John Low writes about The map Of Australia.
The 1930’s marked the peak of tourism to Lawson which commenced after the rail line was opened in 1867. By 1930 despite the hardships of the Depression years, Lawson was still enjoying the fruits of two modes of conveyance – rail and road . In the 30’s the local valleys and waterfalls were still incredibly popular with bush walkers and motor cars increasingly made short work of any haul .
Lawson was a very convenient place to stop. It was the Shire centre and its train station was one of only two on the Mountains – the other was at Mt Victoria. The dam – not overly reliable in drought years as a source of water for the steam engines – was adapted by the community to eventually form one large natural pool and a more formally constructed toddler’s pool which was surrounded by rainbow coloured fencing.
In the 50’s the deepest one had a kind of large tin wheel you pushed around with your feet before diving into the water. This tended to be the domain of reckless youth. You didn’t know whether to applaud them or condemn them as show offs. Families clustered around the edges of the large free form pool and the medium depth pool was fenced off from the main pool by sloping concrete walls, painted timber rails and stretched diamond wire barriers. The foresighted had arrived early and had ‘baggsed’ one of the huts dotted around the pool.
At the top of the valley was a friendly sparkly waterfall which was partially dammed to create a small lake. Twin channels led from it, one an overflow channel and the other a wider one of about 1 metre across. Both fed a large roundish shallow pond with a central tower water feature which was constructed in the peanut brittle style of the time. From there the water flowed over a wall and around a most splendid brightly coloured three dimensional map of Australia before going under the humpy backed bridge with its cement log rails and down a series of shallow terraces to the pool. There were older channels on the hill which could be shut off to allow water to bypass the pool and map to allow maintenance. The water could also be diverted at the pool near the base of the waterfall.
One of the great rites of passage of a Blue Mountains childhood was the day you were finally able to jump onto Tasmania and then over to the mainland of Australia. Only then could you leave the ranks of the small fry eddying to and fro on the path adjacent to the coastline. At last ! Made it ! You felt like some human colossus with the ability and strength to traverse the continent in a few bounds, climb Mt Kosciusko in seconds and compare it (unfavorably) to the Three sisters. And of course you were a giant– the scale of the map saw to that. Using the scale of one inch to 6.5 miles and any kid could tell you how far it was to Brisbane from Sydney using the top knuckle of their thumbs. It provided endless games and other subsequent national challenges like the far trickier feat of leaping on and off the coast of Western Australia.
The best games for children are the ones when they feel they are the all-powerful all seeing omniscient ‘something’, No matter how many times we played on that amazing map of Australia ,we never tired of the game and no wonder - it was a children’s wonderland.
Over the years the Map of Australia proved to be remarkably resistant to vandalism. Glass bottles were lobbed in the channels from time to time and one time a whole garden bench. Testimony to the place it must have had in the memories and hearts of many is that no one ever tagged it or took to it with a hammer. The colours remained bright for years. Similarly the red tin circles for the capital cities and the state lines survived unmolested for decades. Weather, interference with the water flow, ‘someone should do something’ attitudes and the passing of time were and remain its only enemies.
‘President, Percy Wilson, declared the occasion “a children’s day”. The concrete continent was, reported the Katoomba Daily, “on a scale of 75 miles to 1 foot” and “shows all mountains, ranges, rivers, and capital cities and is coloured to correspond with the regulation colours of school atlases”.
Located in a creek sourced from a small waterfall at the edge of the park, the map was surrounded by “clear running water” in which children were invited, like Matthew Flinders, “to sail boats around Australia” [ii]
As John Low goes on to report, the Shire President, Percy Wilson
“ singled out several people at the dedication: John Garlick of the Main Roads Board who “first suggested” the idea; B. A. Heffernan, the Shire Engineer, who “set out” the map and supervised its construction; Bob Medcalf, the “expert concrete worker” who carried out the work and Prof. J. McDonald Holmes of the Geography Department at the University of Sydney who “advised and assisted” on its educative value.
( Local man Frank Higgison of 35 Allen Street Lawson ) was involved in the design & probably helped build the map but sadly died as a result of Japanese cruelty on the Sandakan Death March. )
Now in 2015 there are new generations of children ( and grownups) who would love to have a turn at being a giant for a while. It is well beyond time for the map to be restored. It is to be hoped that day comes sooner or later before another piece of Lawson is allowed to crumble away.
