upper part of the wall to its base. Then a major
spillway was constructed to divert any excess floodwaters around the
dam. The construction of this spillway began in 1998 and it was
completed in June 2002. It is located on the east bank of the Warragamba
Gorge. In the event of an extreme flood, a series of easily
erodible earth and clay walls or “fuse plugs” which are built across the
upstream opening of the auxiliary spillway will progressively be washed away
by the rising floodwaters. Then water will enter the auxiliary spillway
and be diverted around the dam. With possible ongoing effects of
climate change this might now 'never' happen.
History
of the dam
The
Warragamba River site has important advantages for a major dam.
There is a large catchment area and the river flows through a long, narrow
gorge. Its potential was identified as early as 1845.
The Warragamba River gorge is 300-600 m wide and 100 m deep,
cliff-lined. This allows a relatively short but high dam wall in the
gorge to impound a vast quantity of water.
In
1845, the geologist Pawel Edmund Strzelecki was the firt to point out
this potential of the Warragamba Gorge for a water supply catchment, and
others were proposing by 1867 how a dam might be built there.
A
kindred scheme was developed and promoted by a consortium of several men in
the late 1800s. These were George Chaffey, a Californian irrigator who
had successfully completed the irrigation scheme in Mildura, Henry Gorman (of
Gorman and Hardie) an estate agent and property speculator, and also Arthur
Winbourn Stephen of Mulgoa (cf. Cox family and their Winbourne estate which
earlier experimented with major irrigation works), to subdivide the large
Mulgoa estates into small farms and irrigate the valley. Stephen was the
nephew of George Henry Cox of Winbourne. Stephen actively promoted the
scheme and set-up a model irrigation orchard to demonstrate the prospects of
an irrigated orchard. A private parliamentary authorising act for
the irrigation scheme, the Mulgoa Irrigation Act, was passed in December 1890
which permitted the promoters to acquire land, erect plant, and use and
distribute the waters of the Warragamba River through to South Creek as far
north as St. Marys. The proposal was contemporary with the Wentworth
irrigation scheme. An area of 18,610 acres w as proposed to be acquired and
subdivided into orchard and township lots. This substantial area of land
at the time was held by only seven owners including the pioneer Cox, Cooper,
King and Wentworth families. The land was at the time tenanted by about 300
farms. It was speculated that the scheme could dramatically increase
this number of inhabitants. . Based on Chaffey’s American irrigation
developments, George Reid MLA, who enthusiastically supported the scheme,
believed the population could increase up to 15,000. The company w
as listed on the stock exchange in 1892 and a foundation stone for irrigation
works was laid in December by the governor of N.S.W., Lord Jersey.
Having completing an engine house and some canal work, the company went into
liquidation in May 1893, after which its works and assets were were sold at
public auction in 1898.
Any
further plans, by Government, involving Warragamba were deferred during the
construction of the various Upper Nepean scheme dams, between 1907 and 1935.
The
increasing demand for water from expanding population, along with a record
drought from 1934 to 1942, moved the government to begin planning work on the
the development of Warragamba Dam in the 1940s. The project
received approval ca. 1940
and a first weir and pumping station known as the Warragamba Emergency Scheme
was built at a site just downstream of the main dam. Construction
work on the main dam got underway and this ranged over many years, between
1948 and 1960.
In
1943 the Government (Metropolitan Water, Sewerage and Drainage Board)
commissioned geologist William Rowan Browne to being site investigation Browne
continued as a geological adviser to the project until completion.
Geological investigations are reported by Waterhouse et al. (1951) and Johnson
(1960) and were largely completed by 1955. The chief engineer on
the project was Thomas Haynes Upton.
More
than 2,300,000 tonnes of sandstone was removed for dam site preparation.
Construction
work concrete was then mixed at the site using 305,000 tonnes of cement and
2,500,000 tonnes of sand and gravel.
The dam was built as a series of interlocking
concrete blocks. A system of overhead cableways carried 18 tonne buckets
which were used to place the concrete.
The amount of concrete pouring was so large
that engineers had to use two techniques to stop the temperature becoming too
hot as the concrete set. One was to add ice to the wet concrete, which was the
first application of this technique in Australia. The other was to embed
cooling pipes into the concrete and circulate chilled water through the
pipes. One of the first pre-stressed concrete towers in Australia
was built to house the ice-making plant.
According to Nicol (1964) the cement
for the dam came from the Berrima works 65 miles away. The aggregate used to mix the concrete is was Nepean River gravel and it is generally said to have come from at or near McCann’s Island at Emu Plains. It was conveyed from there to Warragamba via an aerial ropeway 12.3 miles long.
There is a
ground-lowered and disturbed looking area today on the southern side of
McCann's Island at Emu Plains but details of the operations there are unknown
(perhaps with details in Anonymous, 1954, which has not yet been consulted).
The
following Warragamba references were obtained from the Institution of Civil
Engineers in London, thanks to archivist Carol Morgan. Further NSW
government records are also being looked for.
REFERENCES
Anonymous, 1944. Warragamba dam. Concrete and Constructional Engineering, vol. 39, no. 2, pp. 46-47.
Anonymous, 1950. Warragamba dam. Engineer, vol. 190, no. 4935, pp. 199-202.
Anonymous, 1954. Warragamba dam, aggregate winning and processing plant. Commonwealth Engineer, vol. 42, no. 1, pp. 10-14.
Anonymous, 1960. Warragamba dam. Engineer, vol. 210, no. 5468, pp. 786-789.
Anonymous, 1960. Warragamba dam. Engineering, vol. 190, no. 4935, pp. 680-681.
Bandler, H., ?date. Warragamba and Burragorang: a history of two submerged, confluent valleys.
Johnson, W., 1960. Geological investigations at Warragamba dam, N.S.W., to end of 1955.
Institution of Engineers, Australia. Journal, vol. 32, no. 4-5, pp. 85-97.
Nicol, Thomas Bruce, 1964. Warragamba Dam. Institution of Civil Engineers. Proceedings, vol. 27, pp. 491-545.
Nicol, T.B., 1964. Warragamba Dam. Institution of Engineers, Australia. Journal, vol. 36, no. 10-11, pp. 239-262.
Waterhouse, L.I., Browne, W.R. and Moye, D.G., 1951. Preliminary geological investigations in connection with proposed Warragamba dam, N.S.W. Institution of Engineers, Australia. Journal, vol. 23, no. 4-5, pp. 74-84.
Fletcher, H.B., 1948. Dual 12 1/3 mile cableway to haul aggregates for Australian Dam. Concrete, vol. 56, no. 5, p 26.
[ ICE call number 628.1(944) TFV 249 ].
Metropolitan Water Sewerage and Drainage Board, 1947. Sydney Water Supply. Warragamba development project.
[ ICE call number 628(944) TFV 249 ].
Metropolitan Water Sewerage and Drainage Board, ?undated. The Sydney water supply head works.
[ ICE call number 551.49(94) T8V 818 ].
WARNERVILLE
Mountain
Road. Shale quarry and brick plant near Buttondeer Creek.
Zacuba company. An amount of about 100,000 tonnes was extracted in 1990/91
and the reserve was 1 Mt.
WENTWORTH
FALLS
Gladstone Colliery - In Jamison
Valley at base of cliff below Fairmont Resort, which is between the Leura Golf
Course and the Jamison Valley. Construction work for this mine
began in 1884 or earlier. The mine operated to begin producing coal
between 1885 and 1896 but was never truly successful and faced very
considerable engineering difficulties. The mine was able to extract only
about 200 tons of coal, mostly or entirely in 1885-1887 (requires checking).
The coal was hauled by a ropeway up the cliff and via aerial ropeway across
the Valley of the Waters and on to a siding on the main railway. This
siding, the Gladstone siding, was later redeveloped into Leura railway station
in 1891 and thus the coal siding was the nucleus to Leura township coming into
existence. The 1891 first platform and waiting room were built and
paid for by land developer William Eyre. After the conversion from coal
siding to passenger platform (even though unattended initially), Leura (at
that time known as Lurline) was about to have its raison d'etre changed.
