The History of the Bellinger Valley. | Bellingen and Urunga Museums

 

 

The History of the Bellinger Valley. | Bellingen and Urunga Museums.

 

Had the pleasure of meeting a number of the Historical Society and Museum Volunteers yesterday at the launch of the Pegums’ new book about the PILOT HOUSE in URUNGA.

URUNGA MUSEUM was washed out with the 09 floods and is now approaching readiness for re-opening due to the industry and vision of a small core of slightly deranged Urunguans.

The webpage is also up and running with some equally deranged Bello people hard at work.

Both jobs are impressive and without these dedicated people, we would keep losing our History just as we have recently lost the unique roof on McBaron’s Silo at Raleigh in the winds.

How exciting to see the Old Valley coming alive again in the Museums and Online.

There are more stories out there and one of them might be YOURS.

An email to the Historical Society with YOUR snippet of history just might add a missing piece of our Valley’s Mosaic.

bellingenmuseum@yahoo.com.au

MONDAY AFTERNOON

Its one of those curious days when the air is thick and the sun don’t seem to exist. Something ‘should’ happen. A storm or a wind or – ‘something’. Instead the day hangs there. Quietly.  We took a drive down Gurney Road to where the Raleigh Railway Station used to be. Almost ran into the Sydney-Casino XPT on the unfenced and unsigned road. Back THEN, things were very different. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article17519061

Flowers on a fence at PACIFIC BAY RESORT. There is always an edge of the Tacky at resorts – so it seems to me.

The supper club in Charlie’s Restaurant, Pacific Bay. That’s Izzy playing Bass in Beret with Billy White’s DELTA AMPS.

My lifestyle of choice involves a good deal of being ‘at home’. A few years ago I did the online Ignatian Retreat in Everyday Life and that was a 10 month period which I truly enjoyed. 2010 has seen me ON THE MOVE. Now I am doing something which I once read in a Readers’ Digest ART OF LIVING. I am waiting now for my soul to catch up to my body. I do rather like Life. Sitting in the Haematology Unit of RPA in Sydney reminded me of that as did the effects of a sedative on a body which had its fair share and more of sedation in the 70s and 80s and none since then. My brother was telling me of the young ones who come in with acute cancers. Come in, suddenly ill and often don’t go home again.

On the Thursday, I was there in the midst of Sydney and enjoying the rooftops and dinner at DEUS EX MACHINA on Parramatta Road. On the Friday, I was flying in the Qantas Dash Plane back to Coffs Airport. On the Saturday, I was at the Bellingen growers’ Market in the Showground with Izzy having his mugoccino and KatiB fetching juices for us. The Little Girl sat in the McLaren and thoroughly enjoyed it.

The Sydney Morning Herald… Thursday 8 June 1933 SWAGMEN ON TRAINS. COFF’S HARBOUR, Wednesday. The prevalence of “train-sealers” on the North Coast line has been a source of constant annoyance to railway officials and the Police Department, and, despite efforts made to check swagmen from obtaining free rides on trains, the “sealers” seem to have doubled their activities during the past month. Thirteen train-jumpers fell Into a neat trap laid by the police at Coffs Harbour station recently. Advised beforehand that train jumpers had refused to leave a goods train at Raleigh, the train was brought to a standstill at Coffs Harbour in the full glare of the plat-form Hants, and, with policemen on either side of the train. Thirteen arrests were made. Subsequently the men, whose ages ranged from l8 to 55, were charged at Coffs Harbour Police Court and were each fined £3 or six days’ gaol. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article16981233

The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842-1954), Tuesday 29 June 1937, page 11 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article17390805 CATTLE OUT THE BACK OF THE COTTAGE RALEIGH.

