SATURDAY BREAKFAST #26: MILITARY ROAD, AVONDALE HEIGHTS

Visited 10 September, 2011

During the Second World War my father worked at the Maribyrnong munitions works.  I make this bare bones statement with absolutely no way of fleshing out the story.  He never spoke of it; he never provided the context; I never asked; he died at age 45, when I was 20 and unaware of the importance of such things; and now there’s nobody left who might be able to elaborate.

My father, Gordon, was born at Korong Vale in central Victoria.  I presume that my Grandma Andrews (nee Laity) had gone there for the confinement, to be with her own mother.  My grandparents were farmers near Chinkapook, in the Mallee region of Victoria, about 100 miles to the northwest of Korong Vale, and 250 miles (420 kilometres) from Melbourne.   Gordon was a farmer’s son, and doubtless when young had worked on the farm, and – again I’m guessing – had the expectation of becoming a farmer too.  I know little of his schooling.  I’m pretty sure he went to the tiny Eureka school about a mile from the Andrews home.  The one-classroom schools of the time were creatures of the numbers of school-age children in the close vicinity, and the Eureka State School had three physical locations over its lifetime from its opening in 1915 to its closure in 1940.  On two occasions the local farmers put it on a makeshift sled, and carted it to a new site more proximate to the homes of the current enrolment – the first time dragged by a bullock team, the second time drawn by draft horses.  Gordon attended the School during the period of its second incarnation.  Later, I know that he attended Footscray Technical School.  (His two elder sisters were sent as boarders to Methodist Ladies’ College in Hawthorn.)   I think that while attending Footscray Tech he would have boarded nearby.  He later had depression-time city jobs after completing school; and it’s likely that there was a continuance of lodging and/or a work connection in the western suburbs.  I say this because he was a member of a Masonic Lodge based at Footscray.  There was a strong Freemason presence in the Mallee, and Gordon would have been recruited in his home region as a young man………………..if he hadn’t already been recruited at Footscray!

At the time of his marriage Gordon was back on the farm.  He never did but my mother, Gloria, sometimes spoke of the early years of hardship, camping in a barn on the Andrews property, remote from the house and the home block.   The Andrews house was commodious by local standards, with two bedrooms and a large sleepout, and I expect that the exile in the barn was self-imposed, and the result of a severe case of mother-in-law aversion.  I have no time line of Gordon and Gloria’s farming endeavours, except that by the time I was five they were share-farming at a location named Daytrap, a couple of miles further from Chinkapook than the Andrews farm, and a bit more westerly.  This was 1945 and the War was over.

For the War years Gordon, as a farmer, had been in a “reserved” occupation and exempted from military duty.  But this didn’t exempt him from having to make a living; and there were serious droughts and failed crops in the early 1940s.   I don’t know whether the time spent at the munitions factory was merely a way of earning money; it’s more likely that there was a wartime arrangement whereby cereal farmers were asked – perhaps obliged - to “report for duty” at the times of year when the crops didn’t require their daily presence on the farm.  It’s possible that Gordon worked at Maribyrnong for short bursts over a number of years, and on these occasions I expect that he stayed with his aunt and uncle Em and Frank Templeton, who lived at nearby Essendon from the early 1940s onwards.  [Having written the foregoing I received quite a surprise when I referred to the Australian War Memorial website on the subject of WW2 “reserved occupations”.  Farmer was not a reserved occupation……..but munitions worker was!  So Gordon could in theory have volunteered for active service at any time before he commenced his munitions work – I put that as a question rather than a statement.  And the second question:  was it his position as a munitions worker that prevented him from being called up when conscription was introduced later in the War?  Perhaps he had flat feet or was otherwise medically unfit, and this answers both questions.  Who knows?]

All this – such as it passes for family history - came to mind as we drove past what remains of the Maribyrnong factory site on our way to exploration of Military Road, and breakfast.   Let me get it said right away:  that the few shops in Military Road, Avondale Heights, are a dreary bunch, and the place where we ate is forgettable.  The breakfast itself was some once-hot bacon and egg trapped in a bun inside some cling-wrap.  The coffee, however, was strong and hot.

By the way, the route we traversed to Avondale Heights follows what is in effect the one street with multiple names.  It zigzags all over, with the differently-named sections slipping into each other, across the metropolis, rather like the so-called ring roads in Sydney 40 years ago.  Starting from Merri Creek in North Fitzroy the continuous thoroughfare from east to west is named, in sequence, Holden Street, Brunswick Road, Ormond Road, Maribyrnong Road, Raleigh Road, Cordite Avenue, Corning Street, Military Road, and terminates in Keilor East as Milleara Road.  Follow it on a map; it’s quite a journey.

