Broken Hill Post Office is a heritage-listed post office at 258–260 Argent Street, Broken Hill, in the Far West of New South Wales, Australia. The original building was designed by James Barnet, and was built from 1890 to 1892 by John Dobbie. Walter Liberty Vernon designed a telegraph office addition in 1900. The property is owned by Australia Post. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 22 December 2000. It was added to the Australian Commonwealth Heritage List on 8 November 2011.
History
Background
The first official postal service in Australia was established in April 1809, when the Sydney merchant Isaac Nichols was appointed as the first Postmaster in the colony of NSW. Prior to this mail had been distributed directly by the captain of the ship on which the mail arrived, however this system was neither reliable nor secure.
In 1825 the colonial administration was empowered to establish a Postmaster General's Department, which had previously been administered from Britain.
In 1828 the first post offices outside Sydney were established, with offices in Bathurst, Campbelltown, Parramatta, Liverpool, Newcastle, Penrith and Windsor. By 1839 there were forty post offices in the colony, with more opening as settlement spread. The advance of postal services was further increased as the railway network began to be established throughout NSW from the 1860s. Also, in 1863, the Postmaster General W. H. Christie noted that accommodation facilities for Postmasters in some post offices was quite limited, and stated that it was a matter of importance that "post masters should reside and sleep under the same roof as the office".
The appointment of James Barnet as Acting Colonial Architect in 1862 coincided with a considerable increase in funding to the public works program. Between 1865 and 1890 the Colonial Architect's Office was responsible for the building and maintenance of 169 Post Offices and telegraph offices in NSW. The post offices constructed during this period were designed in a variety of architectural styles, as Barnet argued that the local parliamentary representatives always preferred "different patterns".
The construction of new post offices continued throughout the 1890s Depression years under the leadership of Walter Liberty Vernon, who retained office from 1890 to 1911. While twenty-seven post offices were built between 1892 and 1895, funding to the Government Architect's Office was cut from 1893 to 1895, causing Vernon to postpone a number of projects.
Following Federation in 1901, the Commonwealth Government took over responsibility for Post, Telegraph and Telephone offices, with the Department of Home Affairs Works Division being made responsible for Post Office construction. In 1916 construction was transferred to the Department of Works and Railways, with the Department of the Interior responsible during World War II.
On 22 December 1975 the Postmaster General's Department was abolished and replaced by the Postal and Telecommunications Department, with Telecom and Australia Post being created. In 1989, the Australian Postal Corporation Act established Australia Post as a self-funding entity, which heralded a new direction in property management, including a move towards smaller shop-front style post offices away from the larger more traditional buildings.
For much of its history, the post office has been responsible for a wide variety of community services including mail distribution, as agencies for the Commonwealth Savings Bank, electoral enrolments, and the provision of telegraph and telephone services. The town post office served as a focal point for the community, most often built in a prominent position in the centre of town close to other public buildings, creating a nucleus of civic buildings and community pride.
Broken Hill Post Office
In September 1883, Charles Rasp, a boundary rider on the Mount Gipps sheep station, pegged out a mineral lease on the property, in the belief that a rock outcrop within the lease area bore tin oxide. Rasp was joined by two other property workers, who in turn advised the manager of Mount Gipps, George McCulloch. McCulloch suggested a "syndicate of seven" investors to pay for the development of the lease. Early samples proved to have a low bearing of tin and the main settlement was at Silverton to the north.
It was not until January 1885, when silver ore was discovered in the tailings of the Rasp shaft that people began to take an interest in the Broken Hill area. In June, the "syndicate" decided to register itself as the Broken Hill Proprietary Company Limited, to mine the ore load. With the establishment of the mine, the town began to grow rapidly with a Broken Hill Progress Committee being established in November to encourage the town's development. The first storekeeper, Walter Sully, operated a postal service pending the construction of a post office.
In January 1886 the first post office was opened in Broken Hill following pressure from the Progress Committee on the postmaster at Silverton, the nearest post office. The Broken Hill office was run by Marie Wilson from a small building attached to Walter Sully's general store in Argent Street. Wilson was the first Government Official appointed in Broken Hill.
In August 1886 a telegraph station was established in Broken Hill, also operating out of the post office building, with William Newtown appointed as Post and Telegraph Master. By the end of 1886, Broken Hill's population had risen to 3,000, and the post office building was deemed no longer adequate for the bustling mining town. From October 1886, the Progress Committee began to make official requests to the Post Master General's (PMG) Department for the erection of an official post office. Initially, the PMG Department was reluctant to approve the erection of a large office due to the uncertainty of Broken Hill settlement being permanent. Many other frontier mining towns had disappeared when the ore had dried up. However, by October 1888, the Department had accepted Broken Hill's permanency and plans had been drawn up by the Colonial Architects Office under James Barnet, for a large office, with a residence attached. These were rejected on the grounds of being too small and it was not until 11 November 1889 that the final plans were accepted.
