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The 1868 photograph of Johnny Mullagh, which was lost when the Harrow Hall burned down

Yes everyone will be watching the Harrow episode of the ABC's 'Back Roads' tonight at 8pm.
This week is the final episode of Season 2. Heather Ewart visits Harrow, a creative community that took to heart the mantra "reinvent or perish" and found unique ways to bring new people and fresh ideas into the town.
Stories include the Aboriginal cricketers, the Beaut Blokes weekends, Stretch Penrose's paintings, and Neil Grigg's millinery, to name a few.
And then there is this cute little back-story.

If you miss the episode, the repeat program is on Sunday 5th February at 1:30pm.

Freezing in Donald

On the outskirts of the Donald township, straddling its own railway track, are the rusting remains of the Donald Inland Freezing Company's buildings. 

The layout of the freezing works

The works cover 10 acres of 109 acres of company owned land of resting paddocks. Most of the buildings are abandoned or converted to other uses. Only the portion of the rail-line to the grain silos is utilised.

A grain train loading at the silos

Built at a cost £130,000 by the Donald Inland Freezing Company, it started in 1920 (the foundation stone was laid on August 31 1920 by the Victorian Premier Sir Harry Lawson). 
It was registered as a shareholders company in September 1919, with an opening capital of £100,000. In 1920, the state government gave loans to both the Donald and Murtoa freezing works for extensions. The plant was erected under the Primary Products Advance Act. Preference was to be given to the employment of Returned Servicemen.

The slaughterhouse and toppled chimney

The plant had a killing capacity of 2,500 lambs by a full board of 28 butchers per day, with storage for 60,000 carcasses.

The sheepyards with the ramp to the slaughter house

The skins and offal gravitated down chutes to the ground floor. The dressed carcasses were conveyored by endless iron rail to the scales then to the hanging room, where they cooled for 4 hours then gravitated into an air-lock at the entrance to the 6 freezing chambers (each holding 1,200 carcasses). From 45 degrees Fahrenheit on the first day, the temperature was gradually reduced to 5 degrees on the third day. Carcasses then passed down through trapdoors into the 50,000 carcass storage chamber where they were stacked for transport.

Pieces of one of the engines

The 70 square-foot Engine room supplied power generated by 3 sets of Hornsby 116 horse-power twin-cylinder gas engines, and the freezing was produced by two 60-ton Linde refrigerators powered by a 75 kilowatt electric generator.

Other buildings were the huge skin-drying shed, the tallow building for extraction and refinement of the fat.

The lamb was sold to a firm of London importers.

Ice was produced as a sideline and shipped as far north as Mildura, while the blood, offal and bones were converted into manure for the Mildura citrus growers.

 

The engine rooms

Operations began in October 1921, but by 1922 the company was unable to make its repayments to the government and sought to increase the number of shareholders. In the 1922-23 season it slaughtered 96,000 lambs and sheep for the London markets, it was hampered by a shortage of slaughter-men. The shareholders agreed to joining the formation of Amalgamated Freezing Companies (it later became the Inland Meat Authority) in March 1927. This was followed by a Royal Commission into AFC in August, and the Company was again in arrears to the government in October.

The rail-line & slaughterhouse (the brown ceramic tiles on the walls cover a deep hollow block filled with cork)

The works limped on, re-opening in September 1932 after being closed for several years, and by 1943 had only operated 4 times in the last 15 years, due to insufficient lamb supplies.

The plant closed and re-opened & closed again in 1977-78. The freezing section was turned into a yabby (freshwater crayfish) production plant 'Oz Crays' during the 1980s (now derelict). Oz Crays exported crayfish to France, the building has also been used for cultivating mushrooms.

The sign still advertising Oz Crays

The north-most section is home to 'Kooka's Country Cookies' (established in 1990s). Cooka's nearly closed in 2012, but has since begun exporting to Asia, and can be seen on supermarket shelves and as individually wrapped biscuits in motels.

Trove locations

Heaps of people know about and use Trove to access its Historic Newspapers collection, even those who would not usually frequent a library.  
Now to make it even friendlier, there is the Trove newspaper locator. It is an early experiment in providing a place-based interface to the Trove newspapers. 

Newspaper locations in the Wimmera region

Just enter a place name and state and it will attempt return the ten nearest newspaper titles that relate to that location. 
Obviously not all Australian newspapers, only those that have been digitised and loaded onto Trove.  

 For instance, none of the Edenhope newspapers are on Trove, but this tells you what papers are geographically around (including interstate) the area, which may be relevant or have reported on Edenhope happenings or events.

The locator was created by Tim Sherratt a historian in Canberra, who researches the possibilities and politics of digital cultural collections. He creates online resources relating to archives, museums and history, making them more accessible like this Trove newspaper locator.