Those able to afford respite from the summer heat had discovered a
hillside protected from westerly winds and with the fancied healing powers of
the mountain mists. Henceforth, Leura would be a popular tourist
destination. The mine holding was apparently sold after the propietor
was gaoled for fraud. One of the main mine buildings was re-erected to
serve as Wentworth Falls Catholic church between 1896 and 1912. Also see
the Katoomba entry for some further ramifications as it is likely that the
equipment from it was re-used to construct the ropeway used to bring the oil
shale from the Ruined Castle mine to the head of the Katoomba
Incline. In 2001 the Blue Mountains Council took note of some
relics of the mining that still survived, including remains of the winding
engine, as development began to encroach on the area.
WENTWORTHVILLE
Shannon
Roof Tile Co. -
The
Powerhouse Museum preserves records of this company (1928-1982):
Archive,
tile and brick manufacturing, Shannons Roof Tile Co, Australia, 1928-1982
Business records of Shannons Roof Tile Company of Petersham (head office) and
Wentworthville (works), manufacturers of terracotta roofing tiles,
agricultural pipes and texture bricks, including (-1) record of plant
maintenance, 1949-1978, (-2) quotations books, n.d., (-3) brochure on Shannon
Hollow Terra Cotta Blocks, n.d., (-4) docket book, 1980-1981, (-5) delivery
dockets, 1981-1982, (-6) docket book/cash sales recipt book, 1963, (-7) rubber
stamp, n.d., (-8) cheque butts, 1965-1966, 1978-1979, (-9) record book,
1936-1957, (-10) credit notes book, 1958-1977, (-11) account book, 1930-1955,
(-12) cash books, 1936-1958, 1973-1979, (-13) Journal (Carter & Co),
1931-1937, 1942-1946, (-14) account book, 1940-1960 and (-15) miscellaneous
material, 1928, 1957 and n.d. [Registration No. 85/41]
WEST
PENNANT HILLS
West
of Franklin Road at Castle Hill Road - Location is west of Franklin Road and
near back of 186 Castle Hill Road and 128 Franklin Road (AMG 317654E,
6265123N). Silcrete and yellow/green tuff flakes noted over an area of
80x79m during consideration of the North West Rail Link in 2006. Site is
on upper slope about 200m south of Pyes Creek.
WETHERILL
PARK
Shale
quarry. Camide company. Discontinued.
WILBERFORCE
Wilberforce
is near the right of this map. Of the three patches of Rickabys
Creek Gravel shown, only the middle one along Salters Road was found during
two visits in March 2010. There is Bringelly Shale where the
western patch is shown but no gravel. At the middle (Salters Road)
patch the gravel directly overlies Ashfield Shale and the latter seem to
form the land surface further east, with no gravel sighted at the eastern
end of Old Sackville Road where the eastern gravel patch is shown on this
map. A discrepancy was found on published maps as to the
whereabouts of Fleming's Hill (gravel capped), with some different maps
showing it at either of the here-mapped middle and eastern gravel
patches. (Source: 1:100,000 Penrith
Geological Series Sheet 9030; per Sydney Water),
Wilberforce
is a very historic place. It has Australia's oldest settler's
cottage made of timber, and various fine old structures of brick and stone
work. Rose Cottage is the oldest slab hut in Australia, or at
least the oldest such structure still standing on its original
site. Wilberforce
also probably has the oldest park in Australia; the town park in the centre of
the laid-out village, still exactly where it was first planned and still
serving the initial designated purpose.
Wilberforce
has been a focus within Hawkesbury Council about what its sense of heritage is
- with a memorable statement made by one Councillor that Rose Cottage was
"not the sort of heritage that we like to live up to."
Was he perhaps have a bit of a joke, or did some think "old"
buildings like Rose Cottage are not worth keeping?
The Hawkesbury hereabouts was settled in
1794 when twenty-two farm grants were given along the river and along the
near-river stretch of South Creek. One year later the settlers
numbered 400 hundred and were strung out along a 30 mile length of the
Hawkesbury River. In 1810 Governor Macquarie had five town sites
surveyed on higher ground because of the disastrous flooding those who lived
on the river flats had experienced. Wilberforce was one of these
five higher ground township sites then laid out (the other four are Pitt Town,
Windsor, Richmond and Castlereagh).
Touring
the Hawkesbury in 1810, Macquarie recorded, '. . .the Township for the
Phillip District; on the North or left bank of the Hawkesbury, I have named
Wilberforce in honour of and out of respect to the good and virtuous William
Wilberforce. British Member of Parliament and humanitarian, a real
patriot and the real Friend of Mankind'. Early in 1811,
Macquarie returned with James Meehan, the surveyor, to mark out the township.
Wilberforce
school centennary in 1920. Constructed in 1820
Tombstone
removed from river flats to outside the school - of early child who died from
snake bite:
In
Memory of
JOHN
HOWORTH
who
departed this life
October 8th 1804. Aged 11 years
from a subtle surpent's bite he cride
our rose bud cut he drup'd and died
in life his Father's glorey
and his mothers pride
Rose
cottage, 2010
.
Rose
cottage, 1984. It is recognised as Australia’s oldest known
timber slab house that is situated on it’s original site.
A
Permanent Conservation Order, first proposed by the Rose family in 1977 was
finally granted on 14 August 1985.
The
cottage during its 1995-1996 conservation repairs.
Pioneer
Village, commenced 1960s
Thomas and Jane Rose and
their four children arrived in the colony on 16th Jan 1793 aboard the "Bellona",
the first shipment of free settlers.. The settlers called the land area
of their grants "Liberty Plains", now in the suburb of
Strathfield. Rose named his grant "Hunter's Hut",
after the Governor. Their fifth child John was born there as was
Sarah and Henry. Mrs Jane Rose was speared outside their dwelling
but the spear struck whalebone in her busk stay and did not penetrate her or
cause any severe injury. It was to Rose's house that the first
'bushranger', escaped convict "Black Caesar" was taken, and soon
died, after being shot by John Wimbow. The Liberty Plains
land proved infertile and settlers from there moved to the Hawkesbury.
Thomas Rose purchased an
allotment of 15 acres, part of Laurel Farm, in 1802 from Lawrence May in 1802
and some Rose presence remained in the area for 110 years, although most of
the land came to pass from the Rose family over time. Rose's first
purchase is located approximately one mile downstream from Rose Cottage and
that area passed to succeeding generations of the Rose family until the
1950s. Their first home was on the river flats there but after
they lost most of their possessions in the flood of 1806 they moved to the
present house position. In 1809 Thomas bought from William Mackay
part (15 acres) of a 30 acre farm a short distance down-stream from Laurel
Farm and on higher ground. There Thomas and Jane built, around 1811, the
house that is now known as "Rose Cottage".
Rose descendants owned and
inhabited this cottage till 14/7/1961 when bachelor John Rose who then held it
decided to sell it to the Mc Lachlans., who owned the hotel
alongside. Bill McLachlan had a vision to build a Pioneer
Australiana Village which would have the Rose cottage (thought to be the
oldest standing wooden cottage in Australia still at its original location) as
its central attraction.
On version read, states that
in 1970 Bill McLachlan bought Rose Cottage and developed Australiana Pioneer
Village next to it by transporting there 25 wooden buildings from other
Hawkesbury locations. The Rose house contained early furniture
still, including an ornate organ which was used in the early Methodist
services held at the house (Strathfield District Historical Society
newsletter, April 1998). When this was noted in the
newsletter, it appears also that the Rose Cottage was stated to be then open
for visits Thursdays to Sundays each week.
Another source states that after
John Henry Rose's death in 1961, Rose Cottage, including the other half of the
land devised to Richard in Charles' 1911 will, was purchased by Dugald
McLachlan, the proprietor of the hotel next door to Rose Cottage who
envisioned making the Cottage the centrepiece of his planned Pioneer Village.