RALEIGH NEAR WINERY AND HALL. HERD OF CATTLE PASSING THE DOOR IN RALEIGH. http://www.Wilsons almanac.com/articles.html#baddies

APRIL FOOLS MARCH ON

EASTER MOON OVER RALEIGH	IZZY FOREAL WITH BILLY AND THE BLUES AT PACIFIC BAY	BABY IN BELLO	ANNANDALE TREES	IZZY AND BABY

The quick trip to Sydney is over and I am back in Raleigh and beginning this next stage of life.  There are horses in the paddock beside me and I am working outside on the verandah. The Ulmarra House is almost finalised. The Real Estate Agent is to inspect it tomorrow. The world of the Renter is my world. And with it comes the Property Manager which is a rather flash name for the person who comes round dealing with inspections etc. Thanks to my brother, I have been given right royal medical treatment and am able now to sit and watch the sunrise and visit with the Girls in Bello.
SUNDAY HERALD SYDNEY 1953	Izzy played with the DELTA AMPS at a National Convention in Coffs harbour – up at PACIFIC BAY RESORT.  That was the Easter weekend. More than 1000 people attended the AA Convention. I liked PACIFIC BAY.
The hills behind the Resort seemed to have fewer bananas than they once did. I am continuing with my conscious exploration of the Northern Rivers Life after so many years of unconsciously, semi-consciously and intuitively living here. Its been a wet time the last year or so with the Coffs and Bellingen Floods but without the bananas massed on the western hills behind Coffs, it looks a little less green than my recollections tell me. I am very fond of sugar cane.
The Workers’Cottage begins to feel a little like Home with some of our books out on shelves and the buddha my sister gave me for my 50th birthday perched beside them and smiling. Downsizing from the very large Ulmarra House to this Cottage is taking some doing. We had gathered some fine books along the way.
I started a Clarence/Ulmarra Blog last year but it didn’t take off and I tended to forget to update it so I am staying with this one for the Raleigh Days. That should incorporate a good deal of Bellingen Shire information. Just to the East of us is the village of Repton and the town of MYLESTOM. Mylestom is also called NORTH BEACH – being the North Beach of the Bellinger River with Urunga on the South. Two rivers meet the sea at Urunga. The Kalang and the Bellinger. The plague to the right is at North Beach.
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article16430172 The Sydney Morning Herald… Thursday 29 December 1927, page 10. BELLINGEN ELECTRICITY URUNGA WEDNESDAY The Shire Council is investigating the possibility of extending the .present electric lighting and power scheme from Bellingen to Urunga, Fernmount, Raleigh, and Repton, towns on the Bellinger River. The estimated loan requirements are £12,000, with an estimated annual expenditure of £1350, and an estimated revenue annually of 1590 pounds The total road mileage would be about 15 miles,with Urunga as the biggest consumer.

I HOPE THAT I DON’T FALL IN LOVE WITH YOU

BRIAN RALSTON

GOODNIGHT SWEETHEART

THE PEOPLE OF THE MOUNTAINS AND THE SEA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fbJNHAdbkg WHERE SOME OF  MY GRANDCHILDREN ARE

AUSSIE XMAS

FANCY RESTAURANTS

THEY have gone to a Fancy Restaurant for Katrox’s Birthday. How pleased Izzy would be.

FOR ALL OUR LOST TOMORROWS

FOR ALL OUR LOST TOMORROWS

Through all the long strong seasons of the moon
I’ve wandered wistful, yearning for his touch.
In all the empty spaces placed in front of me
where he can never be, I mourn.

For all the poems he will never share,
for secrets, songs and sounds he’ll never know,
and for the moon that shone in glory when he died
I’ve cried the many months since he was gone.

Through all the bright bold silvered nights
the moon has dressed in loveliness he’ll never see,
and all our lost tomorrows wrapped in sorrow
I will still love him tenderly.

KATHLEEN EARSMAN 2004

RALEIGH RUMBLING NO 13 TODAY

Hey. This RUMBLE has sneaked up on us ! It is TODAY. Best bring your own food or starve. We are NOT organised AT ALL. 12-5 pm. RALEIGH HALL.