Pictorial history of Elaine goes on display next month

ALL is in readiness for a major photographic exhibition of Elaine history, titled Elaine Thru the Lens, on the weekend of 18 and 19 October.

An estimated 3000 photographs dating from as far back as the 1800s have been collected and prepared for display since the project got underway earlier this year.

And from 10am to 3pm on the late-October weekend, they will be on show at the Elaine Hall, with free entry.

The exhibition, being billed as an extravaganza, is being organised by the Meredith History Interest Group, which has organised and run similar events in Steiglitz and Morrisons.

The group’s president, Margaret Cooper, said the aim was to collect photos of the town, its people and the district for posterity and to make them available for everyone to see.

“We wish to preserve the history of the town and district before it is lost,” Ms Cooper said.

Photographs have been organised into categories including bridges, businesses, buildings, railways, trees and water races.

“Of particular interest in this exhibition are the many marvellous photos of what we have called ‘enterprise’ that include the labour-intensive process of thrashing sheaves of hay to separate the grain from the straw,” Ms Cooper said.

“The grain was then bagged and the straw was baled in stationary balers. We are told that the threshing team often consisted of at least 17 men and the machinery included a steam engine, a thrasher, furphy tanks, a hut, a stationary baler and lots of pitchforks.

“Some of the photos show women in dresses and aprons bagging grain or sewing the bags up.”

The group plans to compile many of the photos into an A4 coffee table book – which will also be called Elaine Thru the Lens – and hopes to publish it in November next year.

It has produced similar books for the exhibitions in Steiglitz and Morrisons.

The exhibition will be officially opened at 1.30pm on the Saturday, when local identity James Connell will ring the ‘Larundel bell’, the actual bell used to call shearers to the sheds on the historic Larundel property.

Ms Cooper said that while entry to the exhibition will be free, gold coin donations would be gratefully accepted.