COOPERS CREEK, by PETER MORRISON
(Margaret Fullard)

Coopers Creek had its beginnings in 1864 when Donald MacLeod prospected for gold in the Thomson River. At the junction with Coopers Creek he found a vein of copper 3.6 metres in thickness. Samples were sent to Melbourne and these showed that the ore was of good quality.

Over the years many small companies operated; not much gold was found but copper, platinum silver, palladium and lime were extracted.

Due to its isolation, transport was difficult, slow and expensive. People arrived by pack-horse and supplies were packed in on horses once or twice a week. Copper was carried out by pack-horses for 2 or 3 miles and it was then loaded on to bullock drays for transport to Port Albert or Sale and. Melbourne. Open coaches with a 5-horse team took 7 hours from Moe to Walhalla. There were two lines - Cobb & Co. and Fryers Coach Line from Toongabbie.

The Walhalla Copper Mining Co. was formed in 1874. To reduce transport costs they erected roasting and smelting furnaces which smelted the ore to produce rich blue metal or coarse copper. Firebricks for the furnace were made on site from local clay; they were of inferior quality to delivered firebricks which cost 2/6d. each. A tramway was built to link the mine with the spalling and calcining areas.

In 1879 the Pioneer Crushing Mine was opened and large crowds attended the opening, but by 1881 the ore was worked out and the mine was closed.

The 1870s were the golden years of Coopers Creek. There was a population of 200, 22 houses, 2 lime kilns, a general store, the Copper Mine Hotel and a school. Dances were held in the school on Wednesday and Saturday nights. A bridge was built across the Thomson River - this gave the miners a new source of timber. The whole area was eventually denuded for firewood.

There were severe floods in 1922; the Iveson house opposite the hotel was swept away and two people were drowned.

One of the early investors was wealthy Peter Clement. His daughter, many years later, was known as The Lady of the Swamp, and the mystery surrounding her disappearance has never been solved.

In the 1930s, there were still 22 houses, 2 lime kilns and the school. Several families of Italian extraction lived at Coopers Creek; some had worked as masons in the building of the Shrine of Remembrance before coming to work at the lime kilns. The Grollo brothers also lived there.

Just past the cemetery the White Rock Lime Kiln operated and most of the lime was used by C.S.R. in purifying sugar. In 1943 there was an enormous explosion, luckily after working hours. No-one was hurt but the kilns were then closed. The population declined and the school closed in 1952.

Coopers Creek Pty.Ltd. was formed in 1967; a smelter to work the old copper lode, a tramway and a flying fox were built to take ore from the mine to the smelter. However, all work ceased in 1971 as the price for copper was too low and Coopers Creek was deserted.

The bare denuded landscape has now gone; trees, ferns and undergrowth have returned and Coopers Creek is again a beautiful valley in the mountains.

Excursion:

On Sunday, 23rd October, (1994) about 90 people came on our excursion to Coopers Creek. The weather was perfect. We had lunch near the site of the school - now, an enormous oak and two pines are all that remain. We listened to a taped talk by a former teacher, Mary (Dixon) Micah who taught 14-16 children in the one-roomed school. It was bitterly cold in winter and. often the frost would last all day. Wood was hard to obtain and came from Erica. Mary chopped the wood, cleaned the school and the Grade 7 and 8 boys emptied the toilet pans. She boarded with Percy and Dorrie Black for 3 happy years.

A fire burnt the cemetery and now all that remains is a wooden marker. There were 6 recorded burials, including Hulbert Black, a boy Pat (who was drowned), a little girl who died from pneumonia, and a Chinese market gardener.

The quality of the limestone at Evans Bros. kiln deteriorated and the kilns were closed. In the late 1940s, Don Dunbar helped to remove the bricks - they were red Hoffman bricks from Melbourne and they were still beautiful after many years of use. Charles Blucher, a sawmiller, used them to build a house in Commercial Road, Morwell, and Bill Duff built a house in Hickox Street, Traralgon.

Stan Dykes, of Morwell, worked for 2 years in the 1940s at the White Star Lime Kilns. He told. us of those days while we inspected the remains of this kiln. There is a circular hole about 50 ft. deep and 12 ft. in diameter; this is lined with bricks. The fire chamber was about 35 ft. deep and limestone, wood and briquettes were burnt there. Underneath was the cooling chamber and at the bottom of this there was a horizontal tunnel. When the lime had cooled it was raked out of the tunnel and put into bags. These were sent to the Jubilee siding and later to Platina station. They were transported to Cairns where the Colonial Sugar Refinery used the lime in refining sugar.

Safe work practices were unknown: men stood on the top and shovelled in lime-rocks, wood and briquettes. At the end. of the day they were covered in lime and looked like ghosts, and often they were burnt. A number of cows, seeking warmth at night, fell into the kiln and were incinerated.

C.S.R. needed extra lime and the clinker in the kiln was stuck. Hundreds of gallons of water was poured in to try to free the clinker and. the kiln was fired up with briquettes. Luckily, the men then all went home. While Stan was having a bath at Black's, there was an enormous explosion (possibly caused by water, gas and the volatility of the briquettes). The water in Stan's bath shook and windows in Erica were rattled.

A corrugated iron shed near the tunnel was blown to pieces, and bits of iron hung from the trees. A truck just vanished - no traces of it were ever found. There were cracks in the hill and the whole hill was lifted by the explosion. It was too dangerous to mine any more. The White Star Lime Kilns closed. and with this, all paid employment at Coopers Creek was gone. Lime was then produced at Buchan.

We would like to thank Stan for sharing his memories with us and we also thank the members of the Walhalla Heritage League for their photos and information. We also thank Peter Morrison for his help.