From Abc · · 2m
Snowy Scheme cottage opens window to workers' lives
A restored portable timber cottage now on display at the Snowy Scheme Museum shows how workers and families lived during Australia's largest engineering project.
In brief
A restored portable timber cottage now on display at the Snowy Scheme Museum shows how workers and families lived during Australia's largest engineering project. A refurbished worker's cottage from the Snowy Scheme is now displayed at the Snowy Scheme Museum in Adaminaby, revealing how families lived in temporary…
Housing a massive project
When work on the Snowy Scheme began more than seventy five years ago, about two hundred portable timber cottages were needed to house workers and their families.
A cottage goes on display
One of those structures has now gone on display at the Snowy Scheme Museum in Adaminaby, giving visitors insight into the transient life of workers on Australia's largest engineering project.
Moving from town to town
The scheme was built in stages across different areas. Museum president Tim Corkill said workers might start in Tantangara in the morning and end up in Island Bend by afternoon.
“You might have started off in Tantangara in the morning and in the afternoon you ended up in Island Bend.”
Cottages built for families
The two and three bedroom cottages were designed for families and trucked from town to town, often with everything inside including wardrobes full of clothes and kitchens full of furniture.
“The wardrobes were full and the kitchen was full, and all the furniture.”
Staying warm in harsh winters
The cottages had wood heaters, double glazing, and insulation in ceilings, walls and floors. One temporary town, Happy Jacks, was the highest in Australia at almost fifteen hundred metres above sea level.
Colourful homes against the snow
The two bedroom cottage is just under four metres wide and about twelve metres long. Cottages were painted orange, pink, light blue or green and stood out against the white backdrop of snow.
“They were painted anything from orange to pinks to light blues to greens. Against the white backdrop of snow ... they would have stood out.”
Cottages scattered after the scheme
When the Snowy Scheme finished, the cottages were sold and scattered around the region, often used as farm sheds or holiday homes on the New South Wales far south coast.
A cottage becomes a beach home
Joe Werner's father, a German engineer on the scheme, bought one of the cottages and erected it on the coast at Pambula. The family sold in nineteen seventy two, but the building remains.
“They weren't built to last. It's amazing that so many of them have.”
The big picture
A refurbished worker's cottage from the Snowy Scheme is now displayed at the Snowy Scheme Museum in Adaminaby, revealing how families lived in temporary towns during the project.
