29 woodland st 'geraldine'
da201900302 demolition application
The house that Jack built - part 2
If you haven't read part 1 click here
Jack had left the brickmaking business in 1880 to start his own career as a builder. He could see the prosperity generated in the building industry and was probably tired of the smoke and dust of the brickpits. 29 Woodland Street was the first documented house that he built. It was small and plain but serviceable. Jack took his time learning how to build and then how to find a buyer. The process took a little over two years but ‘Geraldine’ eventually became home to Rebecca Muir who had come to Sydney from Maitland. While waiting for the sale, Anthony purchased a block in Fletcher Street for Jack to build on, taking a mortgage to fund it. Jack built numbers 8 and 10 Fletcher Street but either couldn’t sell them or chose to keep them as rentals. In any event, they were lost in a mortgagee sale in 1894.
Realising his limitations with design and styling, Jack teamed up with builder David Williams and the two created some spectacular homes in Petersham. 21 Palace Street, ‘Zanobi’ is heritage listed. Its commanding presence on the corner of Palace and Croydon Streets is a head-turner. Even the stables which have been converted into a garage are stunning. They built neighbouring houses 23 and 25 Palace Street in the same style and a terrace of three house in Croydon Street, numbers 33, 35 and 37. Other examples of their work still stand at 2, 4, 6 and 8 Railway Street.
Realising his limitations with design and styling, Jack teamed up with builder David Williams and the two created some spectacular homes in Petersham. 21 Palace Street, ‘Zanobi’ is heritage listed. Its commanding presence on the corner of Palace and Croydon Streets is a head-turner. Even the stables which have been converted into a garage are stunning. They built neighbouring houses 23 and 25 Palace Street in the same style and a terrace of three house in Croydon Street, numbers 33, 35 and 37. Other examples of their work still stand at 2, 4, 6 and 8 Railway Street.
After years of watching Anthony’s cautious approach to debt, Jack now found himself with up to six mortgages on a single piece of land. The banking system was seeing new players enter their market on the back of skyrocketing land values. They were land finance companies and building societies, lending money for purely speculative purposes. Private investment outstripped government investment and the builders were riding a wave. In hindsight it couldn’t possibly last.
David and Jack went their separate ways when David decided to build The Albert Hall at 580 Parramatta Road. It was a passion project for David, Jack may well have seen it as self-indulgent.
David and Jack went their separate ways when David decided to build The Albert Hall at 580 Parramatta Road. It was a passion project for David, Jack may well have seen it as self-indulgent.
The pressure of the split from David Williams and having the eyes of the family firmly fixed upon him must have affected Jack deeply. On the 28th of March 1886 he walked out of the house and didn’t return. After more than a week, Dick became so worried he placed an ad in the paper asking for people to look out for his missing brother.
Jack eventually made contact from Far North Queensland where he had gone to try his luck at mining. Dick and Thomas left their families behind and joined him camping in the rough conditions of the Orient Camp near Herberton in the Atherton Tablelands. In 1888 Jack went missing yet again but Dick and Thomas stayed until 1889 until one of them injured himself by stepping in molten lead. They returned to Sydney later that year, as did Jack.
In 1890 Jack and Dick teamed up to build the houses at 47 and 49 Beach Road Dulwich Hill. They are beautiful homes, miniature versions of the grand Petersham houses.
They were the last houses that Jack built.
In 1891 the Sydney property market collapsed. Subdivision had become a Sydney addiction and houses across the city stood vacant. The building industry had enjoyed three decades of prosperity but it was over. In 1893 the Australian banking system collapsed and the country lurched into its greatest depression ever recorded.
In 1890 Jack and Dick teamed up to build the houses at 47 and 49 Beach Road Dulwich Hill. They are beautiful homes, miniature versions of the grand Petersham houses.
They were the last houses that Jack built.
In 1891 the Sydney property market collapsed. Subdivision had become a Sydney addiction and houses across the city stood vacant. The building industry had enjoyed three decades of prosperity but it was over. In 1893 the Australian banking system collapsed and the country lurched into its greatest depression ever recorded.