McLachlan went on to acquire almost all of the original 30 acre Mackay grant,
and set about moving other old buildings from their original locations to
there. (Bill McLachlan and Dugald McLachlan are the
same person).
Somehow the Hawkesbury Shire
Council acquired the Village. On 17/1/1993, at the Bi-Centennial
celebrations of the Arrival of the Thomas and Jane Rose family, the Council
returned Rose Cottage to the Rose family but in 2009 the Council put the
remainder of the Pioneer Village for sale. Ownership of the cottage has
passed to the "Thomas and Jane Rose Family Society", founded
1975, which has as its goals, two targets:
- The conservation of Rose Cottage at
Wilberforce,
- The publication of the family’s history
and genealogy.
The Australiana Pioneer
Village in Wilberforce was established by the late Bill McLachlan. It
was listed on the State Heritage Inventory as a significant item.
Dugald Andrew 'Bill'
McLachlan had purchased the property in the 1960s with the dream of of
rescuing some of the Hawkesbury's heritage. He transferred a
number of historic buildings from around the district that were at risk during
the 1970s. Without such rescue these buildings may have otherwise been
lost.
Bill McLachlan died in 1971,
aged 54 years, and is buried in the grounds of the village. His family
carried on his vision, supported by a Friends Group.
When in 2009, the Council
moved to sell the site to a developer, the Friends group which had run the
pioneers village call a protest meeting in June 2009 and organised a petition
not to sell it.
(Photos:
Hawkesbury Gazette and Colin B., 2009)
The
protest meeting is reported on by the Hawkesbury Gazette on 1 Jul 2009,
http://www.hawkesburygazette.com.au/news/local/news/general/hundreds-protest-pioneer-village-sale/1556390.aspx?storypage=0
The Friends of the Australiana Pioneer Village
who organised the rally to fight Hawkesbury City Council's decision to sell
the Village garnered plenty of support from locals on the day. The
Council had locked up the site and the Friends' President Mrs Lesley George
made the group's resolve known when she addressed the crowd: "We'll
get those gates open by hook or by crook and we'll all be in there by
Australia Day next year."
The Friends' business manager Sid Kelly said
the Council was "fresh out of ideas" when it came to the Village,
and their approach had been to "get rid of the problem ....It's a bloody
disgrace .... Shame on you, you are endeavouring to destroy a national
icon" he said.
Riverstone MP John Aquilina vowed to support
the community in its fight to save the Village. Mr Aquilina said he had spoken
with Planning Minister Kristina Keneally, who had promised to make sure the
Village stayed on the State heritage register.
"I was recently reading a brochure
published by the Hawkesbury City Council titled Shaping Our Future. It stated
that one of our main goals was to retain and manage key heritage assets ....
The Pioneer Village is a key asset not only to the Hawkesbury but to
Australia" said speaker Amy Barry, aged 10.
Chris McLachlan, whose parents had founded the
Village in the 1960s, addressed the crowd and thought any potential sell-off
"disgusting". He stated "A number of councillors
said it was never profitable... I challenge any of them to prove that. I
have got documentary proof the Village made money from day one," he
said. "It was successful and it will be successful again when
Council gives it back to us."
Why Hawkesbury Mayor Bart Bassett and seven
other councillors had voted a little earlier, in May, to sell the Village was
not entirely clear. Council had closed the village years before
and apparently regarded it as a dead liability.
It was thought that following this protest
meeting it is understood that Council reflected on its decision to sell, and
probably shelved or abandonned.
On 3 February 2010 the
Hawkesbury Gazette reported "Australiana Pioneer Village saved" -
"
The Australiana Pioneer Village is
back in community hands after a shock backflip by a number of Hawkesbury
councillors at last night's standing-room-only meeting .... Friends
publicity officer Lesley George was on the brink of tears as supporters hugged
her and congratulated her and other Friends members on the momentous win ....
She was absolutely elated that the Village would be kept in community hands,
which is what she and others have worked long and hard for" ( http://www.hawkesburygazette.com.au/news/local/news/general/australiana-pioneer-village-saved/1741520.aspx
)
The reopening of the Pioneer
Village may also bring more visitors and re-invigorate Rose Cottage as well -
for at present there is not even any sign on this building that visitors can
ever inspect it. It is understood that it did have opening days
previously, and that although no sign was seen to such effect, it might still
be opening for inspection on the Third Sunday of each month (10;00 am to 3:00
pm, admission $2).
Because of fears on what might
happen with the adjacent Australiana Pioneer Village complex after Council
closed it, the Rose Society determined that it would aim to build on adjacent
vacant land a "resource centre" which building would contain
amenities, conference/display area and a storage facility for archivial
material. Beyond some preliminary sketches that have been
prepared, this project has perhaps not progressed (the family website has not
been updated since 2008 - http://www.rosefamilysociety.org.au/meetings.asp
).
There are discrepancies of
information apparent. On the Rose Society website ( http://www.rosefamilysociety.org.au/cottage.asp
) it states "In 1809 Thomas Rose bought from William Mackay part of a 30
acre farm a short distance down-stream from Laurel Farm and on higher
ground" (where the present Rose Cottage is). However, on the
Heritage Council website ( http://www.visit.heritage.nsw.gov.au/16_subnav_09_2.cfm?
) it is stated "An allotment of 15 acres, part of Laurel Farm, was
purchased by Thomas Rose in May 1802. Located approximately one mile
downstream from Rose Cottage, Laurel Farm is considered an associated
place". Thus one source says the higher ground Rose Cottage
is downstream from Laurel Farm and the other source says Laurel Farm is
downstream from Rose Cottage. These two websites also differ in
other respects. The Rose Family one says Rose Cottage was built in 1811
and the Hetitage Council one says "Rose Cottage was built in the 1820s or
1830s ...". This Heritage webpage also states that The
Australiana Pioneer Village, featuring Rose Cottage, was opened as a tourist
attraction in 1970, whereas other sources say in the 1960s.
Fleming's
Hill - Rickabys Creek Gravel
"Fleming's
Hill" as marked on the 1896 map of Parish Castlereagh. This
is at the
left
of the intersection of Old Sackville Road with King Road.
Contours
show a ridge running east along the northern side of Wilberforce, along which
Kurmond Road and
Old
Sackville Road run. At the eastern end of the ridge it birfurcates
along both Salters Road and
towards
the end of Old Sackville Road. Some maps have shown Fleming's Hill
at the end of Old
Sackville
Road but others have shown it at Salters Road (near Sunnyleaf Pty Ltd's
"Snow
White
Mushrooms" [42 Salters Road], and stone house "Barredeen" [52 Salters
Road]).
For
some uncertain reason, the name "Fleming's Hill", a little east of
Wilberforce, has been printed on maps at two different locations.
On the above 1896 map where the words "Fleming's Hill" occurs
certainly looks to have been Flemings family land. Portion 302 was
a grant to Charlotte Fleming who is believed to have been the wife of John
Henry Fleming. Her maiden surname was Dunstan and portion 302 is
shown surrounded by relatives' land (e.g. J.H.F. Dunstan would presumably be
John Henry Fleming Dunstan and assuredly a relative). It was later
learned, from Norma McLean whose 3-g-uncle was JHF, that John Henry Fleming Dunstan was Charlotte's nephew, as she
and John Henry Fleming didn't have any children (J.H.F. Dunstan was the son of Benjamin Dunstan
and Ann Turnbull).
South
of Charlotte's portion 302 is the large portion 46 of David Dunstan.
There were several David Dunstans , one of
which was Charlotte's father and another her brother (family information from
Norma McLean) .
John Henry Fleming was leader of the group who carried out the Myall Creek
massacre for which seven men were hanged, but Fleming himself was never
captured. What happened to him after that the writer does not
know.
