Jacarandas Removed in Central Camden

Protesters from the Camden Community Alliance express their objection to the removal of jacarandas in Argyle Street Camden on 12 August 2015. Members of the Alliance have ramped up their protests in recent weeks. The protesters are standing on the corner of Oxley and Argyle Streets. This is one of several street protests that the Alliance members have conducted in recent weeks.

Camden Council contractors removing the jacarandas at the intersection of Oxley and Argyle Streets in Camden. These works are part of the Town Centre Improvements that the council approved in 2014. The Camden Community Alliance has requested meetings with council and they have been declined. One of the principle objections mounted by the Alliance is the lack of engagement by council over these matters.

The Camden Community Alliance members protested this week over the removal of Jacaranda trees in Argyle Street to make way for traffic lights at the intersection with Oxley Street. 

Earlier the week Alliance members made their presence felt at the meeting of Camden Council. They were expressing their increasing frustration when council staff took questions on notice at the meeting. Mayor Symkowiak adjourned the meeting for 5 minutes, hoping the meeting could be continued, according to the Macarthur Chronicle report.

Later in the meeting local residents called out from the public gallery and the council meeting was adjourned on two more occasions.

A post of the Camden Community Alliance Facebook page maintained that it was 'impossible' for members 'to contain their voices any longer'. The post said that it was sad that it had all come to this and Alliance members looked quite radical over these matters.

The council meeting ended with cries of 'shame' from the gallery.

See Camden Community Alliance Facebook page

Camden Aesthetic

Fun with Flowers

Azaleas add fun with flowers.

Flowers can be uplifting and provide a bright spot in a dull. The local area is in full bloom with street trees, in private gardens and in other locations.

Flowers offer a sense of the new and bright perspective on a dull place—a sense of a new dawn, a new awakening. Flowers give inspiration when you are feeling down in the dumps. Try walking around the streets of Camden and Elderslie and feel inspired and uplifted.

Spring is Sprung

Flowering Plum in Macarthur Road Elderslie (I Willis)

A casual walk through Elderslie at the moment reveals the wonder of the early spring blooms that you get in the local area. The air has been crystal clear after recent rain with no haze. The light has an intensity that any keen photographer would notice and results in great images. The Sydney Basin is usually enveloped in a haze, and it is pleasant to witness the strength of colour that occasionally happens after rain. The crisp morning air just after dawn is invigorating for the soul when joggers and dog walkers are out in force taking in the fresh air.

Voices Soar on High

The first concert of A Maiden Chorus, the St John’s Camden Ladies Choir, was held at the St John’s Church Hall on Saturday night 24 May 2014. Under the direction of talented conductor Genesa Lane, the women put their hearts into several splendid a cappella arrangements drawing on influences from African, Latin, Gospel, contemporary and traditional. The angelic voice of Anneleise opened the 2nd set with a solo, and later numbers were supported by an all-male band composed of keyboard, bass and drums.

Acapella singing traces its influences to the religious music of  Medieval period drawing on  Christian, Islamic and Jewish traditions. Some sources claim the origins of a capella are found in the absence of instrumentation is founded in early forms of worship that were without musical accompaniment.

The night’s programme was lifted with talented local cellist Jonathan Bekes who performed several pieces. Jonathan will tour Italy and Norway with the Estivo Piano Trio in 2014 and will also perform in Verona. 

The concert by A Maiden Chorus was a fundraiser for the Hooper family who are undertaking mission work teaching in Tanzania later in 2014.

A Maiden Chorus is a community-based women’s only choir whose members are from a variety of backgrounds and ages. The current choir has 27 members and started in September 2013 amongst women from St John’s church.  The choir rehearse on Monday nights at the St John’s church hall at 7.30pm. 

Community singing provides distinct benefits for health and well-being. VicHealth commissioned a report called Benefits of group singing for health and well-being conducted by the Wellness Promotion Unit from Victoria University. The reports state that group singing promotes social capital which has positive impacts on physical and psychological well-being. Benefits for individuals can include increased social connectedness, increased sense of belonging, physical and emotional benefits and reduced personal stress.

Read more about the benefits of community singing here.

The Doings of the Platypus 

Camden Council held a platypus information night on Wednesday 21 May 2014 at Narellan Library for residents of Camden, Wollondilly and Campbelltown areas. 

