COLLECTION

POLICY

St Helens History Room

August 2016

Contents

HeadingsPage

1.0Statement of Purpose2

2.0Purpose and Scope of the Collection Policy2

3.0History of the St Helens History Room2

4.0What the Museum will Collect4

5.0How the Museum will Collect13

6.0Collection Care: Documentation, Conservation and

Storage15

7.0Deaccessioning and Disposal Procedures16

8.0Loans18

9.0Oral History Policy21

10.0Access21

11.0Review21

12.0Date of Endorsement21

13.0Appendices22

COLLECTION POLICY
St Helens History Room (2016)
1.0 STATEMENT OF PURPOSE
The St. Helens History Room strives to be a leader in the intellectual, social, historical and creative development of the Break O’Day municipal area. We will achieve this by increasing the enjoyment and understanding of our historical, social and cultural heritage through the collection (including oral history), preservation and interpretation of the region’s moveable heritage as it relates tosome of the main themessuch as Aboriginal History, European settlement, early tin mining, the timber industry, agriculture, maritime history and the fishing industry. The museum aims to chart the social history of the region from early settlement through to the current era.
2.0PURPOSE AND SCOPE OF THE COLLECTION POLICY
The collection policy underpins the development of the collection. It defines the range of objects the museum chooses to collect, and also, not collect, in order to fulfil the aims stated in the Statement of Purpose. The policy ensures that a high standard of care of the current collection is maintained and that future acquisitions or disposals are made in a structured and considered manner. The policy also provides a basis for the provision of services by the Break O’DayCouncil who manages the St Helens History Room and its collections.
3.0 HISTORY OF THE ST HELENS HISTORY ROOM
The first public meeting held to formalize a local St. Helens History Room was in 1964, subsequently, in 1974, Mr. Peter Burns OAM and his then wife, Kathleen, set up the St. Helens History Room to help promote the centenary of the St. Helens District High School. A booklet was published to cover this event ‘Then And Now’. Peter and Kathleen operated the St. Helens History Room from two separate locations between 1974 and 1985. In 1985, a purpose built area was incorporated into the then St. Helens State Library for the St. Helens History Room. The original purpose of the St. Helens History Room was to house the Burns Collection through the then State Library of Tasmania – now known as LINC Tasmania. The St. Helens History Room continued to develop as an organization, coming under the control of the Break O’Day Council in 1992 and moving into its new premises in 2005/2006. The Break O’Day Council appointed a part-time Curator in 2005.
The Burns Collection includes a series of photographic images taken of the St. Helens district and its changing landscape and other places around Tasmania generally. The earliest photo dates from 1860 – a view of Stanley. Other old images are: Weldborough’s first house (1875); the Schooner St Helens in Georges Bay (1878); a group outside the Poimena Hotel (1890).
The collection is made up of negatives sizing from 35 mm to 80x140 mm, prints both black and white and colour sizing mainly from postcard to A4, 35 mm colour slides and 80x80 mm lantern slides. There are some glass negatives mainly in the quarter plate size and some paper negatives. The prints are kept in archival folders according to subject matter and the negatives, in the main, in archival albums. The glass negatives are stored in specially made boxes that keep each individual image separate from the others. Glass lantern slides are kept in wooden boxes with separators. Lantern slides came from more than one source in theseboxes. The lantern slides have been scanned and entered into Mosaic. There are about 583 mainly in good condition with a small percentage damaged; cracked, missing cover glasses and some chipped.
The negative collection is made up of several individual collections. There are the Burns' Collection (mainly black and white negatives but with a significant number of colour ones too), the Dr Rae Collection, The Burns' Family collection and a series of miscellaneous albums.
The Burns' Collection contains approximately 20,000 35 mm negatives catalogued in FileMaker Pro (previously catalogued on an Apple Mac and later transferred to a PC and filed in Microsoft Access – which had limitations on data holding which FileMaker Pro hasovercome). The Rae collection is about 25-30% that of the Burns. There is no catalogue of the Rae Collection as most images are unidentified (hopefully a shooting log or index will eventually surface). The miscellaneous collection is about 1500 in number and is in the process of being digitised, and where the subject matter is known will be catalogued in Mosaic.
The St Helens History Room holds a wide collection of maps of the area and surrounding districts. Amongst these are a series of maps that constitute the Burns Collection. The earliest of these date from 1830, depicting the then settled areas of Van Diemen’s Land. These maps range from navigational, topographical, tenure, mineral, forest types and infrastructural maps of locations.
The St Helens History Room also has an extensive reference library that comprises approximately 1,230 items. A great many are from the Burns Collection, with others from the Evans Collection and the Rats of Tobruk Association, plus other private donors. A card catalogue and the computer catalogue system called Mosaic provide easy access to this collection. A broad range of topics is covered that includes the discovery and exploration of Tasmania (formerly Van Diemens’ Land) the days of early settlement, with the arrival of convicts, the emergence of bushrangers and the dispossession of the Aborigines. Also featured are books on shipping and shipwrecks around Tasmania and the development of industries such as whaling, fishing, forestry, farming and mining. The Chinese had a strong influence on mining in North East Tasmania.