Other
maps however (government published) have placed Fleming's Hill further west,
where the J. Salter land is shown above, along Salters Road. It
was to the latter site that this writer went in 2010, believing Fleming's Hill
was there, and found there an excellent exposure of the Fleming's
Hill Gravel, at "Barradeen", 52 Salters Road.
This
is an interesting and signficant site. Next to a fine heritage sandstone house, "Barradeen",
the Attard residence, there is a small cut made for levelling out ground for a
large shed. That cutting gives an excellent exposure of
Rickabys Creek Gravel abruptly overlying shale. The shale is
rather bleached and looks like it is Ashfield Shale (or it could be a pure shale
interval in the Bringelly Shale) but
there is no weathered profile below the gravel. Such, if it
existed, had been stripped off by the gravel depositing
river.
This
place, 52 Salters Road is the site Wi/3 that was visited in the late 1990s by Tessa
Corkill, for her "Here and There" thesis concerning stone materials
likely useful for Aboriginal useage (Corkill 1999):
|
Area |
Code |
Easting |
Northing |
Elev(m) |
Geology |
Rock Types Collected |
|
Wilberforce |
Wi/3 |
300300 |
6285750 |
40 |
Tr |
silcrete, qzite |
|
Wilberforce |
Wi/1 |
298440 |
6286340 |
30 |
Rwa (Tr?) |
silcrete, silicified wood, ironstone, sandstone |
Hall
(1926) described the Fleming's Hill gravels thus: "Immediately to
the north of Wilberforce, near Fleming's Hill, in shale country and well above
the level of the old river alluvium, is an extensive outcrop of river
gravel. The pebbles are very numerous, well rounded or egg-shaped,
varying from a fraction of an inch to ten or twelve inches in length embedded
in fine friable soil or dark brown colour. Some of the smaller pebbles
are composed entirely of milky or rose-pink quartz; some of the bigger ones
are quartzite and others are of igneous origin. The outcrop is
about 100 feet above the level of the river and has been dissected by the
present drainage. On the gravel slopes orcharding is carried on, for
although the soil is very difficult to plough it is rich enough to pay for the
trouble."
Silcrete
boulder from Wi/3 (Photo: Tessa Corkill)
At
the mushroom farm. Note low cut exposing the gravel at left of
track, and the exposed shale to the right of the track
where
the gravel have been stripped off. The remaining thickness of
gravel at Fleming's Hill is likely not great.
(Photo
per real estate agent, Cassidy
Real Estate Agents - Bligh Park.
Peter Cassidy & Trevor
Devine.
The
12 acre site having been for sale since about 2008; price $1,500,000 )
Thus
in the southern half of Salters Road the gravel seems to overlie Ashfield
Shale. Looking east from Salters Road, along Old Sackville Road
one sees more Ashfield Shale exposed (cutting at 110 Old Sackville Road) but
no more gravel was found, even though the Penrith Sheet maps a stringer of it
running east. Going further east, along Grono Farm Road, more
Ashfield Shale is seen in cuttings and this then passes down stratigraphically
into Hawkesbury Sandstone. Along Argents Road there is
also seen the top of Hawkesbury Sandstone, or more likely the Mittagong
Formation which is a thin sequence of transitional beds, in the roadside
gutters.
Sandstone
in gutter along the southern side of eastern Argents Road. This
appears to be thin-bedded sandstone
and
may be within the Mittagong Formation.
Along
the Nepean-Hawkesbury catchment all gravel occurrences regarded as Tertiary
are referred to using the one formation name, Rickabys Creek
Gravel. There is no proof that these remnants all below to the
same river (assumed ancestry of the Nepean-Hawkesbury a.k.a. Great Lost River)
but as there is also no proof of the opposite, or any known systematic
difference in the lithological assortment of their contents, it is thought
best and simplest to refer to them all by the one formation name until or
unless evidence arises to subdivide them. If they ever were
subdivided then the gravels near Wilberforce should be called the Fleming's
Hill gravel as they have been noted as such since the 1920s when mentioned by
Lesley Hall. Who noted them first of all is not known.
And today the people spoken to who live there had never heard of Fleming's
Hill or of Fleming - yet it is so marked on older maps. Some
modern maps do not show Fleming's Hill. The maping company Sydway
Publishing Company, which publishes "Greater Sydney and Blue Mountains
Street Directory" (and has 'electronic maps and data available - www.sydway.com.au
) has slightly misplaced Fleming's Hill, which is shown on their 11th Edition,
2006, as being not near "Barradeen" and the Mushroom Farm (fide
older maps) but as just north of Old Sackville Road to the east of its
junction with Salters Road. Later it was also learned that
other maps, including the orthophotomap of the area position the name
Fleming's Hill near the eastern end of Old Sackville Road, similar as where
the 1896 parish map has it.
The
Penrith 1:100,000 sheet (9030) geological map shows several small patches of
the gravel hereabouts, but the stratigraphic section of the Notes has omitted to mention it where
discussing the distribution of the Rickabys Creek Gravel.
The gravel, however, is discussed in the Notes in the "Geomorphology'
section by R.W. Young of University of Wollongong. In the context
of stratigraphy/geomorphology it may be remembered overall that both the
Tertiary Rickaby's Creek Gravel and the younger Pleistocene gravel (sometimes
called Cranebrook Formation) are both of seemingly sheet-like extent with a
slight dip to the north (reflecting of course the river valley
gradient). The Rickabys Creek Gravels are 10-12m thick (nothing
like that at Fleming's hill where gravel patches are mere erosional remnants)
and slope/dip northwards from Penrith area to Windsor area. The
Cranebrook Formation gravels are similar thickness, 10-12m, and also slope
northwards from Penrith to Windsor. Outliers of Rickabys Creek
Gravel are also found at greater elevation on the face of the Blue Mountains
and at Flemings Hill. There are all sorts of theories about
why this may be so, which Young discusses - the mountains have gone up, the
plains have sunk ('sunkungsfeld') and so on.
Leslie Hall in 1926
wondered if the lowlands at Richmond had sunk and she was probably much
influenced by the work or Griffith Taylor who envisaged a 'warp lakes'
phenomenon (Taylor, 1923). Hall envisaged that a "slight
depression of the land in front of the uplift occurred" with the result
of a temporary lake forming around where the Richmond lowlands now
are. The idea of this structural depression probably begins with
Jensen (1911) who expressed his semi-vague suspicion of a movement of
depression being particularly strong or centred in the area around Richmond,
following on the monoclinal fold of the Blue Mountain.
Hall
envisaged this lake build up as very extensive, ranging between Penrith and
Cattai. She wrote "Finally the water in the lake became high
enough that to overflow through its former notch [meaning near Cattai] and so
the stream continued to cut down to its former valley to sea
level". She further wrote that "The original stream was
obliterated by the lake, but the pebbles which were in its bed remained there
in association with the silts and so have formed the gravel outcrops to be
seen in the Windsor district to-day". In modern terms then,
the sediment of Hall's (and her supervisor, GriffithTaylor's) great warp lake
would be the Londonderry Clay as overlies the Rickabys Creek Gravel.
Also overlying the Rickabys Creek Gravel at Vincent Road, Cranebrook, is white
sandstone with ferruginous mottles which is very like the sandstone at Burgess
Road, Freemans Reach.
Young, in the Penrith Notes noted how "The great extent of alluvium
between Penrith and Windsor has been attributed to subsidence of this part of
the Sydney Basin (Smith 1979)" but gave his reasons for not believing
that. He stated that the "Nepean River flows on berock near
Castlereagh (GR 836725), and its drowned bedrock thalweg further downstream
shows no sign of reverse tilting (Hickin 1970)". Re the
elevated patches of gravel on the face of the Blue Mountains (at Lapstone
Monocline or 'structural complex'), Young whilst probably not doubting uplift
overall did also note that because the river likely shifted eastwards in
response to initial (structural) movements on the monocline, the age of the
more elevated gravel remnants need not be the same as the age of the
main mass of Rickabys Creek 'sheet' of gravel. Young noted that
caution is needed, however, "in using the scattered outcrops of Ricksabys
Creek gravel near Wilberforce, which are 30m or so higher than those at
Windsor, as a guide to the uplift of the Hornsby Plateau".
