Australian Historic Engineering Plaquing Program NOMINATION For the award of a HISTORIC ENGINEERING MARKER PLAQUE commemorating THE SAUNDERS QUARRYING OPERATIONS IN PYRMONT-ULTIMO, NEW SOUTH WALES Submitted on behalf of the Centenary Stonework Program of the New South Wales Department of Commerce March 2005 CONTENTS 1INTRODUCTION . Page 1 2 BASIC DATA . 1 2.1 Item name . 1 2.2 Location . 1 2.3 Owner . 2 2.4 Current use . 2 2.5 Former use . 2 2.6 Period of operation . 3 2.7 Physical description and condition . 3 2.8 History . 3 2.9 Heritage listings . 3 3ASSESSMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE . 4 3.1 Preamble . 4 3.2 Aesthetic significance . 5 3.3 Historic significance . 6 3.4 Scientific or technical significance . 6 3.5 Social significance . 9 3.6 Spiritual significance . 9 3.7 Comparative significance . 9 3.8 Summary Statement of Significance . 10 3.9 A commemorative plaque . 11 3.10 References . 11 Map . 14 4A NARRATIVE HISTORY OF THE SAUNDERS QUARRIES AND THEIR INFLUENCE . 15 4.1 Preamble . 15 4.2 Beginnings . 15 4.3 The Boom Time . 20 4.4 Into the 20th Century . 28 4.5 Pyrmont transformed . 31 4.6 Postscript . 32 4.7 Acknowledgements . 32 1 INTRODUCTION This is a nomination under the Australian Historic Engineering Plaquing Program for the award of a plaque commemorating the Saunders quarrying operations in Pyrmont-Ultimo. It has the support of the NSW Department of Commerce, Powerhouse Museum and the Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority. Documentation of this support forms part of the nomination. It is an unusual nomination because of the fact that in Pyrmont-Ultimo, the locale of the Saunders activities for three-quarters of a century, the only important surviving evidence of their work comprises some striking sandstone cuttings and former quarry faces, one street name and a handful of significant stone structures. The nomination was initiated by Ron Powell, Manager of the Centenary Stonework Program of the New South Wales Department of Commerce, and researched in 2004 by Robert Irving, OAM, ARMTC (Melb), MArch (NSW), FRAHS, Architect, Architectural Historian and Heritage Consultant. Irving is author of the forthcoming book tentatively titled Paradise, Purgatory and Hell Hole: the Story of the Saunders Quarries, Pyrmont, which will be an extended version of the Historical Outline given in Section 4 of this nomination. 2 BASIC DATA 2.1 Item Name The name of the item is The Saunders Quarrying Operations in Pyrmont- Ultimo, 1853-1930. This encompasses the yellowblock sandstone quarrying operations and building activities in the Pyrmont-Ultimo area begun by the founder Charles Saunders and continued by his son Robert and grandson Robert Junior. The Saunders influence underlies a large range of very significant structures outside Pyrmont-Ultimo, built from Saunders’ yellowblock, which are fundamental to Victorian Sydney’s identity as a ‘sandstone city’. Although these associations are beyond the particular scope of this nomination, they provide important background and contextual information, some of which is given in the following pages. 1.2 Location The quarries were in various locations in Pyrmont and Ultimo. The most famous were known by the names of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell Hole. The quarries have been worked out, reclaimed and are now largely built over. Some former sandstone quarry faces and several exposed sandstone cliffs can be seen. The extent of the three main quarries and some associated features are shown on the map given on page 13. Most of the 50 or so Pyrmont-Ultimo buildings erected or owned by the Saunders firm as contractors have been demolished in the process of 20th-century industrialisation and development. One that still survives is called Saunders Terrace, a three-storey terrace group on a prominent corner, comprising shops and a former bank at street level. Another Saunders building is the former Quarryman’s Arms Hotel. Other physical evidence, though less obvious, may still be seen, and some is described in these pages. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Saunders Quarrying Operations, Plaquing Program Nomination . Page 1 The many impressive structures in the CBD and suburbs of Sydney and beyond, built or faced with Pyrmont yellowblock sandstone, are of course not part of this nomination. Most of them are in good order, many have been carefully restored, and a high proportion are already recognised heritage items. Some are mentioned later and are also described in Paradise, Purgatory and Hell Hole. The Centenary Stonework Program of the NSW Department of Commerce is dedicated to a continuous program of conservation of public buildings including the ones named in Section 4 of this nomination. For these purposes the Program has established a substantial stockpile of high quality Pyrmont yellowblock sandstone, from such sources as excavations for basement storeys of large new buildings in Pyrmont and The Rocks. 