Above are the convict built gates to Macquarie Field House which were located next to the Gatehouse.
Welcome to the Campbelltown City Library Local Information Blog
Friday, 28 November 2014
Archaeological Artefacts Displayed
The artefacts retrieved from the archaeological excavation at the site of the convict built Macquarie Fields Gatehouse are now on exhibition at H.J. Daley Library at Campbelltown. The exhibits include bottles, convict made bricks, bone and everyday household items as well as much more. To read more about the gatehouse and the archaeological dig, click on the archaeological artefacts label which will retrieve my earlier blog post. The display will be at the library until December 15.
Above are the convict built gates to Macquarie Field House which were located next to the Gatehouse.
Above are the convict built gates to Macquarie Field House which were located next to the Gatehouse.
Monday, 24 November 2014
Who's with Michael?
We need your help in identifying the women in this photograph pictured with Michael Knight. The photograph was taken in front of the old Campbelltown City Library in the civic precinct in Campbelltown. The photo is not dated but appears to be taken around the early 1970s.
Michael Knight was the member for Campbelltown in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly between 1981 and 2001. He is probably most known to Australians as the Minister for the Olympics between 1995 and 2001 in the Carr Labor government. In January 2002 Knight was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia partly for his service to the Campbelltown community.
If you can identify anyone, please click on the comments link or contact the local studies section of Campbelltown Library.
Written by Andrew Allen
Thursday, 20 November 2014
A Pre-historic Discovery
It was the main topic of conversation in the street for Campbelltown and in particular Macquarie Fields residents in July 1970. The footprints of a pre-historic animal were discovered, solidified in clay, by men constructing a sewage tunnel near the railway line at Macquarie Fields Railway Station. Dr Anne Howie from the Department of Zoology at Sydney University identified the animal as a labryinthodont, known as Paracyctosaurus Davidi. It measured 3 metres in length and was similar to a crocodile with wide opening jaws which contained very small teeth. The animal had been preserved for 200 million years!
It was believed the animal made the footprints in mud or clay which solidified and eventually filled up with sand and silt. This sand and silt then solidified over the ages. Workmen then removed the earth under the impressions.
Unfortunately the tunnel had to be cemented and once again the footprints disappeared from sight, but not before the university team made recordings for official records.
Drawing of a labryinthodont
It was believed the animal made the footprints in mud or clay which solidified and eventually filled up with sand and silt. This sand and silt then solidified over the ages. Workmen then removed the earth under the impressions.
Unfortunately the tunnel had to be cemented and once again the footprints disappeared from sight, but not before the university team made recordings for official records.
Drawing of a labryinthodont
Written by Andrew Allen
Sources:
Campbelltown-Ingleburn News, July 7 1970 p4
McGill, Jeff 1993
Campbelltown Clippings
Campbelltown: Campbelltown City Council
Campbelltown-Ingleburn News, July 7 1970 p4
McGill, Jeff 1993
Campbelltown Clippings
Campbelltown: Campbelltown City Council
Tuesday, 11 November 2014
Miss McGuanne
It was an unusually large gathering at the Town Hall in 1922 when the people of Campbelltown gathered to honour local teacher Miss Catherine (Kate) McGuanne after forty years of service.
Many former students were among the audience that night, remembering their first lessons with Miss McGuanne as well as the “smiling welcome each morning as they came to school” Mayor Hannaford proclaimed that his old friend had “all her life carried out the arduous task of training young minds” so that they could “take their place in the world.”
The evening opened with children singing, the Wattle, and followed by a cup of Camamile tea for which an encore was called.
Born in 1855 to Campbelltown shoemaker, Martin McGaunne (owner of 284-286 Queen Street, McGaunne House) Miss McGuanne began teaching at her own private school located near the Fisher’s Ghost restaurant. In 1894 she was appointed to Campbelltown Public School’s infants department, teaching there some thirty years before her retirement. She wore ‘four different frocks, black, bottle green, grey and mauve, each with high boned collars done up to her throat. Always, she wore a bonnet with an ostrich feather and had a jacket fastened with frogs.’