Family histories feature prominently in the collection with reference to early settlement, involvement in wars (e.g. Transvaal War, World War 1 and 2 etc) and colonial life in general. The environmental aspect is covered by books on geology, wildlife, plants and marine life to mention a few. Some of the earliest items are WE Sharland’s ‘Rough Notes of a Journal of Expedition to Westward (from Bothwell to the Frenchman’s Cap 1832) and the Tasmanian Directory 1867-1868. The collection is added to frequently by donations from the Friends of the History Room and other donors. The latest addition entitled Lottah and the Anchor published in 2016 was donated by its author, Mr Garry Richardson.
The St Helens History Room also contains an extensive Archive section covering diverse collection themes such as local publications, ephemera, correspondence, newsprint articles and records for local clubs, societies, businesses, events, and police. The Archive section of the St Helens History Room has been collected since inception (1985)An important element of the Archives is the RaeCollection thatcovers information and photographs relating to Tasmanian flora and fauna. Dr. Rae also bequeathed his extensive research on local sawmill sites and bushcraft to the St Helens History Room. Dr. Rae was a resident of St Helens on his retirement from being Head of the Repatriation Hospital in Hobart. He died in the c.1990s.
The permanent home of these collections is now a purpose built building on Cecilia Street, located with the Library, Online Access Centre, Service Tasmaniaand the Visitor Centre.
The St Helens History Room relocated to its new premises in 2005.
The current St Helens History Room is a cement-brick building with a cement floor. The exhibition display space and collection store have no external lighting source such as windows or sky-lights, except incidental light through the glass entrance to the foyer. Air-conditioning is provided by reverse-cycle heat pumps.
This policy has been developed to provide guidelines and a rationale to allow for the refining and the on-going development of its collection.
4.0WHAT THE MUSEUM WILL COLLECT
Key Themes
Aboriginal History
The Luni Mapali Collection consists of 200 stone implements, collected by local teacher Denys Walter in the 1960s and early 1970s from the North East Coast of Tasmania, with a small number from Western Tasmania. They include hammer stones, axes, cutters, scrapers, augers, ‘horse hooves’, ‘duck bills’ and ‘thumb nails’. The tools were fashioned from chert, hornfel, quartzite, chalcedony, opal, opalised wood and sea and beach cobble stones. Every specimen has been marked with the date and location from which it was collected. Unique registration numbers identify each piece in the inventory. They date from pre European settlement.
The John Lord Collection also displays a range of stone tools that was privately collected on school trips to North East Tasmania in the 1960 with local teacher Denys Walter. These were donated to the St Helens History Room by the Lord family in c.2012.
In addition to the Luni Mapali Collection, the St Helens History Room has a Tasmanian Aboriginal shell necklace with contemporary objects of kelp work and basket weaving demonstrating traditional practices.
Tin Mining
Exploration for tin in the North East began after the success of the Mount Bischoff Tin Mine in the North West of Tasmania in the 1870s. Significant quantities of alluvial tin were discovered in the North East and first independent prospectors and then mining syndicates began to move in, in the hope of finding the next Mount Bischoff.
Tin was first discovered in the St. Helens area in 1874 by Samuel Harrison. The location was the Royal Ruby later known as the Argonaut. It was a short distance up the Trafalgar Track, so namedbecause of the colour of the tin. The discovery of tin enticed several prospectors from the declining Mathinna gold mines to the area, which resulted in the discovery of the Blue Tier tinfield. At this time St. Helens comprised of 4 stores and 2 hotels, all made out of wood. A telephone line had just been completed and sailing vessels of 45-70 tons were at anchor in Georges Bay.
Following the discovery of alluvial tin in the Groom River by Captain James William Robinson during 1880, the original Anchor leases were worked on tribute by Arthur Hodge and James Kerguelan Robinson. The first consignment of 20 bags of tin ore was transported to Georges Bay during June 1881 and shipped to Sydney for smelting. Later, a smelter would be built in St. Helens, where Queechy cottages (Jason Street) now stand. Alluvial mining was replaced by open-lode mining which required more capital investment. A crushing and concentrating plant was erected and the famous Anchor Wheel was constructed during 1884. The waterwheel was estimated to be 20 metres in diameter, 1.34 metres wide and weighing 100 tonnes. The wheel was reported to be the largest in the Southern Hemisphere. It was used to power a 40 head stamper battery to crush the ore. There was huge excitement in Hobart when the Anchor Mining Company was launched on the stock exchange in 1882, with majority shareholders being W Crowther, M Gaylor, Captain J W Robinson and Charles Chapman.