Apart
from that mention by Young, Wilberforce does not seem to be mentioned in the
Penrith Notes (Jones and Clark 1987), but it is difficult to know that since
there is no index in the book. There is one thin
section in the Geological Survey collection from Fleming's hill area (Tessa
Corkill, pers. comm.).
West
of the high points with patches of the gravel, there is observed white
post-Triassic sandstone with apparently wide distribution. It is
seen in gutters along Argents Road and on the east side of the Putty Road
(a.k.a. Singleton Road) just north of where Argents Road joins that
(i.e. at 224 and 217 Putty Road. This whitish sandstone is similar
as that seen at the east end of Burgess Road, Freemans Reach, where there are
several silcrete boulders that have apparently weathered from such
sandstone. Along Argents Road no silcrete boulders were
noted. However, close west of here, on Edgeworth Park Stud,
silcrete cobbles/boulders are known to be present (not visited, pers. comm.
Tessa Corkill, being her site Wi/1). Location Wi/1 seems similar
as the Burgess Road occurrence, i.e. post-Triassic sandstone and
silcrete clasts but not other clast types found (hence unlike the Rickabys
Creek Gravel at Fleming's Hill. At her Wi/1 site, Corkill also found a very interesting cobble of waterworn silicified
wood.
Lesley
Hall in 1925 (Hall 1926) was possibly the first to record the gravel at Flemings Hill. She carried out a physiographic and geographical survey,
covering all manner of aspects, along the Hawkesbury River between Wndsor and
Wiseman's Ferry in 1925 under the direction of Professor Griffith Taylor, a
famous geographer and geologist. Her paper thus likely reflects
Taylor's own theories on how the landscape formed (an ever controversial or
unsettled subject of speculation).
Hall
recorded ancient gravels all around Windsor and Pitt Town and elsewhere.
She wrote: "The origin of these various gravel outcrops is not precisely clear and they offer an interesting field for more detailed work".
REFS:
Corkill T.,
1999. Here and
There: Links between Stone Sources and Aboriginal Archaeological Sites in
Sydney, Australia. Unpublished M.Phil. thesis, University of Sydney.
Hall,
L.D. 1926. The physiography and geography of the Hawkesbury River
between Windsor and Wiseman's Ferry. Linnean Society of New South
Wales. Proceedings 51, pp. 553-593.
Jensen,
H.I., 1911. The river gravels between Penrith and
Windsor. Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South
Wales. Vol. 45, pp. 249-275.
Jones,
D.G. and Clark, N.R., 1991. Geology of the Penrith 1:100,000 sheet
9030. Geological Survey of New South Wales. Sydney. 201 pp.
Taylor,
T.G., 1923. The warped littoral round Sydney.
Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales. Vol. 57, pp.
58-79.
More
- For more
developments, and information on additional aspects of Willberforce area see wilberforce.htm
WINGECARRIBEE
SHIRE
Wingecarribee
shire and LGA
The
major towns in Wingecarribee Shire are Mittagong,
Bowral,
Moss
Vale and Bundanoon.
Smaller towns or villages include: Balmoral
Village, Hill
Top, Colo
Vale, Yerrinbool,
Robertson,
Burrawang,
Burradoo,
Berrima,
Sutton
Forest, Exeter,
Wingello,
Welby
and Penrose.
The Wingecarribee shire is named after the
Wingecarribee River. The tourist industry term "Southern
Highlands" is more or less synonymous.
The eastern parts of the Shire are bounded by
the Illawarra escarpment with remnant areas of rainforest and heathland.
The north of the Shire is rugged eucalypt bushland. The Wollondilly and
Wingecarribee Rivers flow through the west of the Shire in deep sandstone
valleys. Much of the area around these rivers is catchment for the
Warragamba Dam which supplies water to the Sydney metropolis. The south
of the Shire is bounded by Uringalla Creek and is also sandstone plateaux
country dissected by deep gorges.
The Wingecarribee Swamp is home to the
remaining population of the endangered Giant dragonfly (Petalura gigantea),
which is is one of the world's largest dragonflies, growing to 20cm long with
a wing span of 12 cm.
Female
Petalura gigantea
Giant dragonflies have an extraordinary life
cycle, spending their first few years underground as larvae. At
that stage the dragonflies are more like trapdoor spiders, building
underground tunnels up to 1.5 m long and emerging only at night to hunt.
The swamp was also the scene of
a dramatic peat deposit basal detachment in August 1998.
The collapse of
the peat deposit at Wingecarribee Swamp
(The
swamp collapsed, its whole topography and geography transformed
overnight.
A Wetland of national,
perhaps
international,
significance reduced to a torn and twisted wreck - which may take hundreds of
years to fully rehabilitate
-
Researched by Prof. Sharon Beder, University of Wollongong.)
As regards fine quality
building stone, the Shire is famous for the Bowral trachyte stone industry.
The last amalgamation of local government
bodies, as
Wingecarribee Shire Council, occurred in 1981. In this the
Mittagong and Bowral Councils were amalgamated into Wingecarribee Shire
Council (on 1 January 1981). This was State government driven, although
it also had a good deal of local support from people who saw it as a logical thing to do.
In early times there was also a Nattai Shire Council for land surrounding Mittagong (formed in
1906). Bowral was the headquarters of the Nattai Shire Council.
The Mittagong Council (town municipality) had combined with Wingecarribee in 1949. Moss Vale Municipality
had also previously joined the former Wingecarribee Shire Council (on 10
February 1933). The 1981 amalgamation came after various former attempts
to effect amalgamation of courncils in the region. In 1921 an effort to
amalgamate the municipal councils and shires did not proceed when Nattai Shire
and Moss Vale Council refused. Amalgamation (of Bowral, Mittagong
and part of Nattai Shire) continued to be pressed by the State government but
the Shire Council refused to consider it. In 1934 the State
government again attempted to amalgamate Mittagong Council but the council
refused. In July 1938 an inquiry regarding the amalgamation was held and
Mittagong Council registered their opposition; nevertheless on 1 January 1939
the municipality and shire did amalgamated (more detail sought). In
March 1949 Nattai Shire changed its name to Mittagong Shire, possibly to
re-assert Mittagong's prominence (more detail sought). Prior to
the 1981 amalgamation, the Mittagong Shire Council had been dismissed by the
State government and an Administrator, Mr Jim Gasson, appointed.
The
former School of Arts, later Mittagong Shire Council building, believed to
contain stone
from
the historic Stone from Fitzroy Iron Co. (Photo: Robert Dean,
1996). This site
now
contains the library and archives of the Berrima Historical Society.
Wingecarribee
Shire Council is based at Moss Vale. It uses the Conquest
Asset Management System (which was installed late in 2008 with planned data
loading and commissioning in early 2009) and ESRi
ArcGIS for geographic information system work. The Asset Management
Coordinator is Darron Passlow (darron.passlow@wsc.nsw.gov.au).
The Council participates in the Local
Government and Muncipal Knowledge Base.
Amalgamations
may play havoc with records. After the "collapse" or
disintegration of the peat land at Wingecarribe Swamp an inquiry was informed
that in spite of exhaustive searches of archives, including those of
Mittagong Shire Council, no evidence could be found that the Pike's peat mine
(which some hold responsible for the catastrophe) had ever gotten any form of
development consent. It seemed that State authorities had
mistakenly taken Bowral Municipal Council's interests in the operation as
evidence of development consent.
WILLOUGHBY
Mashman
Brothers pottery operated at Willoughby in 1900-1930. Also sometimes
referred to as having been in Chatswood. [Address unknown at present.]
