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FORACOMPLETE
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& LARGERSCREENSmemorable head into mine.
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Victoria and I’d rung ahead to the
Berrigan Royal to make sure there
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was also someone I was hoping to
meet up with.
“Do you know the current boss
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taken my call.
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sleeping with him!”
I said I was sorry to interrupt and
that I could ring back when they
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“No no,” she laughed, “not right
now, just when I get the chance.”
He was out on his farm working on
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but she’d try to get him in for a chat
in the evening.
A blue heeler barks and dances at a
gate nearby as I pull up beside the pub,
a gang of sulphur cresteds rasps the
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from the corner, headed south.
And then as I turn off the bike,
the truck is well down the road, the
cockatoos are gone and the heeler stands
looking, just wanting a rub and a pat.
The sudden silence wraps me as I
massage the dog’s ears over the gate.
Everything’s tranquil, still. You know
that feeling that you get when your
hands have been really cold but then
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comes back and it’s a warmth that has
a special, unique character? Well that’s
what the silence out here is like after a
day of noise, different to just quiet.
Anyway I tell the dog I’ve got to go
and head over to the pub.
Beris (call me ‘B’) is behind the bar,
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downing some amber and yarning. All
look up, nod, say, “g’day” and keep
doing what they’re doing.
B’s bloke is caught up with fence
repairs out on his property and can’t
make it but dropped some stuff in for
me to look at.
Berrigan and its Royal Hotel played a
crucial part in the formation in one of
this country’s truly iconic and special
organisations.
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was formed in Berrigan and the
Berrigan Gazette of November 30th
1900 reported that the formation
meeting suggested that the old bell at
the public school could be, ‘handed
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alarm....and a suitable place to hang
it...would be the archway over the
back entrance of the Royal Hotel.”
One fella present that night was a
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54 gallon beer cask, “on behalf of the
Narandera Bewery” to be used on a
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“Mr Ritchie then moved, and Mr
Little seconded, that all present form
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brigade, and the motion was carried
unanimously”, continued the
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“It was decided to erect the bell
the next day on (the Royal Hotel’s)
archway...and ask the police to take
sharp proceedings against anyone
giving false alarms.”
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brigade’ which became the model for
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Unfortunately the archway is long
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the 1920’s although the exact dateseems lost in the smoke of time.
John, B’s dad and current publican
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pub rebuilt in 1931. Ian Fuzzard, the
local historian wrote that the pub was
rebuilt in 1925.
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single storey and the second a
double storey and both agree that
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hall which the visionary publican,
Edward McGrady had constructed
and turned into a theatre.
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electric generator in the town in 1919
and had allowed the council to tap
in to power the street lights but this
noble gesture throws a shadow on
John’s claims that it was the candles
in the theatre that started the inferno.
When I get back to base I put in a
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help so often generously given
by the amazing people from such
organisations throughout the country.
Turns out both are wrong.
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on Feb 24th 1927 that the previous
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two ‘old landmarks of Berrigan, The
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operating room... About an hour
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both theatre and hotel were a mass
of smouldering ruins.”
Justice can move quickly in the
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coverage continued, “Three
arrests were made, and at the trial
on Monday, one of the accused