Month / September 2015

by Eddie

The difficult birth of a statue

Looking grumpy about the time it took to erect

“I think I can see my brother from here”

Visitors to Kings Park can’t help but notice the memorial to John Forrest. As imposing a statue as the man was in life, it didn’t have an easy time coming into being.

Firstly, the organising committee tried to raise money from the public, both here and in England. Perth residents were mostly uninterested, and contributed very little. As a result, by 1921 the Brits got all sulky and decided to spend their cash on a stain glass window to Forrest in St Paul’s Cathedral, London.

So the committee had to go, somewhat predictably, to the government and beg some cash to get their statue. But it three more years before anyone got round to doing anything about it. And then the choice of sculptor, the England-based Sir Bertram Mackennal, caused outrage.

Perth had its own very popular sculptor, Pietro Porcelli, who had already done a good job on Forrest’s brother, Alexander. In addition, Pietro had known Forrest, so might have seemed like the obvious candidate. Instead. someone with a ‘Sir’ in front of their name got the job.

In March 1926 a large box arrived at Fremantle and was shipped to Kings Park. And there it was dumped in a shed and forgotten about. Rumours started to spread that Mackennal had created such an ugly statue no one was prepared to put it on show. No one from the Kings Park Board bothered to contradict this, so it quickly became the received opinion.

The reason for the delay is still mysterious, and it took nearly eighteen months for the memorial to be erected, and finally unveiled in August 1927.*

And then the Mayor of Perth managed to ruin in the whole event by using his speech to rant about the lack of funding for a State War Memorial. The crowd got quickly bored by William Lathlain’s raving and walked off, leaving the Mayor talking to a near empty park.

Nothing ever goes to plan, does it?

* Note to the Botanic Garden & Parks Authority. The statue was unveiled in 1927, not 1928 as your website claims. A small detail, but we historians get all worked up about such things. Please change it so we can calm down.

by Eddie

Sulphur and fire

Just waiting for a squaddie with a match

Just waiting for a squaddie with a match

It deserves to be better known, but the first town in the Swan River Colony was not Perth or Fremantle, but Sulphur Town on Garden Island. Admittedly, Albany had been colonised a couple of years before.

Sulphur Town was home to the first Government House, and saw WA’s first horse race. What became of it is the subject of today’s story.

More than 400 people lived in the town, named after the ship which carried the 63rd Regiment. A regiment that was to start and end the settlement.

But by 1834, Sulphur Town was practically abandoned, as people left in the rush to claim good land along the Swan River. Even so, all the original buildings still remained.

In May of that year, the transport ship Lonach was anchored off shore. Onboard were the 45th, 55th, and 63rd Regiments. Some of the soldiers’ wives were permitted to land on Garden Island to do the laundry, and it seems that a few of the men followed them.

After a few ales, the squaddies did the only reasonable thing possible. They burnt the entire town to the ground. It seems likely they started with Governor Stirling’s old residence, before moving on to the barracks, the stores, and several huts and out-houses.

Ladders belonging to Thomas Peel were tossed into the flames, while any locked cabinets were broken open, just in case something valuable had been left behind.

The newspaper howled for the severest punishment the law allowed, but by this time the Lonach had departed, taking all the guilty men (and their wives) with them.

Recently, local archaeologist Shane Burke has discovered a molten champagne bottle on Garden Island, a permanent reminder of the need to keep soldiers well away from matches.

by Eddie

The unlikely terrorists amongst us

Jihad probably preached here. Probably.

Jihad probably preached here. Probably.

What’s with all these boat people coming to Western Australia with their strange ways and strange religion? Setting up their own schools and places of worship. And wanting to force us all to convert to their weird… Roman Catholicism.

Wait. That can’t be right.

But it is. Throughout much of the 19th century, Catholics were treated—at least by hard-line Protestants—with great suspicion. Attempts were made to stop Catholic schools receiving decent funding, and there were occasional riots on the goldfields between the two major branches of Christianity.

In 1869, one writer had had enough of the Catholic immigrants, who were largely Irish. He accused them of a conspiracy to take over WA, and pointed out that most of them were criminals anyway. Weren’t British jails full of evil Catholics, he asked?

Our Protestant correspondent went on to extract some out-of-context notes from an RC Bible, to prove Catholics were commanded to slay good Christians, and they were teaching jihad in their schools. Every Protestant had reason to worry about the forthcoming terrorist campaign.

For some reason, this all sounds very familiar. But we can’t think why.

by Eddie

Where was Perth’s first gym?

Feel the burn

Feel the burn

There is, apparently, anger at the news ECU is thinking of privatising its gyms. All the users will get in exchange is better opening hours and increased investment in the equipment. Outrageous!

But this does lead to the historical question: where was WA’s first gym? It’s not an easy question to answer, since it depends on what you mean by gymnasium. The school at Fremantle had the first equipment, but it wasn’t open to the public.

In which case, we nominate Stirling Square at Guildford. Some wooden gear, painted white, was erected there around 1885. This was organised by future MLC and local businessman, James Morrison, who was worried about the local larrikins and wanted to give them something energetic to do.

stirling_square

Named after James ‘Young Brides’ Stirling

The following year, Wellington Square got Perth’s first outdoor fitness centre. There was a trapeze, a horizontal bar—one for adults and one for kids— rings and a climbing pole. While it was popular, residents complained the unpainted wood made it look half finished.

Wellington_Square

Then known as the Recreation Ground

A commercial gym was established in 1887 by William Rosevear at the back of his ironmongers in William Street, right where the entrance to the Bankwest Tower now sits. The club taught self-defence, and had a horizontal bar, free weights and other equipment.

The 1880s saw an obsession with gyms because of the rotten kids. Boys were standing on street corners, smoking and swearing, while the girls were walking the streets looking for a quickie. The solution, known as Muscular Christianity, believed that anaerobic exercise resulted in more spiritual souls.

As the Dodgy Perth staff can testify. After a good gym session we are in no state to smoke, swear or seek one night stands. Muscular Christianity works.

by Eddie

How to keep the Guildford Hotel open

Back in the day before it met with an unfortunate accident

Back in the day before it met with an unfortunate accident

As the Guildford Hotel controversy still rumbles on in the background, Dodgy Perth looks back to a time when the scandal took place inside the building. And it was all revealed by accident.

In 1927, Bassendean residents were clamouring for a hotel of their own, since the suburb still didn’t have one. A few locals opposed the idea. They had only moved to Bassendean, they said, so they could keep their daughters away from the evil drinking types.

In the licensing court, James Wilkinson was giving evidence about why Bassendean needed a hotel. The accommodation would benefit his FIFOs, he said, and sporting groups needed somewhere to meet. The bench was sceptical. How useful would a hotel be for sporting groups, when it would have to close at 9pm each night? Surely that would be a little early for committee meetings?

Don’t worry about that, blurted out James. All we have to do is pay the landlord £1 each for a special license and we can keep drinking until 11pm. We do it all the time at the Guildford Hotel. Suddenly, the proceedings fell silent.

“The police will be interested,” quietly observed one official. At this point, James probably realised he’d dropped the hotel’s landlord right in it.

So remember, when the Guildford reopens, £1 buys you a two-hour extension to closing time, otherwise they’re not being true to their heritage.