After being presented with a gold wristlet Miss McGuanne responded she would not lecture or preach as she had done in days of long ago when their childhood hours were her special care. She instead, thanked everyone for ‘this lovely, this very lovely watch’ and was reminded not only of the present time but of past hours of satisfaction, gratification and “sometimes minutes of misery.”
She recalled the stage where she stood now being filled with the ‘creditable’ work of her kindergarten class during an agricultural show. And then of taking 40 children to Sydney for School Sports and though the day was ‘perfect, crowded with scenes of entrancing beauty’ at home-time the tram filled fast, and a boy, little Walter Carey became separated from them. Arriving at the station the tram emptied and ‘joy of joys there was Walter eating an apple.’
Earlier in her career, a young man of 19 arrived at the door of her school room.
‘How do you like me in Khaki?’ he asked.
She admitted to liking him very well but didn’t know who he was.
‘I’m Harvey Edmondson. I came from Sydney to say goodbye before I go to the front.’
It was not the last time ‘bronzed and brawny’ lads would seek her out before going off to the Great War but the two she mentioned, Harvey and Willie Rowe are on the honour roll at Campbelltown Public School.
Though many of her ex-students had good memories, John Cheeseman remembers her differently, “Miss McGuanne was a tyrant and I hated her... She would regularly get me carrying her shopping basket after school.’ John would help deliver the groceries to a corner house on the site of Campbelltown Mall today. ‘Her brother was a real sourpuss too! He just grunted.’
Miss McGuanne always set aside time in the morning for a conversation piece where the class would tell her what had happened at home. John reckons she used this time to find out all the gossip of the town.
If John’s recollections’ seem subjective there is another worth mentioning. ‘I was fidgeting with my pencils in the groove of the desk and without warning she brought the cane across my knuckles and broke my finger. It never recovered properly and I shall always have that as a reminder of her.’
I doubt John was at the town hall that night as the musical entertainment resumed - an action song sung by five junior girls ‘dressed as negresses’ but Catherine McGaunne ended her retirement speech, ‘But why linger? The tale is told. My work is finished.’
Miss McGuanne lived out her retirement, ‘in a shady nook of her garden among flowers and books’, dying on the fourth of June, 1946.
McGuanne House.
Do you have stories of Miss McGaunne? Perhaps your parents shared an anecdote or two. Please, share them with us!
Article written by M. Sullivan
Sources: Campbelltown and Ingleburn News Sep 8th 1922
Campbelltown and Ingleburn News Oct 21 1980 p13
John Cheeseman Remembers his Childhood Grist mills Vol 4 No2 Campbeltown Public School 1876-1976
Campbelltown Pioneer Register 1800-1900
Campbelltown & World War One 1914-1918 by Jeff McGill.
Campbelltown : the bicentennial history by Carol Liston.
Many former students were among the audience that night, remembering their first lessons with Miss McGuanne as well as the “smiling welcome each morning as they came to school” Mayor Hannaford proclaimed that his old friend had “all her life carried out the arduous task of training young minds” so that they could “take their place in the world.”
The evening opened with children singing, the Wattle, and followed by a cup of Camamile tea for which an encore was called.
Born in 1855 to Campbelltown shoemaker, Martin McGaunne (owner of 284-286 Queen Street, McGaunne House) Miss McGuanne began teaching at her own private school located near the Fisher’s Ghost restaurant. In 1894 she was appointed to Campbelltown Public School’s infants department, teaching there some thirty years before her retirement. She wore ‘four different frocks, black, bottle green, grey and mauve, each with high boned collars done up to her throat. Always, she wore a bonnet with an ostrich feather and had a jacket fastened with frogs.’
After being presented with a gold wristlet Miss McGuanne responded she would not lecture or preach as she had done in days of long ago when their childhood hours were her special care. She instead, thanked everyone for ‘this lovely, this very lovely watch’ and was reminded not only of the present time but of past hours of satisfaction, gratification and “sometimes minutes of misery.”