Yonder to Yanac

Following a comment concerning the ‘Railways – Yanac line’ post in August 2016, which referred to an article featuring the history of the Jeparit - Yanac branch-line published in the Spring Edition of the ‘Australian Railway Enthusiast’ magazine, we have sourced a copy from the State Library of Victoria’s collection (Thanks SLV).

Titled ‘Yonder to Yanac-a-Yanac Jeparit – Yanac branch line history’ by Bruce Payne, it follows the establishment of the lines from Dimboola to Yaapeet and the branching from Jeparit through Detpa, Lorquon and Netherby to Yanac, and details how the line was constructed –

Detpa 255½ mile (441km) 318ft (97m) ASL

Detpa opened with the line to Lorquon and appears to have always been operated under no-one-in-charge conditions. The name is native “wait” or “stop a bit”. There was once a suggestion of naming it ‘Hindmarsh’ but this never eventuated. It consisted of a siding, sheep race, silo complex of 13,300 tonnes in 1984, 15-ton weighbridge, and a Mallee shed situated on the passenger platform.

Detpa in 2012

Lorquon 261½ mile (421km) 356ft (109m) ASL
Lorquon became the terminus and train staff & ticket station from December 1912 till the line was extended to Yanac in 1916...it consisted of 2 sidings, silo complex of 9,700 tonnes in 1984, 15-ton weighbridge and a platform with a small station building.

Lorquon's silos & weighbridge

Netherby 267½ mile (431km) 406ft (109m) ASL
Netherby was named after Netherby in Yorkshire and the ship Netherby wrecked off King Island. It was established as a train staff  and ticket station when the line opened to Yanac in June 1916. Initially it was operated by a Station Master who also supervised Yanac. He was replaced by a caretaker in September 1922, then dis-established as a staff and ticket station in December. The caretaker remained till May 1976. Netherby had 2 sidings, a sheep race, silos of 14,200 tonnes, a 2½ ton crane, 15 ton weighbridge and a small wooden station building.

The Netherby silo complex

Yanac 279½ mile (450km) 421ft (129m) ASL
Yanac opened on 27 June 1916 and operated under caretaker-in-charge conditions. The station facilities were two sidings, a cattle & sheep race, silos of 14,000 tonnes, a 2½ ton crane, 15 ton weighbridge, a small wooden station building, loco water storage and a crew rest house. A turntable never eventuated, and the station building was downsized and finally removed. It operated under caretaker conditions till July 1976 and officially closed on 8 December 1986.

Site of Yanac's station building, looking toward Netherby today

 

Bruce's view of Yanac in 1975 (sorry for the flaring)

Yanac's silos without the Goods Shed & Station building looking west to the buffers at the end of the line

Thanks to Bruce's article for all the information and the historic photos.
 

Leaning to oblivion

The importance of recording and digitally preserving abandoned buildings before they too succumb to the elements is indisputable.

Dinyarrak Hall in March 2013

This was no more obvious than approaching the Dinyarrack Hall to find it collapsed onto itself.

Remains of the Dinyarrak Hall in December 2016

'Border Chronicle' 4.4.1933

The Dinyarrak Hall was the center of the community for many years, which had a racecourse, a hunt club, the Dinyarrak Bush Fire Brigade was formed in the hall, and the Wild Dog Club was just one group which met in the hall.
It also housed Dinyarrak State School No. 4178. The school opened on a trial basis in October 1923 for the children of soldier settlers (the number of pupils was insufficient to warrant the establishment of a school for the district close to the South Australian border) in the Dinyarrak Hall leased from the Trustees of the Hall Committee from July 1923. In 1926, a proposal to move to a more central site was defeated. It was the opening of the new school at Cove Estate that reduced the number of pupils, and Dinyarrak closed under ministerial direction in November 1930 in favour of the more central SS4457 Cove Estate. The school furniture & equipment went to Cove Estate.

Interior of the Dinyarrak Hall

Further down the road at Diapur, it was a similar situation for the little grain receival/sampling shed at the railway siding. After adopting a definite lean for some years, it finally toppled over.

The Diapur shed in January 2008

Diapur with the Melbourne-Adelaide rail line behind, December 2016

And so it was with some trepidation to continue on to Boyeo, knowing that it was only the sturdy construction with extra rafters and internal bracing that had prevented it from collapsing earlier.

Had the wild weather affected Boyeo too?

Boyeo School in March 2013

And in December 2016

Fortunately not, apart from a greater degree of incline it was still upright. A few more weatherboards were missing, the door was no longer swinging on its hinges and someone had propped it against a wall, but essentially it was much the same - for now.

The message though is don't expect abandoned or neglected buildings to remain or be saved and restored. Capture them while you can because tomorrow may be too late.