2.3 Owner The Saunders quarries were originally located on sites leased on a long-term basis from John Harris’s Ultimo Estate. At least one quarry site, with a Miller Street address, was owned in 1891 by Robert Saunders. Since then land ownership has increased and diversified considerably. Particularly since 1994, much of the Pyrmont-Ultimo area has come under the umbrella of the State Government’s Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority (formerly the City West Development Corporation), owner of the site which is considered most suitable for the location of a plaque. This site is intended to be handed over to the City of Sydney. The whole area is part of a broad urban development and planning scheme known as Ultimo + Pyrmont, given that name by the Department of Infrastructure and Planning in 2004, the Year of the Built Environment. The present urban hub is Union Square, at the corner of Harris, Miller and Union Streets. 2.4 Current use ‘Ultimo + Pyrmont’ now evidences a greater variety of uses than at any time in the past (though none of the heavy industries remains). As well as retained traditional buildings and functions, these uses range from high-density apartment blocks to town houses, public and ‘affordable’ housing, business accommodation, heritage projects, public open space, parks and gardens. Indications of the changes now being experienced can be seen in some statistics taken from the booklet Ultimo + Pyrmont: Decade of Renewal, published by the Minister for Infrastructure and Planning. The population of the area in 1901 was 19,000; in 1994 it was 3,000. It is now something like 13,000 and is expected to reach about 20,000 in 2021. In 1994 there were three public places; there are now 15. Some five percent of the area had harbour access in 1994, while the present figure is 60% of the peninsular shoreline. By 2008 it is intended that 100% of the area will have public access to the water. 2.5 Former use As mentioned earlier, Saunders quarries and stone working operations were located in three key quarry sites known colloquially as Paradise (Miller and Bank Streets), Purgatory (Wattle Crescent and Allen Street) and Hell Hole (Wattle, Fig and Quarry Streets). Charles always lived in Harris Street, not far from ‘Paradise’, while Robert lived for many years in Abattoirs Road (now Bank Street, also located near ‘Paradise’), moving later to a cottage in Mount Street and later still to a property in Centennial Park, where he lived until his death. There ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Saunders Quarrying Operations, Plaquing Program Nomination . Page 2 were other quarry sites, stone workshops, workers’ housing, a wharf and a further variety of miscellaneous structures. The known locations of some of these are shown on the map at page 13. 2.6 Period of operation Charles Saunders began quarrying in what is now Pyrmont (then part of the Ultimo Estate) in 1853. Under his Son Robert and grandson Robert Jr, the quarries continued to operate until 1930. The Saunders firm then continued winning sandstone until the late 1930s, in the Bondi quarry that had been established by Robert Saunders Jr in about 1924. 2.7 Physical description and condition As mentioned above, surprisingly little of the fabric of these comprehensive operations now survives in the Pyrmont-Ultimo area. In contrast, the available documentary evidence is both sufficient and engaging, permitting a very good understanding of the Saunders family firm and its activities. 2.8 History This is given in greater detail in Section 4 of this nomination. In brief, Charles Saunders began his operation in Ultimo (now Pyrmont) in the early years of the gold rush. The work of his firm expanded in the boom years which followed, during which time he was joined by his entrepreneurial son Robert and later by his grandson, also Robert. The Saunders firm was not the only quarrying operation in the area, but it became the biggest and lasted the longest, well after the others had gone. The three principal quarries provided high quality Pyrmont yellowblock sandstone for the construction of a great number of important buildings in Sydney and beyond. As well, the firm, which became also a building contractor, erected some 50 residential and commercial buildings in Pyrmont-Ultimo. Robert Saunders adopted mechanical quarrying and stone working and was the first Sydney quarry owner to use steam power for drilling, sawing and planing the stone. For example, four of the best steam cranes, with ropes of wire rather than heavy chains and hemp, were brought in for lifting stone blocks, as were several smaller hand cranes, replacing what Saunders described as ‘the old style of gallows cranes.’ (Refer to Section 4.3.2). The operation came to an end just prior to World War II as the demand for sandstone diminished, but not before Robert Saunders Jr had established a Sydney sandstone quarry in Bondi, almost all trace of which has now also disappeared.