The Anchor Mine was one of the largest and best known mines of Tasmania in the 1880s, and was part of a mining boom that boosted the state’s population and economy. It was located at Lottah in the Blue Tier, 27 km northwest of St Helens. At its height the Anchor Mine produced up to a third of the total tin produced in Tasmania. In the early years of the mine there was little planning or thought given to infrastructure – the only way to transport the ore out of the mine was with packhorses via a notoriously muddy track. It appears that beyond an initial survey of the alluvial tin, the consortium did not even organise an assessment of where the most productive deposits of ore lay under-ground. Due to the high hopes held for the mine, there was a great deal of capital available. However, this was spent on grandiose projects such as the spectacular Anchor Mine Water. The engineers however, failed to take into consideration local conditions, such as a lack of sufficient water to drive thewheel at more than three-quarter capacity during the dry months of the year.
An inadequate water supply, with 10 tonnes of water required to drive the waterwheel in one revolution, was only able to drive 30 of the 40 stampers. Due to unsuitable equipment and a lack of water the mine closed in 1887. The mine was subsequently worked on tribute. This meant that when a mine could not be operated to the owner’s satisfaction, an alternative to closing it was to let the mine on tribute, with the tribute party paying the owner a percentage of the money received for the tin.
Names of some of the earliest mines were the Union (also known as Liberator) the Niagara, Full Moon, Rising Sun, Blue Tiers, Marie Louise, Albert, Emu and the Waverley. To travel the 14 miles to Goulds Country, en route to the Blue Tier, miners had to cross 3 rivers, the George, the Ransom and the Groom. Generally, they stayed overnight at The Temperance (est. 1869) which later moved to The Junction (Lottah). In 1877, The Junction consisted of a smithy, 1 dwelling house, 1 store and a butcher shop.
In 1891, records show that 931 Chinese miners were operating out of Weldborough. The idea to introduce Chinamen upon the East Coast tin mines, as cheap labour, first emanated from the mine owners who had experienced their services upon other fields. Some of these families were the Maa Mon Chins, Le Hungs and the Chintocks, to name but a few. In all, 1200 Chinese labourers weredrawn to Weldborough and the Blue Tier mining field. With them they brought their ancient culture and crafts to the remote bush area of NE Tasmania. Their Joss House is still preserved in the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery in Launceston, being removed from Weldborough for conservation in the 1930s. Little is left at Weldborough now, where in the 1870s, the lights never dimmed and there were 3 shifts to every bed. Chinese archeological domestic objects are on display that is evidence from this period.
The fortunes of the mine were characterised by sharp peaks and troughs, and quick changes of ownership, complicated by the rising and falling prices of tin. However, the Anchor Mine and other smaller mines like it were responsible for the development of the township of St Helens and Georges Bay as a port for exporting ore.
Boom time for the area was ensured with the discovery of alluvial tin ore in 1874.
The St Helens History Room has a range of objects to support this theme e.g. maps, archival material, tools, machinery, photographs, tin alloy ingots and other objects.
Early Settlement of St Helens
In 1804 when Van Diemens Land was settled, the Georges Bay District, as it was then called, was but sparsely populated. Tasmanian Aborigines came and went. Itinerant swanners plied their cruel trade – starving live swans in crowded enclosures prior to killing and plucking them for saleable down and feathers. Whalers and Sealers, operating along the coastline, periodically entered Georges Bay for supplies.
St. Helens was gazetted as a town in 1889, but had its beginnings as Georges Bay in 1834 after the first land grant had been made to Mr EP Butler, solicitor from Hobart (1830). The second land grant was to William Talbot of Malahide from the Fingal Valley in 1831. This was the Bay View estate later farmed by another settler family, the Treloggens, in the 1850s. Michael and Thomas Coffey came to the area in about 1840 and were to make their mark as farmers and businessmen. They built the ‘Black Swan Inn’, c.1830s where they were ‘licensed to sell rum and plug tobacco’ to the whalers who used Georges Bay as an anchorage and watering port.
Intrepid surveyor, John Helder Wedge, explored the district and in 1833, led the then vice-regal party, headed by Governor Arthur, on a well- publicised excursion to Georges Bay. All concerned were impressed by the potential of the bay for a port. A military barracks was also established towards the mouth of Georges Bay in 1834. Its purpose was to intercept escaped convicts and apprehend bushrangers.
Tourism
In the early 1870s, Governor Du Cane was the first ‘tourist’ to visit St. Helens and delighted with the ‘fishing and shooting’. Georges Bay, Ansons Bay and Scamander were popular holiday resorts and people came regularly from mainland Australia to enjoy some recreational fishing and shooting.
Transport and Communications
All early transport (passengers, goods and mail services) to St. Helens was by sea until coach serviceswere introduced in the 1870s.
Maritime
St Helens History Room is an important repository for the maritime history of the area. Georges Bay was a crucial and vital aspect of the region’s development as this body of water was the district’s link with the rest of the world. As roads were virtually non-existent in North East Tasmania, shipping was the lifeblood of the area.