WINMALEE
(YELLOW ROCK)
Flagging
stone quarry in Hawkesbury Sandstone.
WINSTON
HILLS
Rileys
Quarry - An olivine basalt dyke intruding the Ashfield Shale was noted in
1904 at Rileys Quarry (Jones and Clark, 1991,
p. 81). Microprismatic jointing is developed in the shale adjacent to the
dyke.
WOODFORD (South from)
Tobys Glen. Diatreme. This diatreme is still heavily
forested, not cleared like others in the Blue Mountains. It is difficult
of access and is rarely visited. It can be reached by foot or bike, as a
round trip of about 25 km. It is an almost circular depression surrounded
by Hawkesbury Sandstone. Its soil supports a beautiful stand of bluegums (Eucalyptus
deanei). It was recorded by Adamson (1969. NSW Geological Survey
Records, 11[2], 93-114).
WOLLEMI NATIONAL
PARK
Engraved sandstone slab - In 2006, archaeologists
Matthew Kelleher and Michael Jackson discovered in the heart of the Wollemi
wilderness National Park a 100m x 50m engraved sandstone slab with 42 figurative
motifs. A visit to the place in April 2007 by Kelleher and Jackson,
accompanied by Paul Tacon, Wayne Brennan, Dave Pross and Roger Shannon-Uluru,
interpreted there the supreme being Baiame and his son Daramulan. Near
them is the evil and powerful club footed one, infamous for eating
children. The site was declared 'the most amazing rock engraving site in
the whole of south-eastern Australia'. (
"Wollemi
find an Aboriginal seat of the gods" - Sydney Morning Herald, 21 April
2007).
WOLLONDILLY
SHIRE
Wollondilly
shire map, showing adjoining local government areas
Wollondilly
Shire is well known and liked for the Razorback Range (Bringelly Shale
landslides and Mark Foys "While I live I grow" tree), Burragorang
Valley (coal mines), Yerranderie (silver-lead mines), Picton/Maldon (elusive
fossil fish and a cement works without limestone or coal nearby), Thirlmere
Lakes (a palaeodrainage mystery), Appin (coal mine) and Warragamba (big dam
that sends water to the Sydney mega-sprawl). Not all these
places are yet in Geo Sites and any information would be appreciated.
Buxton
quarry - Located
at end of Boundary Road, Buxton. No details known.
Mermaid
Pool - A popular
spot with bushwalkers. To reach it turn right from Tahmoor into Rockford
Road leading to Rockford bridge. From the bridge a
well worn path follows the right bank of the river to the pool.
The walk distance is 3 km so be careful not to get lost.
There
are many pristine and picturesque natural places in Wollondilly Shire.
At this one, Mermaid's Pool
on
the Bargo River, there was
a one kilometre coal mining exclusion zone placed around it in 1975,
as
a precaution so that the water could never disappear down into any mine
workings.
A
low angle 30 degree fracture seen in the sandstone wall at Mermaid
Pool. The fracture is seen on both
sides
of the pool and possibly this weakness may have influenced the drop in river
level here(?).
Possible
slickensides are also seen in the river bed sandstone above the waterfall.
A
longwall miner taking out a coal seam.
According
to the tourist information centre, Mermaid Pool was a sacred womens' site in
Aboriginal times, and protected by spirits.
Note
the gorge downstream of Mermaid Pool, shown above. Here the
Bargo River flows through an entrenched meanders gorge or 'canyon' ca. 4.5 km
long. It contains fifteen to twenty rock pools besides the best known
one, Mermaid Pool. In many places, near vertical sandstone walls, 20 m
to 105 m high, rise from the river, including directly from river pools and
cascades. Other similar river gorges in the Southern Coalfield area
include the Cataract River Gorge and the Nepean River Gorge.
"The
Potholes" on the Bargo River at the entrance to the Mermaid Pools bush
walk. (Source: Macarthur visitor information service)
Inferred
subsidence cracks in rock near The Potholes has been attributed by some to the
effects of nearby longwall mining ("We
have seen only one case in the Southern Coalfield of a section of a river
which has “healed itself” after being cracked by mining. At the “Potholes”
stretch in the Bargo River,
beside the Rockford Road bridge, in a fairly flat stretch formerly badly
cracked by mining, the cracks have filled up to a large extent with
sediments" - In RiversSOS submission to 2007 'Panel of Inquiry into NSW
Southern Coalfield). These cracks were up to 25mm wide.
.
Bargo
River gorge sandstone wall downstream of Mermaid Pool, with weathered dyke.
(Photo:
NSW Department of Planning, southern coalfield inspection tour, 2008.)
WOY
WOY
Woy
Woy vicinity, showing localities of interest - Pindar Caves (Aboriginal art)
near where there were an orche mine, and
Dillons
Farm (about 3 miles SW of Woy Woy) which is also known as Dillons Crater and
is over volcanic neck breccia.
Map
showing land owned by the Dillon family; C.F., G.D., L.G. and H.G.
Dillon. Thw portions 153 and 155 (Parish Patonga)
are
over twin necks of volcanic breccia; and portion 110 has the basalt of the
unsuccessful Woy Woy basalt quarrying
(that
failed at arrival of the Great Depression). Map is situation pre
1941. ( Map courtesy of Bob Pankhurst. )
Woy
Woy area ochres - Thick limonite capping
developed upon a weathered intrusion (cf. Woy Woy basalt - old 'ochre' record
card at Mining Museum). Has been mined? - Perhaps
near to or the same as the pits some have
referred to as Aboriginal ochre mining. More likely ochre would have
been extracted in early 1900s and possible for sale to paintmakers? ]
Sketch
of where some of the 'ochre pits' lie, by Anthony Dunk 2009. Compared to
outline of the
basalt
(below) this would likely be on the eastern side of the intrusion.
Anthony
Dunk (pers. comm.) has I've seen these elusive pits at the back of Woy Woy tip on a
number of occasions. Some of them are beside the walking track between the rubbish tip and the rock plateau that leads to "The Rampart" at Umina.
Pits are up to 2 m deep, and around 1 metre in diameter. They have
puzzled various people as to who dug them, and for what. Why they
have been termed ochre pits is not known. Could they just be
exploration pits for basalt from the 1920? Comparing Dunk's
location of the pits with the other maps below, the site would be just south
of Patonga Brook in Por. 110 and at or just east of east the inferred (from
magnetics) southern extension of the basalt.
Pindar
ochre mine - However
the pits near the Woy Woy rubbish tip are not the only, or the main, site of
former ochre extraction in the area. The main site was probably the 'Pindar
mine' at GR 345,919 to Gunderman 1:25K map. According to local
information this mine was once at a small farm owner by a German family and
prior to WWI it exported white, yellow and red pigments, via a 6 km track down
to a stone wharf on Mooney Mooney Creek. Some small record of this
operation is in Mines Department records (not yet extracted to
here). The mine shaft had collapsed to just a depression with only
a few decomposing timber remains by the 1990s.
Woy
Woy volcanic necks and basalt quarry
Three basaltic deposits, show here in centre as "Tb" (Tertiary
basalt). The eastern one is basalt only. The two
western
ones are twin volcanic breccia necks, with a small body of basalt known in the
western of the pair.
. (Plan 2571, NSW Geological Survey)
Railway
line south to quarry (from Wilson 1981), recent appearance of the quarry area
in Pors. 110, 171, Par. Patonga,
and
a 1972 rough plan of quarry area (Mines Department, drawing 6152).
A
basalt quarry was started in 1927 at
what is the current tip site, south Woy Woy, by Basalt Quarries Ltd.
Access was put in southwards from near the eastern portal of the Woy Woy
tunnel of the main northern railway, and the quarry had a siding off this
line. Quarry production lasted only for a short time, because of
the Great Depression. The area is surrounded by the current
Brisbane Water National Park, and can be accessed via Woy Woy Tip road.