Camden Council’s Natural Resource Projects Officer Tracey Poulter introduced  Dr David Phalen from the University of Sydney to 45 keen residents who listened attentively to a very informative presentation.

Dr Phalen outlined the life cycle of the platypus, feeding characteristics, its habits, its characteristics, local sightings, risks to its well-being and habitat. He explained the territorial nature of the platypus and described the movement of platypus in river systems and how they can move between catchments. 

Dr Phalen reported that over the past 50 years, there have been a host of sightings in the Georges River, Nepean River, Shoalhaven River, Wollondilly River Catchment areas. Platypus was recently sighted in the Georges River catchment, with one specimen caught in fishing line. He concluded that the platypus is not threatened and is quite adaptable to changes in its environment. 

Members of the audience reported their sightings of platypus in the Georges River and the Werriberri Creek. 

Nepean River at Little Sandy Bridge Camden (I Willis)

A tranquil water view

The Nepean River has provided poetic inspiration to many people.

While the river has provided inspiration for paintings, sketches and storytelling for other folks.

The river has been at the heart of Camden’s identity for over a century. The river is an integral part of the social heritage of the history of the district. 

The Nepean River is one element of the area’s intangible cultural heritage. Unfortunately, Australia is not a signatory to the United Nations Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. (Paris, 17 October 2003)

The geography of the Nepean River and its floodplain has shaped the landscape of the area.

The river floodplain is the site of many community celebrations, traditions and rituals and some of the most important is the Camden Show and Anzac Day.

Read more on the Camden Show here. 

Read more on Camden’s intangible cultural heritage and the country town here.

Read more on Camden’s charm as a country town.

Read more of the importance of the Nepean River in the area’s cultural heritage.

A moment in Exeter Street, Camden NSW (I Willis)

The essence of a moment

What have you noticed while out and about? Our local community is such a pretty place. We really are privileged to capture it sometimes. Just take a deep breath and soak up the moment. You look around, and there is a glimpse of something special. A moment when the sun catches the branches of a tree. A moment when a shadow crosses your path. 

One such moment occurred in Exeter Street on the Nepean River floodplain next to the Town Farm. Just another moment in one of Camden streetscapes that visitors come to our community to soak up. These visitors add to the tourism of the area and create jobs in the local businesses that serve them. 

Just as day-trippers have done to Camden for nearly 100 years from the Sydney area. The essence of the day-tripper was the experience of the tourists who visited our community in the 1920s and 1930s—the inter-war period when Camden’s Englishness was its attraction.

Read more about Interwar Camden. 

Attractive flower bed in Oxley Street Camden (I Willis)

Flowers and things

What a wonder a bit of colour does for a drab streetscape. The aesthetic beauty of flowers and green things are a soothing effect on people’s hectic lives. A bright spot in the day. A hit of happiness. A flourish of fun. A corner of quietness.

If you have a moment, have a look in Oxley Street outside Butterflies Florist. The florist, Angela,   has taken time out to plant flowers and different types of greenery in the flower beds opposite her shop. The colour and greenery provide a freshness, a vitality to the otherwise drab urban environment. It generates happiness. Angela said ‘I have planted roses, lavender, sweet william, geraniums, salvia, gazanias, vincas and marigolds’. She has added a burst of sunlight and brightened up a rather dull part of the streetscape in Oxley Street. We need more of it.

This novel and the attractive process has beautified an otherwise colourless streetscape of tarmac and bare brick walls. The flowers make people feel happier, and they smile at you as you walk past them. Butterflies Florist has created a comfortable zone in Oxley Street precinct.

This complements the greenery in other parts of the Camden central business area. The greenery provides a counterpoint to the rush, rush, rush of daily life. Green is a natural colour that has a soothing effect on people’s outlook. By just slowing down a little as you walk past the greenery of a  Camden streetscape, you might lower your stress levels a little.

Other green gems include the shrubbery outside Camden Council’s John Street Entrance which softens an otherwise plain streetscape and heritage office frontage. The greenery provides a pleasant entry to the council chambers adjacent to historic Macaria.

There are also the garden beds along the busy thoroughfare of Argyle Street. The flowers and shrubbery are a touch of authenticity in our ever-increasing artificial environment—a flourish of colour and a bit of nature. A back to basics approaches that there needs to be more of.

