Stuart Town celebrates “best kept train station” birthday

Numerous COVID-19-induced delays couldn’t put a stop to the belated 140th birthday celebrations for “the best kept train station” in NSW at Stuart Town.

 The Station which opened on June 1, 1880, as “Ironbark Railway” — its name until 1889 — celebrated its anniversary last year, with the commemorations unfortunately put-off until now.

 To commemorate the contribution of the railway to the community, a public artwork was commissioned by a division of NSW TrainLink via Orana Arts and awarded to local Stuart Town visual artist and designer, Tim Winters.

 The commemoration was originally-intended to be part of the coronavirus-cancelled Stuart Town Easter celebrations, and then the October 2020 “Man From Ironbark Festival” that had been organised by the Stuart Town Action Group.

 Plans included for the railway station to be open with joint celebrations involving the nearby Railway Hotel, now an Arts and Craft Centre, which is also 140-years-old. 

 Unfortunately, the well-planned, exciting programme did not go-ahead due to COVID-19, and again, despite all the work and effort, could not be held at Easter this year.

 This year has also rattled and rumbled-on like an old steam-train with the pandemic again rearing its ugly head to throw a spanner in the works.

 A decision was finally made for a late-June official opening for Tim Winter’s “On the Night Train” which features a wonderful design contribution by Louise Austin. To beat the latest lockdowns, the event was, however, restricted to only a small group of involved locals and railway staff.

 The NSW TrainLink representative at the event stressed the role that the main western line from Sydney to Dubbo provided for freight, goods, and post with the mail actually hand-sorted on the night train! 

 Although regular train services wound-down during the 1970s and 1980s, the local community successfully lobbied to retain the railway station because of its heritage and its State significance as a fine example of a Victorian railway station building and one of the best examples of a third-class country station building on the NSW Railway system as well as its value to the town with a daily XPT service to Wellington/Dubbo and Orange/Sydney.

 Tim Winters explained that his work incorporated a photo of the old Lamp Room that housed the old kero lanterns to design a “ghost” of the old building.   

 He sought to also re-interpret the demolished building into a three-dimensional visual expression combining poetry, history, and visual featuring Henry Lawson’s 1922 poem “On the Night Train” conveying the sense of loneliness, darkness, and mystery involved with the Lamp Room and night trains.     

 Friend Ian Marr inscribed the poem into stone at the end of the arched work which tied it all together.

 Wellington graphic designer Louise Austin’s artwork design represented the significance of railway stations as an important meeting place where people, railway lines, and roads meet.

 Orana Arts contribution was acknowledged with a special Ironbark tree planted by NSW TrainLink employee and Stuart Town resident, Alf Trudgett with the help of local identity, Pam Gough.   

 The group then attended a barbecue held in the park to ensure safety spacing, enjoying the best tasty, edible steak sandwiches from the new Rotary mobile van, with delicious home-cooked cakes to follow.    

 “Those involved from sections of NSW RailLink are to be congratulated on recognising this important milestone and co-ordinating with Orana Arts to make it happen,” Pam Gough said.  

 “Those involved at Stuart Town say ‘thank-you’, this is a good town, and we are lucky to have talented people like Tim and Louise in our town or nearby,” Pam concluded.