The tender for the construction was awarded to John Dobbie of Balmain for £6,475 on the condition that the new office be erected in twelve months.
The new office was finished in 1892, opening for business on 9 May. The most striking feature of the new office was the tower, standing 86 feet high. A balcony adorned the tower and second storey of the office, with a verandah encircling the ground level. The internal fittings, including entrance door in Argent Street, mail counters and stairways were made out of cedar. The postmaster was accommodated within the building, with a residence for a postal assistant also provided. See Image 10 for the layout of the double residence.
In 1973 the rear section of the Post Office was removed to make way for the building of a new telephone exchange. The postmaster's residence was also removed at this stage. Between August and November 1979 a major refurbishment and renovation program was undertaken in the post office, during which time the service operated out of temporary accommodation.
Description Broken Hill Post Office is a two-storey, Flemish bond, red-brick corner building in the Federation Free Style with Arts and Crafts influence. It has a complex, corrugated steel roof, comprising hipped and gable-hipped forms, with a small dormer to the northwestern side of the original two-storey roof. There is an 86 ft high, square, heavy corner clock and bell tower that dominates the building and the streetscape. It has a light-coloured slate pyramidal roof with lead flashing, decorative metal finials at the apex and four clock faces. Timber gablets are centred over each face with louvred vents to the bell room and a dentilled, corbelled brick course between.
To the southwest is an English bond, gable hipped single storey addition, , a two-storey addition fronting Chloride Street, and to the rear, much later stretcher bond additions s. Two chimneys punctuate the roofline; one rendered and painted corbelled chimney to the east and a single face brick chimney with a terracotta pot to the west.
A wide, high verandah wraps around three facades at ground level, surmounted by a first-floor faceted balcony wrapping around the tower. The verandah and balcony have board and batten soffits and are supported by paired, turned-timber posts painted green, with cream painted, shaped timber brackets topped by a plain, cream entablature, which also continues below the eaves of the first floor. The balcony has a non-original, intrusive asbestos sheet and batten balustrade, and flooring comprises exposed timber joists and temporary covering.
There is a smaller, hipped verandah attached to the rear of the building, sheltering the loading dock and access to the stairwell, at the northern end of the verandah.
The red-brick facade is both concave-tooled and tuck-pointed, and retains rounded arches over the front-arched windows. There is a cream-painted, rendered skirting around the perimeter of the building and painted detailing to the single storey addition fronting Argent Street. The painted detailing comprises pilasters between windows, sills and lintels, corbelled string course below the parapet, entablature, balustraded parapet and coping. All window joinery is painted dark green. The upper-floor openings retain shallow-brick header arches and cream-painted sills. There are red pavers to the verandah footpath, modern square tiles to the main entries and concrete paving to the rear yard, with a bitumen surface to the laneway to the southwest.
First-floor fenestration appears to be original to the street facades, retaining uniformly distributed, two pane upper and lower sash timber-framed windows and French doors to the balcony. There are small vertical slit windows with round brick ends below each clock face of the tower. The ground floor retains shallow brick arches to the southwestern additions and early windows with six-coloured pane upper and two clear-pane lower sashes to the front facade of this addition. The original corner building ground-floor windows have recent glazing in timber frames, and the ground floor has later doors, sidelights and later banks of post boxes to the northern facade.
The ground floor interior of Broken Hill Post Office is divided into four main areas, comprising a carpeted retail area to the eastern corner, carpeted timber and glass partitioned offices adjacent at centre, sheet vinyl floored mail sorting and storage and staff amenities.
Ceilings to the ground floor vary in height and material, including early decorative plaster and batten ceiling with a moulded cornice to the mail sorting areas, and some boarded timber with a moulded cornice south of the centre strong room. There is board and batten ceiling to the office areas, plasterboard to the later additions to the rear spaces and acoustic tiling of a false ceiling to the southern mail rooms. There are many exposed beams throughout this level, largely due to the extensive changes to the original fabric and removal of material. Air-conditioning ducting is also exposed and is intrusive. The ground floor has predominantly attached and suspended fluorescent lighting. The retail space has some pendant light fittings, and some spaces have had ceiling fans installed.