Plants are suitable for the soul. They have a calming effect on people. People smile when there are pretty flowers around them. They provide a moment of relief—a moment when people might reflect on other matters. Flowers and greenery can create a tiny therapy space so that they can have a moment of reflection.

There are health and well-being benefits from having plants around people. Plants have a positive effect on people’s outlook and disposition.

The flowers and greenery around the business centre of the town is part of the Camden aesthetic. It is part of the charm and character of the community. It means many things to many people.

Historically it is the desire by some in the community to retain the country town atmosphere based around the ‘country town idyll’ in the face of Sydney’s urban encroachment in and around the town area.

An extension of the ‘country town idyll’ is a desire by some who want to retain the rural atmosphere in the community.

It is reflected in the open space, the urban parks, the rural vistas, the bucolic countryside and the desire of many newcomers to find a spot where ‘the country looks like the country’.

Read more about the ‘country town idyll’.

Read more about the charming town of Camden.

Read about the Camden Dreamtime

Originally posted 30 January 2015. Updated 31 July 2020.

Souvenir Teacup

Camden souvenir teacup

Camden souvenir tea cup c.1930s-1940s (Camden Museum/I Willis)

This image shows a souvenir white glazed china tea cup dating from the 1930s-1940s. It is Shelley porcelain ware made in England for Whiteman’s General Store, Camden. The transfer of St John’s Church is dated 1910.

A souvenir, from French for memory, is an object that is treasured for the memories associated with it.

This type of tea cup was sold to tourists who visited Camden on day trips and those who wanted a momento of their visit to the area. 

 Whiteman’s General Store sold a range of these souvenirs. They illustrated natural beauty spots (Nepean River), civic buildings and momuments (war memorial) and indicators of local progress (commercial centres).

 Souvenir tea cups, plates, ash trays and other nic nacks were common for highlighting 'the best' of country towns and Sydney suburbs throughout the 20th century. They complement souvenir teaspoons and other momentos.

 See more of these type of souvenirs at the Camden Museum.
For more information http://www.camdenhistory.org.au/cmindex.html

Charming Country Town

Jacarandas in Elderslie 2014 (I Willis)

More Blooming Flowers

The Jacarandas in Camden and surrounds are out in bloom again. They are a picture of colour and when a breeze pops  up or it rains they carpet the ground. 


Local jacarandas add to the sense of place and character of the area. They add to the picturesque aesthetic of the Camden district. Mr Tim Pickles stated in the Camden press that they are suited to the local area.



Read more in the Macarthur Chronicle 25 November 2014 Camden Wollondilly Edition p.36

Blooming Jacarandas 2013

Blooming Jacaranda street trees in the Camden area (I Willis)

 As you walk around Camden streets you will come across the current flush of purples and  mauves. The local jacarandas are in full bloom and they have spread a colourful carpet across local streets. The streetscapes provide a wonderful vista  of fantasy and charm. They take you on a journey of the imagination into a another world.

The jacarandas in bloom are regularly the front page story in local newpapers. (Macarthur Chronicle (Camden Edition), 5 November 2013)

Jacarandas have been a feature of the urban landscape for quite a while in the local area.

The jacarandas were planted in Camden’s main street in 1927. (Macarthur Chronicle 24 June 2006)

In 2006 Camden mayor Chris Patterson asked the question should the jacarandas in the main street be replaced and he got a very loud response from the community. Save our trees!

The Camden Chamber of Commerce first proposed the removal and replacement with Manchurian pear trees in early 2006.

The Macarthur Chronicle reports that the unseasonably hot weather recently has resulted in the trees blooming early in the local area. (Macarthur Chonicle (Camden Edition) 12 November 2013) Jacarandas also bloomed early in drought years of the early 2000s giving a wonderful burst of colour in suburbs of Elderslie, Camden, and parts of Campbelltown and Picton.

In October 2013 the hottest day was Monday the 21st with a maximum temperature of  36.4°C while the monthly average for October is 27.6°C. October was also unseasonally dry, which according to horticulturalist Tim Pickles, has resulted in better flowers and more of them. The jacaranda originally came from Brazil  and really  like the warm conditions. (Macarthur Chonicle (Camden Edition) 12 November 2013)

Charm and Character of the Old

Argyle Street Camden c1938 (Camden Images)

What is it that gives Camden its charm and character? The answer is found in what still remains of the 1940s and 1950s country town of Camden, that is, its  rural and cultural landscape.

