LAT LONG
110 Australian Geographic
In the ensuing years Ellen and Jim returned to
London to live. Ellen continued her career as a phar-
macist, while Jim opened a second-hand bookstore,
aptly named Reid Books. Upon their return to
Australia in 1999 they needed a shipping container
to freight their books to Ferntree Gully.
“The whole house was filled with them and almost
all my life I’ve had to walk sideways down passages,”
says Jean, who returned home when her father was
diagnosed with amyloidosis, a condition that results
in organ failure. He passed away in 2005.
Several years later Ellen and Jean visited the Shrine
of the Book in Jerusalem, where the Dead Sea Scrolls
are housed. The two were inspired and Jean sugges-
ted they open a museum. Today their collection has
versions from dozens of different denominations in
more than 300 languages, including some Australian
Aboriginal dialects, and some in Pitman shorthand.
There are also Bible covers made from mother-of-
pearl and olive-tree timber, military versions in cam-
ouflage colours and miniature ones with a magnifying
glass. There’s even a section with humorous versions.
Somewhat incongruously, The Bible Museum also
has butterflies, not inside but fluttering about in a garden
at the rear of the premises. Ellen’s love of gardening
grew from a pharmacy studies assignment she did on
natural antibiotics. Now she spends as much time prop-
agating as she does preaching and shows visitors
butterflies at different stages of their life cycle.
Most visitors to the museum are from out of town
- such as church Bible classes, Probus and Rotary clubs,
and even Ulysses clubs, the over-40s motorcycling
fraternity – and Jean believes that taking tour groups
through the garden helps to soften the crowd. “We get
a lot of people from retirement village groups who say
they would not have come if they’d known the trip was
to a Bible museum. But once here they say they’re glad
they came because it gave them a lot of pleasure.”
Attracting day-trippers has long been a tough task
for St Arnaud, but there’s another couple in town
attempting to turn that around. Peter Bloomfield and
his partner, Samantha Pritchard, have spent the past
12 months refurbishing the formerly derelict Man-
chester Arms Hotel, which they hope will attract the
well-heeled arts community. “We’re looking for peo-
ple who enjoy good food, wine and art, and plenty of
well-to-do art collectors would enjoy coming into the
countryside and staying in an area like this,” says Peter.
In conjunction with Regional Arts Victoria, the local
Northern Grampians Shire Council and renowned
curator Maudie Palmer, the couple has established an
artist-in-residence program. “We could see there were
fabulous buildings and hidden treasures that artists
would find an absolute delight to work in,” Peter says.
The first artworks appeared early this year when
James Geurts adopted an aquatic theme, based on the
1924 flooding of St Arnaud’s main street and the
town’s relationship with water. It took the form of a
series of installations on several shop fronts, and a
mural that covered much of the supermarket frontage.
Val Salter and her dog, Penny, pass the artworks
each morning. “As you walk along and see those instal-
lations floating there [in shop fronts] and the mirror
images in the water, it makes you think,” she says.
Barry Robertson, a member of the St Arnaud
Community Action Network, and a green thumb who
helped establish the town’s community garden club,
adds, “The artworks are good, if you like that sort of
thing, and some may end up in galleries throughout the
world. I find that astonishing because it might just put
St Arnaud on the map.”AGPopulation: 2500
Where: 244km north-west of Melbourne
Founded: The area was settled in the 1850s, when a tent
town was erected during the Victorian gold rush
Named: In honour of Jacques Leroy de St Arnaud, a French
commander during the Crimean War. He was buried in Paris in
L’Hôtel National des Invalides, the same complex as Napoleon
The Bible Museum entry: Free
Other sites: Opened in the 1940s on an old goldmine site,
Pioneer Park is the only remaining public park in Australia
designed by renowned horticulturalist Edna Walling
Local rag: North Central News was edited by Ella Ebery
from 1981 until 2013, when she retired at 97 (see AG 115 )BEARINGS: ST AR NAUD
House of prayer. Ellen, right, and her daughter, Jean, in their
museum, which houses an incredible array of Bibles, including
one with a metal-embossed cover and semi-precious stones.