In 1892 the Blamires were given notice to quit Dunstaffenage Street. Having previously lost it to the mortgagee, it was now being subdivided to be sold as the Fernhill Estate. Dick had set up Emma and their eight children in Farr Street Marrickville, John drifted with no home of his own and Thomas went to Darlinghurst looking for work. Their mother Maria wasn’t even able to die in her own home, she went to friends at Lewisham Street and died that year after 18 years of suffering from chronic rheumatism. They watched their father leave the home he had built ten years before, and after 22 years of living in the district, at the age of 77, he followed Thomas to the inner city. The proud brickmaker from Lancashire was penniless.
There is no way of knowing when the labor movement ignited a fire in the belly of the Blamire boys. They had watched young lads working in some of the pits carrying clay from 5am until 7pm. Despite mechanisation, some brickworks introduced ten-hour days while the stonemasons and carpenters had negotiated the world’s first 48-hour week in 1855. They had felt the pressure to lower their prices and work longer hours to be able to compete with the more sophisticated brickmaking enterprises. Legislative attempts to limit the hours and conditions of employment for women and children were thrown out in 1877. The General Public Health Bill of 1885 contained clauses to regulate the physical condition of factories and shops but failed to become law. They saw foreclosure after foreclosure on properties owned by themselves and their mates in the building industry.
There is no way of knowing when the labor movement ignited a fire in the belly of the Blamire boys. They had watched young lads working in some of the pits carrying clay from 5am until 7pm. Despite mechanisation, some brickworks introduced ten-hour days while the stonemasons and carpenters had negotiated the world’s first 48-hour week in 1855. They had felt the pressure to lower their prices and work longer hours to be able to compete with the more sophisticated brickmaking enterprises. Legislative attempts to limit the hours and conditions of employment for women and children were thrown out in 1877. The General Public Health Bill of 1885 contained clauses to regulate the physical condition of factories and shops but failed to become law. They saw foreclosure after foreclosure on properties owned by themselves and their mates in the building industry.
In 1885 they attended a meeting of the Brickmakers Union held at the Botany View Hotel where a large representation of the local brickyards were present. They discussed and agreed to shorten the working day to eight hours and to set a minimum wage.
And in 1890 they watched as a new force, the Labor Party, emerged from the unions leading the maritime strikes.
And in 1890 they watched as a new force, the Labor Party, emerged from the unions leading the maritime strikes.
In 1893 they were attracted to an experiment in State Socialism that was started at Pitt Town Co-operative Labour Settlement in the far west of Sydney. It was intended to help ease the rampant unemployment of the depression that had hit the colony. Jack, Dick, Emma and the eight children all relocated from Marrickville. A ninth child Stanley was born at the settlement. The superintendent of the settlement was a person the boys had probably met in the 1880s when he was the president of the North Shore chapter of the Brickmakers Union. His name was George Waite and he was to have an enormous impact on the Blamires for the rest of their lives. The rules at Pitt Town were simple: every man was to work eight hours per day on the 2000-acre settlement but after that was free to do as he wished on the small plot of additional land that each was granted. Proceeds from the communal work were to be evenly distributed. A brick kiln was erected that churned out 25,000 bricks for the settlement and I expect Jack and Dick were running that. The settlement failed as the majority of men wanted a ‘reward for effort’ scheme. Single men resented working for the families of others and after they had paid for the superintendent and the lease of the land, they were earning minimum wage. By 1896 most of the settlers had left. Jack had gone off to Western Australia, Emma had returned to Marrickville with the children and Dick was left in a head swivel. Frustratingly for Emma, he followed Jack to Western Australia.
In Western Australia, the Blamires found their calling. After Pitt Town, they had become distrustful of the government and its failure to deliver. George Waite’s libertarian ideals had inspired them and they became embedded into the Labor movement in Western Australia. In 1897 they were granted a gold mining lease and entered the union movement of that state. Settling in Kalgoorlie, Richard became the president of the Kalgoorlie and Boulder Workers Association. When it was absorbed into the Amalgamated Workers Association, he retained the presidency and Jack became treasurer. They were both prolific letter writers, warning others via newspaper about the labour crisis in WA just after the turn of the century and arguing against both the major parties – the free traders and the protectionists. In 1899 Dick was a delegate at the first Trades Union and Labor Congress. At this event, the Australian Labor Federation of WA was formed and decided on party policy on a range of electoral, industrial and taxation reforms. It was the beginning of the Labor Party in WA.