 

The country town

A walk around the central area of Camden reveals to the casual observer that the town is still strikingly similar to what it was like in the 1940s, especially the streetscape. Along streets like Menangle Rd, Broughton St, Murray St, Barsden St, Park St, Hill St, Mitchell St, Elizabeth St, View St, Alpha Rd, John St and even Argyle St. For example, the view along John Street from Camden Public School to St Johns Church is remarkably similar to that  of 60 years ago. Even the view down Argyle Street, especially building heights and street frontages, is similar to the times when the Hume Highway came through the centre of the town.

Picturesque panorama 

The panorama of the township across the floodplain  from a number of locations, eg, Macquarie Grove, Elderslie, or Cawdor,  is largely unchanged from the Second World War. There is the picturesque church on the hill, framed by the town and the farmland in the foreground.  Much as it was when RAAF fighter pilots at the airfield were worried that they would hit the church steeple as they took off on their missions.  As visiting RAAF airmen came into Camden on leave along Macquarie Grove Road the profile that the town made against the skyline would be very familiar to them today.

Federation houses

When the visitor enters the town from the north they still pass the old milk factory where the local dairy farmers unloaded their milk cans from their horse drawn carts. Coming into the township from the south along Cawdor Road the rural landscape gives way to the village showground as it has done since the 1880s. Or along Broughton Street, the visitor  can still image entering the town in 1940s passing the rows of neat weatherboard and brick cottages with their well maintained gardens.  The visitor walking along Menangle Road  passes the Federation houses adjacent to  Macarthur Park,  St Johns church and Dr Crookston's house. The same setting as the 1940s when young female voluntary aids walked up to Camden Hospital to do their wartime duty. 

Attractive streetscapes

The old part of central Camden has a number  of attractive streetscapes which illustrate the town's Victorian and Edwardian past . From the days when the local policeman would tie up his horse outside the police barracks and everyone in town knew that 'Pansy' had arrived at the railway station. The stationmaster would wander over from his house in Elizabeth Street, which still exists, to attend to his official business.




Argyle Street, Camden, 2012

Rustic charm and aesthetics

The farmland that surrounds the township is part of the rustic charm and aesthetic value that attracts many tourists to the town. The landscape of the Nepean River floodplain has shaped the image of the town from the 1840s and still determines how people view the town when they visit it today.

Camden today

The Camden of today still shows the signs of the social and community activities of the country town of the past. For example during the Second World War the ladies of the Camden Red Cross would go to the weekly sewing workshops in the town hall, now the library, while their husbands spent the day at the saleyards. And the location of the churches, shops, garages, showground, community halls, hotels, government buildings and parkland have remained unchanged in years.

Camden retains charm 

Despite recent developments in central Camden  many of the elements of Camden's rural  past still exist.  They give the town its rustic charm and pleasant ambience, and attract the Sunday visitor.  It would be disappointing to see any short sighted decisions made today that might damage this character.


Read more @ http://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/camden   and  
@ http://www.heritagetourism.com.au/camden-the-best-preserved-country-town-on-the-cumberland-plain-nsw/  and
@ http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/sydney_journal/article/view/713
@ Townies, exurbanites and aesthetics, issues of identity on Sydney's rural-urban fringe (AQ, 2012)

Charming Photographs of Camden
@ https://www.facebook.com/CaptureCamden

First published in The District Reporter 7 October 2005

Camden's Edwardian Cottages

64 John Street, Camden. Built c.1920. (J Riley)

Camden's Edwardian Cottages

Camden has quite a number of Edwardian cottages in the town area, on surrounding  farms and in local district villages.  They are typical of the early twentieth century landscape in the local district. The housing style was evidence of the new found confidence of the birth of a new nation that borrowed overseas trends and adopted them to suit local conditions. These style of houses were a statement of the individualism and the national character.

The name Edwardian is loosely attached to cottages and buildings erected during the reign of Edward VII from 1901 to 1910. This period covers the time after the Federation of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901 when the six self-governing colonies combined under a new constitution. They kept their own legislatures and combined to form a new nation.

Examples of Edwardian style cottages, including in and around Camden, were an Australian version of English Edwardian houses. Houses were plainer in detail, some with lead lighting in the front windows. Australian architecture was a response to the landscape and climate and the building style tells us about the time and the people who built them, how they lived and other aspects of Camden’s cultural heritage.