Quartzite formed by the intrusion of the basalt into the sandstone has also
been quarried here (history of that operation currently unknown) and there is
likely another entrance to that adjacent operation (which later on also
expanded to crushing normal sandstone as well).
The basalt is the easternmost of the three "Tb" patches on the map
above.
Remnants of the eastern and
western faces of the quarrying are at the southern end of the tip area, now
called the Woy Woy Waste Management Facility. The site has been researched by
Craig Wilson, and published as "Basalt Quarries Limited, Woy Woy, New
South Wales" as pages 3-15 in Light Railways, April 1981.
According to Wilson, it was a Mr John Garrett
who promoted the quarry development. He had initially been interested in basalt at two
places near Gosford - Mount Bushell, and on a
property called Dillon's farm off Patonga Creek. These locations are not close
together and Mount Bushell is near Peats Ridge. In an old "Erina
Shire Tourist Guide" Mt Bushell it refers to 'Wonderful Mount Bushell' as
being about a mile from Peats Ridge.
The district was
prospected for igenous rock quarry development by John Garrett in 1925.
At that time Mount Bushell was already taken by rival developers, the Blue Metal
and Timber Co. Ltd. which was formed to exploit that deposit. By
February 1928 that company had been taken over by the Great Northern Blue
Metal Co. Ltd. Although a tramway was planned to Mt Bushell,
developed was never commenced back them and the deposit later passed to the New South
Wales Associated Blue Metal Quarries Ltd.
As Mount Bushell was
already tied up, John Garrett turned his attention to gaining control over the
Patonga Creek or Dillon's farm deposit instead. This appeared to
consist of 'twin' volcanic necks, separated by just 200-250 feet of
intervening sandstone. There is about 40 acres underlain by breccia
(Portion 153 and 155, Parish Patonga). Where Patonga Creek flows
down to meet and cross the eastern of the two breccia bodies it forms a
waterfall at the boundary, in a narrow zone of induration of the
sandstone. The breccia weathers to a deep rich soil that was early cleared for
farming. However, Patonga Creek exposes almost fresh breccia in
numerous places, often in the form of extensive pavements in the creek
bed. Seeing such may have been what initially encouraged Mr John
Garrett. No outcrop of breccia is found away from the creek
beds.
A small equant intrusion (or
inclusion?) of basalt, about 250 ft across, is present in one of the
necks. There is very little disturbance of the rock surrounding
the diatremes. An observable effects of the intrusions are limited
to within merely a few feet of the contacts. Hardening or slight
silicification of the sandstone is apparent and in places near-vertical
slickensides have been found on joints within hardened sandstone.
By 1926 Garrett had succeeded in securing an option for a
50 year lease over the western neck and also a 21 year lease over two blocks
of land containing the basalt mass half a mile to the east of that (located at
the ridge between the headwaters of Patonga Creek and Woy Woy
Creeks).
H.G. Raggatt examined the deposits
in 1926, apparently after Garrett had approached the Mines Department about
the deposit, and estimated there to be over 5 million tons of good material at the Dillon's
farm deposit and some 900,000 tons of weathered rock at the second (basalt) deposit. Raggatt's report is: Raggatt, H.G., 1927.
Basalt and volcanic breccia near Woy Woy. Annual Report Department
of Mines, NSW, for 1926, p.102.
Other Geological Survey geologists
who are known to have visited the area are Carl Adamson in 1960,1963-1964 (GS
1964/63), Ian Wallace
(1972) and possibly G. (Toby) Rose in or before 1962. Wallace was
perhaps unaware of the operation being economically killed by the Great Depression, as
the research by Craig Wilson suggests. In a report by Wallace and others
on construction materials it was thought that the basalt quarry was
abandonned because of irregular and deep weathering (GS 1971/132; probably
following Adamson 1969). Wallace stated that the Woy
Woy basalt has been "quite extensively investigated", and he
recommended that it should be zoned for extractive industry (as also recommended
by Rose and Adamson). Wallace was referring to the description by Raggatt (1927),
but also to extensive drilling in the 1960s, which estimated 22 million tons
of breccia to 180 feet depth. Wallace (GS 1971/132) emphasised
that the breccia deposits will be very useful in future and should be exempted
from the Brisbane Water National Park until fully exploited. Thus
the breccia was presumably exempted from the park at that time
(1971). The 1992 Plan of Management of the Park by NPWS states
"Brisbane Water National Park consists of Hawkesbury Sandstone overlying
Narrabeen Group sediments. Tertiary basaltic diatremes intrude the sandstone
in the Dillons Crater area." However, Anthony Dunk's map
(above) has "Dillon's Crater (Private)". Also, later in the
plan of management it is state "The Patonga Creek catchment contains
Dillons Farm and the Woy Woy refuse tip at its northern end; these are both
inholdings in the park". It also states "A lease or licence is
proposed to be granted to Kevin Dillon for access to property which lies
within the park", which suggests Dillons farm could still belong to the
Dillon family? The plan of management also has an aim (low priority) to
"Interpret the history of the railway in the park" which might be
referring to the basalt quarry line. However, the list of references in
that document does not include the Wilson article of the basalt quarry and
railway - whence it is not apparent if the NPWS were aware of that in
1992. According to National Parks Association, pers. comm. the NPWS did
acquire Dillon's farm too, in about 1997.
By 1927 Garrett had been
able to purchase
some of the key land and this allowed Basalt Quarries Limited to be floated (prospectus 16
September 1927). The Longworth family of the still existing company Longworth Mackenzie
may have been involved (not actually checked), as a W.E. Longworth did the estimating and surveying,
and directors of C.R. McKenzie and Co. Ltd. were provisional directors of
Basalt Quarries Limited in the prospectus (this company was also part
underwriters). Sandy Longworth established the
still existing Longworth & McKenzie Pty Limited (and what is now GHD
Longmac geotechnical consulting engineers) in partnership with Alan
McKenzie. The 1920s had seen rapid growth in construction
around Sydney and the demand for basalt was expected to increase.
Construction of the railway into
the quarry, and other works, began in September 1927, the same month as the
float. All major plant was on site by April 1928.
Production began in September 1928. Plant of 75,000 tpa had been
constructed, but actual production has not yet been found. It possibly
produced about 5000 tons in late 1928 and maybe about 2500 tons in 1929.
The quarry was destined for early
failure. The company was under-subscribed and as early as November
1928 had to take a mortgage over its assets to raise additonal working funds. It
would be caught in the effects of the coming Great Depression and a fourfold
fall-off in demand for construction stone. To make things worse for the Woy Woy
operation, more quarries elsewhere had opened or increased in
production. The major ones
were Southern Blue Metal Quarries Ltd near Berrima (opening a 300,000 tpa
operation) and Nepean Sand and Gravel Co. Ltd. which from 1925 to 1929
increased its sand and gravel production from 80,000 to 500,000 tpa.
The result of downturn towards the
Depression and increased output feeding the Sydney market was that price fell
to 8/- or less per ton by 1919, which was below the continuing cost of
production at Woy Woy. The Woy Woy operation could not carry on and had
probably ceased by mid 1929. Thus the quarry possibly produced for
only 9 or 10 months, making the whole operation a disastrous loss.
The company installed a caretaker and hoped things might improve after the
Depression. No improvement of prospects happened and the
company went into receivership in 1933. Assets were disposed of
progressively from 1934 till 1937. Council resumed all the land in
the valley. It commenced a tip at the quarry, and a sewerage farm
on land closer to the main line siding.
Some intermittent quarrying of
basalt and/or the adjacent quartzite has taken place after the failure of
Basalt Quarries Limited but records of such have not been searched
for. In portion 153 a small quarry was excavated to a depth for 12
feet to extract weathered breccia. Whether this was done by Basalt Quarries Limited
or some later party is not known. In 1959-1962 Mr Van Daal,
trading as Metal Daal Pty Ltd, and later as Daal Crush Ltd, erected plant for
crushing quartzite. Up to five men were employed at this quarry,
however it diverted from quarrying just quartzite to producing ordinary
sandstone for use in Council road works (MR 6011, Q461). "Van
Dahl's Trail" is seen marked on the district map above.