By 1902 Emma had had enough and demanded Dick return home. She had spent six years virtually a widow with Dick only periodically returning to Sydney.
Neither he nor Jack were present when in 1900, ten days before Christmas Anthony died in Dowling Street Woolloomooloo of senility and pneumonia. They didn’t make his funeral two days later and family tension was running high.
In June Dick left WA for good, with a rousing send-off organised, and a gift of gold sovereigns, a gold medal from the AWA and an expensive silver pipe bestowed on him. A gold bar brooch was a gift of appeasement for Emma. At the end of 1902 Dick was representing the Railway Association at the Trade Congress in Sydney. He represented Western Australia at the second Commonwealth Labor Conference in December. Many delegates from WA were in attendance and Dick reconnected with his old mates. It fired him up again and in 1903 he went back to the goldfields of WA.
He didn’t stay long. Jack had gone from the goldfields by then and without his brother life in WA didn’t have the same appeal. In 1904 he was back in Marrickville and remained there for the rest of his days.
But where was Jack?
Neither he nor Jack were present when in 1900, ten days before Christmas Anthony died in Dowling Street Woolloomooloo of senility and pneumonia. They didn’t make his funeral two days later and family tension was running high.
In June Dick left WA for good, with a rousing send-off organised, and a gift of gold sovereigns, a gold medal from the AWA and an expensive silver pipe bestowed on him. A gold bar brooch was a gift of appeasement for Emma. At the end of 1902 Dick was representing the Railway Association at the Trade Congress in Sydney. He represented Western Australia at the second Commonwealth Labor Conference in December. Many delegates from WA were in attendance and Dick reconnected with his old mates. It fired him up again and in 1903 he went back to the goldfields of WA.
He didn’t stay long. Jack had gone from the goldfields by then and without his brother life in WA didn’t have the same appeal. In 1904 he was back in Marrickville and remained there for the rest of his days.
But where was Jack?
He became the secretary of the Hamel Settlers Association in Western Australia. Tasked with clearing and cultivating the lowlands of the Hamel Estate, essentially a swamp, each settler received a contract and a sum of about £100 to set up each farm. An inadequate contribution by the government to what would reasonable be expected to cost around £1000 to achieve. With no roads to either enter the settlement or get their produce to market, the task was hopeless.
John had his first attack of pleurisy in 1904, the years of smoke from the kilns and dust from the pits had caught up with him. In June 1905, he went to Perth to plead the settler case to the Minister for Lands but his trip was cut short by his illness. He was promised warm clothing and financial assistance to settle his affairs in order that he could return to his brothers in Sydney whose letters had been arriving with every mail delivery. He returned to his campsite in the swamp to wait out his symptoms and for help to arrive. The leaks and damp in the hovel did his illness no favours and as the wet weather set in, the Corkrans next door removed him to their house where they put him to bed. His final thoughts were of hope and anticipation that he would return east to Marrickville to be surrounded by his brothers as his life of struggle for the rights and freedom of everyday people ended. He never got out of that bed and he remains in an unmarked grave in the Waroona Cemetery in Western Australia, a long way from home.
John had his first attack of pleurisy in 1904, the years of smoke from the kilns and dust from the pits had caught up with him. In June 1905, he went to Perth to plead the settler case to the Minister for Lands but his trip was cut short by his illness. He was promised warm clothing and financial assistance to settle his affairs in order that he could return to his brothers in Sydney whose letters had been arriving with every mail delivery. He returned to his campsite in the swamp to wait out his symptoms and for help to arrive. The leaks and damp in the hovel did his illness no favours and as the wet weather set in, the Corkrans next door removed him to their house where they put him to bed. His final thoughts were of hope and anticipation that he would return east to Marrickville to be surrounded by his brothers as his life of struggle for the rights and freedom of everyday people ended. He never got out of that bed and he remains in an unmarked grave in the Waroona Cemetery in Western Australia, a long way from home.
