This short posting is made to soothe the nerves of anxious readers who fear that this blog has stalled for some unknown reason.
This evening I can announce that it is stalled for a known reason.
The reason is simple. There is now considerable doubt in my mind that both the official NSWGR records and family folklore are wrong about the 1932 expansion of the silos at Eumungerie, when a work-house was supposedly added, In fact, construction of the work house may not have occurred until 1936-37.
Against the evidence of the 1932 construction is a series of newspaper reports in the mid-1930s about a planned expansion of Eumungerie's silos. Of course, this in of itself does not mean that the work-house was not built in 1932. That is, it may have well been a further expansion of the silo complex.
And does it matter when it was built? Well, yes... for a few reasons. First of all, it matters because it matters. Writing an incorrect date on a modest little blog could be like a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon.. meaning I have already posted photographs which have been dated to 1932 as they show the construction of the silo underway. There is considerable doubt that these were correct.
And it probably mattered for the men who lumped nearly one million wheat bags over this five year period. While I plan an emergency research trip to the ARHS reading room to collect corroborating evidence of either date, I will post the following photograph, taken from the top of Eumungerie's silos at some date in the 1930s, to recognise the efforts of those who faced the line of lorries in the railway yard during those years.
I shall return, hopefully very soon, with dates confirmed and more stories about the storage and transport of the golden grain from Eumungerie.
