Our Local History – Page 2

Jul

04

2025

Our Local History – Stannum Bush Nursing Hospital

Local NewsDeepwater, Our Local History, Stannum, Torrington

On May 15, 1937, The Glen Innes Examiner ran this report from the Inspector and Organiser of the Bush Nursing Association: "...Nine miles from Deepwater lies the township of Stannum, tin mining being the main industry. "This part does well when water is plentiful, and the price of tin is high, otherwise the men are out of work with all its serious consequences. "The police patrols of Deepwater and Torrington each have over 1,000 people without a medical officer or even a trained nurse. So Stannum makes a good centre [for a Bush Nursing Hospital] for these districts, nine miles…

Jun

22

2025

By Shirley Jones

Always a Torrington Girl: Alma “Betty” Trewhella

Local NewsBetty Trewhella, Our Local History, Shirley Jones, Torrington

Betty was born on the 8th of August 1931 in the miners’ cottage her father, George Junior Trewhella, had built on The Dutchman in Torrington, NSW. Bush nurse Grannie Finnegan delivered her and was delighted that she was born with a caul covering her, such a rare birth was said to ensure the child would have good luck throughout her life. Betty’s life was full of challenges, yet she believed that Grannie Finnegan’s prophesy proved valid. Her grandparents had a cottage on the other side of the paddock and grandfather, George Henry Trewhella, ran from his cottage with the scales…

Jun

06

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History – The Courthouse

Local NewsBob Thurling OAM, Glen Innes Courthouse, Our Local History, Wellingrove

Early courthouses were used as venues for church services, polling places, meetings - even it is said, for theatrical performances (although I’ve not been able to find any such performances in Glen Innes unless you count the spirited acting some solicitors could be relied upon to produce.) There have been three buildings where justice has been dispensed in this district. First in a tiny rough wooden slab hut in Wellingrove, then after Glen Innes became the official centre in1859, a basic four-roomed building for Court of Petty Sessions. In 1873 after a citizen ‘grand indignation meeting’ had demanded a new…

May

22

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History: Storyplace – A Virtual Museum

Local NewsOur Local History, Storyplace

Twenty seven items from The Land of the Beardies Museum in Glen Innes are featured in the Museums and Galleries NSW Storyplace site https://storyplace.org.au/. The stories share new insights into objects professionally photographed from various angles. The site explains “Storyplace publishes stories about the history and culture of NSW.” Its stories are inspired by the objects, records and artworks cared for by museums, galleries and Aboriginal cultural centres, located throughout regional NSW. Storyplace stories are told by various authors and from different points of view. Stories about regional landscapes, localities, towns, villages, and communities, along with the animals, peoples, and…

May

08

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History – The Post Office

Local NewsGlen Innes Post Office, Land of the Beardies Museum, Our Local History

Early mail deliveries to Glen Innes were spasmodic. James Martin was appointed first Postmaster in 1854. At the time roads were primitive and delivery of mail depended on the vagaries of the weather. When the mail did get to Glen Innes and was sorted Martin blew a bugle to let people know to collect their letters. Prior to this a post office had been established at Wellingrove in 1849 - mail was delivered by a man riding and leading a packhorse. As tracks became better coaches commenced services and by 1873 Cobb and Co ran three coaches a week. In…

Apr

24

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History – Celtic Connections

Local NewsOur Local History

Glen Innes’ Celtic connections go right back to the arrival of the first white settlers in 1838 when the Boyd family from Selkirkshire in Scotland took up Boyds Plains – now Stonehenge Station. Although Wellingrove was our first official centre, it was soon realised it was too isolated. When Surveyor JJ Galloway laid out the town in its present location in 1852, he surveyed it beside the track, the Great North Road, which ran between Armidale and Drayton (forerunner of Toowoomba). At the suggestion of Archibald Mosman, the town was named in honour of Caithness-born Major Archibald Clunes Innes -…

Apr

10

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History – Menzies Ave & Wentworth St

Local NewsBob Crothers, Glen Innes Examiner, Our Local History

Our splendid autumn colours are a great magnet for tourists and the planting project spearheaded by the late Bob Crothers to beautify the median strip on the southern highway approach to Glen Innes is much admired. One of many prior beautification schemes was ‘Menzies Avenue’. On August 24, 1935, the Glen Innes Examiner wrote “With the completion of the planting of trees at the South Park, Town Tennis Club and Grafton Road work will now commence at the Railway Station, an additional step in the campaign of the Town Beautification Committee”. Harold C Menzies had ‘fostered the suggestion’ of this…

Mar

27

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History – Soldier Settlements

Local NewsDeepwater, Glen Innes Court House, Glen Innes Examiner, Kings Plains, Our Local History, Rangers Valley, Waterloo Station

The Historical Society is anxious to collect the history of our second wave of pioneers, the Soldier Settlers - from subdivision maps, correspondence, documents, photos, reminiscences, ledgers… We have some information about Soldier Settlement on Waterloo, Rangers Valley, Kings Plains and Deepwater. Jean Cameron, in a presentation to the historical society said “The Closer Settlement Act of 1904 gave government the power to resume large estates in cases where agreement to sell could not be reached. At the end of 1918, 3,327 settlers had been established on 1,700,000 acres. “In the fifty years of operation of the Closer Settlement Acts,…

Mar

13

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History – Trees

Local NewsOur Local History

Trees played a major part in the development of our area – the term ‘blazing a trail’ literally meant carving marks into trees to indicate the best route over unknown terrain for horsemen or bullock wagons; as well, marked trees could indicate the perimeters of early holdings. Our present roads, though now much modified, generally followed the inevitable rough tracks. A leasehold system of property tenure was brought in here in 1848. As Sommerlad wrote in The Land of the Beardies in 1922: “Prior to 1847 the pastoral industry in this district in common with all districts ‘outside the boundaries…

Feb

27

2025

By Eve Chappell

Our Local History: St Josephs Convent

Local NewsOur Local History, St Josephs Convent

St Joseph’s Convent, that magnificent Edwardian Gothic edifice built 108 years ago and relinquished by the Church in 1995, is on the market again. I will quote just a scrap of its history from the Glen Innes Examiner of October 15, 1917, under the heading ‘A Triumph of Architectural Genius’: “…The first Sisters of the Order of St Joseph came from Adelaide and accompanied by Bishop Torreggiani arrived by coach in Glen Innes on 15th January 1884 … They intended to establish a first-class school straightaway, but owing to insufficient accommodation they were compelled to restrict their operations - however…