Dick (pictured left) had secured a job with Marrickville Council and worked as a labourer at the tip on Petersham Road. His brother-in-law George Clissold told him about a house that had come up for rent in Woodland Street, across the road from his own home at number 18. It was number 29, the house his brother Jack had built 20 years before. Dick immediately took up the lease and moved his family in.
After years of working for Marrickville Council he managed to save enough money to buy his own home once more. He bought the house directly opposite at 16 Woodland Street, next door to George’s and moved into ‘Warrigal’. Every morning as he left for work, he would glance across the road and be reminded of Jack.
On the morning of the 8th of July 1914, Richard left for work as normal. At lunchtime he complained of not feeling well and suffered a massive heart attack. He died almost instantly.
The name Blamire Lane was gazetted in 1966 and runs between Schwebel and Grove Streets off Illawarra Road. Originally known as Rose Street, it lost its status as a street when the streets of Marrickville were renumbered in 1923 and it became simply a laneway servicing the rear of the properties in Grove Street. It is a reminder of a family that contributed so much to not only our suburb, but the city of Sydney and the Labor movement of this country.
After years of working for Marrickville Council he managed to save enough money to buy his own home once more. He bought the house directly opposite at 16 Woodland Street, next door to George’s and moved into ‘Warrigal’. Every morning as he left for work, he would glance across the road and be reminded of Jack.
On the morning of the 8th of July 1914, Richard left for work as normal. At lunchtime he complained of not feeling well and suffered a massive heart attack. He died almost instantly.
The name Blamire Lane was gazetted in 1966 and runs between Schwebel and Grove Streets off Illawarra Road. Originally known as Rose Street, it lost its status as a street when the streets of Marrickville were renumbered in 1923 and it became simply a laneway servicing the rear of the properties in Grove Street. It is a reminder of a family that contributed so much to not only our suburb, but the city of Sydney and the Labor movement of this country.
Marrickville was filled with brickmakers. Rupert Cook in Addison Road supplied bricks for Central Station. His enamel bricks won first prize at the RAS Show. Thomas Daly’s Standsure Brick Company grew to be one of the largest and most productive in the state. It is now buried beneath Henson Park. Fowler’s moved from Camperdown to Fitzroy Street Marrickville. It closed in 1975 after 88 years in operation.
The chimneys that stand tall and proud above the kilns in Sydney Park are all that is left of the Bedford Brickworks, the start of the brickmaker’s golden mile that stretched all the way to Smith Street in Tempe.
If you pay a visit to the new library at Marrickville and stroll down Lilydale Street you will see some reminders of a Marrickville brickmaker’s work. A wall has been built of bricks from the old cottage hospital, and if you look closely, you will see the stamp of Rupert Cook who supplied the bricks.
All of our brickmakers have a story. This has been just one.
Acknowledgements
The following resources were indispensable in helping me understand the enormity
and impact of the brickmaking industry in Marrickville:
Warwick Gemmell: And So We Graft From Six to Six
Nora Peek and Chris Pratten: Working the Clays
Ron Ringer: The Brickmasters 1788 – 2008
Special thanks to Shirley Fitzgerald for her work Rising Damp. Every time I ask “why?” Shirley has the answer. She brings nineteenth century Sydney alive for me, the glory and the tragedy.
Copyright © 2019 Marrickville Unearthed. All rights reserved
All of our brickmakers have a story. This has been just one.
Acknowledgements
The following resources were indispensable in helping me understand the enormity
and impact of the brickmaking industry in Marrickville:
Warwick Gemmell: And So We Graft From Six to Six
Nora Peek and Chris Pratten: Working the Clays
Ron Ringer: The Brickmasters 1788 – 2008
Special thanks to Shirley Fitzgerald for her work Rising Damp. Every time I ask “why?” Shirley has the answer. She brings nineteenth century Sydney alive for me, the glory and the tragedy.
Copyright © 2019 Marrickville Unearthed. All rights reserved