A mines inspector reported in 1959 that this quarry had three rock types,
sandstone, quartzite and basalt. In 1971 a magnetometer survey
indicated that the main basalt body in the area is roughly lens shaped in plan
view, its longer dimension striking approximately north-south. The main body
is approximately 260 metres long with a maximum width of 120 metres and it
trends northerly. The magnetic survey suggested the northern boundary is
abrupt against this dominant portion of the body but to the south there is a
tail extending SSW for a further 370m but much narrower (maximum
45m). There is no outcrop of the sourthern extension and its
magnetic response is weaker, suggesting that it is more weathered than at the
north.
The main company known to have had
major later interest in the breccia was Gosford Excavations Pty Ltd, then of
158 Mann Street, Gosford. The Chairman of Gosford Excavations was
Paul A. Cullen. It is known that In 1962 a twenty-five year lease
was granted to Gosford Excavations Pty Ltd. However there was a Dillon v
Gosford City Council court case at some stage involved in this area and the
details of that are not known. Gosford
Excavations Pty Ltd actually had some form of lease arrangement with Dillon
before 1962.
In 1961 Dillon got a letter from
Lands Department to the effect that his property was to be resumed to be
included in a national park. This spurred geologist Colin Adamson to
note to the Mines Department that similar loss of volcanic breccia had already
occurred at Peat's Bight, Berowra Creek (incoporated in Muogamarra parkland)
and he recommended that the Department both support the endeavours of Gosford
Excavations and also develop future policy to prevent repetition of the
situation. A difficulty, as Col recognised, was that the
Department did not have any clear control over volcanic breccia because it was
not a declared mineral under the Mining Act. Hence, in this
instance the Mines Department wrote to the Lands Department about the need to
keep the threatened area (about 20 acres, Por. 153) available for future
quarrying. The Department sought the exclusion of the volcanic
breccia from the envisioned park. The Minister for Lands replied
that no further action would be taken towards resumption of the portions where
the necks are, portions 153 and 155 of Parish Patonga "in view of the
mineral deposits thereon". Drilling exploration continued and
by 1963 Gosford Excavations has established reserves of 14 million cubic yard
of rock suitable for concrete and other aggregate. It was then wishing
to open a quarry. It began distribution arrangements for marketing but
Cumberland County Council raised objections (to a plan to take material by
boat to a depot at upper McCarrs Creek for distribution from there by
road). The 1964 Mines Department records note that copies of
records were given to "Gosford Excavation (actually to C.S.R. Ltd)"
in May 1964, showing that this major company had become involved in the quarry
development by that stage. C.S.R. Co. Ltd. had apparently become a
partner in the plan to quarry the breccia. Representations by the
Minister for Mines on behalf of the company to other ministers, like the
Minister for Local Government (then the major planning node) were taking up to
one year or more with no reply, during which time the Department of Mines
would tell the proponent that the matter was still under
consideration. This very unsatisfactory state of affairs between
arms of the State government spurred Col Adamson in and interest that would
last for many years in in resource protection and geological conservation
(especially in the resource sense), and the need for better policy
formulation and coordination. In 1966 the estimated resource of 2
Mt of clay in the weathered zone overlying the breccia was investigated by the
Mines Department at the request of the Colonial Sugar Refining Company Ltd.
(GS 1966/052). The weathered breccia passes up into a zone about
30 feet thick consisting of compact plastic clay, overlain by more variable
clay affected by slope wash. Above that almost the whole of the
deposit is overlain by two feet of rich dark grey to black sandy or silty
loam. The clay zone is suitable for manufacture of bricks and
pipes.
For whatever ultimate reason,
neither the envisaged GE/CSR quarrying of breccia from the necks nor the
overlying clay was ever commenced; and on 22
October 1974 it was Gazetted that Portion 153 of Parish Patonga (Lot 153 of
DP755251) had been added to Brisbane Water National Park.
Little is currently known of Mr
John Garrett the quarry's founder, but he appears to have been a mining
prospector/promoter. In the Woy Woy basalt quarry company's Memorandum
of Association he is listed as a sawmiller of Brooklyn. However in 1927
he seems to have moved to the Nepean area, and became manager of (and possibly
involved in formation of?) River Sand (Nepean) Limited that was in operation
by late 1928. It was dredging the river and shipping output via
the Kurrajong Branch of the NSWGR. The
Nepean Sand and Gravel Company operated this branch line from a junction a
mile and a quarter beyond Richmond station, on the eastern side of the
Hawkesbury River. The line crossed the river and ran as far south as the
junction of the Nepean and Grose Rivers. The company's dredging
operation was "Yarramundi Falls" there. The company
commenced operations at this site in 1925, which is also the same year that Mr
Garrett was active around Gosford in search for basalt. The Nepean
Sand and Gravel Company constructed the
railway branch line as an alternative to an inefficient aerial ropeway which
it at first built. That branch line closed in the mid 1940s.
[Acknowledgement: Much of
this information was obtained via Chris Morton who sent copy of Craig Wilson's
work.]
Coal
- Having
accumulated
more information on the volcanic necks helps solve the Woy Woy of Patonga "coal
mystery".
The diatreme is possibly the solution to
a "coal" dilemma for Woy Woy. Coal interest or coal occurrence has been mentioned
in the area as follows, which is geologically curious as coal would not be
expected to occur.
-
At the mouth of Patonga Creek, extending from Patonga across the headland of
Walker and Juno Points (at that time with a public camping ground reserve and
now Broken Bay National Fitness Centre surrounds) a large area was applied for
by D. Melvin in 1908 to mine for coal (ML1 and ML2 of Parish Patonga) to mine
for coal. Whatever the plans or hopes were here (deep mining?),
nothing happended and indeed the leases were refused as early as
1911.
-
Page 53 records coal near Patonga in a book by C. Swancott (1954) "The Brisbane Water Story. Part 2 - Woy Woy & Hawkesbury
River" (published by Brisbane Water Historical Society). This
records that Lou Dillon took up a selection called "Cedar Brush" a half mile from salt water up Patonga Creek. George Dillon had 40 acres on Patonga Creek above Lou's property and here found coal in the creek bed.
He later leased this property to the Caloola Club of bushwakers.
- Page 105 records that: According to Billy Strachan who worked in the Woy Woy tunnel a seam of coal was encountered during the excavation of the tunnel.
It was wondered could such coal be within the Narrabeen Group, as no coal of
any note would be expected in Hawkesbury Sandstone. Putting together the
various names mentioned suggests that the coal found would have
been within the diatreme. Swancott mentioned Lou and George
Dillon. Biographical cuttings on Louis George Dillon, early Woy Woy
settler, are in the National Library (Bib ID 1855153. It is not
established that "Dillon's farm" or "Dillon's Crater" was
George's but it likely was. And Swancott records that George
leased it to the Caloola Club. At http://www.npansw.org.au/web/journal/200708/Anniversary.htm the NSW National Parks Association
notes that it sprang inter alia from the Caloola Club , and that Caloola Club had
"two educational field studies huts: one at Dillon's farm on a volcanic neck at the head of Patonga Creek, near Woy Woy and Mt Wondabyne: and another that club members built at Tongarra near Macquarie Pass."
All
that suggests that if Dillon found coal in the creek bed then it was within
the diatreme. The 1960s drilling also records of Adamson also
recorded the presence of coal in the diatreme. No attempt has been
made to go through the drilling records to find the details of the coal noted,
however the occurrence of coal in other Sydney region and Blue Mountains
diatremes is well know.
WYEE
Bridge
Road. Shale extraction area (Mining Lease 554 and Special Lease
84/7). Initially operated by Montoro. Then by Boral Roofing
Tiles. An amount of 27,912 tonnes was extracted in 1990/91 and reserves
were then 2 Mt.