Edwardian housing style detail

The Edwardian style of housing also includes a broad range of styles including Queen Anne, Federation, Arts and Crafts and Early Bungalow. These styles often tend to be asymmetrical with a projecting from gable, can be highly decorated with detailed work to gables, windows and verandahs. Edwardian style cottages often fit between 1900 and 1920, although the style extends beyond this period influencing the Interwar style housing.

A number of Camden Edwardian style timber cottages have a projecting room at the front of the cottage with a decorated gable, adjacent to a front verandah, with a hipped roof line. This housing style is often characterised by a chimney that was a flue for a kitchen fuel stove and chip copper in an adjacent laundry. In some houses plaster cornices were common, sometimes there were ceiling roses, skirting and architraves. A number of houses have been restored while unfortunately many others have been demolished.

Some Camden Edwardian homes had walls of red brickwork, sometimes with painted render in part. While there are many examples in the local area of timber houses with square-edged or bull-nosed weatherboards.  Sunshades over windows supported by timber brackets are also common across the local area.

Doors in Edwardian style houses typically have three or four panels, with entry doors sometimes having an ornamentation. Common windows were double hung while later cottages may have had casement windows especially in the 1920s. Some cottages have return L-shaped verandahs, sometimes roofed with corrugated bull-nosed iron. Verandah post brackets had a variety of designs, with lattice work not uncommon feature. Verandahs featured timber fretwork rather than Victorian style cast ion lacework for ornamentation. Front fences may have had pickets, or just a wire fence in country areas.

Typical Edwardian colour schemes range from apricot walls, gables and barge boards, with white lattice panelling, red roofing and green coloured windows, steps, stumps, ant caps.

Gardens were often more complex than Victorian examples. Amongst Edwardian gardens growing lawns became popular. Sometimes had a small tree in the front yard which could frame the house and might separate it from adjacent houses. Common trees included magnolia, elm, tulip tree or camellias, while shrubs and vines might have been agapanthus, agave, St John’s Wort, plumbago, standard roses, begonias, day lily, jasmine and sometimes maidenhair ferns.

John Street, Camden

In the March 2014 edition of Camden History Joy Riley recalls the Edwardian cottages in John Street. Joy Riley vividly remembers growing up as a child and calling one of these cottages her home. ‘I lived at 66 John Street for the first 40 years of my life before moving to Elderslie with my husband Bruce Riley. The two rooms of 66 John Street were built by the first John Peat, Camden builder, to come to Camden. In the 1960s I had some carpet put down in my bedroom, the floor boards were so hard, as they only used tacks in those days to hold carpet, the carpet just kept curling up.’ She says, ‘The back of the house was built by my grandfather, William Dunk. They lived next door at 64 John Street. He also built the Methodist Church at Orangeville or Werombi.

Yamba Cottage, Kirkham

Another Edwardian style house is Yamba cottage at Kirkham. It was built around 1920, fronts Camden Valley Way and has been a contested as a site of significant local heritage. The building, a Federation style weatherboard cottage, became a touchstone and cause celebre around the preservation and conservation of local domestic architecture. This is a simple adaption of the earlier Victorian era houses for Fred Longley and his family who ran a small orchard on the site. The Yamba story is representative of smallholder farming in the Camden LGA, which has remained largely silent over the last century.  Yamba speaks for the many small farmers across the LGA who have not had a voice and were an important part of farming history in the local area.

The Toowoomba House

Edwardian country cottages are not unique to the Camden area and can be found in many country towns across New South Wales and inter-state. Toowoomba has a host of these type of homes and published the local council publishes extensive guides explaining the style of housing and what is required for their sympathetic restoration in the online publication called The Toowoomba House (2000). More elaborate Edwardian houses with extensive ornamentation can be found in Sydney suburbs like Strathfield, Burwood and Ashfield.

Edwardian Revival

For those interested in reading more there a number of good books on Australian Edwardian houses at your local library and there are a number of informative websites. Edwardian style houses have had a revival in recent decades and contemporary house can have some of their features. For example some are evident in housing estates at Harrington Park, Mt Annan and Elderslie.

Further reading

Read more on Edward housing styles in Australia here

Read about Federation houses here

Read about Australian residential architectural styles here

Read about Yamba cottage and Kirkham here