The history of the munitions sites in Melbourne’s west is one of the more remarkable of Melbourne’s industrial stories.  And a remarkable military story too: it is not an exaggeration to say that for more than a century the Western Suburbs works were the centerpiece of the Australian defence industry.  Over time there came to be hundreds of buildings on the sites. 

The colony of Victoria, in early times, was not short of self-confidence.  From its 1835 beginnings through the gold rushes of the 1850s to the resultant booms in population, in community wealth, and in extravagant civic and private building, there was swagger in the air.  The term “Marvellous Melbourne” captured the astonishment of visitors who - in 1880 say – found at the end of the world a city of half-a-million people, larger than most of the capitals of Europe at the time.  Surprising, then, that there was considerable concern about potential invasion, first fear of the Russians, later fear of the French; although perhaps not so surprising, given what Melburnians had to lose.  This underlying concern triggered serious moves for the colony to become self-reliant in terms of arms.  This concern then received a substantial fillip from the repatriation, in 1870, of the last British troops from Australia.   There was, thereafter, a rapid increase in the colony’s volunteer forces, and continual public debate about the perceived need to manufacture armaments locally.  This led, initially, to the government establishing, in 1874, the Saltwater Gunpowder Magazine at Footscray – known to all as Jack’s Magazine, it is still there today, abandoned, but inevitably sturdy!  Incidentally, the formal name comes from the Saltwater River, as the Maribyrnong River was then known.  The existence of the River was a key to the location chosen for each element of the armaments and defence establishments over the next generations: available water transport down to the Port, for shipment to other parts of Australia, and abroad. 

The manufacture of basic explosives at Jack’s Magazine, was not sufficient for military purposes, so in 1888 the Colonial Ammunition Factory was established (also at Footscray), as it happens by private enterprise, albeit with a government cash incentive and a free grant of land and assurances of custom from Victoria and other colonies. 

Some twenty years later, in 1908 - after the federation of the Australian colonies - the Commonwealth established the Commonwealth Explosives Factory at Maribyrnong.  By the commencement of the First World War the Footscray/Maribyrnong area had truly become the arsenal of Australia.  It is said that 2 million .303 bullets were produced for Australian troops each year of WWII.

More was to come.  The Commonwealth Ordnance Factory was established on the Maribyrnong site in 1924.  And in 1927 the Footscray ammunition works were acquired by the Commonwealth, bringing all core defence ordnance under government control.

Little more than a decade later there was massive gearing-up for the Second World War.

What existed at Footscray and Maribyrnong during WWII was a huge integrated military industry: explosives manufacture; and bronze manufacturing and metals extruding works, with the incorporation of these down-stream products into the manufacture of small arms; plus the manufacture of the range of military paraphernalia.  The several works provided employment for most locals (and expatriate farmers!), and there developed a unique works culture.   Significantly, large numbers of women were employed (around 45% across all factories).  Overall, thousands of workers were involved, one source says 8000, another says 16000, a third says 20000 throughout the course of the War.   Clearly there was mass domestic mobilization to serve the military needs of the time.

A sense of the dangers of life in the world of munitions comes from the following extract from a study prepared by Igor Bera, a year 10 student of Footscray City College:

“Safety precautions were strictly applied at the factories.  Buildings were separated by great distances so that one explosion would not set off a chain reaction of explosions.  This resulted in factory sites being the size of small suburbs.  Mounds were created around buildings so that if an explosion occurred it would blow upwards, instead of laterally.  Mowers were not used to cut the grass, because of the fear that the vibration could cause an explosion, so sheep were allowed to graze within the factory grounds.  The buildings had very thick walls to contain an explosion if it occurred.  Not all safety solutions were as elaborate as these.  Some were quite primitive……….exposure to toxic chemicals often went unrecognized……….exposure to TNT left workers with yellow skin, nausea and violent headaches.  The solution was to rotate workers more often…………”.

Young mister Bera has managed to locate some statistics too.  Prepare to be staggered.  During WW2 the Maribyrnong/Footscray output, among a lot of other ordnance, was 9.6 million artillery shells, 1.8 million mortars, 750 thousand anti-personnel land mines, 4.3 million anti-aircraft shells, and 1845 million rounds of small arms.

Although still operational during the later Korean and Vietnam Wars and beyond, the Maribyrnong complex closed in 1994.  The Edgewater housing estate today occupies some of the site.  A few of the old buildings remain but most have gone.

By definition, history is a passing parade.  I regret that I heard none of the wartime Maribyrnong history first-hand from my father.

Gary Andrews