She recalled the stage where she stood now being filled with the ‘creditable’ work of her kindergarten class during an agricultural show. And then of taking 40 children to Sydney for School Sports and though the day was ‘perfect, crowded with scenes of entrancing beauty’ at home-time the tram filled fast, and a boy, little Walter Carey became separated from them. Arriving at the station the tram emptied and ‘joy of joys there was Walter eating an apple.’
Earlier in her career, a young man of 19 arrived at the door of her school room.
‘How do you like me in Khaki?’ he asked.
She admitted to liking him very well but didn’t know who he was.
‘I’m Harvey Edmondson. I came from Sydney to say goodbye before I go to the front.’
It was not the last time ‘bronzed and brawny’ lads would seek her out before going off to the Great War but the two she mentioned, Harvey and Willie Rowe are on the honour roll at Campbelltown Public School.
Though many of her ex-students had good memories, John Cheeseman remembers her differently, “Miss McGuanne was a tyrant and I hated her... She would regularly get me carrying her shopping basket after school.’ John would help deliver the groceries to a corner house on the site of Campbelltown Mall today. ‘Her brother was a real sourpuss too! He just grunted.’
Miss McGuanne always set aside time in the morning for a conversation piece where the class would tell her what had happened at home. John reckons she used this time to find out all the gossip of the town.
If John’s recollections’ seem subjective there is another worth mentioning. ‘I was fidgeting with my pencils in the groove of the desk and without warning she brought the cane across my knuckles and broke my finger. It never recovered properly and I shall always have that as a reminder of her.’
I doubt John was at the town hall that night as the musical entertainment resumed - an action song sung by five junior girls ‘dressed as negresses’ but Catherine McGaunne ended her retirement speech, ‘But why linger? The tale is told. My work is finished.’
Miss McGuanne lived out her retirement, ‘in a shady nook of her garden among flowers and books’, dying on the fourth of June, 1946.
McGuanne House.
Do you have stories of Miss McGaunne? Perhaps your parents shared an anecdote or two. Please, share them with us!
Article written by M. Sullivan
Sources: Campbelltown and Ingleburn News Sep 8th 1922
Campbelltown and Ingleburn News Oct 21 1980 p13
John Cheeseman Remembers his Childhood Grist mills Vol 4 No2 Campbeltown Public School 1876-1976
Campbelltown Pioneer Register 1800-1900
Campbelltown & World War One 1914-1918 by Jeff McGill.
Campbelltown : the bicentennial history by Carol Liston.
Friday, 7 November 2014
Macarthur Community College Photography Group.
The Macarthur CC Photography Group was formed in late 2009 by Macarthur Community Photography tutor Debra Pearson. Comprised of digital photography students, the newly formed group met monthly to discuss ideas, their work, and photography together.
Their first group exhibition “Points of View” debuted at Fairfield City Museum and Gallery in 2011, then traveled to Narellan and Camden Libraries.
2012 saw new student members added to the group, and a second exhibition “Points of View 2” was mounted at Fairfield City Museum & Gallery, Fairfield City Chambers, and Campbelltown and Narellan Libraries. The exhibition showcased a variety of styles & interests, as well as individual experiences & cultures.
In 2013 www.macphotogroup.org was launched – “Points of View 3- Inspirations Around Us” showed at Fairfield City Museum & Art Gallery, Campbelltown City Library and Narellan Library and members of the group also took photographs for the covers of the Macarthur Community College brochure.
This year’s exhibition, “Living Culture”, is currently showing at the H.J. Daley Library Campbelltown until the 28th November. It represents 12 former photography students exploring an individual vision of the Campbelltown and Camden areas.
Debra Pearson remains as mentor and co-ordinator of the group. More information about the group can be found at their website www.macphotogroup.org
Written by Claire Lynch
Sources
www.macphotogroup.org
"Living Culture" exhibition, HJ Daley Library
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