|
| The cliff above
Yerranderie |
Yerranderie
Ghost town now owned by an architectural conservationist.
Visiting Yerranderie is a labour of love. Having travelled
either 101 kms from Goulburn or 50 kms from Oberon the
traveller turns north on a dirt road (an old stock route)
marked 'Mt Werong' and 'Jerrong' and for the next 1 1/2
hours travels 62 km crossing five creeks (in good weather
the road is open to all traffic but in the wet it is
strictly for 4WD vehicles) before arriving at the charming
old silver mining town of Yerranderie. The journey is worth
making. Yerranderie is a remnant of a once-thriving
community. In its heyday between 1900 and 1914 it had over 2
000 residents and services including a school, three
churches, two butchers, one hotel, a police station and
court house and a silent movie theatre. At the top of the
hill was the small 'Government Town' (where one of the
churches, the court house and the school stand rather
forlornly in grassy fields) and below it was the more
populous 'Private Town'.
|
| The Post Office (built
1907) |
'Private Town' is currently owned by the conservationist
and architect Valerie Lhuede who is slowly restoring the old
buildings. The Post Office (built in 1907) has been
converted to bunk style accommodation, S.C.Meldrum's
tailor's shop is now a gift store, the bank is a museum and
the bakery is an Aboriginal artifacts gallery. There is also
a well preserved boarding house. Lheude's restorations are
tasteful and authentic.
Yerranderie is located on the edge of an extinct volcano.
In 1871 a part Aborigine Werriberri (known as Billy Russell)
found galena - from which silver and lead can be extracted -
three kilometres from the town site. The price of silver was
such that serious mining did not start until the late 1890s.
From 1899 to 1914 the town prospered. A road from Camden via
The Oaks and the Burragorang Valley was constructed and
mining machinery (much of which now lies rusting in the
bush) was brought in by horses.
Between 1900 and 1912 5 381 000 ounces of silver, 9 951
ounces of gold and over 12 000 tons of lead were extracted.
The outbreak of war saw miners leave the area and the 1920s
were a period of severe industrial unrest with miners going
on strike for years. There were a number of attempts to
re-open the mines after World War II but they were brought
to an abrupt halt in the 1950s when the Sydney Water Board
flooded the Burragorang Valley for the Warragamba Dam
cutting off access to the town from Camden.
|
| A view of the old houses
at Private Town, Yerranderie |
Subsequently L.J. Hooker bought the town to acquire the
hotel's liquor licence which was transferred to the Sydney
suburb of St. Marys. The town was then sold to a company
which subsequently sold both the town and the leases to Ms.
Lhuede who now flies in from Camden and, with a permanent
caretaker and solar electricity, runs the Yerranderie
Village Project as a quiet holiday resort and conservation
area.
The owners have recently opened Slippery Norris's
Cottage, (a fine old miners cottage) as self contained
accommodation for six. Slippery Norris died in 1994 keeping
the secret of why his nickname was Slippery to himself.
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Yerranderie
